Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town (English) · Test

Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town?

GBA veterans will immediately find something familiar with this game and that hunch would prove them correct! Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town is indeed a remake of the GBA classic Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town. Why the name change? That’s because of Story of Seasons is the original under a different name due to licensing and a change of publishers. So if you’re looking for the classic Harvest Moon from your childhood, Story of Seasons is the IP to look out for.

Earlier we looked at Rune Factory 4 Special, which is an RPG Spin-Off of the main IP Story of Seasons, and now it’s time to take a look of the origin.

So how does Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town compare to Rune Factory 4 Special?

A Life in Mineral Town

Before everything else, you can decide on one of the 4 character avatars, with 2 female and 2 male options. The main story only consists of the intro of you reminiscing about your fun holiday at your grandfather's farm. Unfortunately, after he passed away it has fallen into disrepair. Now it’s up to you to bring it back and lead a happy life!

Don’t mistake it for not having a story at all. This is all about the people in Mineral Town and you can see it as a collection of stories. There’s plenty to discover and experience.

The biggest draw is of course the bachelors. 6 women and 6 men are going to be your potential spouses and it’s up to you to vie for them.

Special Note: In a special request, the localizers have changed the former “special relationships” into same-sex marriages.

Gameplay & Controls

Easy game, easy controls

• Left Stick: Move
• Right Stick: Choose and hold items from the Bag.
• D-Pad: Left/Right to switch between tools in your pocket. Up/Down to adjust the camera angle slightly.
• A Button: Talk, examine, etc. Your normal multi-contextual button.
• B Button: Put away the item you’re currently holding.
• X Button: Open the Menu Screen that comes with all kinds of data like relationship status, save, and load function.
• Y Button: Use the currently equipped tool.
• L Button: Shortcut to Tool section in the Menu.
• R Button: Hold to auto-run.
• ZL Button: Whistle to call pets or stop residents.
• ZR Button: Hold to walk slow and sidestep.
• + Button: Open the Town Map. Use the Y Button to check the shops opening hours.
• - Button: Open the Farm Map.

As you can see, there are quite a few buttons used as shortcuts or alternatives/modifiers for certain actions. There are a few nitpicks worth mentioning in regards to overall controls. The tool selection is limited to left and right, which means you’ll have to go through a whole set of tools before getting to the one you’re looking for. It wouldn’t be much of an issue if it weren’t for the unnecessary animation where your character shows it off every single time. It’s also not possible to directly equip a tool and you can only swap places which are rather a contra-productive.

Then there’s another issue of getting the option of fast travel very late in the game because it’s optional and you have to go very deep into the mines to get the item. Once you have it, it’s pretty powerful because you can use it anywhere.

Rune Factory 4 Special made a comparatively better compromise by making it available from the very beginning but limited to your house and soon airship but that’s only a minor inconvenience for having it early available.

Time, Stamina, Fatigue and Money

The game has a real-time Day/Night System that’s vastly faster than ours and it’s also moving in 10 Minute increments. It’s important to note that time does not flow while you’re within a building.

Wake up early at 6:00 AM and go to bed whenever you want to move to the next day. Do your work too late and you will exhaust yourself.

Your stamina is represented in numbers and berries. Make sure you don’t run out or you’ll collapse and wake up in the local clinic.

Just like every other civilization, money is needed for trade and that’s where your work at the farm comes in. You raise crops, take care of your animal friends, and produce byproducts! Everything you want to sell, you put into the Shipping Bin. Resident Zack will arrive at your place at exactly 5 PM and pay you for your shipped products.

As for what you’ll be using the money for? A lot but more about it later.

Festivities in Mineral Town

Don’t let the relatively peaceful town fool you. There are a lot of festivities planned like Horse Racing, Chicken Sumo, Cooking Competition, etc.

This is where you put everything you have done so far into the test. Face the challenge, win, and grab some cool prizes.

Friends in Mineral Town

It wouldn’t be a fun place if it weren’t filled with a lot of interesting people and places. Luckily, it has both. The General Store offers a variety of things such as Seeds for crops, cooking tools, foods for cooking, and more. The most interesting ones are probably the bags that let you carry more Items and Tools, satisfaction guaranteed.

Then there’s a clinic, a shop with all kinds of curiosities at the house at the beach, a winery for some fine grape juice, and a few other things.

There are also two ranches ready to sell you some livestock animals for you to take care of: Chicken, Rabbits, and separated from them are Cows, Alpacas, and Sheep. There are even different kinds of more cows with the double price that produce special milk such as Fruit, Strawberry, and Coffee… YUMM!

The local Forge will help you upgrade some of your tools in exchange for money and material. You can also buy some of the tools here.

You can also opt to have something more fancy made such as accessories in case you’re trying to vie for somebody.

Mineral Town, a new family

You can befriend every single character in Mineral Town. You can see the level of your relationship in the menus in the respective tab as musical notes. Build them up with frequent talking, gift some occasional presents and you will unlock their individual scenes.

