Thursday, July 24, 2008

Thanks from a Perfectionist

Hey. I just wanted to say thank you for all of the guides, they've always been immensely helpful to me. Harvest Moon is my fave series, even though I'm horrible at time management and such; coupled with my need to be a perfectionist, it makes these games really tough for me! But still, I love it. Right now I'm playing Harvest Moon DS Cute while waiting for the two new games (preordered, looking forward to my plushies). I think the farthest I've ever made it is 23 Spring, Year 1. I keep restarting...! I can never get my daily routine hammered out, so I struggle and feel like I've done something horribly wrong. Hehe, I have to try and get gifts to EVERYONE, but it's difficult... ah well!

Sorry, I ramble on (it's 3am after all, kinda loopy). Again, thank you very much...! It makes it so much easier to know what to give people. I'll hammer out my daily schedule someday...!

My response: Thank you for your email. I always am inspired to work harder when players tell me that my guides have been helpful.

I myself am a perfectionist and my own instinct is to wring the most out of every day in Harvest Moon. I find myself replaying a day in order to save a few minutes (in-game) here or there or to perform a chore better. I hate to make mistakes but really, Harvest Moon is VERY forgiving of errors. There are few errors that cannot be reversed. When you give an individual a gift he/she detests, you always can restore Heart Levels that have been lost. Littering can reduce an individual's AP to zero, but you can RESTORE that AP by giving Most Favourites or even gifts that are liked but not loved. I try to trigger events as early as possible in the game for the sake of the guide but an ordinary player has all the time in the world in many cases. If a game can last for 255 years, what is the rush? What errors cannot be reversed in 255 years???

You need to move on past the first Spring. Buy the Teleport Stone so you can visit every one early in the morning. Even if you give them items that they like rather than love, you can raise FP to maximum very quickly! You really do need to allow yourself to experience Events and make progress in the game.

By the way, my guides for Island of Happiness should be published on IGN on the day the game is released. My written guide for Tree of Tranquility will be published by Brady Games and is available now for pre-order I believe. As I worked on a printed guide for ToT for Brady, I shan't be able to write online guides for that game but a printed guide may be more useful in any case.

Thursday, July 17, 2008

Thanks from Alyssa

Hello--

I got a later start on Harvest Moon than most people...while everyone was talking about Magical Melody's upcoming release, I had just discovered MFoMT. With all of the talk about the newer games, and me struggling to make myself known in HM forums, it was more than a little difficult to get some of the information I needed for the game I was playing. Your guides for MFOMT for were lifesavers for me! I progressed well through that game and ended up rich, married, and with a kid and a highly developed farm.

Well, what happens to many happened to me--I got hooked on HM! Unfortunately, I tend to be a minimalist if I don't know any better...and reading your guides helped me know better! If it was up to me, my biggest goal in most HM games would be to get married and then I would probably throw it aside and wait for the next game to come out. However, I read your general guide for the game before playing (I'm kinda going backwards with the series, I just bought HM3 for the GBC) and it helps me out a lot! You've probably saved me from throwing my DS in the trash on multiple occasions when I couldn't figure out how to win Keira over.

Anyways, just wanted to drop you a virtual line and say "Keep it up!" Now that I'm more established in Harvest Moon message boards and someone asks me a question to which I don't know the answer, your guides are the first I check, becasue they are so thorough! I from experience know that it's not easy to write them, and it's very time consuming, but, at the expense of sounding corny, you're actually very inspiring to me.

Keep writing! I know I speak for a lot of people when I say we really appreciate your hard work!

Alyssa