Story of Seasons: Difference between revisions

[[File:Harvest_Moon_Logo.png|frame]]

 

 

 

In addition to making money through a variety of means, the player is generally expected to integrate himself or herself into the community. Players can make friends with various townsfolk, attend festivals (which range from paralleling real-life holidays like Thanksgiving or Christmas, to pseudo-religious ceremonies, purely social occasions in the community, and competitions where the player can compete himself or herself or enter his/her livestock or pets to compete), woo the local girls (or guys in later versions where you can [[Distaff Counterpart|play as a female farmer]]), and eventually get married and have children.

In the majority of the games, there is a certain time limit (usually between two and three years of game time) built in, at which point some event (such as the character's father visiting the farm) occurs and the player is "graded"- but it's almost always possible to continue playing indefinitely even after you've received your "grade".

 

 

Don't confuse for the [[Neil Young]] song, although it could make one good soundtrack for the game, or the [[Blue Öyster Cult|Blue Oyster Cult]] song which would make a decidedly [[Eldritch Abomination|less fitting soundtrack]] for the games.

* ''[[Harvest Moon 64]]'' ([[Nintendo 64]], 1999)

* ''Harvest Moon 2'' GBC ([[Game Boy Color]], 1999)

* ''Harvest Moon 3'' GBC ([[Game Boy Color]], 2000)

* ''Friends Of Mineral Town'' ([[Game Boy Advance]], 2003)

* ''[[Distaff Counterpart|More]] Friends of Mineral Town'' ([[Game Boy Advance]], 2003)

* ''Harvest Moon DS'' ([[Nintendo DS]], 2006)

* ''DS [[Distaff Counterpart|Cute]]'' ([[Nintendo DS]], 2005)

* ''My Little Shop'' ([[Wii Ware]], 2009)

* ''Sunshine Islands'' ([[Nintendo DS]], 2009)

* ''Grand Bazaar'' ([[Nintendo DS]], 2010)

* ''The Tale of Two Towns'' ([[Nintendo DS]], [[Nintendo 3DS]]; 2010)

* ''A New Beginning'' ([[Nintendo 3DS]], 2012)

 

== Spinoffs include ==

 

* ''[[Rune Factory]]: A Fantasy Harvest Moon'' ([[Nintendo DS]], 2007)

* ''Puzzle De Harvest Moon'' ([[Nintendo DS]], 2007)

 

{{tropelist}}

* [[Acceptable Breaks From Reality]]: Goes hand in hand with logical problems in the series.

* [[A Homeowner Is You]]: Some games let you buy another house.

* [[All in a Row]]: In the Wii games, you can have your spouse, your pets, or one of your children walk with you. They follow obediently behind you in this fashion, and you can create some amusingly [[Benny Hill]]-esque chains. (Farmer chased by little boy chased by penguin chased by [[Everything's Worse with Bears|OH GOD A BEAR!]])

* [[All-Natural Gem Polish]]: In most games it's played straight, but it's notably averted in ''Animal Parade''--all the gems you find are uncut and require Mira to appraise and cut them before they're worth anything. And she has a decent chance of failing, too.

* [[An Economy Is You]]: Especially egregious in ''Island Of Happiness'' where not only do you fix up your farm, but pay for bridge and road repair

* [[An Interior Designer Is You]]: Not much, but you do occasionally get to spiff up your house with accessories.

** [http://www.fogu.com/hm4/farm/oopsy.htm More errors here.]

** In Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life for the Gamecube you can get a "Mae" sheep.

* [[Boring but Practical]]: In many games, fishing is one of the best ways to make money, especially early in the game, but it can get highly repetitive. However, many games make catching every kind of fish a [[Sidequest]] which can be rather enjoyable.

* [[Bragging Rights Reward]]: Marrying the Harvest Goddess--by the time you're capable of marrying her, you've usually done everything else ''but'' get married. She doesn't even live with you--you still have to give her a gift in her pond if you want to talk to her.

