Harvest Moon DS
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| Harvest Moon DS | |
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| Developer(s) | Marvelous Interactive |
| Publisher(s) | JP Marvelous Interactive NA Natsume PAL Rising Star Games |
| Platform(s) | Nintendo DS |
| Release date | JP 2005-03-17 NA 2006-09-12 EU 2007-04-13 AUS 2007-06-07 |
| Genre(s) | Simulation |
| Mode(s) | Single player |
| Rating(s) | ESRB: Everyone OFLC: General PEGI: 3+ USK: Everyone |
Harvest Moon DS (牧場物語 コロボックルステーション Bokujou Monogatari: Colobocle Station?) is the first game for the Nintendo DS in the Harvest Moon series of farm-simulation video games.
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[edit] Story
The game takes place in Forget-Me-Not-Valley, 100 years after Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life. Unlike the previous games in the series, which create new characters based on old ones, the characters in Harvest Moon: DS are exactly the same as the ones in A Wonderful Life and Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town.
The story of the game mirrors that of Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life and Harvest Moon: Magical Melody for the GameCube while the gameplay follows Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town for the Game Boy Advance. The Harvest Goddess has been petrified and sent to another world by the Witch Princess, and it is up to the player to restore her. In Magical Melody, this is done by collecting magical music notes, but in Harvest Moon: DS, the player must find and rescue the Harvest Sprites from the other world by doing various tasks. Once the player finds 60 out of 101 sprites, the goddess will be revived, and the player will be able to propose to any of the potential wives.
[edit] Marriage
In order to get married,you need to find 60 Harvest Sprites.The potential wives in Harvest Moon DS are as follows:
- Muffy, a blonde with sparkling green eyes, she works at the Blue Bar with Griffin. She loves jewelry dug up at the excavation site. She also loves wine and daffodils that grow in the spring. Give her flowers, jewels from the mine site, and apple pie to win her heart. Never give her jewelry from the 2nd mine except pink diamonds and diamonds, and never give colored grass or small fish.
- Nami, a beautiful redheaded worldly traveler who was hardened by hard times. She lives at the Inn and has a thing for grapes,but does not like grape jam. Anything with grapes will make great presents, however Gratin is her absolute favorite.
- Celia, a simple yet sweet, brown-haired farm girl who works for Vesta. She can be shy some times but likes things that you dig up. She is easy to win over. She likes cake and Rainbow Curry. She hates picked cucumbers.
- Lumina, the classy and demure brunette granddaughter of Romana. She will accept only the finest gems found deep in the second mine, or flowers. She also loves Relax Tea. She hates Elli Leaves.
- Flora, the most intelligent of the bachelorettes. She is a blonde woman with glasses who works with Carter at the dig site. She loves curry, especially rainbow curry. Flora's most hated item (-5000 Love Points) is Red Grass. She is the hardest to win over out of the five 'normal' girls.
Aside from the normal brides one can also choose to marry four special women, two of whom are, unfortunately, glitched in some copies of the North American version:
- Harvest Goddess, the goddess who has been sealed in stone and sent away by her rival, the Witch Princess. She loves strawberries, and can grant you wishes but, due to a missing item called buckwheat flour in some versions of the game, is un-marryable. You can get a buckwheat item (sometimes flour, sometimes not) at the festival, after emptying all your pockets and going there.
- Witch Princess, a cutey, mischievous, slightly evil rival to the Harvest Goddess. Only the worst farmers will be noticed by her but she cannot be married due to the fact that some games do not count the amount of animals that die on your farm, a requirement for marrying her. You have to have poor relations with the townsfolk, sick animals, and pass out from fatigue many times to marry her.
- Leia the Mermaid, a mermaid, rescued by Daryl. She currently resides in his basement which you can only enter if you've raised Daryl's FP to 100. You also have to have a pond to have Leia as a wife. If you experience her yellow heart event, you will find her at the beach at midnight on Tuesday when the clock changes to Wednesday. She loves large fish. Due to a glitch in some games if a storm comes ((after you marry Leia)) she and her pond blows away!
