One of the more popular glitches you can perform in Animal Crossing: New Horizons is the 'climbing the fourth level' trick which, as you can probably guess, allows you to build and climb onto a fourth tier of ground. Usually, players can only walk around on three levels, using terraforming to craft them and ladders, slopes or steps to navigate them.
Tricks to reach a forbidden fourth level have been around for some time, but the most popular methods of doing so were recently patched out in the Version 1.3 update. It doesn't seem to matter how hard Nintendo tries to stop players from getting up there, though, because fans have found another way which still works at the time of writing.
The folks over at Animal Crossing World have detailed exactly how to pull off the new trick - you'll need a bit of patience to pull off the ultra-precise terraforming shapes, as well as some expertly-timed button presses. If you do want to give it a go, bear in mind that while you can fully decorate the fourth level, it's very possible that Nintendo might patch out this new method, forcing you to lose access to any items or plants you put up there.
Here's the final result:
If you need help with any other aspects of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, we have complete guides and walkthroughs to practically every element of the game. Feel free to take a browse if you're looking for new things to try. In the meantime, let us know how you're getting on with your island life in the comments below.
[source animalcrossingworld.com]
Comments 26
I'm loving my island life, it has been helping me get through lockdown. I'm probably 150 hours into the game and haven't done any terraforming yet, just going with the flow. 😁
I wonder what will happen if i put my house on the 4th level and got fixed by Nintendo on the next update ?
Will my house be gone ?
If the game tells me it is too dangerous to go up there, I believe it. This is dangerous, don't do it!
Seriously, what a great game, and the more ways people have fun with it the better.
Seriously, the implementation should've been "It's too dangerous to build any higher", not "It's too dangerous to climb any higher".
The current fourth-level cliffs are a complete waste!
Sorry. Not really relevant to this post, but...
Is anybody else suffering from absolutely horrendous framerate issues, regarding this game? I bulid something... BOOM! Framerate drops like a stone.
Seriously Nintendo! First Joycon drift, and now my island is clanking to a near 20fps halt with nothing really taxing going on!! It's 2020! I've seen ganes running better and more consistent on hardware from 3 generations ago!
Loved you as a video game creative company all of my life! I also own pretty much every piece of hardware you've ever released.
Know this though... I won't be ***** purchasing anymore from you though, if I have to buy yet ANOTHER pair of Joycons! (3rd pair now)
Seriously... Patch the framerate up please. As its simply beginning to border on the side of unplayable now!
Oh yeah... Where's the games this year?
Cheers.
A loyal Nintendo (yet unbiased) fan
@Mr-Glissando not in this instance, but another game had inexplicable framerate issues, ultimately resulting in not being able to boot that game or any other game on my Switch.
I had to get my Switch replaced. To me it felt like some sort of system wide level memory leakage, after one game started having issues, it spreads to all other software eventually unable to boot.
Never got a satisfying answer from Nintendo but I suspect it's video memory getting (permanently) corrupt in some way.
I mean, seeing as how the 4th level is quite real - which is to say, that it's a tangible and developable object (ie one that isn't wonky, invisible, etc) - wouldn't that suggest that Nintendo had at some point in time during development intended to include it? Like, it seems like the glitch is more or less a means of unlocking existing code. If that's the case, then I wonder why Nintendo locked it away.
And why are they so concerned about people reaching it? Seems like an awful lot of patching for something that doesn't really change the way AC is played. I mean, it's not like the duplication glitches which, when abused, can actually break the game.
Perhaps the 4th level is something that Nintendo plans to unlock in a future update. If true, then they're probably annoyed that the "surprise" is being preemptively spoiled/ruined by intrepid glitch artists 😂
@Snesionetty
Cheers for your reply.
My issues have started out minimal, and are now spreading like a erm....bad framerate Pandemic!
Framerate-19....As that's about the number of frames my copy of ACNH is now currently running at!
They seriously, seriously need an upgrade at this point! Especially with PS5 and Xbox series X channel, now looming large on the horizon!
I'd genuinely hate to see the Switch suddenly fall after all its achieved. I love them... but they're really pushing all my wrong buttons as a loyal customer at this point.
Sadly though, Nintendo being Nintendo will probably quite happily sit on their arses till their sales figures plummet!
They need to seriously be working on beefier hardware at this point (PS4 Pro spec equivalent, would be more than enough for me personally) they also DEFINITELY need more memory and ram on board regarding any future upgrade as well! (Let alone the drift issue)
Swich= Great hybrid console... Piss poor build quality though!
