Do you guys think the Harvest Moon games gradually got worse after BTN?

[Uncle Jon]

That was Eric Barones opinion of the series, and he made Stardew Valley which was inspired by Harvest Moon. Do you guys agree with him?

[funewchie]

Well, depends.

Are you talking about the official Story of Seasons games, or Natsume's homebrewed Harvest Moon games?

[Uncle Jon]

Originally posted by funewchie:

Well, depends.

Are you talking about the official Story of Seasons games, or Natsume's homebrewed Harvest Moon games?

Well I'm guessing his opinion might have been in regards towards the "actual" harvest moon games (Story of Seasons) which was called Bokujō Monogatari (Farm Story) in Japan. The Natsume ones in general I've heard negative things.

[MightyMidgit]

There were pluses and minuses as the different iterations of the official series came out (all the Natsume "Harvest Moon" ripoffs have been garbage). They tried new things, and some worked while others didn't. This game seems to be a remake of the best classic in the series using the best new features from the recent entries in the series. It is better in almost every way than the original BTN, even if some people do not like a few of the character design changes.

When I think people say that BTN is the best in the series, I think most of them are looking at it through nostalgia's rose-tinted glasses. It was my personal favorite, but I accept that good things have come since.

[Yürei]

Originally posted by funewchie:

Well, depends.

Are you talking about the official Story of Seasons games, or Natsume's homebrewed Harvest Moon games?

Considering he is pointing out games after BTN, that includes FoMT, A Wonderful Life, and all the other games. I would have to disagree with that opinion considering how loved FoMT is. Hell, some consider A Wonderful Life the best even the creator of the franchise as it was the closest to what Harvest Moon/Story of Season was meant to be.

[Otterly Confused]

I don't think so personally. Animal Parade will remain my favorite HM next to 64 and while the series hasn't always hit the mark properly, particularly in recent years (New Beginning was so hilariously broken if you used multiplayer), I wouldn't call any entry in the series 'bad'. Course that's exclusing the Natsume rip-offs since 2014, which are objectively worse than the real series.

Personally I think the only games I didn't enjoy in the catalog post BTN were Sunshine Isles, A Wonderful Life, and Grand Bazaar. The first because the grind was so bad that it made simple existence a painful task. The second because I disliked the characters immensely and the color palette and wasn't too fond of the concept. I did however enjoy the DS remakes when they weren't being buggy. (Also before anyone skewers me, I thought it was a good game at it's core. It just wasn't my cup of tea in the slightest.) The last because... Well. It was so boring I legitimately quit before the first summer because I was falling asleep just trying to get daily chores done.

[funewchie]

Originally posted by Otterly Tired:

I don't think so personally. Animal Parade will remain my favorite HM next to 64 and while the series hasn't always hit the mark properly, particularly in recent years (New Beginning was so hilariously broken if you used multiplayer), I wouldn't call any entry in the series 'bad'. Course that's exclusing the Natsume rip-offs since 2014, which are objectively worse than the real series.

Personally I think the only games I didn't enjoy in the catalog post BTN were Sunshine Isles, A Wonderful Life, and Grand Bazaar. The first because the grind was so bad that it made simple existence a painful task. The second because I disliked the characters immensely and the color palette and wasn't too fond of the concept. I did however enjoy the DS remakes when they weren't being buggy. (Also before anyone skewers me, I thought it was a good game at it's core. It just wasn't my cup of tea in the slightest.) The last because... Well. It was so boring I legitimately quit before the first summer because I was falling asleep just trying to get daily chores done.

That's a pretty good list.
I liked Animal Parade (though Tree of Tranquility had things I liked...apart from the horrifyingly bad English voices).

Sunshine Islands was okay for me, in the sense that it was what Island of Happiness should have been (as I hated those controls).
In their defense, rumor has it Nintendo were the ones who insisted that it be exclusively touch-screen controls only.
(I do wish they'd given Shea a female counterpart of marriageble age (a sister, perhaps?))