- Keira, a mute princess sealed on the 255th floor of the 3rd mine because of a spell casted by the Witch Princess. (She only has a brief appearance in the second mine to give you the Legendary sword. If you have that and try to meet her there again you will not see her.) She requires a lot of rare and expensive gifts to please her. Golden lumber is the best kind of present to give to her:
You can marry both the Harvest Goddess and Witch Princess in the Japanese and European version of the game. The US version is glitched and neither the HG nor the Witch can be married. However, the Version 1.1 and later releases of the US version has this glitch corrected. To find out what US version a particular cartridge is, look at the serial number on the back of the cartridge. The glitched game has ABCEN0J13, ABCEN0J20 or ABCEN0J22 written on the back. The corrected versions have either ABCEN1J09, ABCEN1J11 or ABCEN1J22 on the back. To date the newest version is ABCEN1J22.
Furthermore, if a Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town or Harvest Moon: More Friends of Mineral Town cartridge is inserted into the Game Boy Advance slot and the player loads up Harvest Moon DS, the bachelorettes from Mineral Town become available to be wed. However, the credits roll immediately after the wedding thus bringing the game to an end. After the credits finish, the game will return to the save previous to getting married. This feature was removed from the European version of the game. The girls who come to visit from Mineral Town are the following:
- Ann, the feisty, ponytailed, ginger-redhead works at the inn in Mineral Town and helps out Ruby at the Inner Inn when she visits Forget-Me-Not Valley on Fridays.
- Elli, a nurse in training, who visits Dr. Hardy's house along with Dr. Trent on Wednesdays.
- Karen, the manager of the General Store. She comes to visit her friend (and relative) Celia on Tuesdays. She is about the same from the last game, except her hair is darker.
- Mary, the sweet and quiet black-haired girl who runs the library in Mineral Town. She is a writer and will visit Lumina on Mondays.
- Popuri, the outgoing pink-haired girl also runs the Poultry hotline on your phone. Her family runs the Poultry Farm, and she studies at Takukura's house on Sundays. Rick is her brother.
The five "valley" girls have rivals for their affections as well. The player will have to make their move before the corresponding rival does, and has until Year 4 before a rival marriage can be witnessed. The rivals are:
- Marlin, Vesta's handsome, quiet, black-haired brother works on Vesta's Farm and will marry Celia if the player doesn't. He keeps to himself but will warm up if you give him gifts of wine and rice cakes.
- Griffin, The shy, gentle owner of the Blue Bar, a skilled brewer who will marry Muffy if the player doesn't.
- Gustafa, The free-spirited musician and poet lives in a colorful yurt and will marry Nami if the player doesn't.
- Rock, Ruby and Tim's son. A vain and confident blonde playboy, he lives in his parents' inn and will marry Lumina if the player doesn't.
- Carter, a serious, intelligent archaeologist. He lives in a tent by the dig site and will marry Flora if the player doesn't.
Once the player marries a girl, the girl's to-be-husband before will have max fp with you.
[edit] Unlockables
If the player inserts a copy of Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town or Harvest Moon: More Friends of Mineral Town into the GBA slot, the player can unlock additional content, such as newspapers from Mineral Town. This feature was removed from the US and EU versions of the game.
Aside from new characters visiting from Mineral Town, you can also receive a variety of new Friends of Mineral Town related objects such as DVDs of the TV shows available in Friends of Mineral Town for your DVD player. You can change your background music to different games music as well, after buying 5 records.
The five Mineral Town girls and boys do visit, along with their Friends of Mineral Town and More Friends of Mineral Town rivals. However, whilst the player can marry Friends of Mineral Town characters, the rivals are not the player's rivals in Harvest Moon DS, and will not marry their corresponding boy or girl. Furthermore, if the player does marry one of these characters, the game ends, and the player must reload a previously saved game.
There is no "Connection Content" in the PAL version of the game as different publishers released the two games.
