The makers of Animal Crossing: New Horizons are huge fans of all the DOOM Eternal crossover art.
It was an unlikely pairing, to say the least. Two completely separate game franchises decided to release their games on the same day. The decision was likely done out of marketing--the type of gamer that wants to buy DOOM Eternal at midnight on March 20 is probably not also going to pick up a copy of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, and vice versa.
And yet, despite everything, DOOM Eternal and Animal Crossing have united two completely different groups of gamers in a single cause: the love of the meme.
For years now, artists have been showing their appreciation for both Animal Crossing and DOOM Eternal by lovingly crafting fan art crossing over the two genres. We don’t know what id Software thinks about this unlikely marriage, but we do know that the producers of the new Animal Crossing are loving it.
"I definitely do notice and have noticed that there’s a lot of DOOM and Animal Crossing collaboration art and illustrations that are being posted, and as I look through them I’m in awe of how much creativity our fans have," said New Horizons game director Aya Kyogoku in an interview with IGN. "We’re so excited at the same time to see how the two [fandoms] are coming together to celebrate this day."
Kyogoku and New Horizons producer Hisashi Nogami sat down with IGN to discuss the bizarre-but-charming phenomenon that has sprung up because their game coincidentally releases on the same day as DOOM Eternal. Besides the same release day, the other thing that stitches these two games together is social media, something that Kyogoku insightfully pointed out.
"I think because there is a common denominator of this type of communication happening between DOOM and Animal Crossing fans, and also the fact that Animal Crossing is a communication game, we’re very thankful and very thrilled to see all this,"
Most of the crossover art depicts wholesome interactions between Doomguy and Isabelle, but occasionally it’s Isabelle teaching Doomguy how to have a bit of class. Here’s a few of our favorites.
We’ve got less than 24-hours to go before Animal Crossing: New Horizons and DOOM Eternal are available.
Source: IGN, main art by El Devorador de Flanes on Twitter