Although Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town – a remake of a very old game, the original version came out with a different title. It was Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town, appeared on the Game Boy Advance in 2003. Over time, developers from Marvelous lost the rights to this title, but there were no problems with the release of the remake. Two-dimensionality was replaced by cheap 3D, but the basis of the farmer simulator remained the same, except that some innovations appeared.
Unexpected gift
Over 17 years, games in this genre have evolved greatly: some have at least some kind of plot, others give out tasks so that you can achieve certain goals, others offer non-standard mechanics. Friends of Mineral Town same – the game that you roughly imagine when you hear the phrase “farmer simulator”. There is a large field, it is possible to plant seeds and water plants, as well as purchase animals for various purposes: milking cows, cutting wool from lambs, collecting chicken eggs, and so on.
The game begins with a user-created character (there are almost no appearance settings here) receiving an invitation from the mayor of Mineral Town. The protagonist’s grandfather left him a farm, which he last visited 20 years ago. No one has worked on the farm for a very long time, so it is not in the best condition: there are weeds, stones and stumps everywhere, the barn is empty, there are no living creatures at all. But the tiny house is well preserved – the TV works, there is a bed, and a small warehouse. In addition, there is no need to worry about tools, because everything is already in a special box.
The mayor has a lot of things to do, so he doesn’t bore you with long explanations of everything, and after ten minutes the player sets off on a free voyage – no one leads by the hand, entertain yourself. You begin to explore the area: if you follow the road up, you will find yourself in a city, and below there is a workshop, a mine and some kind of tent. You knock on all doors, but some buildings may not be accessible – sometimes this is due to the hours they operate. If the store opens at 11 a.m., you won’t be able to get in earlier, so you wait for the salesman and watch him enter his store.
Not the easiest way to earn money
Sooner or later, the understanding comes that the main task in the game is to earn money, and preferably as much as possible. To enlarge your home and add a kitchen, you need money. To put a refrigerator there, without which there is simply nowhere to store food, you need money. The same goes for improving tools, purchasing livestock, and most importantly, purchasing seeds. You can earn money by selling any things put in a special box on the farm – every evening (except holidays) at the same time a person comes up to it, takes all the trash and automatically exchanges it for currency.
At first you collect pennies, since https://fwincasino.co.uk/ there are very few sources of at least some valuable things. You chop scattered branches with an ax, turning them into logs, and “process” small stones with a hammer. You go for a walk and pick flowers – there are few of them, but they will give you something for them. Plus, right next to the house there is a tree that generates grapes and a beehive with honey almost every day, and they also offer a decent amount for this.
After this, you can go to the bench on the beach and buy your first seeds, then return to the field, cultivate the land, plant everything, water it and continue walking until evening comes. The main thing is to read the descriptions of the seeds, since all the plants in this game grow only in certain seasons.
Anxious waiting
Launching Friends of Mineral Town, you need to be prepared for the fact that everything happens very slowly here. Perhaps the version for Game Boy Advance had some bugs and exploits, but I didn’t look for them for the review – I played as intended. Vegetables, for example, take almost three weeks to grow – the seeds for which you paid all your money will not pay off soon. And the most annoying thing is that as soon as one season ends (after 30 days), on the first day of the second season all your plants die. My cabbages, planted in mid-spring, wilted just after summer, which would certainly frustrate any farmer.
Questions also arise about other elements – for example, about the extraction of ore in a mine. There are several floors, and you have to look for the stairs to each next one yourself, breaking stones with a hammer and clearing the ground with a hoe. Since every action in the game burns up stamina, you can spend all your energy looking for a passage to the second floor, hoping for a “random”. But the lower you go, the better quality resources you find. But you can cheat the system – save immediately after getting to the next floor, look for an exit, reboot and get to it as quickly as possible. Not entirely fair, but the mechanics of mine exploration are so idiotic that it doesn’t bother your conscience.
The rest of the game is so simple that it even becomes exciting due to its “casuality”. A new day has come. You left the house, picked up a watering can, collected water from a nearby pond, and watered all your plants. Then he greeted each animal: he brushed the horse, stroked the cow, went to the chickens – the more often you pay attention to them all, the better the products they produce will be. The morning is over, which means the shops are open. I bought food, looked into a seed shop, and talked with city residents. Along the way I collected some flowers, destroyed stumps, destroyed stones. I returned to the farm before evening, put everything in a box and received the money in a matter of minutes. It’s a pity that all the shops have already closed – but tomorrow there will be something to do.
This happens almost every day. A little routine, sometimes boring, but it’s hard to fight the desire to spend at least a couple more days in the game and buy something for yourself. In addition to ordinary cows, there are those that produce fruit or chocolate milk. The workshop not only allows you to increase the size of your house, but also sells trees from which you can pick berries every day. When a character has his own kitchen, he begins to collect recipes and all the products and ingredients received become much more useful. With some dishes it will even be possible to go down into the mines without using saves and loads.
Your own farmer
There are still some goals that are not directly talked about in the game. The more often you use a particular tool, the sooner you will be able to create an improved version of it. With the first level ax it will not be possible to destroy stumps, with the second it will require six hits, and with the third – only three charged. The watering can also becomes much more convenient – if at first you water only one square, then later you can simultaneously irrigate three or six. You spend the same amount of energy, but save valuable time. Periodically, the city hosts festivals where residents enjoy chicken fights and horse racing, and if the player has their own animals, he can take part.
Sometimes Friends of Mineral Town allows you to learn more about the game universe: shows dialogue or starts scenes with the participation of the protagonist when he enters a certain location. Subsequently, it becomes possible to start a relationship with your favorite resident and start a family with him. And next to the church there are spirits hiding, ready to help the user if he brings them gifts. They will water the plants, collect them (and automatically put them in a box), and also take care of the animals. The game remains simple, but can surprise.
Few people probably played the original version, but it’s worth saying a few words about the innovations. They don’t radically change the game, but they make it more convenient. Managing inventory, for example, is much easier thanks to the ability to quickly switch between tools using the D-pad. Items like pieces of wood, cobblestones and ore are automatically picked up in the mine – you don’t have to grab them with your hands like before. Walking animals has also become more convenient – you ring the bell near the barn, they go out (in this case there is no need for food – they will find something on their own), and when evening comes, they return and go to bed.
Of course, fans of farming simulators like Stardew Valley remake Friends of Mineral Town may seem rustic and boring at times. But if there is a routine here, it is very pleasant, thanks in part to the charming visual style. The game is clear and convenient, does not punish too much for mistakes (except for withering plants when the season changes) and does not tire you with long trips from one corner to another. If you didn’t feed the little animal, you won’t get food from it, but it won’t die from exhaustion. We ignored the holiday – there will be another one soon. Didn’t go to the store – you’ll have time tomorrow. You do what you want – and that’s the beauty of it.
Pros: nice (albeit simple) graphics that preserve the atmosphere of the original; the remake’s innovations simplify the gameplay and make it more convenient; gameplay that is understandable from the first minutes and can present surprises; although they don’t directly talk about the goals of the game, there is almost always something to strive for to make your farm better.
Cons: everything happens very slowly, and you feel real progress only after ten hours; ore mining is done so stupidly that it’s not at all shameful to deceive the system with saves and loads.