A great game to add to your collection. Undoubtedly one of the best Harvest Moon games ever created!
Now for the things introduced in this game which other Harvest Moon's did not have. The "rune" system is something i don't quite fancy. Each use of a tool or weapon costs "Rune Points" or better known as RP. Once Your RP is depleted your HP then starts to deplete. To recover RP you must have a patch of 9 fully grown crops. Everyday it will have a white floating ball, collect it and your RP gets partially filled. This system makes it a little bit tougher. Although as you level up your HP increases, but RP remains the same. This makes the game a little bit more difficult. The monster capturing part is a nice feature. You can actually make the monsters fight with you, gather crops, or water the fields! This is a really good feature! Also there are certain monsters who you can milk, collect eggs from, and collect wool from. They have removed the farm animals in change of this. Which is just as good!
Overall a great game! It removed a lot of the undesirable of Harvest Moon and added a few new mechanics, which unfortunately have their own undesirables. But the good seems to overshadow the bad. Rune Factory is one of the best things that ever happened to Harvest Moon!