@Mr-Glissando I temporarily had framerate issues with ANCH a while back, but that was due to having a huge number of fish & bugs stored in one area waiting for Flick to arrive (waited a month in the end). Once I'd cleared the area & restarted, my framerate went back to normal.
Obviously if that was the issue you'd have sorted it by yourself already, but that's been my only frame issue in the last 700hrs.
If you're standing on the fourth level when the patch hits do you also get patched out?!?!😏
some people may like the 4th level but by adding it your just making your island smaller and losing more space to place stuff so not worth building a 4th level
each level built = more space lost
@Mr-Glissando I haven’t had any problems with the framerate. I got 3 joycons with drift and Nintendo repaired them for free
It begs the question of why Nintendo patches these bugs out instead of just letting us up there. Clearly once you're there, it works like normal.
@Mr-Glissando I have the same issue!! But I think it is because I built a huge castle with custom textures and have many items laying around.
But when I walk past that area the framerate goes below playable levels. It’s really annoying.
@Mr-Glissando hm. My frame rate has been silky smooth and I haven’t heard any friends complain about it either. Even when on an island with 7 other players, I haven’t had frame rate drops.
@Heavyarms55 they might not have done much bug testing on that level so they simply don’t know what will break. They have to draw a line somewhere, and if they haven’t done many tests it’s a bit risky to just open it up (especially if it ends up having some game breaking bugs). Granted, players are seeming to find it works fine (as far as I know), but Nintendo is likely playing it safe so they have no liability if something breaks badly from exploiting the glitch.
Personally, I’d be too nervous to place anything up there. What if they do patch it out and things just get stuck up there? Besides, I keep running out of space with three levels, I don’t know where I really would put a fourth level. Wish there was a way to get a bigger island!
@ShadJV I mean, what's been stopping them from testing it since release?
Perhaps they do intend to add it, but later along with some planned new features related to it.
@Heavyarms55 perhaps they do intend to add it. Hard to know, though I don’t see it as being a feature worth that much effort to properly implement - I think it’s a vocal minority that want a fourth level over other features.
As for what’s stopping them from testing it? Resources. Most games with ongoing content like this have a very small team after release to handle updates. The team might even have split responsibilities between this and another project, only devoting so many hours a week to this game. The limited manpower and time is spent working on additional features, events, and bug squishing. Time spent testing a fourth level is time not spent on the other upcoming content. It’s quite likely they have a lot of the future content already planned out so their priority would be those deadlines. Any extra time may be spent adding other features that they didn’t plan but hoped they’d get a chance to add eventually, or simply things they plan to add once they have enough time to finish implementing them. Sure, they could spend some of those resources on adding a fourth level, but perhaps they feel the other ideas they want to implement will be better received.
Personally, officially adding in a fourth level isn’t exciting enough to me to delay other content. Especially since a lot of players that want it use the exploits anyways and so adding it wouldn’t feel like a big deal to them. It’d be an update that is nearly meaningless to the players already using exploits and irrelevant to quite a few players who are happy with their current layouts. I’m not saying it’s a waste of time or that nobody would be happy, but in the end they do have to weigh what features they think would be most wanted and this one doesn’t seem as high on the list. Properly implementing it would probably take less time than something like diving, but certainly more time than most events that just add a character and/or new furniture. Heck, they didn’t even do enough testing for Bunny Day and that should’ve been simple to implement. It’s hard to know what issues could crop up with actually adding a fourth level - could be nothing, could be game breaking.
Wishlist (not immediate of course) for future updates:
4th level building
increase the cap on inclines and bridges
an additional room (or a second house/building you can buy and customize)
and maybe allow one or two more villagers?
Seems like there is a new bug or glitch every week.
Interesting... though I also agree this should become official I mean... it just leaves more room for more everything right?
@fafonio
My Chinatown area is literally a no go zone! 😂 😂 The framerate literally drops to under 20fps! It's incredibly noticeable and simply puts me off going there!
@Zach
Sorry for the late reply chap! Most of island runs at a solid 30fps, but as soon as I enter my Chinatown area, it really, REALLY, tanks to near unplayable levels! No idea why? As its not particularly over complex of an area even.
@DanteSolablood
Oh I've had that as well, when I've a ***** load of critters stashed waiting for the aforementioned duo to arrive. But my Chinatown area (which isn't particularly taxing in any shape, way or form, REALLY tanks for reasons unknown?)
@Snesionetty
Interesting response chap! I'll have a look into it, as one area literally tanks to under 20fps! It's terribly off-putting! Soon as I leave that area the frame rate instantly smooths itself back out👍👍
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