To paraphrase a bunch of anti-Nazi singing nuns: How do you clear up an issue like reviewing a recreation that is nearly 25 years previous? The nuns by no means got here up with a solution, however we now have to, as a result of it is a evaluate, not a convent, and it is the difficulty on the coronary heart of this evaluate, in any case. Harvest Moon 64 got here out in 1999 — the twentieth century! — and it actually performs prefer it, with clunky digital camera angles, poor localisation, a dearth of issues to do, and music that can drive you loopy with its incessant 32-bar loops.
However nobody is coming to the Nintendo Change On-line emulations of N64 video games anticipating one thing that might have been made yesterday. There are many individuals who will gladly gobble this recreation up from the NSO Enlargement Pack service, eyes blissfully blurred by the rose-tinted specs of nostalgia, and to that we are saying — good for you! We’ve got been that particular person sufficient instances to know the enjoyment of feeling the nice and cozy ’90s-flavoured fuzzies working by means of your blood. However to these of you studying this who’re, maybe, extra used to a extra fashionable interpretation of a farming sim — this evaluate is for you.
Harvest Moon 64 is from a less complicated time, far nearer to the origins of Harvest Moon in 1996 than what farming sims are as of late. The collection started as creator Yasuhiro Wada’s goals of a rural, pleasantly pastoral facet of Japan that’s largely gone now, changed by machines, skyscrapers, and consumerism (a theme that seems in video games like Stardew Valley, too). In rural Japan, there’s not a lot to do, and positively no mix harvesters and computerized sprinklers that will help you plant, develop, and reap your crops — every part is completed painstakingly by hand, from feeding your cows to watering your fields.
Is it tedious? Oh, sure. Your life will get barely simpler as soon as your instruments auto-upgrade after a sure variety of makes use of, which you’ll cheat a bit bit by spam-using them inside buildings, the place time is paused, but it surely’s nonetheless a ache within the donkey to should feed all of your cattle or promote your crops one-by-one, and it is not helped by your piddly little eight-slot stock, both.
And let’s not overlook the harshness of early farming sims, the place you may typically end up throwing crops on the bottom by chance, or sowing seeds one millimetre away from the place you wished and shedding half of them, or — like we did — having your horse bravely leap between you and the dust, leading to you hitting him with a hoe. And now he is mad at us. MATE. YOU DID THIS TO YOURSELF.
Harvest Moon 64 is fiddly, infuriating, and unforgiving… buuuuut when you’re taking part in on Change, liberal use of the save-state function of the NSO video games smooths over lots of these creases. In truth, save-scumming may even turn out to be useful if you wish to win huge on the horse races. Trace trace.
Talking of horse races, there are just a few festivals to partake in, which break up the nice tedium about as soon as each fortnight. There are different occasions, too, just like the mine opening throughout winter solely, or the bridge being in-built late autumn, giving entry to a brand new and really boring mountain. However the basic feeling of nothing-to-do-ness is kind of the purpose, is not it? For those who’ve ever lived in a small city that misplaced its thoughts when a McDonald’s opened up simply off the roundabout, you may know the sensation.
You’ll, after all, be anticipated to marry. Giving presents and speaking to your supposed will slowly construct up their affection for you, and after some time, you possibly can pop the query with the collection’ equal of an engagement ring: the Blue Feather. Or — as a result of it is a janky recreation with lots of bugs — you are able to do what we did, and spam ‘A’ to indicate the tsundere Karen your canine 255 instances in in the future to take her all the way in which to most hearts. Romance is useless, however our turbo button is alive and effectively, thank goodness.
Sadly, marriage ain’t all it is cracked as much as be. In truth, seconds after proposing to Karen, she requested us what our identify was, and launched herself. Later that exact same day, we met her on the seaside, the place she yelled at us for… not proposing. Woman. Now that we’re married, she lurks round our home, speaking about laundry. Each single day. There was even one time the place we got here in to seek out her in mattress, solely to enter the kitchen and uncover one other Karen, who had whipped up a birthday feast for us. For those who can teleport, Karen, why do not you assist with the farmwork each on occasion?
These little quirks of code will maintain developing, and as we have already talked about, the localisation is not nice, both. Typos abound, and a few issues make zero sense — like after we examined one among our cows to seek out out that its birthday was ‘jis020-13’, a date format we’re not acquainted with, or when Popuri responds to us exhibiting her our canine with “Hand, huh?” There’s even a typo on the beginning display screen, the place Natsume’s identify is spelled ‘Natume’, which looks like a reasonably dangerous oversight. We do not count on this recreation’s bugs to be ironed out a quarter-century later — particularly provided that the developer, Victor Interactive, not exists — but it surely actually makes us admire the diligence of contemporary devs and their thorough patches.
General, dunking on how janky and empty Harvest Moon 64 is looks like getting mad at an ageing actor for not being cute anymore. Although its jankiness is difficult to forgive, the shortage of issues to do is just so apparent as a result of we have had 25 years of improvement within the farming recreation style. If you wish to play one thing that is higher, then you possibly can actually comply with the evolution by means of Again To Nature, Pals of Mineral City, and the new-ish remake of Pals of Mineral City — all of the characters persist, however the world is greater, the mechanics extra forgiving, and the characters extra fleshed-out.
However if you wish to expertise historical past, soak your self within the waters of nostalgia, and study to understand how good we now have it as of late (and you have already got the Nintendo swap On-line Enlargement Pack)… then give Harvest Moon 64 a go.
Conclusion
Harvest Moon 64 cannot hope to face as much as fashionable farming sims, however typically it is good to get a reminder of how far we have come. When you have a shred of nostalgia for this one, you may have a good time, particularly with the added bonus of simple save-scumming, and you must add a few factors to the rating beneath. For anybody else, the jankiness and tedium could be an excessive amount of to bear. Simply make certain to play it with a information, as a result of this recreation tells you NOTHIN’.