Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life/ Thoughts and Experiences

Lately, I've been feeling nostalgic for some of the slower games of my childhood. The one that stands above all the others in my mind, without a doubt is Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life. However, discerning what made the game so special to me when I was younger isn't so much about the game but myself and what I was going through when I played it.



I bought Harvest Moon: A wonderful Life for the GameCube when I was about ten or so. I remember being intrigued by the back of the box boasting about marriage being possible in the game. This was something that I was curios to see, so I... didn't buy it. Nope, I went home and waited for about two weeks where the game clung to the back of my mind. Eventually I gave in and bought it, immediately feeling buyer's remorse at the fact that I had just bought an incredibly slow, and rather ugly game about farming of all things. I put the game on my shelf, never to be played again. It wasn't until 2 or three years later, when I found myself in a hideous purple/pink cast that when up to my thigh with nothing to do, that I actually decided to play it. I was bored, and seriously frustrated at the fact that simply getting out of a chair was now a struggle. I was pretty glum, and without any new game to play I decided to try that weird game about farming.

It's odd to say, but that game was exactly what I needed at the time. The game is in no way a graphical showcase, even for the GameCube, and it was even more dated in 2008. Yet, it was very easy for myself at the time to get lost in it. I've always thought that the sound design is one of the best parts of the game, with nature sounds being predominant for most of the time spent playing. While I can now see a myriad of technical issues in its mechanics, the game is lovely to go fishing in, hearing the nearby waterfall and gazing at the low-poly trees... It's honestly a silly thing to reminisce about, but especially during a time when I cooped up inside all day, having a crude approximation of nature helped me immensely. More importantly, the game let me walk, note even run, just walk and that alone would make my day. The game is not prefect, I don't even know If i should even call it good, especially with the expectations of today. It is in many ways a dumbed-down experience compared to many of the other games in the series, and painfully shows its age today. Even with all that, the game has an amazing atmosphere, and an incredibly eclectic one at that. As soon as you leave the farm, the game goes from serene to, well, serene and WEIRD. Oriental styled hotel right next to mad scientist's laboratory? Yup, it's there. A strange triangle-based variation on  the board game go? Yep, it's even played with a fireworks-crafting duo of rather short brothers! Sure some of it went over my head at the time, like the overweight traveling merchant that references the Atkins diet, but a whole lot of it seemed very strange at the time as well. The fact that the dog you don't choose at the beginning in the game can be found at the very northern part of the map, albeit very tiny? NO EXPLANATION GIVEN. (Your assistant/ mentor even says he will find the other one a home! Did he LIE?) The incredibly mysterious artist? As far as I could see, never given any more development. At one point one of the villagers dies and her husband then goes on to become a recluse, living in a fishing shack. These were odd to see in a farming simulation at the time, and are definitely still now.

Everything, from the bizarre to the quaint, adds to why I adore this game. It's a game that would never be made to today, with a lot of Japanese development focusing on more anime-inspired aesthetics and the game's caricature-like characters possibly being seen as offensive (especially the possibility of your teenage son becoming a drunk). It's a game I love slather praise on today, but absolutely hated when I got it. All in all... I don't really know what the point of this article is, but this game is great even if solely because it helped me through a hard time.