The bachelors are a little bit more special as they can become your future spouse. In addition to just liking you, they also have a love stat shown as a heart with different colors depending on their level. It’s easy to spot because the heart is visible right next to their portrait when talking to them.

It’s required to gift them things they like but there are additional steps before becoming a married couple and ultimately parents with a child.

Items and Tools

There’s an important difference between these two because you have a tool and item bag. Items are simple things such as food, vegetables, wood, honey, weed, and whatever you can pick up. Each slot in your item bag can stack up to 9 of the same items before having to occupy another one. Your bags will get full soon but fortunately, you got a shelve and fridge to store them. The latter is only available after your first house expansion and you have to buy it separately. There are only a handful of key items while you can turn the other items into money via the shipping bin.

Tools are things that accompany you throughout your life in Mineral Town such as Hammer, axe, hoe, watering can, etc. It’s important to note that those items required for raising crops are special as you can upgrade them.

The most important thing to keep in mind is that you can buy bigger bags at the General Store later on. Get them early and spare yourself some headaches.

Upgrading your tools

There’s a little bit of RPG in this one. You can gain experience when using special tools. Use them often and level up to unlock further upgrades. It’s one of the three requirements. The next two are material and money. The latter is self-explanatory. You can obtain material within the Spring Mine. You don’t even have to dig too deep to get the penultimate upgrade because you get the required material at level 9 and below.

Their final levels are more complicated and require you to find their cursed counterparts and some extra steps.

Why is it important to upgrade your tools? Because you can charge up to either cover more ground or hit tougher resource deposits. While it takes more stamina to use the charge moves, they are overall a win-win in terms of efficiency.

Workshop

Are your buildings too small? Do you want to take care of more animals? A bigger bed? A fridge? New windows? Then the Workshop is the place to be! Expand and upgrade everything but you have to keep the materials ready which consists of rocks, logs and it also obviously requires money. Each building upgrade will take 3 days so make sure you don’t need anything from the Workshop in that period.

On top of improving your buildings, you can also buy machines such as a fridge and other useful things for money. The trees are going to be the most interesting offer there because they cost only a little bit and they produce fruits and honey. Make sure you have a plan as there’s only a limited place for them.

A Story of Seasons

Just like in reality, there are typical 4 Seasons but each of them only lasts 30 days. Every Season will come with their crops you can raise and it also changes the world visually. Spring, Summer, and Autumn are similar to each. Winter on the other hand does not allow raising crops at all and that’s why it’s seen as your involuntary break month. With no crops available your income will take a big hit but there’s also something that mitigates that lack of income: The Lake Mine.

The Mines

We’ve already established that you can upgrade your tools at the Forge but what are the Mines and why are there two different ones?

They are randomly generated “dungeons” where you can break rocks to get material but here’s the catch, every level has a ladder downwards and those are random as well! So how does it work? You need to bring along your Hoe and Hammer to do the mining work. Break rocks for materials; use the hoe to dig for the ladder to the next level or other items. No tool specials are allowed which means you have to do everything fair and square.

You have to watch your Stamina to not run out and dig as deep as you can. Bring a lot of high stamina food to replenish it or else your expedition will find an untimely end.

As for the difference between the mines. The Spring Mine gets you material for upgrading things and at a really low level the teleportation stone.

The Lake Mine, you could also call it the Winter Mine because it’s only accessible in winter due to the lake freezing, has valuable gems that fetch a good amount of money.

One more thing, sometimes there are hidden holes where you can drop through. While you get a fast track into the lower levels, you also have to pay with quite a bit of stamina. Those falls shouldn’t be lethal as long as you have stamina left but fatigue will start to set in instead if you’re not careful.

TV, fishing, learning cooking recipes and cooking

As a callback to its GBA roots, there’s a CRT TV at your home ready to entertain and help you. There are 4 different programs available with something new to watch every day:

Weather: Curious about tomorrow’s weather? This weather forecast has a 100% success rate!

Education: The education channel will provide you with advice about your life in Mineral Town.

Entertainment: Some long stories in mini-segments and most importantly you can learn new recipes from the cooking show. Then there’s also a fishing guide that tells you what and where to expect which fish.

Fishing is very simple and requires you the fishing rod at a water body and wait for the exclamation mark to pop up. But don’t forget, the better your fishing rod the more types of higher grade fish you can catch.

Your culinary journey starts once you have expanded your house for the first time. Equipped with your trusty Kitchen you cook food to gift them away or prepare for a long digging session in the mines.

Raising Crops

Buy seeds from the general store. Every single seed lets you plant a 3x3 spot, profit guaranteed. Some are one time harvest other ones continue to grow until the end of the season. Sounds easy but also requires commitment as you have to water them every day and you’ll sound find out that it takes time and stamina to pull it off. Plant too much and you run out of both fast. Not only are the crops good to earn money, but also for further refinement such as turning single corn into 30 Chicken/Rabbit fodder. Gras is a little bit special as it grows by itself and is solely used for your Animals like Cows.

