Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp Live Service Shuts Down This Fall, Offline Paid Version Coming Soon

2 months ago Justin 6 Comments

Nintendo’s mobile journey with Animal Crossing is sadly coming to a close with Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp’s live service ending later this year — but there’s a silver lining.

Announced in the app’s notice page today and through support channels, the game’s online service will shut down on November 28th, 2024 for both iOS and Android. New events and items will continue to be released until then, but the existing game will cease to be playable afterwards.

This news will no doubt come as quite a shock to fans of Pocket Camp with its abrupt nature, but the writing has been on the wall for some time with Nintendo’s mobile game initiative declining in recent years after other shuttered games and no sign of new releases.

For those still playing, both Leaf Tickets and Pocket Camp Club subscriptions can still be purchased for these remaining final months, but both will no longer be sold shortly prior to the shut down. Leaf Tickets cannot be carried over and must be spent before November 28th.

Offline Paid Version Coming Soon

However, here is one small silver lining announced with today’s news: an offline paid version of Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp is planned for release around the same time. Without this upcoming planned release, Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp would simply become unplayable and lost to history, just like many other shuttered mobile games.

Details from Nintendo remain slim for the time being, but it appears the intent is to offer an archived offline version of Pocket Camp that players can transfer their save data over to continue interacting with their favourite villagers and decorating their campsite after the online service shuts down in late November.

Of course, there’s still a big catch as presumably no new content or events would be released for this version of the game. Additionally, due to the offline nature, features that relied on an internet connection to interact with other players such as sending gifts, using their Market Boxes, or visiting their campsites will no longer be available.

In a twist though, this new offline paid version may actually be favourable to the current game for some fans. It’s confirmed to be a single paid download with no further in-app purchases or subscriptions requiring real money, unlike the current Pocket Camp experience that heavily relied on paid loot box purchases called Fortune Cookies.

But on the flip side, if the reason you played Pocket Camp was for the continually released new events and items to enjoy every month — a contrast for sure compared to Animal Crossing: New Horizons since 2022 — then this offline version will likely be of little interest to you.

More details on exactly how the new offline version of Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp will work are expected to arrive in October, so we’ll have to wait until then for all questions to be answered.

Why Is Pocket Camp Shutting Down?

We first saw Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp release during November 2017 in an environment where there was plenty of pent-up demand for a modern Animal Crossing experience after the previous release of New Leaf was feeling outdated visually and only available on the aging Nintendo 3DS system.

We have an important announcement for everyone playing the Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp app. Please see the following page for details as well.https://t.co/JGacPgXFyo pic.twitter.com/RHZt5u7SPU

— Pocket_camp (@Pocket_Camp) August 22, 2024

Then after the launch of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, another big bump in engagement came from the increased visibility of the franchise associated with that new release. However, at least anecdotally, we’ve felt that interest in Pocket Camp has been steadily declining for the past couple years as the game’s content releases became increasingly predictable, and Animal Crossing’s mindshare continues to decrease.

Nintendo doesn’t release official numbers, but the latest data from third-party industry analyst Sensor Tower released in mid 2022 showed that Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp earned around $10 million in Q1 of 2022. If spending has dropped in half during the two years since, we’d be looking at $20 million a year before development costs. For a company like Nintendo that brings in billions of profits ever year, that’s practically nothing.

Even outside of the Animal Crossing franchise, it’s been clear for some time that Nintendo no longer considers mobile games to be a top priority for the company as the division has lost both focus and energy in recent years.

For example, last October, we saw Nintendo discontinue releasing new content for Mario Kart Tour on mobile. Other games like Dragalia Lost and Dr. Mario World were shut down even earlier. And generally, the company has demonstrated little to no interest in new projects for a few years.

It’s worth remembering that Nintendo’s initial entrance into the mobile market came alongside the dark days of the Wii U generation, and during a time when some wondered if mobile games would replace traditional consoles. Now that fortunes have clearly turned around vastly with the Nintendo Switch, it’s likely Nintendo considers mobile games to be more of a distraction away from their real business. Thoughts and prayers for Fire Emblem Heroes!

Ultimately, as sad as it is that the live service for Pocket Camp will end, we’ve gotta give some props to Nintendo for developing an offline solution to ensure the game isn’t entirely lost to history, and those who are still playing can continue to see their villagers for the foreseeable future.

Let us know your thoughts on the upcoming live service shutdown of Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp in the comments below. Are you still a loyal fan playing to this day, or have you long given up on the spin-off? And would you be interested in this paid offline version?

Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp News