Monday, January 26, 2015

Shall We Do It? (Harvest Moon: The Lost Valley)

If you follow me on Twitter, you've likely seen me comment on my Harvest Moon: The Lost Valley playthrough quite a bit over the last couple of weeks.

A lot of those tweets have been pretty negative, and for good reason. This 3DS game--which was made internally at Natsume rather than by the folks at Marvelous Entertainment--does nearly everything it can to break the heart and soul of the person playing it.

First, there's the blink-and-you'll-miss-it passage of time. As in, each in-game day lasts about five minutes in the real world--which may not sound all that bad, but it surely is when you have to try to fit tending to your crops, milking and feeding your cow, chatting with semi-random visitors and many other, similar sorts of tasks into such a severely compressed period of time.

This is what summer looked like in my version of
The Lost Valley--for two whole days.

That's especially true when it comes to the portions of the game that revolve around watering flowers and other plants as well as the Minecraft-y ones that involve re-sculpting the landscape (by digging into the earth or excavating stone) in various ways. Crops are fertilized, watered and harvested one plant at a time, for instance, and digging and excavating stick to a similar formula.

Another way in which The Lost Valley attempts to deter even the most Pollyanna-ish players is tied to all of the annoying "fetch quests" that are forced on those who would like to push along the story that sits at the center of the experience.

Here's a much more typical view of my particular
portion of this 3DS game's world.

And believe me, you'll want to push along the story as quickly as you're able, as doing so allows you to eradicate from the game one of its biggest and most obnoxious issues, which is its seemingly never-ending winter.

For those of you who've yet to read or hear much about The Lost Valley, you may be surprised to learn that it drops you (or, rather, your avatar) into a desolate, snow-covered landscape. Unbelievably, that's about all you'll see for the first 20 hours or so, assuming your playthrough is anything like mine has been so far. That's because, as per the game's story, your main task during your first year in The Lost Valley is to help bring the seasons back to this harsh and deserted environment. Although it's possible you'll be able to do what it takes to see a couple days of spring, summer or fall before they cruelly snap back to winter, the most likely scenario is that your initial 120 days with this title (each season lasts 30 in-game days) will be spent staring at a blanket of white.

Presented without comment.

As I said while recording the latest episode of The Nichiest Podcast Ever, a part of me actually respects and even appreciates that The Lost Valley's developers were so brazen as to plop players into such an uninviting world. Another part, though, absolutely hates them for it, as what seemed like an acceptable-enough situation for my first few hours with the game has since become almost unbearable.

Note I just said "almost" unbearable rather than, say, completely unbearable. That's because despite all of my complaints so far, I've still devoted more than 20 hours to The Lost Valley since I first crammed its cart into my 3DS a couple of weeks ago. Clearly, something keeps drawing me back, even if that "thing" is nothing more than a stubborn desire to prove--to myself, to shidoshi, to designers who surely snickered as they pieced together this masochistic experience--I can make it through the game's abominable opening salvo.

Believe me, I enjoyed summer as much as I could while it lasted.

I'm nearly through my first year in The Lost Valley, by the way, so it's possible the game will take a turn for the better shortly. Being an avowed cynic, I'm not going to place any money on that coming to fruition, but who knows? Maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised for once.

Even if I'm not, I'm planning to plow ahead (pun intended), at least for the time being. I won't be shocked if my interest in the game wanes sometime the next week or two, though, as I just can't imagine it's going to change enough once I rid the world of its oppressive frigidity to the bowels of hell--or somewhere similarly suitable--to keep my attention. 

I'll let you know one way or the other in my next "Shall We Do It?" post, of course. In the meantime, have any of you played Harvest Moon: The Lost Valley? If so, what are your thoughts on its particular pros and cons?

19 comments:

Zach said...

Man, that sounds like a rough game! The "Dark Souls" of Harvest Moon, as a modern game critic would say. ;)


But seriously, that sounds real tedious. I, too, hope that it gets better as you play more. Passage of time was always weird/difficult for me in "Wonderful Life", with inexplicable situations like your cows drying up for the winter when your crops were gone, having to live off selling chicken eggs and different weeds/plants that you'd previously been subsisting off of... and obviously this game would probably have a lot of refinement in those areas compared to an old GameCube game, but it sounds like there's still a very real struggle against nature.

apricotsushi said...

Heh they made a lot of odd decisions with this one! Hopefully they'll at least learn from the criticism and make a sequel that is more polished

TheGameroomBlitz said...

Wow, the Minecraft comparison is right on target. Thems some seriously ugly graphics!

thegaygamer.com said...

I actually think it looks better than these shots suggest, Jess, but I like the game's art style quite a bit so maybe I'm being blinded by that?


Also, I love your ideas for how I could rename this column in the future, if need be--the second one, especially.

thegaygamer.com said...

I sure hope they learn from the mistakes they made here, Anne, as I think it has potential. I actually like the idea of The Lost Valley's story, for instance, but it just doesn't really work in the end (in part because you have to play through 20-plus hours of winter before you get to see proper seasons). Oh, well, maybe next time?

thegaygamer.com said...

It isn't entirely terrible, Terry. If it were, I wouldn't still be playing it--even if I am only playing it out of spite (which I actually don't believe it completely the case).


As for the Minecraft elements: I quite like them, actually, but every day is so rushed that it's almost impossible to enjoy them.


You know what's sad? I have a feeling that a year or two down the road I'll say this game grew on me, too. I'm not sure it should, though...

thegaygamer.com said...

Ha! You're definitely right that a lot of folks would call this the "Dark Souls" of the Harvest Moon series--and they'd deserve everything they get as a result :P


As for this game being tedious--yes, that's pretty much it. There are some nice elements here, but they have a nearly impossible task in overcoming the tedium.


Another weird thing about this game is that the constant winter is only superficial, as far as I can tell. You can still plant every crop and flower, for instance--which is a godsend, as can you imagine if you couldn't plant any crops/flowers for an entire year in a HM game?

TheGameroomBlitz said...

Off-topic, I just put you on my 3DS friends list. Heads up!

thegaygamer.com said...

Oh! Which 3DS did you "friend," Jess? The one listed here, I'm guessing?

klkAlexar said...

My intentions were to preorder this game, mostly for the plushie, but I kept putting it off and then it came out before I noticed. I'll probably make do with Story of Seasons for my farming fix, and wait for a more polish Harvest Moon game.

thegaygamer.com said...

Sorry if I was in any way responsible for prompting you to pass on this game, klkAlexar. In a way, I'd kind of like to hear what someone like yourself--who seems to be a Harvest Moon fan--thinks of this iteration, as I honestly have no idea how similar or dissimilar this entry is to past ones :|

TheGameroomBlitz said...

Yep. Hope that's the way to go!

klkAlexar said...

Nope, I just haven't heard that many praises from other HM fans, and your post just confirms that it's a bit rough. I wasn't really hyped for this game but I was curious to see Natsume's take on Harvest Moon. Are you planning on buying Story of Seasons?

thegaygamer.com said...

I think that's my OG 3DS, which I still use, but use less than my XL. I'll get you that friend code, too, so we can be friends on both of them :)

thegaygamer.com said...

Not at the moment. I don't care for its art style (boring) and I have a feeling that this game will be enough for me for a bit.


I just got the first Harvest Moon (via the Wii eShop) and a Harvest Moon 64 cart, though, so if those really excite me I may consider Story of Seasons or some of the other, more modern HM games.

TheGameroomBlitz said...

Works for me!

Justin Difazzio said...

That sounds horrific. I loathe winter in real life and in video games. There are hardly ever ice levels that are fun. 20 hours of winter? I'd have put the damn thing in the microwave to see if I could warm it up a bit.

thegaygamer.com said...

I'll send the code to you tonight via Twitter DM, I think. So, be on the lookout for it!

thegaygamer.com said...

Believe me, Justin, I've considered doing the same--and worse!