Every season you will have to start from zero because all your crops die and you have to clean it up first before planting new crops. It’s recommended to take this into account as you will have to buy new crops to accommodate the change.

The field is huge and it’s very unlikely you’ll be able to take care of it by yourself within reason even with upgraded tools. The good news is, you can ask for some help from the Nature Sprites.

Raising Livestock

Livestock is different from raising crops but none less challenging. The seasons aren’t playing a big role outside of winter where you can’t let them go out to graze. Your first step is to buy them at their respective shops to build your friendship with them. The higher the friendship, the higher quality your By-Products will be. There’s a catch! Your friendship with bought animals has an early cap of 5. Let them breed and their offspring will have higher caps and thus are capable of creating even better By-Products.

Chicken only requires you to breed the eggs at no cost. Cows, Alpacas, Sheep, Rabbits require the consumable breeding tool. Just take care of them as always and soon you can welcome a new member into your family.

Talk, brush, or feed them by hand to improve your friendship.

The 7 Nature Sprites

Taking care of livestock and raising crops is a lot of work. Especially the latter but fear, not 7 trusty friends can help you with 3 things: Watering crops, harvesting crops, and taking care of livestock. You can find them at the north-east of Mineral Time just behind the church.

It’s not as easy as it sounds though! You have to befriend them first, preferably with gifts, and then you can ask them to take care of specific tasks up to 7 days.

Their initial speed is slow that’s why you play with them to level up their skills. Each of the 3 skills has separate mini-games that become increasingly difficult but make sure you are successful or it’ll get worse.

Just like many other things, it takes a while to turn them into masters of their craft especially because all of them have to be trained separately.

Easy Mode

Not interested in having things drawn out? The Easy Mode kick starts with Turnips, faster relationship improvement, and higher payment for your goods.

Gameplay Impression

Despite the relaxing appearance, you always have something to do. Independent action is mandatory, you can try to amass a lot of money, vying for a spouse, adventuring in the mines, winning festival competitions, etc. There is no lack of options.

But one thing is important, the whole game is not a sprint but a marathon. It’s one step after another as there are limitations of how much you can do in a single day.

The randomly generated mines are a mixed bag because… well, they are random, and therefore luck is part of the equation. Trying to go to the lower levels will prove to be a challenge in luck and resources.

The biggest point of contention is most likely going to be the teleportation stone as it’s hidden in the deepest parts of the Spring Mine. This leads us to the next topic: Time and travel.

There’s a certain charm when it comes to having to run to your destinations but when the time is running out when you’re on your way to the shop it leaves you with a little bit of annoyance. This is especially the case when that particular shop is closed the next day. Though it’s only a small thing as everything runs like clockwork and just a very small setback most of the time.

Another point is the people of Mineral Town. All of them have a weekly schedule every day shouldn’t deviate too much depending on the character. Nevertheless, it would be nice if there was at least an indicator for them on the map. The safest way to know their schedule is to follow them around for a day if you’re interested.

And that’s it with nitpicking. They sound like issues but it’s nothing that big, to be honest.

The strength of the game lies in having a relaxing day in Mineral Town and creating your routine to work towards your set goals in the way you want. Putting it into perspective when it comes to playtime, the first year took me already over 10 hours and that’s just the beginning.

Graphics & Sound

The graphics are one spot where Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town is better than Rune Factory 4 Special. There are no longer any pre-rendered backgrounds and thus it leads to more coherent visuals. The character and animal designs are on the cute side that enhances the atmosphere. The cows are a special kind of cute.

On a technical view, it’s nothing special but also nothing that sticks out negatively. The biggest advantage is the nearly non-existent loading times that make the gameplay experience flow smooth.

Your auditory senses aren’t neglected either. Beautiful soft and upbeat tunes will accompany you through the seasons. If there’s one thing I disliked is the fact that there’s no music when it rains. While it helps with the atmosphere, I don’t think the tradeoff is worth it.
The sound effects are more reserved to fit the theme of the game but there are still strong ones like the call of the cow which never gets old. The soothing sound of hammering stone or preparing the land with the hoe still gives you good feedback for your ears.

Verdict

Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral town is a fantastic and relaxing game that lets you set your pacing. There’s a lot to do and plenty of content to uncover. If you’re looking for a simple and good time, this is it.

Away from the action, a tranquil but fulfilling everyday life in Mineral Town at your farm is awaiting you. It convinces with a simple but engaging gameplay, soothing visuals and music.

The slightly lower rating in comparison to Rune Factory 4 Special is because of the UX (User Experience) like fast travel being locked away deep into the mines and the slightly weird item/tool selection.

Considering the entry price of 49,99€/£42.99, which is still under the usual MSRP, it’s a clear recommendation. This game is for those who’re looking for something to slow down and relax from a stressful day.

Wertung

9.0Sehr gut

Kaufempfehlung

95% Kaufempfehlung

95%Absoluter Pflichtkauf