I am genuinely unsure if MiHoYo are capable of making a game that doesn’t heavily borrow from a different game you probably already love at this point in time. Denying The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild’s influence on Genshin Impact is like denying the sky is blue! Only recently was Honkai: Nexus Anima revealed, a game that takes Pokemon and shoves it into a blender with Auto Chess. And now there is Petit Planet, a game I can only describe as Animal Crossing but if it was in space, I guess.
There are a few differences between the Nintendo classic and MiHoYo’s borderline wholesale ripoff. For one, the animal people feel much more akin to fursonas than just anthropomorphic animals. And there’s the fact that, rather than living on an island like in AC: New Horizons, you live on tiny planets, of which there are a number you can visit.
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It looks like there’s a lot of customisation options too, from different clothes, to houses that can be built and interiors that can be designed. You can also visit other players’ islands, go fishing, grow vegetables. Honestly, it’s a bit hard to figure out just how different Petit Planet is from Animal Crossing aside from aesthetics. Which kind of begs the question, why does this even exist?
Well, the likeliest answer is that Animal Crossing: New Horizons was removed from sale in China following in-game protests performed by people in Hong Kong. That means there’s a wide open market for a big budget game like that! For the rest of us, it looks like just more of the same thing you already like, but with a higher chance of getting more updates than New Horizons did. Congratulations to those of you that think games that don’t need infinite updates should get them anyway!
In any case, if you are still curious about the game, and want to see if it truly is just an Animal Crossing clone, you can sign-up to beta test the game here.
