Together with HM64, I consider this one the best in the series thusfar. Many steps in the right direction.
I'll start off with the obvious topic- is this the best Harvest Moon game out there? I think it is very nearly as good as my favorite title Harvest Moon 64 and a bit better gameplay-wise in comparison to Harvest Moon : Back To Nature's GBA reworkings (FoMT, MFoMT). I haven't played the SNES version so I can make no comparison there. It is far deeper and more challenging than A Wonderful Life (AWL) and its remakes (AnWL, AWL:SE), and about worlds longer than Save The Homeland(STH).
So yes, it is a must-play game if you are a Harvest Moon fan. Even if you aren't, this game tries to collect many of the great things in this series and refine and build upon them with some unique features making for a vast game with just a few failings to keep it from absolute perfection.
Things unique to this game - There is no time limit. You aren't forced to get married, you can just keep going at your own pace. But there is an overarching goal in this game- and that is to free the Harvest Goddess who has been turned to stone. You can collect 100 music notes in total. 50 will revive the harvest goddess and she'll do you a nice favor. Each note is unique and acquired from doing everything there is to do in the game from staying out in the snow for 10 hours, staying up all night, collecting all ore, shipping a number certain items, attending festivals for the first time, befriending several characters, and triggering a great many more conditions.
You can choose to play as either a guy or girl at the beginning of the game. Several various characters dating back to the first to the latest Harvest Moon game(s) are compiled in this one, along with a couple re-drawn and new characters. If you play as a guy, there are 10 girls from which you can choose to date and/or marry. If you play as a girl there are 10 guys. There is also an additional character (your rival) that is of the opposite gender of whichever gender you pick to be at the beginning of the game. However, marrying this character will result in the ending of the game. Otherwise the game has no ending, and you can keep playing forever.
Speaking of the rival.. you compete with him/her daily to see who has sold the most produce, misc items (like gems from the mine), and animal products. Your house can be upgraded as many as five times and there are a vast array of furniture you can purchase and arrange in your house to your liking. Similar to Animal Crossing in that regard. There are also a fridge and shelf for which you can store things. These start off having limited space, but you can buy bigger ones as you upgrade your house.
The overworld in this game is the biggest in any Harvest Moon game. It was quite overwelming for me at first. Time passes as it did in HM:FOMT so it takes a very long time to explore every area of the map. It took me about two in-game seasons to completely know my way around. Thankfully there is a map in the menu screen. You can now raise horses and have a pet pig. In addition to the 39 characters with which you can befriend in this game (many will only move into town once you have done simple things like shipping a particular item, befriending certain characters, or attending various festival) there are 11 animals with which you can befriend. Most don't serve much of a purpose, but the dolphin can take you to a hidden island for fishing.
The menu systems are also unique in this game (see Controls & Menus section of this review.) You must construct barn(s), chicken coop(s), an any other building you desire (such as multiple houses, a windmill, watering hole(s), etc) on the land you own. You can buy plots of land, the amount of land available increases when you befriend the mayor. You are given freedom as to how and where you will arrange the buildings. As you play, you can unlock mini-games that are accessible on the start menu. These games can actually be multi-player. A nice, if gimmicky touch.
Things returning from other HM games - Similar to the first Harvest Moon game for the SNES, you do not have a lot for which you are limited to planting vegetable/fruit and tree seeds. Nearly the entire overworld (save for land owned by various characters) is your soil to use as you wish. The soil levels from AWL are present here, with there being different levels of soil that dictate how fast seeds will sprout and how much the end produce will sell.
The traditional animals are all here to raise with the exception of ducks and goat that were featured in AWL. There are as many seeds to plant as there were in HM: FOMT and HM:BTN. The tool leveling from HM64 and HM:BTN & HM:FOMT are back. The traditional tools are all here and with the required ore, cash, and experience with the item you'll be able to upgrade them up to five levels. Mining is back, but has a unique twist with the inclusion of gems that can bring about special effects such as restoring stamina or paralyzing you for a moment. There are several ore and gems, and two mines that have 100 floors each. Time passes in the mine, time passes everywhere except in buildings.
