a time consuming maniac in disguise ...
Given that I wasn't able to play the very first Rune Factory, it will be an impossibility for me to compare this game and highlight its improvement/s from its predecessor. I however was able to play the very first Harvest Moon for the DS. And wasn't all that "happy" with the 3d version: Island of Happiness. My expectations for this game wasn't all that high since most (if not every single) Harvest Moon update had very little to brag about in terms of improvement. I however was surprised as to how good this title is when compared to Harvest Moon.
Anyone who has tried playing Harvest Moon before should feel right at home with this one. You are given a story in the first part of the game, and you'll end up having your own farm to tend to. You plant seeds, grow crops and sell them, take care of your pets and farm animals, and earn money. If you have spare time you can run around town, and talk to your neighbors and even court a special someone by giving him/her gifts etc. Other than the once in a while hunting for item for upgrades in a cave and attending of holiday celebrations thingy, that pretty much covered the basic gameplay of Harvest Moon. It's pretty addicting and eats up a lot of your time. As perfect and easy-going that may sound, it was also filled with frustrating experiences like not being able to do a lot in your farm per day since your character has the stamina of a 4 year old kid. You also cannot water multiple plants unless you upgrade your watering tool etc. There are a bunch of other things in that game that fits the same description, and after some time you'll feel like the developers only did those so that the game will last longer.
In Rune Factory 2 however, those things were fixed. Your stamina has vastly increased because this game is not only focused on farming, but with monster battles as well (I'll get with that one in a bit). So now, you can rake, plant seeds, water, harvest, and tidy up your farm and still have the stamina to do something else. With this release, your farm serves as the source of your money and food. But, you'll probably find yourself spending more time outside your farm solving quests which enables you to get handsomely rewarded. And it's pretty much a requirement for you to solve quests because some of the tools that you need for basic farming can only be acquired by solving them.
Now this is not going to be called the "fantasy" harvest moon version for nothing. There's also an element of monster killing-RPG added into the mix (or whatever you want to call it). You can purchase weapons and set-off to monster infested lands. You gain experience by killing monsters, that at the same time can be turned into pets. You can tame monsters and keep them in your barn and use them for different purposes like fighting, harvesting, and watering ... which somehow reminded me of my Pokemon gaming days. And buildings here doesn't start small like in Harvest Moon, my barn was built in a single day and it was 4 levels high complete with an elevator. Gratification in this game is quicker when compared to Harvest Moon titles, but not in a bad way. You'll simply get rewarded here much quicker for spending some time playing the game. Which in my opinion gives the player a more satisfying experience.
The graphics looks great in an artistic kind of way. You have a 3d character in a smooth and detailed 2d environment. I just don't know if the falling petals are necessary to keep the "mystical" feeling in the game intact but it's not in any way distracting. Animation looks good as well but I just wish that they added additional animation for the monsters that water and harvest plants. Because when they start to do their "thing", they look more like they're stomping on your crops than taking care of them.The game tends to get choppy in places where there are more than 3 characters on the screen at the same time, which usually happens during holidays when almost everyone in town is out of their houses. I also saw a glitch where Barrett (a male character in the game) walked through walls and chairs as he take his "station" for the day.
Controls might take some time gettings used to. But I find it much easier using the buttons on this game than the touchscreen controls found in Island of Happiness. You can use the touchscreen to move around but your actions are controlled via the DS buttons.
Audio is pretty good. You have the usual mystical soundtrack accompanied by good quality sound effects. You'll get a couple of speech in the game but you'll still spend most of your time reading text than actually hearing them.
There are tons of things that you can do in this game that if I was to mention all of them, it might take me an hour to simply write them all down. There is so much that you can do with this game that it will eat every single second of your spare time. And given how addicting Harvest Moon is eventhough it's only focused on farming, courting, and upgrading ... you can just imagine how much more time you'll spend with this game since it added quests and RPG elements into the mix. Nothing in this game felt like it was rushed, it seems like Natsume wants to prove that they can create a title that can get the same praise as the first releases of Harvest Moon. If only the game didn't have any performance issues, and an option to play a girl at the beginning (for the lady gamers out there), I would have given this game a slightly higher score of 9.5. It's (in my opinion) that good.
.:My reviews are only as good as everyone else's. Take every single one of them with a grain of salt:.