Many games have events based around specific holidays such as Easter and Christmas, butNew Year’soften tends to be overlooked. There’s no jolly or fluffy mascot related to the holiday with which to signpost an event in game and cultures globally tend to celebrate the event differently. Because of these factors, it is difficult to find a game where the birth of a new year is treated with the same degree of celebration as other holidays and include a New Year event.
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Though most games don’t tend to make a big deal about New Year, there’s still a few that take the time and honor the traditions of the date, even if they might be a little different. These events are a great way to ring in the new year if you own the game, especially coming up to 2023.
5Animal Crossing: New Horizons
This Nintendo Switch game is an island and community building sim where the gamer, as the island representative is responsible for building and developing an overgrown wilderness into a true paradise.Develop far enough into the gameand events will become available to play around the calander including Lunar New Year, Easter, Christmas and of course, the New Year’s Event.
While Zipper T. Bunny and Jingle are in charge of their own holidays, New Year falls to Isabelle, Tom Nook and the residents tomake the most of what happens. While all of December 31st is considered part of the event, the actual festivities begin at 7pm. Aside from buying multiple New Year themed items, your character can stay up and watch the countdown in front of the giant clock and celebrate with the other island inhabitants.
4World Of Warcraft
While the MMO has seen more popular days in the past, Blizzard’s online role playing game still has its New Year Celebration taking place from December 31st and is still expected to bring in a crowd consideringthe recent expansion release. From 6am server time, players can join NPCs and fellow adventurers by shooting off fireworks, drinking some of the potent potables and indulging in dancing and merriment all around.
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While the game only has one very short quest available for the day, the event is still one that can be enjoyed by revelers throughout the realms and can net some useful items for newer players. It’s also a chance for PvP characters to launch ambushes while the guards are unable to come to any defense, so players should ensure to not drop their guard during the event.
3ARK: Survival Evolved
Ark’s Happy New Year! content will be coming inside the Winter Wonderland 7 update. With each new update that is provided for the game, players are able to obtain special skinsfor their dinosaursand “chibi” or smaller, cuter forms of popular dinos. December 2022’s event is expected to see the return of Raptorclaus as well as many other favorites, including the return of Maddy Madden and David Tennant providing some further narrative for the event by reprising their respective roles as Helena Walker and Sir Edmund Rockwell.
Gamers can enjoy unusually colored dinosaurs and presents dropping during the entirety of the event, however one of the main attractions ofArkis the communitywhich can provide servers and events for players to enjoy. Gamers can enjoy the New Year and winter events to their satisfaction with other players who love the season.
2Christmas NiGHTS Into Dreams
While there are many New Year events that are taking place in current gaming, there are still plenty of games that have content available for the season. The best example of such seasonal content in retro gaming is provided in theChristmas NiGHTSgame and its New Year’s NiGHTS event.NiGHTSis a game that makes multiple changes depending on what date it is played and includes Christmas, April Fools and similar events that occur during the year.
Originallyreleased on the SEGA Saturn, it provides a timed series of levels that explore the different locations within the game, has been ported to multiple different systems and is available through several different locations including the Microsoft Store. The New Year event provides new costumes, music and a theme visible from the start of the game.
1Final Fantasy 14: A Realm Reborn
This MMO released under theFinal Fantasybrand has been having regular seasonal events for over a decade and the in-game event known as Heavensturn celebrates the occasion in a more Eastern-themed style. Rewards for the in-game event are based on thelunar calendar and the Chinese zodiacfor the coming year and change each time. Seeing as 2021 was based around the year of the Ox and 2022 the year of the Tiger, it would be expected that this year sees the Rabbit return as the themed character.
With the Heavensturn event, players can take a break from the normal grind of the game to indulge in some themed, short storied quests based around the year’s chosen animal. While nothing has yet been confirmed for the 2023 event, it is expected to continue considering the popularity of the events during the last few years and how in recent years the game has started to become more popular.
