Animal Crossing: Are Humans An Endangered Species?

Animal Crossing: New Horizons focuses on the act of building a thriving town. The player arrives on their empty island, pitches a tent, and proceeds to create a community with their own two hands. However, players may find it odd that, of the 10 villagers living in their town (as well as Tom Nook and the other shop-owners and business-runners), they are the only human being. While Animal Crossing: New Horizons players can find villagers that range in species, unless they connect via internet to invite a friend, they won’t run into anyone who looks anything like themselves.

While Animal Crossing‘s light narrative never touches on the subject, there are a good number of reasons why the player could be the only human among a variety of bi-pedal, humanoid animals. It might be that humans are an endangered species in the Animal Crossing. While this seems like a strange idea, it could be that humans never became the dominant species in Animal Crossing‘s world. Since there are so many other evolved species, there may have been more of a balance between then, preventing one from becoming the most advanced.

It could also be that humans were once as copious as the other Animal Crossing villagers, but something happened to reduce their numbers. Illness or a natural disaster may have impacted the number of humans living in this universe. Villagers don’t seem surprised to see a human in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, so they aren’t so rare that they’re alarming. However, it is possible that habitat restrictions or a lack of resources drove humans to be less plentiful compared to species like cats, bears, or squirrels. 

Animal Crossing: New Horizons’ Humans May Be Dying Out

As outlandish as it may seem, it is also possible that Animal Crossing‘s humans are actually aliens. Perhaps the number of human beings in Animal Crossing is limited because they came from another place to live among this planet’s humanoid animal villagers. The human character spends a large amount of time with the villagers, getting to know them and what they do daily, while learning about the island they call home. All of these traits are similar to science-fiction stories of humans settling on planets across the universe.

While it isn’t clear where humans came from in the Animal Crossing universe, or why there are so few, being the only human in town makes each player’s island quite diverse, as there are 397 different Animal Crossing villagers players can choose from. Players are rewarded for choosing a wide variety of villagers, as each category has plenty of unique designs and personalities. While there may only be one human being in town, Animal Crossing: New Horizons players will never feel lonely with so many different villagers to keep them company.

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