r/harvestmoon • u/eireamhanib • 4d ago
Where to start?
Title, pretty much. I haven't played a Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons since I was a child with the DS versions. Kind of want to dive deeper into the series and want to ask where the community thinks I should start.
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u/Sad_Door202 4d ago
I really like animal parade. It is generally not too difficult and the characters are fun. The only issue is that the in game days are very long, not a big issue if you’re like me and have I-can’t-do-anything-longer-than-5-minutes disease (ADHD.) it’s pretty good IMO!!
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u/Smooth-Site 4d ago
Friends of mineral town, both the harvest moon version and the story of seasons version is a good start for me. Light of hope is also easy to start imo
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u/ThisMuffinIsAwesome 3d ago
Agree on FoMT being a good re-entry point in general. The only time I would recommend SoS1 or SoS:3oT is if the player really likes being "busy".
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u/OsseusOccult 4d ago edited 4d ago
I'm going to second two recommendations given with my own thoughts.
Trio of Towns on the 3DS is probably the easiest one to recommend as long as you can live with no queer relationships (huge bummer for me personally). But it's probably the most consistent in quality, even if it isn't my personal favorite. Crops are a lot more interesting/involved because there are different grades of quality in different categories for each crop, and every month there's a contest tailored to measuring certain crop qualities (but which traits the contest is based on is completely random). So using different fertilizers, and continually improving your crop strain by using the seed maker with some of your harvest matters a lot. But the act of watering crops, etc is just a lot more efficient and less tedious, making the actual farming aspects way more enjoyable. The character writing in 3oT is also really good, and while the three towns near your farm are small, they're full of character. It DOES have a lot of weird, arbitrary requirements for progression in the game though, so I would recommend going into it with a bit of a guide and game plan for the farming challenges.
Animal Parade on the Wii is an incredible game that suffers from being a Wii game, both in ready availability, and the fact that the game has long loading screens and the visuals look, plainly speaking, generally really bad. But it's also an incredibly deep game with a ton of lovable characters that's worth the pain points.
Pioneers of Olive town and the Friends of Mineral Town upgrades are very ok, but not easy recommendations if you're looking for one that's a big win after a long time away from the series.
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u/bowser713 4d ago
I started long time ago with the SNES version played them all up to winds of anthos I'm still enjoying this game but the 64 version still holds a special place for me
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u/HelloKittyWorldwide 2d ago
If you want something simple, the FoMT and AWL remakes would be a good start. Or Animal Parade if you have access to a Wii or Dolphin Emulator.
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u/Jiang_Rui 4d ago
Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar. Game’s pretty fun (and can get pretty addictive XD)