[edit] Crops and Trees
Growing crops in this game is slightly different from the other Harvest Moon games. You are not restricted to only your farm land to grow crops. Instead, fields of various sizes are all over the map and different growth rates are applied to each. Each field has its own fertility level; the more fertile the faster your crops grow. It is possible to level up the crops to level 100 by planting numerous amounts of seeds in the same spot and the better the crop level the better the quality, thereby raising the price. Trees in this game are raised in a similar manner, and trees take longer to grow. Trees differ from seeds in a few ways. One difference is that you can plant trees anytime except winter, and it is recommended to do just that if you want your tree to bear fruit that year. Also note that different trees grow at different paces; some grow faster than others. Another thing to take into consideration is that you cannot grow two trees right next to each other; you have to leave room for them grow, and the same goes for seeds. You cannot plant crops next to a tree or the crop will not grow. Trees do not have to be watered after they sprout.
[edit] Livestock
The livestock feature of the game has not been changed drastically from earlier Harvest Moon games. However, the new dual screen adds new animal caring features. It is possible to wash, shear, milk, pet, or give treats to the animal, depending on which kind it is. At the start of the game, there are no barns for the animals, and the player must call the carpenter, Gotz, to build them. It is possible to have up to twenty-eight animals made up of different species. There are chickens, ducks, cows, and sheep. A horse is obtained through an event during the game occurring after the player ships 1000 items in the shipping bin. The player starts the game off with a dog and cat. Just like in Friends of Mineral Town, a player has the option of breeding animals instead of just buying them. In Harvest Moon DS the sheep can be sheared six times once their wool is grown or once if the Clippers are used along with the Touch Glove. A way to make slightly more money is to shear the sheep once, then shear it again using the Touch Glove. Also, if you simply purchase a cow, it can come in one of three different breeds: normal, brown, or marble. The different cows will appear at random, but if you breed them the calf will be the same as the mother.
Unlike most other handheld Harvest Moon games, livestock in Harvest Moon DS can die of old age at around 6 years old. If the animal dies from neglect, you will lose friendship and LP with the villagers, but nothing happens if they die naturally.
[edit] Building
In previous games, you started with most of the basic farm buildings and upgrades were always done with wood. The building system in Harvest Moon DS has more options as you start out with only a small house to sleep in and must build your farm from the ground up.
The building materials are as follows from weakest to strongest; Fodder, Wood, Stone, and Golden Lumber. Golden Lumber is indestructible.
Unlike most other Harvest Moon games, your farm buildings aren't tied to one place. You have the ability to choose where they are built.
[edit] Sprite Stations
In this game, unlike other Harvest Moon games, the player has a TV-like device that is carried around constantly, accessible through the menu on the bottom screen. It acts much in the same way the televisions in other Harvest Moon games work, except channels are unlocked through the course of game play by completing certain tasks, such as buying records or befriending villagers. There are 9 Sprite Stations, unlike other games, where there are only 4 TV stations. Channels 3 and 9 do not work in the European version. Channels 4 and 6 only work at certain times. Channel 4 will tell you if an animal is sick, or if an animal has become pregnant. Channel 6 will tell you about events happening on the day. These channels work automatically and do not need to be watched.
[edit] Cooking
Cooking remains similar to that in Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town. After successfully fulfilling the house expansion requirements, one can buy a kitchen off the TV Shopping channel. It takes some time to buy the kitchen.( To get channel 2, the Shopping Network channel, you must buy items from the supermarket 10 days in a row not including holidays and days off). The various cooking equipment is gotten in a similar fashion. To cook, the player simply chooses one utensil and up to eight ingredients to create a meal. Certain meals have different effects on stamina and fatigue. You can also cook food to give to the lady you love. This will raise her affection towards you depending on what she likes. You can also buy up to six cookbooks from Roller, the harvest sprite in the casino. Once you have these you will be given 19 free recipes to try out. To find the cookbooks, look in your bookcase next to your bed. There are many different ways to get ingredients. You can buy them from the Supermarket ( by phone ), you can get them from the ground ( such as different grasses and seasonal items ), or you can grow them yourself. Unlike in Friends of Mineral Town, in Harvest Moon DS you can also ship the food you cook but only by canning it or if you put it in the basket, then place it in the shipping bin. Some of the things that you can make are strawberry milk with the blender, boiled egg in the pot and french fries in the frying pan.
Whatever you make, from Rainbow curry to a boiled egg, is worth 0G or nothing. But in order to complete the shipping list (a requirement to marry the Harvest Goddess), you have to make every recipe in the game.
[edit] References
[edit] External links
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