There's so much to discover in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, but there are some things in the game you'll probably never work out or be able to make sense of unless you have a little extra information. This is where datamining comes into play.
Just days after the reliable Animal Crossing dataminer Ninji revealed how certain villagers will only send you fake paintings in the mail, they've now explained the process behind villagers moving out - and don't worry, it's not really your fault when they do leave, it's much more random than that.
Although this information was collected in version 1.2.0, Ninji believes the behaviours are still the same in version 1.2.1. Here's the full rundown:
- you must have at least 6 villagers living on your island before any will consider moving out
- on a given day, the % chance of somebody asking to move is given by (v * 5) + c, where v is the amount of villagers you have, and c is the 'MoveOutTalkCount', the amount of days since you last told a villager to leave or stay (maxing at 30)
there's a couple of conditions on that
- there is a 5-day cooldown after telling a villager to leave or stay - so nobody will ask to move if MoveOutTalkCount <= 5
- there is a 15-day cooldown starting on the day the villager has left the island and freed up the plot (this is called the 'MoveOutSkipCount')
- if these checks pass, a random villager will be picked who will ask to move out
each villager's chance is based on friendship and calculated by floor((300 - a) / 10) - r
a = average friendship they have with all island residents
r = amount of residents with >200 friendship
- friendship is 0-255 (starting at 25), so this starts at 27 for new villagers, going down with higher friendship levels
villagers will be excluded if:
- house is being moved
- birthday was in the last 7 days
- they were picked last time and told to stay
- moved in most recently
Ninji sums up by explaining how there is no "magic method" to make villagers move out and says it's all still heavily chance-based. In saying this, you can kick out villagers if you really want (by asking an existing villager to move out) - but it's not exactly a straight forward process, as explained in our guide.
Has a villager left your town recently? Tell us below.
[source twitter.com, via gonintendo.com]
Comments 79
Here comes the people “Nintendo should have made it easier to kick villagers out so I can finish muh island in a week”
I've had them ask but I usually say no.
@fafonio When has anyone said that?
@Kalmaro the same people who were complaining about Nintendo patching the duplication glitches. That they are not in their right to patch it.
I'm fortunate to have mostly gotten villagers I'm happy with. I do have one I really want to get rid of though...Olaf.
I'm just happy villagers no longer leave without asking. Now I can safely put the game down for a while without having to worry about one of my favorites being gone when I come back.
If have their photo and they ask I let them go. Otherwise I use amiibo to rotate villagers.
@fafonio I don't recall seeing that many people complaining about how hard it id to remove people.
Not here, at least.
Do they move without asking first?
I do wish it was less to do with chance and more about you treated a villager. It's so jarring and unnatural when the villager you talk to every day, buy presents for, help when they are sick, just randomly ask to move away.
@Daruncic No, unlike past games they will always ask. And they will not move out while the game isn't on. So if you don't play for a month and come back, there is no longer a chance that all your favorites left.
@Daruncic they can, if you don't speak to them about it. I ignored a villager for weeks and isabelle announced they were leaving that day. When I went to their home to check, they were packing up.
O no, people will cry about this too.
So, it's clear the villagers will NOT moving out without my acknowledge when i don't play the game for long time.
They HAVE to ask me to move out.
And i feel relief to not being punished by playing ACNH everyday.
Right, @Heavyarms55 ?
I've already had two leave. And to be honest, I wasn't going to beg them to stay. Now, Ketchup? That little sweetheart is not going anywhere 😂😂
@Heavyarms55
Awww that's no fun
@Anti-Matter I thought we already had this conversation? Yes, it has been confirmed that they will not leave unless they ask you and you say yes.
@Daruncic You want them to be able to leave without asking? And while the game is off? Personally I think that was a terrible mechanic that punishes people who have busy lives.
You mean whacking them with a net for 20 minutes won’t make my villagers hate me? Neat!
@Heavyarms55 well yeah?
