Celebrate Global Pride in Animal Crossing: New Horizons

Animal Crossing: New Horizons is throwing a virtual Pride festival called Global Pride Crossing and it kicks off June 18.

The first ever international virtual pride festival in New Horizons is a part of Global Pride 2020, an event organized by Pride groups around the world. Starting June 18 and running the rest of Pride Month, New Horizons players will get a chance to visit a specially-built Pride island, which will offer inspiration on how to host their own Pride parades. There will be a rainbow march, a message board, a hall of fame, a dance club, and a catwalk, plus a bunch of Pride clothing options for you to wear in-game.

The official announcement also points out that "being inclusive and diverse is always at the heart of Global Pride, and #GlobalPrideCrossing will support the Black Lives Matter movement in a number of ways, including resharing BLM-related content."

On Pride Day (June 27), Twitch creators from across the world will live stream their Global Pride session and raise money through Tiltify, while encouraging people to watch the official Global Pride 24-hour live stream here.

Andrew Baker, co-president of InterPride, said: “Pride is an incredibly important moment in the calendar for LGBTI+ people, as it offers the community a chance to freely express their identity in a very public way. However, we all knew that this year’s Pride celebrations were never going to be the same, with communities all over the world still in various stages of lockdown. So when We Are Social approached us with the idea to create a virtual space, using a platform already popular within the LGBTI+ community, where people could safely come together to express and celebrate their identities - we jumped at the chance.”

Tell the Dodo dudes to open the gates, because we're having a Pride party on my island ASAP. Don't try and tell me CJ and Flick aren't dating (Flick is clearly the one making the collectibles CJ refers to).

Speaking of Pride events, the first virtual Sims Pride parade wants to feature your Sim.

Alyssa Mercante used to be a features writer at GamesRadar+ and is now a freelance writer and editor. Prior to entering the industry, she got her Masters's degree in Modern and Contemporary Literature at Newcastle University with a dissertation focusing on contemporary indie games. She spends most of her time playing competitive shooters and in-depth RPGs and was recently on a PAX Panel about the best bars in video games. In her spare time Alyssa rescues cats, practices her Italian, and plays soccer.