** ''More Friends of Mineral Town'' also had the Gourmet. You can only talk to him ''one day out of the year.'' You have to cook every food available. And once you marry him, he doesn't even ''stick around''--he only comes home for family events, and otherwise, he's gone.

** This is possible in the English version, too. It's just a [[Game Breaking Bug|really bad idea]].

** Another example is that in ''Animal Parade'', it is mentioned that in the past, during the Flower Festival, a girl from the village would be voted to be the goddess of the festival. That's what was done in ''Harvest Moon 64''.

** Chelsea has the exact same get-up as Sara however she wears her bandanna rather than having it around her neck.

* [[Convection, Schmonvection]]: The Volcano Island mine in ''Sunshine Islands''. In ''Animal Parade'', you can go so deep in the mines that you reach an area with some land platforms surrounded by a sea of magma.

* [[Crystal Dragon Jesus]]: Harvest Moon games tend to have a church with a clearly Catholic priest, including worship services on Sunday mornings and marriage ceremonies performed as necessary, but they actually worship the Harvest Goddess.

** If you can get past the idea of goddess worship<ref>or Catholicism, whichever might offend you more</ref>, consider that this is one of the ''few'' games in which a church is played up as a positive, appreciated part of life. In ''Back to Nature'', for example, the priest is pleasant, kind, and not above a good laugh, and he gives decent advice now and then; also, at one point you round up the kids in town and take them to church, and from then on they go to church almost daily, are happy to do so, and even discuss a bit of theology (something about confession ("apologize from the heart")). Tell me another game this positive about religion ''at all''.

*** Ones that don't go out the other side into [[Narm]], anyway.

* [[Defrosting the Ice Queen]]: Each game has at least one suitor (male or female) who fits this trope.

* [[Disc One Nuke]]: In order (note, most of these require extreme precision, some luck, and a lot of planning on what exactly you buy and when):

** In ''Magical Melody'', if you get insanely lucky, you can make several hundred the first few days finding random things on the mountain to sell.

* [[Distaff Counterpart]]: Several of the games have a "For Girl" version, which is pretty much the same except that the playable character is female and a few features are added, altered, or [[Game Breaking Bug|fixed]].

* [[Downer Ending]]: ''Animal Parade'' plays this to a tee. Helping the Harvest King and finishing the story comes with a terrible price: your character is forced to give up one of his/her very own children. ''Forever''.

* [[Drama Bomb]]: Sweet little old ladies in the series have a habit of dying, just to keep you from becoming too complacent in your relaxing farm chores. {{spoiler|Ellen in ''64'' and Nina in ''AWL/DS,'' in particular.}}

* [[Excuse Plot]]: Most of the games don't flesh out much beyond the simple premise that you've either purchased or inherited an old farm, and now it's up to you to fix it up and make your living as a farmer. By far the worst is "The Harvest Goddess was punished for calling the king bald. He's to lazy to undo his own curse, so you go fix it"

** ''Magical Melody'' is one of the few that actually has the player trying to achieve a specific goal. The Harvest Goddess turned herself to stone because the townspeople no longer appreciate life like they once did, or her existence; the player must get her back to normal by collecting magical music notes (received by doing a large variety of things in life), and bring the village back to life (so to speak), because he/she is the only person besides Jamie who can see the Harvest Sprites.

** It's a common thing in [[Harvest Moon]], especially the handhelds. Character archetypes are used very often to the point where it's a ritual to some fans. The (usually) hot Asian doctor, the baker, the antisocial quiet guy, the player, the [[Tsundere]], the [[Bokukko]], the [[Meganekko]], etc.

* [[Eyedscreen]]: Used extensively in HMDS cutscenes.

* [[Fan Nickname]]: "Jill" for the female player characters, until their names were eventually revealed to be Claire [the blonde] and Pony [the brunette].

** Many people refer to any of the male protagonists without an ingame default name as "Jack" despite the fact that the [[Darker and Edgier|Wonderful Life]] "Jack" is "Mark", the [[Lighter and Softer|Magical Melody]] one is "Tito", the ''Save The Homeland'' one is Tony, and most others up until IOH were called "Pete".

* [[Fishing for Sole]]: All of them. In ''Animal Parade,'' one of the townspeople actually operates his own recycling service so you can get RID of that junk.

* [[Fishing Minigame]]: One of the main ways of making cash is by catching and selling fish.

* [[Fission Mailed]]: In most of the games since ''Back To Nature'', getting married triggers the credits. But the game goes right back to normal after they finish. One of the exceptions is ''Tale of Two Towns'', where the credits come after the tunnel is fully reopened.

* [[Four Is Death]]: For various reasons, many HM games do strange things if you perform specific actions at 4:44 AM/PM.

** That's because in Japan, the number "4" is viewed with much superstition and is considered unlucky (much like the number "13" in the West).

** In ''Animal Parade,'' rather than just making you or your spouse pregnant, you actually ''plan'' to have children. But when you do so, your spouse makes comments along the lines of, "Well, if we're going to try to have kids, we've got our work cut out for us! [[Say It with Hearts|<3]]"

** The Japanese version of Cute got away with lesbian marriage in an E game by simply slapping the phrase "Best Friend" on everything, even though everything romantic is left intact.

** The Sprite Casino in ''DS.'' Also joked about in DS on the "TV Shopping" station: If they're not selling real items you can use, they're selling items specifically for Harvest Sprites, which use the Sprite currency, Korobos. The sprite who runs the station says, "If you use a different currency, sorry."

** Also, the Super Lucky Lotto in ''Grand Bazaar''. You have to use bronze, silver or gold coins you find or make. It's the only place you can get the stamina-expanding Magic Water (which also happens to be Emiko's favored gift).

* [[Going Through the Motions]]: Usually avoided by using character portraits rather than models or sprites, but ''Magical Melody'' used it, and used it ''poorly'', to great annoyance. ''Tree of Tranquility'' does the same thing but with a little more subtlety.

* [[Good Bad Translation]]: ''Harvest Moon 64'' had one of these, up to and including the fact that the distributing company ''spelled their own name wrong'' on the title screen. Strikes a few of the other games to varying degrees as well.

* [[Gotta Catch Em All]]:

** Musical Notes in ''Magical Melody''

* [[Guilt Based Gaming]]: Just let an animal die. ''A Wonderful Life'' also loved to rub it in your face if you were ever a [[Jerkass]] to the townspeople, especially if you went through the trouble of romancing a bride only to dump her and marry another girl at the last minute. Let's just say if you didn't immediately hate yourself after ruining Celia's life at the altar, you have no soul.

** For some reason, people get angry at you if an animal dies ''of old age''...

** ''Magical Melody'' does this the first time one of your animals gets ''sick''. Your character has a dream that the animal dies and Hank yells at you for not giving it medicine when it was ill. Your character then stands before the animal's grave and tombstone while looking miserable before waking up.

* [[Guide Dang It]]: Some of the [[Scripted Event|Scripted Events]] (as mentioned below), can turn out to be these, often requiring your character to be in a specific place at a specific time and/or day and/or season.

* [[Healing Spring]]: Hot springs in some of the games will rapidly restore stamina.

* [[Heroic Mime]]: In most games. In ''More Friends Of Mineral Town,'' your character has an [[Inner Monologue]], and in the DS games, he or she just talks outright.

* [[Honest Axe]]: Used straight in the original SNES version

** The most infamous is definitely HM64's [[Bragging Rights Reward|Party Picture]], the requirements of which are so stringent that even a good decade after the game's release, the fandom ''still'' isn't entirely sure of what exactly is necessary to get it.

* [[Hyperactive Metabolism]]: More justified than most examples; eating food simply restores stamina, rather than healing wounds.

* [[Interspecies Romance]]: You can woo gods, goddesses, and even a kappa! The Witch Princess and Wizard may not be human, either.

* [[Instant Home Delivery]]

** Grand Bazaar and Twin Villages don't stop time when you're indoors either, so you have to doubly careful with time management.

* [[Item Crafting]]

* [[Jump Scare]]: In FoMT, if you enter your house at EXACTLY midnight (0:00) and examine the mirror (assuming you've bought it), you will hear a loud * THUNK* from somewhere in your house, and your character will look around in surprise. Alternativaly, sometimes you will see the image of the kappa pop out of the mirror for a moment, making your character jump back in surprise.

* [[Kappa]]: One lives in the lake in ''Friends of Mineral Town.'' He'll give you the useful Blue Power Berry in return for lots of cucumbers. In the [[Distaff Counterpart]] version, you can marry him.

* [[Kissing Cousins]]: At one point in ''DS'' and ''DS Cute'', Celia refers to Vesta as "Aunt Vesta." Marlin is Vesta's brother. Marlin and Celia get married if you don't marry one of them. It could just be that she's using "aunt" as a term of endearment because she's lived with Vesta for so long and they're not actually related, but like most character traits in the series, it's open to interpretation.

** Since it's common in Japan to use "aunt" or "grandpa" or the like to refer to people who aren't actually your relatives, it seems more likely that that is the case with Celia.

* [[Law of Chromatic Superiority]]: Rule of accessories: Green -> Red -> Blue = Good -> Better -> Best

** Arguably the heart levels for marriage candidates: Black -> Purple -> Blue -> Green -> Yellow -> Orange -> Red

** Another incarnation might be present in ''Island of Happiness'': mysterious (and rarer than [[Unobtanium|any given ore]]) are stones called "Wonderfuls" that are used to increase or alter the effects of your tools. Taro's fishing rod is the only tool in the game that cannot use these. Balanced out by the fact that the only difference between cheap tools and more expensive tools is how many of these stones can be set into one of the tools.

* [[Marathon Level]]: Many of the caves, including the 65,535 floor fourth mine in HM DS/DS Cute.

* [[Mayfly-December Romance]]: Wooing the Harvest Goddess, Harvest King, Witch Princess, Wizard, or Kappa.

** If you marry the wizard in ''Animal Parade'', he lampshades this by saying that he probably will live much longer than you.

* [[Minigame Zone]]: The Sprite Casino in DS / DS Cute

* [[Mission Pack Sequel]]: ''Sunshine Islands'' and ''Animal Parade'' with respect to ''Island of Happiness'' and ''Tree of Tranquility,'' respectively. They share roughly the same mechanics and same character pool.

* [[Multiple Choice Past]]: ''Back to Nature [[Distaff Counterpart|For Girl]]'' has your life being saved by a mysterious person... {{spoiler|Who always turns out to be the person you marry, regardless of who you choose.}}

** Then [[Fridge Logic]] kicks if {{spoiler|you marry Kai, since he's only in Mineral Town during the summer.}}

** Actually, most of the time, The Mayor would ask if you were sure [[But Thou Must!|until you agreed]]. ''AWL'' and ''(M)FOMT'' did hit you with a Non-Standard Game Over this way, and AWL in particular was chock-full of them: [[Strangled by the Red String|not getting married after the first year]], neglecting your farm in the second chapter (which would result in Nami or Muffy leaving and taking your son with her, ending your game), etc.

** Special Edition makes it even easier. When Takura asks you if you want to own the farm or not just press no and... Game Over before the ''game even actually begins''.

* [[Oddly-Named Sequel 2: Electric Boogaloo]]: The two [[Unexpected Gameplay Change|Unexpected Gameplay Changed]] spinoffs are called ''[[Rune Factory]]'' and ''Innocent Life''; the fact that they're actually Harvest Moon games is only mentioned in the subtitle.

* [[Official Couple]]: The series tries its best to avert this, but it still shows. For example in the ''Wonderful Life'' games Celia and Rock take a liking to you according to your gender, and their events are easy to get even if you don't interact with them (it doesn't help that Marlin and Gustafa are rather hard to court than to Rock and that Celia increases in attraction when you ''buy seeds and such from their farm''); you also can't divorce Celia unlike the other two girls. ''Magical Melody'' has you and Jamie, likewise the ''Island'' games have you and your psuedo-character. Cute seems to imply that the protagonist marries Marlin, Skye, or one of the [[Gay Option|Special Girls.]] An accurate ''[[Harvest Moon 64]]'' guide states that Elli is the canon love interest for that game.

** The fact that Karen (in ''[[Harvest Moon 64]]'') and Nami (in ''Wonderful Life'') get vastly more character development than the rest of the other love interests can make it come off like they're the ones you're supposed to get with. Especially since they leave if you don't.

* [[One Game for the Price of Two]]: Several later games had content that could only be unlocked by connecting another game to it. [Ex: Inserting ''Friends Of Mineral Town'' into your DS to unlock the five ''Mineral Town'' brides in ''HM DS'']

** Don't forget the "Girl Versions". They aren't very different, besides the rivals turning into bachelors and the bachelorettes turning into rivals, some new things were added (such as clothing) and dialogue slightly changed.

* [[Old Save Bonus]]: Unlocking bonus content in the DS games by connecting them to the GBA games.

* [[One Steve Limit]]: The various [[Expy|Expys]] throughout the series are usually kept separate--there are two separate but very similar Basils, for instance, though they're from different games--but ''DS'' brushes up against this. The priest from Mineral Town's church is named Carter. The professor who runs the excavation site is also named Carter. They'll both send you New Year's cards if you're friends with them. Erm.

** In a lighter variation, ''Friends of Mineral Town'' has both an Ann and an Anna. (Say that five times fast.)

** Two protagonists are officially named "Mark". Both the "Wonderful Life" protagonist and the "Island Of Happiness" protagonist.

** There are two Daisy's in the series. One from an obscure [[Game Boy]] game, and the other is from Grand Bazaar. Incidentally, the latter has an eerie resemblance to a character from the [[Game Boy]] games named "Choco", who reappeared in ''My Little Shop''.

* [[Playable Epilogue]]: As mentioned above, you can keep playing indefinitely even after receiving your "grade", though in some games, your character will eventually die of old age! {{spoiler|You can keep playing in Heaven forever; don't worry.}}

** The first game is perhaps the only one that doesn't allow this, making this a case of [[Early Installment Weirdness]].

* [[Puppy Love]]: Stu and May (BTN and Mineral Town), Hugh and Katie (DS\DS Cute), Charlie and Eliza (Island of Happiness), Rahi and Ying (Tale of Two Towns)

* [[Quicksand Box]]: Experienced ''[[Harvest Moon]]'' players will likely have an idea and clear goals in mind when they first start a game, but for a neophyte, the complete freedom and lack of concrete goals can be easily overwhelming. ''Grand Bazaar'' seems to be an intentional attempt to avert this trope.

* [[Quietly Performing Sister Show|Quietly Performing Sister Series]]: The ''River King'' games, which actually predate Harvest Moon, but aren't nearly as popular.

* [[Relationship Values]]: Used to judge your progress with wooing potential mates; sometimes used with other characters as well, to determine how they react to your character or if they'll give you certain items.

* [[Retro Universe]]: It's hard to place a majority of the games. Some look like they could take place in the early to mid 1900s, but there are various aspects of them that are more modern. Although ostensibly set in something resembling the present day (in one game you can buy a DVD player for your house, and in another, there's a modern periodic table hanging on the wall in the school, and the hospital in every game is generally very modern), everyone gets around on horse-drawn carriages, the designs are often 70s at best in their ruralness, and other technology is deliberately retro. More recent games seem to be becoming more modern though.

* [[Romantic Two-Girl Friendship]]: In the Japanese version of ''DS Cute'', Claire or Pony can end up with a girl instead, but as "Best Friends"... even though you still have to propose, you still need the two-person bed in your house, and you eventually adopt a child.)

** In the newer games, you and your spouse share a bed while your child is given a crib by the town.

* [[Slice of Life]]

* [[Socketed Equipment]]: You use Wonderful Stones this way in ''Island of Happiness.''

* [[Sprint Meter]]: As you work, you start to lose energy, and you farmer will display various states of exasperation, like wiping the sweat from his/her brow, or panting heavily. If you work yourself too hard, you'll collapse and be unable to work for the rest of the day.