A Wonderful Life had amazing graphics (being the first 3D Bokojou Monogatari game ever), and worked nicely... as a proof of concept.
But I hated the lack of stuff to do.
(I'm glad DS took and enhanced it immensely, making it a proper game in the series)

And yeah, Grand Bazaar irritated me, too. The days dragged on for far too long, the windmill production was a cool concept, but really overused and not exactly intuitive.
(Animal Parade did it better, with just a few things to use them)
(I did like the bazaar concept, but needed to be more streamlined, so I can mass-sell items more easily.)

I will say you quit right before the game quits handholding you, and speeds up a little.

(That's another gripe of mine with the series. I don't mind tooltips, like this game does, but stop slowing the game down for the first spring and summer (locking all stores and upgrades and areas to explore until later in the year?!).
Let me do my own thing!)

[Maddo]

I think sunshine islands was the last good one for me, I was getting the ones after one by one on the DS as they came out and I never got very far, extremely bland. I felt like I wasted money.
I expected the formula to evolve but all it did was stagnate, then the grid field was completely abandoned in favor of the premade plots, never enjoyed that, it felt like a downgrade on many levels.

Then the split happened and the "new" harvest moon was even worse: recycled and bland characters, mechanics that don't go very deep.

Story of season went its own way and I can sort of respect that but I never got into it

[Kouki]

I still remember playing the PSP HM Hero of the Leaf Valley. That game irritate me to no end.

[🙈🧬👨‍💻🥽Jerry ✡️ VRcia⛐🏁✈️🏓]

when HM 64 came out it was a huge leap from the SNES one but still kept the same exact feel, it was truly magical. every one after that gradually got worse, but BTN is completely playable.

anything after BTN never felt right. too many weird handheld games that never really propelled the series.

i wishlisted it but won't be grabbing this full price. at least SDV added some new layers. this is pretty pricey for what is offered.

[CallmeBerto]

Since BTN we had a few that have been better

Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town - port/re-release; only missing the hot house
Harvest Moon DS - bugs and all I still find it a lot of fun
Harvest Moon: Magical Melody - A great game
Harvest Moon DS: Island of Happiness - Never found the touch controls bad.
Harvest Moon: Tree of Tranquility - A great game
Harvest Moon DS: Sunshine Islands - IoH with a few improvements
Harvest Moon: Animal Parade - ToT with a few improvements
Harvest Moon: Hero of Leaf Valley - More of a spin off to me up pretty fun
Harvest Moon 3D: A New Beginning - A great game
Story of Seasons - Amazing
Story of Seasons: Trio of Towns - best so far.

[MoonlitDNC]

Even though it's technically a spinoff, Rune Factory Frontier has probably been the one that's impressed me the most (outside of Harvest Moon 64) even though it has some pacing problems in spots. It runs great on the Wii, looks amazing for all intent and purpose, and leans just enough towards "Persona JRPG" rather than "hack & slash looter" (like some of the other numbered Rune games) during the combat sections. I'd recommend it as possibly THE best most modern take on the farming sim as of right now.

Animal Parade has some neat stuff going on and until SoS:FoMT came along, is the most recent mainline one I'd recommend due to the sheer number of features. But being feature-complete is negatively counterbalanced by the poor framerate and there's a couple layout tweaks & NPC dialogue expansions I'd make to the town to make things feel less like the pacing is dragging.

Even in the original GBA Mineral Town game, I had some issues with it... some font/presentation things, fumbling with the UI in a rush against the game's speedy clock. Thankfully it looks like the Story of Seasons FoMT remake has addressed a fair pile of the things I didn't like, though I still wonder if the clock could stand to be slowed sliiiightly.

Every other title that is not Harvest Moon 64 (which is a compact and perfectly-sized ecosystem of the series at its best in spite some odd N64-specific quirks) tends to have odd design or tech issues peppered over them depending on the title. Maybe Tides of Destiny looks cool but you cant marry until the postgame starts due to dumb design choices. Maybe the PSP titles look nice and have cool concepts, but the jank (and fact that it's on PSP in the first place) keep things from hitting that sweet spot. Maybe you like Tree of Tranquility but simply aren't feeling the marriage options (is why I didn't play Stardew) and suddenly realise one day that ToT is the demo version of Animal Parade, but are too far along into Tree to feel like restarting from scratch just to romance the Witch/Wizard.