Cooking is back, but now recipes are handed to you quite liberally. The number of recipes, items with which to use them, and cooking utensils is good though. Fishing is back as well, with a system almost identical to Animal Crossing. There are many fish to catch. Foraging (scouring the land- usually in the wooded areas- for berries, herbs, etc) was always a handy feature when starting off from scratch in all the Harvest Moon games. Foraging is back and there are just as many items as there were in HM:BTN & HM:FOMT, but the huge landscape makes for a wider volume of them. As mentioned, the festivals are back. Character birthdays are also present.
Graphics & Sound - The graphics are quite outdated. They are not just a step back from A Wonderful Life, but not quite as good as Save The Homeland either (which was a 1st gen PS2 game on a cd-rom -_-) The camera angle is similar to Animal Crossing. The trees and houses also have a little bit of a resemblance, as well as the simple sprite that represents your character. The other 39 characters are usually viewed at an awkward angle and don't look as good as they could. There are several great designs though and cut scenes often look alright. The animals, water effects, every graphical element of this game harks back to the older Harvest Moon games and looks only the slightest bit evolved. The music is quite good, with the seasonal tracks never becoming all that grating. The musical score is better than most in this series. There is no voice-acting, however there are sound effects that the characters occasionally make. It seems like some of them were dubbed and some were left alone. Nearly all of them are annoying, some so bad that it is a shame it adorns the character (Katie and Alex come to mind.) I'd actually give both of these areas a 4/10 but I bumped it up to 6 since those areas both (unfortunately) have a dramatic effect on the end score which I think deserves a 9.
Controls & Menus - The controls also take a step back in time a little bit, which some could think is for worse. In A Wonderful Life it was impossible to drop anything and you were given an unlimited inventory. In THIS game, you have a rucksack that must be upgraded and you can easily drop and break anything you pick up. It adds a level of clunkiness that almost seems put there on purpose to keep those patient gamers on their toes as they wish. Scrolling through inventory and efficiently using tools and every button is decently constructed, but could be much better. The menus are great, with lots of editions we haven't seen before- like a list of all recipes in the start menu, a list of all heart levels for every character, as well as all of the shipped items, animal, and inventory information in one scrollable pause menu. I hope future games follow suit and even improve upon this meticulous level of detail that is befitting a game that has so much to do with management and collecting.
Gameplay - To quickly sum up everything noted above, there is a ton of stuff to do in this game. Growing vegetables and raising animals may be a large part of the gameplay, but foraging, fishing, mining, gathering materials for construction, collecting items, and befriending every creature in the game is just as much a part. As well as the daily management of picking what you're going to do each day and working your schedule around socializing and festivals, or just doing anything at all that you want- the non-linear quest that has defined the series is at some of it's greatest in this latest entry. The gameplay is as strong as it's ever been, and some of the fresh layers make for an addictive longevity that make this one a must-play for fans of the series, and worth taking a look at for everyone else. Particularly if you liked Animal Crossing, of which this one borrows a few elements from. Unlike in AWL, you won't run out of stuff to collect too soon. There are hundreds of items to earn and you can even have multiple houses.
Weak Points - The weak points of this game will be infinately easier to handle if you don't care about cut scenes. I for one cared about them. They helped break up any particular monotony that might set in (and in this game's case, it doesn't get repetitive to quickly thank goodness) But with so many characters, there is a sore lacking of cut scenes and character development that is unfortunate. There are rival scenes but only one per couple and they are easy to miss, very little in way of scenes to build up our knowledge about the many other characters in this game. Each character has a general line of text that changes with each rising heart level, making for 11 unique lines for each character in addition to the general repeated chatter. All the lines are short and most reveal little to nothing, the writing falling more cheap and lifeless than nearly all the others in this series, which is really too bad as the gameplay is grand and effortful in contrast. Controls are clunkier than most recent HM games. Not unmanagable, but it can serve to be a nuisance early on. While it is great to have the festivals back, nearly all of them are minor and very short. While there are mini-games, nearly all of them can only be played in the start menu and not in the actual game. For those who admire the extreme ease of HM games, this one can be tough going at first. I think the challenge is a good thing, but I've read some gamers getting too discouraged and not knowing the more advantageous paths to take. Just hang in there. It's unfortunate that the game ends when you marry Jamie. I wanted to marry him/her. ;_; Most seem to dislike the character though so I don't think it interferes much.
Strong Points - EVERYTHING else.
Recommended? - By all means! There is a chance than the upcoming DS title could be as good though. Until then this is a beautifully addictive game.