Harvest Moon: Back to Nature

Harvest Moon: Back to Nature, known in Japan as , is a video game in the farm simulation series Story of Seasons, developed and published by Victor Interactive Software. It is the first Harvest Moon game for a non-Nintendo console. Characters from Harvest Moon 64 were transferred to be the characters in this game, although with new lifestyles, personalities, and relatives.
A version featuring a female protagonist was released in Japan on December 7, 2000. In 2005, Harvest Moon: Back to Nature was coupled with the girl version and ported as Harvest Moon: Boy & Girl, known in Japan as , for the PlayStation Portable, although the box art and instructions portrayed it as a new game. In 2008, Marvelous Interactive released Harvest Moon: Back to Nature and Bokujō Monogatari Harvest Moon for Girl for the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable via the PlayStation Network.
This game was remade as the Game Boy Advance games Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town and Harvest Moon: More Friends of Mineral Town, both of which would later get a remake of their own for the Nintendo Switch under the name Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town.
Story
As a young boy, the main character, defaultly named Pete, went to his grandfather's farm for the summer. His grandfather was too busy taking care of the farm to spend much time with him, so the boy explored the town and countryside on his own. The boy befriended his grandfather's puppy and met a little girl his own age with whom he became close friends. When the summer was over the boy had to go back home, but he promised the little girl that he would return someday. Ten years later, years after his grandfather's death, the boy, now a grown man, returns to the town to take over the farm. Upon meeting the main character, mayor and other villagers decide that he would be allowed to stay as the rightful owner if he restored the farm to its original state within three years. Otherwise, he would have to leave. If he is successful and has married one of the bachelorettes, he will be allowed to stay and his wife reveals that she is the young girl from his childhood.
The girl part story began at a ship, where the female character, defaultly named Claire, befriended a fellow passenger, but tragedy struck. The passenger ship she was in sunk, she was the sole survivor, and washed ashore to the village where she found by a boy. She was revived by the villagers and she was given the abandoned farm to start over her life, after they learn of the situation she had. The story ends if she marries a bachelor, who is revealed to be the same boy who found her.
Gameplay
The game begins with main character inheriting a small amount of money and ramshackle farm covered in weeds. Over the course of the game the player must build a thriving farm, and become a friend of the citizens of Mineral Town. Throughout the game the player must balance between attending to the farm and interacting with other characters to maintain friendships. In order to begin with the story, the player must overcome the first obstacle of reestablishing the farm by getting rid of weeds and planting new crops. Once that is done a time frame of three years to completely rejuvenate the farm begins. Time passes while the player is outdoors, and pauses inside different buildings such as shops or barns and mines. Both the growing of crops and raising of livestock require daily attention and the expenditure of time.
Player starts off with an assortment of rudimentary farming tools which can later be upgraded and refined to allow for a more efficient work rate, allowing more work to be done with less energy. Energy is the predominant element of the game, affecting all other aspects of it, particularly in the early stages. The main character can perform a limited amount of tasks each day. Rather than displaying an energy bar, the game instead shows the character becoming more tired as he performs more tasks. Working after the energy has been depleted results in character's blackout and hospitalization which leads to incapacity to perform work; duration of hospitalization increases with each subsequent blackout. There are weather patterns as well as four different seasons in the game, often changing at random but also when certain progress is made. There are rainfalls, hurricanes, frost and blizzards which all do damage to player's farm as they would in real life.
Player can participate in a number of activities, such as betting on horse races, dating and partaking in festivals which coincide with the seasons. During the game, the player will be tasked with finding a suitable wife who will, once proposed to, join the player on the farm where they soon after marry and start a family. Once the initial three years pass, if the farm was completely renewed, the player character's family settles on their farm for good and the game continues indefinitely, otherwise the game ends.
Reception
Back to Nature received "favorable" reviews, while Boy & Girl received "mixed" reviews, according to the review aggregation website Metacritic. In Japan, Famitsu gave the former a score of 31 out of 40.
References
External links
1999 video games
Back to Nature
Marvelous Entertainment
Natsume Inc. games
PlayStation (console) games
PlayStation Portable games
PlayStation Network games
Victor Interactive Software games
Video games developed in Japan
Video games with gender-selectable protagonists
Single-player video games