{"id":257,"date":"2014-10-04T00:00:54","date_gmt":"2014-10-04T00:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gaminginsurrection.com\/stories\/?p=257"},"modified":"2022-07-17T18:34:42","modified_gmt":"2022-07-17T22:34:42","slug":"harvest-moon-back-to-nature-4q2014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gaminginsurrection.com\/reviews\/index.php\/2014\/10\/04\/harvest-moon-back-to-nature-4q2014\/","title":{"rendered":"Harvest Moon: Back to Nature \u2014 4Q2014<\/span> issue"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/span>A life that\u2019s sec\u00adond nature<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

A life of farm\u00ading is nev\u00ader sim\u00adple. Ask any farmer and they\u2019ll tell you: It\u2019s a tough, tough job that requires before-dawn ris\u00ading and at-dusk retir\u00ading that repeats itself over the course of many a day. There\u2019s also the fear of Moth\u00ader Nature wreck\u00ading your liveli\u00adhood and out\u00adside forces such as oth\u00ader humans steal\u00ading from you and run\u00adning you into ruin. But, thank\u00adful\u00adly, you can avoid all of that and expe\u00adri\u00adence the joy of liv\u00ading off the land at its finest, dig\u00adi\u00adtal\u00adly if you so choose, thanks to Nat\u00adsume\u2019s Har\u00advest Moon: Back to Nature. And, if you play your cards right and take time to pull your\u00adself away from dig\u00adging up your ground, you can find your\u00adself a cer\u00adtain Mrs. to share the farm\u00ading duties with as well.<\/span><\/p>\n

Back to Nature is the best game in the long-run\u00adning series. I say this with con\u00adfi\u00addence because it\u2019s one of the only titles in the series to have been remade mul\u00adti\u00adple times with the same set\u00adup, just dif\u00adfer\u00adent char\u00adac\u00adters. Every mod\u00adern Har\u00advest Moon title takes its cue from Back to Nature, as well. The main goal, which stays the same through\u00adout the series, is to take a farm that\u2019s fall\u00aden into dis\u00adre\u00adpair and make it into a prof\u00aditable bas\u00adtion of hard work and suc\u00adcess. Your char\u00adac\u00adter works to accom\u00adplish this by pulling up his boot\u00adstraps and putting in a lit\u00adtle elbow grease with lit\u00adtle to no help from any\u00adone else, aside from the gnomes he meets tucked away in the crease of the town.<\/span><\/p>\n

Speak\u00ading of the town, you\u2019re tasked with meet\u00ading folks and forg\u00ading some type of rela\u00adtion\u00adship with them so that you are con\u00adsid\u00adered neigh\u00adbor\u00adly. The town\u2019s set sched\u00adule makes for inter\u00adest\u00ading inter\u00adac\u00adtions and a type of sched\u00adule plan\u00adning not unlike Ani\u00admal Cross\u00ading. While you\u2019re work\u00ading to save your farm and chat\u00adting up the towns\u00adfolk, you\u2019re giv\u00aden a third task of find\u00ading a suit\u00adable lass in town to wife up. If you can man\u00adage to put a ring on it by woo\u00ading your intend\u00aded (there are five love\u00adly ladies that you can choose from to pur\u00adsue with vary\u00ading likes and dis\u00adlikes), you\u2019re all but guar\u00adan\u00adteed to earn your place in the town and be allowed to stay.<\/span><\/p>\n

Back to Nature is deep, extreme\u00adly deep. So much so that it takes quite a bit of time just get\u00adting the farm up and run\u00adning in a prop\u00ader man\u00adner that you might make mon\u00adey to sus\u00adtain it. And that\u2019s mis\u00adsion accom\u00adplished for Back to Nature: Get you involved and think\u00ading hard about what it is you want to accom\u00adplish in your town. That lev\u00adel of inter\u00adac\u00adtion is sim\u00adple to begin with, and with decent con\u00adtrols it does\u00adn\u2019t get too much hard\u00ader to main\u00adtain. It\u2019s one of the things that I love about Back to Nature. It does\u00adn\u2019t press too hard about mechan\u00adics and there\u2019s a wealth of infor\u00adma\u00adtion with\u00adin the game about crops and car\u00ading for ani\u00admals that can help you main\u00adtain a com\u00adfort\u00adable way of life with\u00adin the game. But some\u00adtimes, the lev\u00adel of com\u00adfort you want isn\u2019t always with\u00adin reach.<\/span><\/p>\n

While I praise the con\u00adtrols, the effect isn\u2019t always ben\u00ade\u00adfi\u00adcial for you. The game is hard in the begin\u00adning, some\u00adtimes too hard for its own good. Take, for exam\u00adple, the fact that you arrive in town with basi\u00adcal\u00adly noth\u00ading but the clothes on your back. You\u2019re expect\u00aded to suc\u00adceed and set\u00adtle down there but you have noth\u00ading tying you there very much. What\u2019s to say that your play\u00ader char\u00adac\u00adter does\u00adn\u2019t decide that it\u2019s too much, packs up shop and goes home? It\u2019s not very real\u00adis\u00adtic with some of the things you\u2019re tasked with doing, and start\u00ading with absolute\u00adly no mon\u00adey and try\u00ading to rebuild a farm is impos\u00adsi\u00adble with no cash flow. <\/span><\/p>\n

My next prob\u00adlem comes with the cash oppor\u00adtu\u00adni\u00adties afford\u00aded in the game. With\u00adout cheat\u00ading, it is near\u00adly impos\u00adsi\u00adble to become suc\u00adcess\u00adful and well off. This leads into a larg\u00ader prob\u00adlem with the way time is struc\u00adtured in the game as well. While the time aspect has to be dif\u00adfer\u00adent than real time, an entire day should not pass with\u00adin near\u00adly 30 min\u00adutes. It\u2019s extreme\u00adly hard to get much accom\u00adplished in the ear\u00adly going and it demands that you must have a rou\u00adtine in place quick\u00adly or risk being left behind. Sure, you\u2019re giv\u00aden a year or two to get things togeth\u00ader but it\u2019s hard to make things work on the farm, court a girl and par\u00adtic\u00adi\u00adpate in town activ\u00adi\u00adties all at once in the short amount of time that pass\u00ades as a day. <\/span><\/p>\n

Cou\u00adple it with the sched\u00adule giv\u00aden to the town and there\u2019s a time man\u00adage\u00adment prob\u00adlem just wait\u00ading to hap\u00adpen. The con\u00adtrols some\u00adtimes leave a lot to be desired, too. More than once I\u2019ve had a buck\u00adet that I\u2019ve filled with good\u00adies from my plot of land emp\u00adty just far away enough from a bin that it went wast\u00aded. And more than once I\u2019ve been angered by loss of income because it\u2019s on the ground and not able to be reclaimed. But that\u2019s a fact of life in Har\u00advest Moon titles, I suppose.<\/span><\/p>\n

Oth\u00ader\u00adwise, Back to Nature is a great sim\u00adu\u00adla\u00adtion of farm life. It\u2019s a good way to play a dat\u00ading sim and life sim all at once with very lit\u00adtle con\u00adse\u00adquence for poor choic\u00ades. Get\u00adting back to nature is an idea all of us need to think of at least once, even if it is to dig\u00adi\u00adtal\u00adly pair off and make a fast dollar.<\/span><\/p>\n