Animal Crossing: New Horizons: Getting started with Happy Home Paradise

Happy Home Paradise released today, November 5, 2021, for Animal Crossing: New Horizons. And it’s kind of great.

The follow-up to the excellent 3DS game Animal Crossing: Happy Home Academy, this paid expansion allows you to take on jobs from random characters and design yards and homes for them.

When you arrive at the island, Lottie introduces you to your fellow coworkers and from there explains the job. People will be coming there looking for custom vacation homes and you have to design them for them.

As if on cue, the first client walks in. I’m not sure if it’s the same for everyone but for me it was the yellow and green elephant “Eloise”. We took her to the meeting table outside and she explained that what she really wants is a calm reading room to relax in.

Once you get to work it’s up to you to set it up how you think would be best for the character. The three items in the above picture are the items she NEEDS to have. Those come automatically with the home. The rest is up to you. There’s suggested fields to choose from but you have more to choose from. Stick with the suggested ones as you start though, they’re themed and make it really easy to make things look nice.

Also, since there’s now the ability to put things on the ceiling, don’t forget to dangle some lights or plants up there.

Once you’re done, talk to the client and let them know you’re finished. Eventually, you’ll be designing the exterior and the yard to but not yet, first couple jobs are just interior. But when you’re done, you get a cute little video of the client exploring the home you designed. Here’s what I came up with.

Afterwards, you head back to the main office where Lottie pays you in Poki. Poki is a different currency than bells and can only be used to buy the special furniture in the office which, is honestly really nice looking.

From there, the world is your oyster. Go out and find new clients hanging out on the beach, by new furniture, have fun with it. And the more you play, the more you unlock.