That's kind of the fun of "a game that keeps playing even when you're not"
So... The last villager that moved in will never move out if no one else does? That's pretty bad, because the one I want to kick out is the last one who moved in, and I like everybody else.
Makes sense. My a-Dora-mouse asked to move out, I let her and ended up with Billy and his trash house. That’s my punishment for letting her go! 😂
wish we could auto kick em out, i had to let zell go to move rodeo in when i wanted beardo to get out
@status-204 Best friends would tell you they are leaving.
@RPGamer You could not read the datamine articles. :/
Why analyzing every damn thing to death? Doesn't this take most of the fun, surprise and excitement from the game? 😑
They did this all to push amiibo sells why else would they design it so a random campsite visitor will randomly pick a villager to replace while the amiibo campsite visitor let’s you choose? Punishing players for not paying is a F2P/Mobile game tactic.
Now if only the game could pick Scoot for once, that would be great...
@MrBlacky
Sorry no not in this case the way the game handles villagers leaving is obtuse and a regular player will spend months trying to grasp it without having outside information, you’ll still see sites claiming that complaining to Isabelle works which is false.
You can ignore a villager for a whole week and still have one you talk to daily ask to leave, the five day cooldown shows how badly the odds are stacked against you in getting a particular villager to leave.
@Kalmaro ohh yeah there are some guys arguing about it.. go back to the article... specially a new dude called PickledKong something. Or here, for example SalvorHardin saying this is made to push amiibo sales and that this is a F2P/Mobile tactic.
Kicking out specific villagers was hard even before amiibo existed.
@SalvorHardin
The more I read about Animal Crossing, the more I realize, that I would play the game totally wrong apparently. I really thought it is about virtual life, doing as good as you can do and live with the good and bad aspects if life. 🤷♂️
this is stupid. data mining is just literally busting the game wide open and pointing out exploits. who cares if they move out! play the game and enjoy! man data mining is only good for one thing idiots and hackers......
@MrBlacky exactly nintendo life is turning into nintendo get a life
@fafonio actually its stop busting the game open and complaining.....
Isn't this the same thing as telling everyone how a magic trick is done? Stuff like this just isn't in the spirit of gaming for me.
@fafonio haha exactly! Love this one
To be honest my villagers potentially wanting to move out always worries me. Encourages me to compulsively talk to all of them and give them gifts. I sort of wonder if this is in the spirit of me wanting to play AC as it's meant to be one of my more "relaxing" games.
because they hate you
I usually say hello to the other islanders and try out a few emotions, but I wasn't really aware that these interactions affected some sort of friendship rating.
Ah yes, disseminating what is supposed to be a relaxing micro-cosm simulation, until it becomes a mathematical challenge of getting to see the little pieces of text and graphics that you want to see. <3
@SalvorHardin if amiibos were still readily available i'd agree with you but since they're almost impossible to find...
Why does everyone care about what villagers they have or don't have? I've been playing this since the Gamecube and I don't care which ones live on my island or not
does the MoveOutSkipCount include villagers kicked out via campsite?
@Giygas_95 Poor Olaf!!!! Give him to me...I had him in New Leaf and adored him. He is an old gay man ant eater, with exquisite dress sense and a love of ball room dancing
I don't wanna lose Sprocket... Or Celia...
Funnily enough, my most recent move-out was Julian too.
He was a good smug, but I wanted to re-home him so I could find someone else.
@carlos82
"Why does everyone care about what villagers they have or don't have? "
Because there are some gamers want specific villagers to stay on their island.
And once they got the villagers, they want to keep them forever.
Not everyone want villager cycling.
That explains why Chop won't leave, haven't spoken to him since he moved in but he still won't go away.
@NintendoPok
"data mining is just literally busting the game wide open and pointing out exploits. who cares if they move out! "
Some players do not want their villagers moving out after they got them with a lot of efforts. I will cry if my villagers moving out without my acknowledge.
Data mining was actually pretty good to understand the mechanism of video games gameplay.
From data mining and also from player's experience, I got clarification if i can leave the game without losing my villagers since they will only moving out by my agreement and i felt relieved.
And you cannot say data mining is for stupid peoples....
It's funny to me to see all the new people complain about villagers leaving randomly, when this type of thing has existed since the series was first created. It would be like someone complaining on why you have to choose one of three starters in a Pokemon game. That's just how it is. For me, I don't time skip all that much so I have nothing to worry about in terms of villagers leaving all the time. If I want a villager to stay I always have enough time to keep them. One of the perks of playing at your own pace 😊
@Toads-Friend When he decides to move, I can let you know if you like.
This explains why the ones I actually talk to every day and give preferred style gifts to still end up asking to leave.
Sorry to go off on a tangent, but I think Audie and Peanut have a gambling problem: they 're always wandering around with a worried look, then hit me up to buy their old clothes/items.
Might be time for an intervention!
Is there any truth at all to them deciding to move out, even if you tell them to stay, in NH?
I thought it odd that of the 3 villagers I've had ask me to leave recently 2 of those were the ones I summoned with amiibo cards. And I only have 3 amiibo cards.
I get people I don't like to leave by picking who the camper should talk to after talking to Tom Nook. It usually shows me a list of all the faces, like on the map, and I choose one.
So far I guess I've been lucky, I haven't really disliked anyone, just got rid of a couple of older guys I felt were an odd fit, my island is mostly kids and female.
@Daruncic yes they wont leave without you saying yes to the "should i move out" question.
@giygas_95 I'll buy him from you when he moves out lol
@fafonio house are delusional. Never heard that before.
@fafonio Hmmm, can't argue with that, getting a villager to leave before was a pain.
@RPGamer Have you considered that people enjoy that sort of thing?
Word of advice, you'll never be happy with social media. There's always going to be people doing and saying things you don't like. Most people wont even try to be polite about it. They wont be like me and actively try to be as reasonable as possible. They'll call you a fool, and insult you in countless other ways. They'll spit on you and everything you like and care about and then act like the victim if you dare to defend yourself.
Social media, especially Facebook, Twitter, Reddit and the like, are cancer. Save yourself the trouble and quit. I did and it was one of the best choices I've ever made.
My wife has almost all the Amiibo cards so she has a ton of them to choose from haha.
@Toads-Friend Ha, speaking of gay, I have Julian coming to replace another villager of mine that just left (Nana). He's a gay as hell unicorn, and he's amazing.
@pleasegivemebrea I won't charge since I'm generous like that, but I do feel I should give @Toads-Friend priority since they asked first. If they decide otherwise, you're up next.
@Giygas_95 Aaaw you're lovely!!! You can let dear old camp Olaf go to the person that asked for him, as long as they promise to ballroom dance with him every day and learn the dance routines to all of Cher's 1970's disco hits.
Julian sounds good fun...he sounds like me actually..a sparkly camp unicorn haha. We should be friends
@status-204 if anyone watched the Animal Crossing movie, they would see that even in the movie, one of the two best friends of the main character moves out to follow her dream (a seriously eye watery moment when I first watched, especially since that villager was in my town at the time and I sadly agreed with the outcome. It was the most mature cry of my young life)
so there's absolutely no chances a villager will move out after you've gone days / weeks without playing this time ? strange.
Aw man. It's useful - but unfortunate - to know that the most recent villager is excluded from the move out lottery. That means if you get stuck with one you really dislike, you can't get rid of it until after you let go of a different one. Bit of a bummer.
@fafonio There are 29 different animals in the game. I have 4 penguins out of 10 islanders so the RNG is bad. I want to be able get rid of 3 penguins and have 10 different animals if only for variety.
The more I play this game, the more I realise how badly coded it is.
