Nintendo is a world renowned game company that has developed numerous consoles and videogames, such as Super Mario, Legend of Zelda, and Animal Crossing. Recently, Nintendo has announced that Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp, a mobile version of Animal Crossing, will be released in late November.

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Animal Crossing was first released in September 2002 on the Nintendo GameCube, and they have since released multiple versions of the game. Animal Crossing lets you play as a mayor to build your ideal town that is populated with animals. Players can also interact with other players or what they call “neighbors.” This interaction and socialization with other characters has always been the main attraction of  Animal Crossing.

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The mobile app will have the usual trope of moving your character to a new town, interacting with the animal inhabitants, and customizing your home. Pocket Camp is camp themed, and players will be expanding and building a campsite, which is on a much smaller scale than the usual cities and towns in their console games. Players will focus on gathering materials from various areas on the map and crafting furniture from those materials. Not to forget, players get to exercise their creativity through customizing their camper van home.

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Similar to Pokemon Go, Australia is the testing ground for this new game. Information on the game was gathered from our friends down under who had shared their experiences online. It turns out, the game is based on a three-hour cycle, which means quests will reset, villages will move and quarry prizes will replenish every three hours. The game also follows real-time, similar to other versions of the game. Trees will grow in real-life days, animals that come out at night will only appear at night, and more. This feature is what makes the game so suitable for a mobile device because players can play in short periods throughout the day.

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Pocket Camp introduces a new in-game currency called Leaf Tickets. These are the in-app purchases that most mobile apps feature, but the game itself is free. This new currency can be used to buy special items such as furniture or tools, or speed up construction of furniture or tools. Leaf tickets can be obtained through real money, microtransactions or earned in-game by completing special tasks.

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The writers at The Verge believe Pocket Camp could be Nintendo’s biggest mobile hit yet. This is because free-to-play business models have often boosted the sales of niche franchises, such as Fire Emblem Heroes that became more successful than Super Mario Run. Animal Crossing has more of a mainstream appeal and is more suited to be played on mobile devices which is why there is a better chance for it to do better than any other Nintendo mobile game.

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Once the app is released, Android and iOS users will be able to download it through the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store respectively. Be sure to download the game before Christmas as some players speculate there might be a Christmas event based on previous versions of this game.