* [[Sugar Bowl]]: About the worst thing that ever happens in the Harvest Mooniverse is that animals occasionally die --everything else is pretty idyllic... which makes the occasional [[Drama Bomb]] that much more powerful. ''A Wonderful Life'' is something of an exception to this, with a generally darker tone than the norm for the franchise.

* [[Super Title 64 Advance]]: [[Harvest Moon 64]], Harvest Moon DS.

* [[Take Your Time]]: With the exceptions of ''A Wonderful Life'', ''Grand Bazaar'', ''Twin Villages'' and ''Tree of Tranquility'', time doesn't pass while in buildings, so you can screw around to your heart's content without missing anything. Especially glaring in some games where you can buy a greenhouse to grow crops in -- meaning that you can have absolutely ''massive'' fields of produce, and since a greenhouse is a building, it takes literally no time to plant, water, or harvest them all.

* [[Talk to Everyone]]: In most HM games, an option, and path to secret items.

** Arguably Nami from A[nother] Wonderful Life although she does borderline Kuudere territory as well.

** Male version: Gill from Tree of Tranquility and Animal Parade. Hie's in "tsuntsun" mode most of the time and gets pretty deep into [[Suspiciously Specific Denial]] territory when it comes to his feelings for your character, should you choose to court him.

* [[Unexpected Gameplay Change]]: Several entire ''games'' do this; ''Rune Factory: A Fantasy Harvest Moon'' and ''Innocent Life: A Futuristic Harvest Moon'' are both [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin]], though the entire rest of the series are in realistic modern day settings, barring some various [[Nature Spirit|fairies, imps, and sprites]], not to mention ''Puzzle De Harvest Moon'', a not very well received Puzzle Game -- not of the Match Three subgenre, despite what anyone who hasn't played it will tell you.

* [[Unwanted Harem]]: In A wonderful Life it's pretty easy to unintentionally get Muffy and Celia to fall for you, without even talking to them sometimes.

* [[Updated Rerelease]]: AWL Special Edition, which added in an extra love interest, changing outfits, and potential daughters. But at the same time, the graphics actually got a little ''worse''.

*** It also got [[Loads and Loads of Loading]] for everything.

** Marvelous has been doing these a lot lately. [[Distaff Counterpart]] related games, games that are basically the same games with extras (dating back to the GBC), remakes, etc.

** Also from ''A Wonderful Life'', the many little animals running around the valley [[Iconic Item|wearing neckacheifs]], and the many ways to 'recruit' them onto your farm.

*** [[Ascended Fanon]]: In ''Sunshine Islands'', once you raise Animal Island, you can befriend the animals there and have them do certain chores for you - like gathering lumber and grasses.

* [[Video Game Cruelty Potential]]: IoH's Chelsea and Mark react in the "really likes" range for all gifts. So you can raise your affection levels with them by feeding them a steady stream of weeds, rocks and fishing trash.

** You can also woo all the girls, and in some games this even seems to prevent them from marrying your rivals...

** It's literally a whistle in ''Animal Parade''; once you rescue all the animals from Theodore's circus, you can summon them with the whistle to take you to certain places on the map (but not the mine district, for some reason.)

* [[We All Live in America]]: Despite apparently taking place in a Western country, most games are quite Japanese and don't attempt to hide it at all.

* [[Who Names Their Kid "Dude"?]]: Seriously? Her name is Pony?

* [[Wide Open Sandbox]]: Narrower than some other examples, perhaps, but there's still a startling amount of ways to go about playing these games.

* [[With This Ring]]: In the HM universe, you propose through means of a ''feather,'' so there's no need to worry about rings... Except in ''Tree of Tranquility'' and ''Animal Parade,'' where they somehow make the Blue Feather into a ring after the proposal [?] and it becomes a wearable accessory.

** (Has nothing to do with [[Incredibly Lame Pun|giving food to Wizard in Animal Parade.]])

* [[Yamato Nadeshiko]]: Most games feature at least one as a marriageable girl/rival. Look for the girl with the short brown hair and/or apron.

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