This Harvest Moon may bring in few new fans but to the people who already appreciate this genre; it's a nice fine tuning
The game begins with a particularly dull tutorial but if you get past that, you will find a world that slowly immerses you in the more you play it. How you might ask? By overwhelming you with freedom. You're given a lot of options right from the get go by choosing which town it is that you want to live in. On on hand, the farming town Konohana sets you up with all the tools you need to succeed but on other, Bluebell supplies you with expensive animals you want right from the start. It's a bit of a tough decision that leaves a lot to personal choice. Fortunately, you're able to move between the towns whenever you feel like it. Freedom is kind of a running theme in the game as you always seem to have a great sense of choosing what to do. Whether it's spending all your money on expensive gifts for your girl, deciding whether to invest in seeds or upgrade your house, there's a lot to keep you busy.
Not unlike the others from the Harvest Moon series, Two Towns doesn't really break from the normal schedule of things but that's okay because it refines and improves what already works not unlike another Natsume game that I reviewed, Rune Factory 3. In fact, this game borrows a lot of ideas from Rune Factory 3 pretty blatantly. The most blaring example of this would be the request board which acts as a quest center. Now the requests aren't exactly creative but it at least makes it so there's always something more to do. Rune Factory made this concept popular and Harvest Moon has borrowed it to great success. Each day you'll find rewarding quests that not only improve what you have, but your standing with the people of the town. It's a nice extra something that moves the genre in the right direction and it's just one among many refinements that make this a much more fluid game than the previous ones that often seemed broken in many areas. The reason that I would consider this game great is not because of it's revolution but because of it's direction to find a solid ground with few flaws to focus on.
There's been a lot of overlooked additions that people might not notice or appreciate right from the start. Being able to actually go on dates is a great direction in the social simulation aspect and really makes the characters feel more real which in turn builds on the addictiveness and credibility of immersion. Not to mention other great updates like allowing you to build irrigation that allows you to plant crops together and water them together. There's no more individually watering crops each day and that goes straight back to my point of refinement. Taking something you already like and making it more playable and less mundane. On it's own merit, it may not seem like much but when you add it together it builds into a great foundation. There's a multitude of tiny improvements like this that you may or may not pick up on but completely add to better overall game play than what we've seen.
Overall, the game has a lot of time value among improving little aspects that add to charm. However, It could be better if it was a bit more revolutionary and pushed the Harvest Moon series in a stronger direction towards change. If you already love these type of games, then you'll fall in love once again and find a lot of key improvements. If you don't like the genre, well you still won't like it but at least now you'll know that it's going in the right direction. This is the best Harvest Moon excursion on Nintendo DS and perhaps the best game in the genre yet.