@DevinRex "This is how it's always been so this is how it must be" is not a good argument. I see this type of argument a lot re Nintendo games and it's not healthy. The player base has changed so the game must evolve with it. If that means change then change we must have.
In this case I agree with you but that doesn't mean this is how it must be forever.
@CdrJameson I like change, when its healthy change. Emphasis on "healthy". Allow me to clarify:
Exploiting a game through unconventional means wherein it causes the company to have to step in and patch it out (such as those dupe glitch exploits), games that have exploits that cause grief for others (ganging up on people in smash as an example), sending glitched, hacked, and fake pokemon to random people online and at times causing their games to lock up, etc. isn't changes in behavior that I view as healthy, and im glad such methods are getting weeded out and fixed in my Nintendo games. Other methods that don't try to break the game or aren't technically affecting other people / isn't seen as problematic by Nintendo is fine by me.
@DevinRex I'm not actually disputing anything you say except the "this is how it's always been" argument. Something that made sense in the past doesn't necessarily make sense now and the idea of healthy change is subjective. Sometimes going with the majority of current players is the right thing to do.
@CdrJameson I would agree. Though I also think the same can be applied regarding new users. Not everything that can be changed, for example, should. So having a balance between the two is probably the best course of action.
This is a great explanation and makes a lot more sense than "someone random every couple of weeks."
The strangest encounter I've had so far is with Flip. Met him on an island, the next day he was moving in (in boxes), and then the very first time I ever saw him outdoors the next day he asked if I thought he should move.
So I'm thinking the "moved in most recently" disqualifier has since been added to the code.
Canberra doesn't want to leave my island . Tomorrow is my birthday i hope she doesn't come to my party. Can't stand her psychotic eyes
@CdrJameson yeah super badly coded.... that or you didn’t make the effort to go to different islands to look for the animal you want? Huh?
That is your fault for accepting 4 penguins in the first place.
Right now I kicked a villager I didn’t want and I’m hopping around islands to find exactly the villager that I want.
So what is the worry about campers replacing villagers? I had a camper, didn't like his style, talked to him once or twice, he just left. Nothing bad happened.
2 days ago, Puddles asked me if she could leave, and I begged her not to. Shortly afterwards, she gave me her photo. The next day, I had a camper and asked them to stay, to which they replied they'd have to kick Puddles out first, so I said yes. Today, Puddles is gone and my camper is moving in.
@pleasegivemebrea @Toads-Friend Hey, guys. It's been a while, but Olaf just decided to move out today. Do either of you still want him? @Toads-Friend I'll give you first pick since you asked first originally.
@Giygas_95 aaaw bless you for remembering me. What a lovely person Thank you. Olaf the kindly old camp gent would fit into my sparkly town very well. Although I have no room...I wonder if that would still work? Thank you again! hugs
@Toads-Friend You'd probably have to time travel to get a villager you don't mind saying goodbye to to move out. Olaf will be in boxes tomorrow so you still have today and tomorrow to decide. Let me know, and I can time travel to put him in boxes, and you can get him sooner if you want.
@pleasegivemebrea @Toads-Friend I'd like to ask again if either of you are interested. If not I'll probably put Olaf on Nookazon.
@Giygas_95 Sorry for the delay, my friend!! Unfortunately I don't know how to do this time travel...so will let some other kind soul adopt my beloved Olaf. I'm sure our paths shall cross again some day on a sweaty dance floor of some glitter soaked gay bar as we both ball room dance to cher's greatest hits. Thank you again for the offer
@Toads-Friend It's not hard to do, but I understand if you don't want to. It just involves going into the Switch system settings and changing the date.
@fafonio Can't say I've seen anyone do that. I think they should allow us to choose who we want to leave if a camper wants to move in, but outside of that, the system is fine. It's not a make or break.
@GravityDerp I had that happen with Teddy! Like literally the day after he moves in, he wanted to leave. LOL!
Show Comments
Leave A Comment
Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...