In the way of Harvest Moon, this is kind of an above average level game.
In the way of Harvest Moon, this is kind of an above average level game. It did a lot of great things, but there were some things I would have done differently too.
I love the graphics and sound effects on this version. You see the wind blowing through the trees, the shadows of clouds rolling by from overhead. When you go to the mountain, you'll hear the bugs, and the sounds of the waterfall. Sounds and sights are generally pretty pleasant. The music isn't anything that's super awesome and memorable, but it's nice and fitting, and doesn't bother me at all. If anything, my favorite would be the town music for Konohana Village. It's very asian sounding and really fits in with the environment.
Speaking of environment, no one should complain that the world of this game is too small. The towns are pretty small/average sized, and the mountain area is just huge. I'm still finding areas I never discovered before when I traverse that place. If anything, it's almost too big! I play the role of complete social butterfly in my game, so I have friends from both towns. It can sometimes be annoying to have to walk all the way over to the other town just because it feels so far to me.
I do like that you are allowed to switch which town you live in at the end of each month if you aren't happy with your initial selection or just want a change of pace. I find it difficult to choose between farming or raising animals. You can do both in each town, but in Konohana, you are only allowed up to 2 chickens, and up to 4 total of any livestock (cows, sheep, llamas). And in bluebell, you only have a few small areas to grow crops, but you can pretty much have a crazy amount of animals in your barns and coops. So yes, in a way you still do kind of have to make a choice.
Each town has it's own sets of festivals, but one thing that both towns share is a cooking contest each week. This could have been an absolutely amazing thing, except that I think people have figured that you don't win based on how complex or high ranking your dish is, it's simply a random victory. So basically, don't waste your 5 star items thinking that you have certain win – just bring something average and hope for the best. Luckily the other festivals can be kind of fun. I haven't played for too long, but I think I remember there being a bug catching contest, or a fishing contest.
Pets in this game serve a pretty useful purpose. They have their own friendship level and as you raise it up, they'll handle the tasks of bringing your animals outside and inside each day. Cats take care of the chickens, small dogs take care of the sheep, and the big dogs take care of the cows and llamas. You even have a bit of a choice as far as what color your pets are. There are also color choices for the other animals as well. I just love the black chickens and black sheep~ They are too cute!
You cannot completely customize your how your character looks unfortunately, but you do have different outfits you can wear in the game. You'll only start off with one, but the more you play, the more you'll unlock, and in my opinion the outfits actually look really cool! I sometimes have a difficult time deciding what to wear (oh the troubles of the female mind).
One really fun thing is that weather isn't set for the whole day. It might be rainy in the morning, but sunny in the afternoon, or some other combination of that. The bad thing about rain is that for some mysterious reason, the shops are not open while it's raining. I can think of no explanation for this other than to inconvenience us gamers. The other thing about the shops is that they only sell 3-5 items a day. So if you need to buy a specific item, you might need to keep coming back each day until the store owner has what you need. I think they were trying to increase the challenge of the game a little bit, but rather than make things difficult, I feel like it just makes things annoying.
Another thing that people did not like at all is the fact that you cannot do expansions on your farm except once a month. You don't really get to choose which ones to do either – you basically have to complete the expansions in the order the game wants you to. So if you want the fish pond for your farm, you'll have to complete the other four expansions that come before that. This system is good and bad I think. It's good because it keeps things happening for awhile, you are more likely to play the game longer than two years.
Another thing that keeps this game going on for longer is the slow speed at which friendships increase. With talking and gift giving daily, you'll get an increase in friendship level about once every 25 days. That's twice as slow as a lot of past games of this series. I like this feature personally though because Harvest Moon shouldn't be rushed though. I always felt that it was a relaxing style of game that's meant to be taken slowly. The negative side to this is that it can be awhile before people start saying different things and new events start taking place, but it's all a matter of preference.
I know one major complaint people have about the latest harvest moon games are the lack of personality in the villagers. This game kind of fixes that. There are still some pretty forgettable people in the game, but there also some that really shine and stand out. Some of my personal favorites are Gombe, an old man who just wants to play and have fun despite his age. Reina, an antisocial botanist who often prefers the company of plants rather than people. Sheng is a blacksmith who wears a panda hat, he has a harsh personality but I think it might just be an act. Howard kind of looks and acts like a woman sometimes, but it really just makes him all the more interesting! Those are just a few of the people in the game too, there's a lot more.
This isn't the best Harvest Moon in the world, but I can say that it's made a lot of improvements from the past games on portable systems. They keep making more and they keep getting better, so I know that soon enough we'll have an even better version out, but until that happens, this really is one that I think everyone should enjoy.