Animal Crossing: New Horizons Fall Update revealed: Costumes, candy, so many pumpkins

(Image credit: Nintendo)

The Animal Crossing: New Horizons Fall Update will make your island life extra spooky starting on September 30.

Nintendo unveiled a new trailer for the next free Animal Crossing: New Horizons update today, and it is sweet manna for anyone with even the slightest love for the time of jack-o'-lanterns and copious candy. Do you want to dress up as a witch? Do you want to adorn your lawn with so, so many pumpkins? Do you want to pass out candy to your island friends as they dress up in classic costumes? You can do all those things.

While the Halloween Night event itself will only go from 5pm to midnight on October 31, you'll be able to get ready all month by buying candy from Nook's Cranny and planting pumpkin vines for harvest (which will also be available at Leif's year round). The vines will yield precious orange gourds that you can use as crafting materials for new DIY recipes; the trailer shows an impressive array of pumpkin configurations, including standalone jack-o'-lanterns, stacks-o'-jacks, and jack-o'-lamp-posts, and I imagine that's just the start.

If you head over to the Able Sisters, you'll find a new selection of costume pieces including some adorable devil horns. You can trade in Nook Miles to purchase new body paint and colorful contacts, opening the way for that green Wicked Witch look, or a full-on ghostly blue, purple, or white. Then bust out some new spooky Reactions to haunt your villagers.

Nintendo is teasing even more additions for Animal Crossing: New Horizons after Halloween passes: a new update to the Nooklink function of the Nintendo Switch Online app will give you instant access to all of your collected Reactions, and later in November an update will bring in some more seasonal joy with Thanksgiving and Christmas-themed events.

Oh, and if you download the update, your villager will get a Ring-Con from Ring Fit Adventure. It stands upright on its own and looms ominously, as if it's demanding another set of 100 ring presses any time you walk by. Maybe it's more appropriate for Halloween than I thought…

Turn your phone into a NookPhone with these fanmade icons and wallpapers. 

Connor Sheridan

I got a BA in journalism from Central Michigan University - though the best education I received there was from CM Life, its student-run newspaper. Long before that, I started pursuing my degree in video games by bugging my older brother to let me play Zelda on the Super Nintendo. I've previously been a news intern for GameSpot, a news writer for CVG, and now I'm a staff writer here at GamesRadar.