Animal Crossing players count down the days until the white picket fence

It’s been 860 days since Nintendo revealed its first Animal Crossing: New Horizons trailer at E3 in 2019. And that means it’s been 860 days since devoted Animal Crossing fans — and future New Horizons players — first caught a glimpse of a white picket fence that turned out to be a white whale.

In desperation to the lead up of New Horizons’ release date in March 2020, eager Animal Crossing fans tore apart the existing trailers for any clue about what was to come. And so, players were surprised when New Horizons didn’t have the white picket fence shown in the trailer. Of course, players didn’t go fenceless: There were a lot of other options in the game, including a brown version of the highly desired white picket fence.

That was that — until the New Horizons 2.0 trailer dropped on Friday. New fencing options were listed as part of the new features, and Nintendo slyly dropped in a nod to white picket fence desirers. Fence customization is now a thing, and that means one thing: white picket fences!

Not only that, but one of New Horizons’ hottest “illegal” items — Harv’s fence — will come to the game on Nov. 5. Unlike the white picket fence, Harv’s fence was in New Horizons, but it was largely inaccessible to players ... unless they hacked the fence into the game. For a few weeks, Harv’s fence (called log fencing in the 2.0 update) was passed around illegally in New Horizons, through trades, giveaways, and sales.

Unfortunately, Nintendo’s 2020 Halloween update removed players’ ability to use some hacked items, including Harv’s fence. And poof, they were gone — fences slipped into the void.

It feels apt that Harv’s fence (again, now called the log fence) will return to New Horizons just over a year since the hacked fences were removed.

Nintendo’s free New Horizons update will launch on Nov. 5, alongside the release of its Happy Home Paradise premium DLC. The fences are coming as part of the free update.