That’s quite a bit of added realism to handle so far already but there’s more. Crops are still grown the same way as before i.e. clear the land, plough, sow seeds and water. However, it’s not that easy to grow crops anymore. Each type of crop requires a different amount of sunshine and water which means if you happen to have several days of sunshine or rain, your crops could end up taking a very long time to grow! Crops are the main income during the early parts of the game and with the unforgiving energy gauge coupled up with these new requirements, it’s really hard to make some cash early on.


You’ll have to hunt for these herbs if you want to achieve much.
Crops are hard to grow but don’t think you can still rely on your animals early in the game. While in previous games the barn and other buildings were pre-built and all you had to do was purchase your animals, you have to build their homes first this time. As before, this involves either gathering the materials and saving up the money you need or, just paying a higher amount of money for the materials too which can cost you up to ten times more. Once you have your animals though, it’s down to the usual business of caring for them before they grow up and produce the raw goods that you can sell. With the new touch screen controls, it’s actually faster to feed your farm animals now that you can just drag and throw their food quickly into their pens.

As you care for your animals, little mini games can also occasionally appear such as stroking your animals with the stylus or, a timing game for bonus produce. The stroking game gets very tiresome however because every time it appears, you have to stroke for several minutes before the animal is satisfied enough. It wouldn’t be so bad if the animals actually reacted differently depending on where you stroked it such as its neck or top of its head but they don’t. When it’s only one animal you have to tend to this isn’t a problem but when you have several, it is extremely tedious.


“Moooo!” - Mini games such as this get boring fast.
It’s not all bad though as long as you’ve planned ahead and saved up a nice sum of money for winter because, this is the time when you can finally upgrade your tools to make life much much easier! Unlike recent HM games where you have to mine for ore, all you have to do now is check your local shop for “Suteki (Wonder) Stones”.

Similar to some RPGs such as FFVII and Legend of Heroes VI, farming tools that you have access to now have a certain number of slots in them and this is how you can customise their stats. Every few days in winter, the shop owner sells a different coloured Wonder Stone that in turn, produces a different effect when embedded into your tool. Examples include Jade Wonder Stones lowering the amount of energy you need to use, Indigo that increases the number of slots, Crimson increasing the area length a tool covers and Blue increasing the area width a tool covers. All has their separate prices of course with the Indigo ones being the most expensive.


Wonder Stones makes the game easier – much easier!
As mentioned earlier, the main theme of the game is developing the island and as you do this, various people start arriving on your island giving you access to new goods and services such as cafes and diners. Developing the island simply means you have to export various goods and pay Gouran the carpenter to expand your farm. This includes making your own small home bigger, building new animal homes but most important of all - the bridges that give you access to the other parts of the island. Without these bridges, you’re not going to have much excitement because one of them leads to a large field where all the events take place.