Aside from the recent Natsume ripoffs, the only one singular mainline Harvest Moon that presented itself to me as a total disaster was Wonderful Life on Gamecube. If you have fond memories for it, I HIGHLY would suggest you go back and have a second look at the game, as it's riddled with technical shortcomings and is a pacing disaster. Every time people praise it I have to think "gosh, they were probably just really young and didn't know any better" - seriously, go watch a Longplay and see how fast you get sick of seeing the same dialogue & chore loop play out. Yeah there's a neat generation concept, but it's horribly executed compared to the family system in Animal Parade, and you're gonna get sick of seeing the bearded guy grifting you 100 times before anything even remotely interesting happens in town.

I can agree with the Back to Nature comment since it was more or less the PS1's take on Harvest Moon 64, and during that generation it didn't feel like I was buying into a tech demo or a bunch of experimental feature additions - everything had its place; as a game, that generation of Harvest Moon utilised every aspect of design to the fullest the technical limitations would allow. Though ironically, I cant ever push myself to sit and pay time to Stardew even though it also seems feature-complete and technically competent between the pixel art not resonating with me and none of the lads or ladies in the game having the sort of charm most Harvest Moon characters have.

Don't mind combat? Play Rune Frontier. Want a mainline and don't mind some fps lag? Play Animal Parade. Don't have a Wii? Grab the latest Rune Factory on Switch or SoS: Mineral Town (once it discounts a bit, teehee~).

[Otterly Confused]

Originally posted by CallmeBerto:

Since BTN we had a few that have been better

Harvest Moon: Magical Melody - A great game

Honestly I feel that game would have been better received in the west if it didn't have the infamous toddler graphics, especially since it was right on the heels of the game using somewhat more 'realistic' chibi models. Because it really is one of the best HM games out there.

[nuna]

Originally posted by Otterly Tired:

I don't think so personally. Animal Parade will remain my favorite HM next to 64

Animal Parade is amazing. The rival couples have unique children. You have more than one child and the child actually does things around town or helps out on the farm. Not sure why they didn't put that into the games that came after it. I'm tired of games with children that just walk around your house and never grow. I was sad to see that Stardew Valley took the kids as props approach to children. They should remake Animal Parade with Tree of Tranquility's map and I'd rebuy it in a heartbeat.

[D's Journal]

SD is better than these HM games imo. Especially if you played SD first - coming into HM series is like ehhh......There's just a bunch to do in SD even then some with the tons of mods. Hopefully they can start expanding these games more and allow mods and stuff.

This game isn't a fair comparison though because it's old anyways lol.

[Erin the Angry]

I really liked AWL. Well. The girl version was much better with the few things they added. I would say that AWL and FoMT were my favorites. My PSP died before I could get through back to nature on it but I really loved it.

I wasn't happy with animal parade because you are so badly kneecapped when it comes to your abilities until you save enough of the world. Can't farm for jack. Can't upgrade tools, can't fish, can't do squat. Just didn't feel "harvest moon" to me at that point but I did like the story itself when I treated it like a non-HM game.

Magical melody got on my nerves with the collect-a-thon of obscurely hidden notes you either only stumbled on by accident (got one when I forgot to pause to go make a sandwich, for standing still) or read it in a guide and DS (I played cute) was just ridiculous for the amount of out of the way and unreasonable junk you had to do to find sprites. Otherwise it was fun.

I just don't play these games to go save the world or have to read a wiki to find all the maguffins...

I love stardew, since it was mentioned, but man, I know the point is to meet the town and have them gradually warm up to you and make strong friendships but some of them start out downright HOSTILE to you so I really don't want to go out of my way to talk to them and give them gifts all the time. Of course I ended up making the town love me and became the big hero and stuff but man those NPCs were annoying to start out with.

And back to AWL, I know it was badly repetitive but that was ok with me. Back then I would come home from work and just not feel like using my brain much. Had something cute and simple to occupy me until bed time. I hope we get a remake of that but with a bit of new stuff too. It had way more potential than was delivered.