You can now visit the National Videogame Museum without leaving your house!
Thanks to Ann Wain, Museum Collections Officer at the NVM, who has meticulously recreated the museum in Animal Crossing: New Horizons in her own time, players can explore a virtual version of the Sheffield attraction from their own island.
Visit Ann’s virtual recreation using Dream Address: DA-7919-4041-2531
Using in-game items, Ann has found inventive ways to recreate the museum’s distinctive features and exhibits. In one particularly imaginative touch, a doll’s house stands in for the museum’s Monument Valley model.
“Nintendo released a surprise update for New Horizons in early 2026. New items included some old Nintendo game consoles like the Famicom, the SNES, and the Game Boy. Because I love museums, I had the idea to make a mini-NVM display to show them off on part of my original island. As the idea progressed, I realised I could add much more, but I would need a lot more space to do it justice. Ultimately, I created a new island to add in as much as I could.”
Ann Wain, NVM Collections Officer
The result is a playful reinterpretation of the NVM that demonstrates how videogames can inspire us to see familiar places in new ways.
Videogames offer more than adventures to embark on and challenges to overcome. They can also provide opportunities to design, experiment and tell stories of our own.
“Videogames offer easy-to-use digital creative tools that are more forgiving than physical crafts. Pixel art mistakes are simple to undo, unlike mistakes with paint or ink. Games also require little space or equipment and no material costs beyond the game and device.”
Ann Wain, NVM Collections Officer
Ann’s project reflects a wider theme explored through the National Videogame Museum’s work: the many ways people use videogames to express themselves and engage with the world around them.
Our Together We Play exhibition celebrates the people and fans behind the games we love, exploring the memories and personal connections that make them meaningful. Animal Crossing Diaries documents how players used Animal Crossing: New Horizons during the COVID-19 pandemic to maintain relationships, express their identities and find comfort in a virtual world.
Meanwhile, The Big Sheffield Build, in partnership with Sheffield DocFest, explores how videogames can bring people together to celebrate the places they call home.
Together, these projects highlight the many ways videogames can be used beyond simply playing them. In Ann’s case, recreating the museum has meant finding creative solutions to represent real-world exhibits, resulting in a virtual NVM that is both recognisable and uniquely her own.
“I loved finding bits and pieces to best represent objects and displays in the gallery, and making patterns for things like the Space Invaders variants when you come into the museum, the labels on the Lucozade ‘Larazade’ bottles, or the rug in the ‘Together We Play’ exhibition.”
Ann Wain, NVM Collections Officer
There’s something particularly fitting about the National Videogame Museum existing inside a videogame of its own.
Our mission is to collect, preserve, exhibit and interpret videogames for everyone, forever. That means celebrating not only the games themselves, but also the people, stories and experiences that shape videogame culture.
Ann’s virtual museum offers another perspective on this culture, showing how a game can become a medium for reinterpreting real places and sharing what makes them special.
So, if you’ve ever wondered what the National Videogame Museum would look like in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, now you have your answer.
“It has been a labour of love, because I love the game and I love the museum, and I hope that shows. It’s not a one-to-one recreation of the museum, but I tried to make it as authentic as possible.”
Ann Wain, NVM Collections Officer
