Nintendo announced a lot of games last night at their Japanese conference. Many of them, like Punch-Out!! here, were brand new. Some, like Supan Smasher and Cosmic Walker, we still don't know anything about. But we've got screenshots. So many screenshots.
After the break, you'll find galleries of all the new games, along with new screens of some upcoming games we've known about for a while. Of special interest to us among the previously-announced Oboro Muramasa Youtouden, coming to the US as Muramasa: The Demon Blade, because it looks super hot, Karaoke Joysound Wii, which appears to have art by Parappa creator Rodney Alan Greenblat, and Takuto of Magic (Wand of Magic), which appears to be a followup to Taito's LostMagic on the DS.
Our Japanese is not quite good enough to ascertain the nuances of this dramatic scene, but what we could understand was self-evident anyway. In this ad for Harvest Moon: Waku Waku Animal March, the frog wants the cow to give him a ride like the animals in the game do.
The cow (spoilers!) relents, and the frog gleefully hops on, only to find the ride slow. The cow complains about being out of energy, and the frog cheers him on, telling him to summon his "cow power." Then the frog takes off on a date with Keromi-chan.
In the second part, after the break, the frog and cow decide to make use of Waku Waku Animal March's photo features. Wackiness ensues, culminating with the frog asking the cow to take some "sexy" shots.
And that's why you should buy Harvest Moon: Waku Waku Animal March.
Do you like drawing Harvest Moon cows over, and over, and over again? We're not going to go investigating (for the same reason we try not to investigate any fanart on the intertron), but we suspect that there is a thriving Harvest Moon fanart community -- and they're going to love this.
All you have to do is draw a picture (like, on paper) featuring any character and any animal from a Harvest Moon game, and mail it in. Twenty winners will get stuff! Official rules can be found at the link.
The official website for Bokujou Monogatari: Waku Waku Animal March has updated with new screens and art of all the super-adorable animals that will be featured -- the ones above can even be kept as pets. But even more heartwarming than cartoon pandas is the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection logo on the front page. The game supports WiiConnect24 in some as-yet-unspecified way -- sharing crops? Sending pictures of yourself riding a goat along the beach?
Marvelous has also announced the Japanese release date: October 30. Since this is a Harvest Moon game, we expect Natsume to pick it up for release here, but they've got to finish with Tree of Tranquility first. Less likely to leave Japan is the promotional campaign associated with Animal March, in which lucky winners will receive Harvest Moon stickers ... or yogurt.
Posted Aug 20th 2008 8:18PM by JC Fletcher Filed under: News
Harvest Moon: Magical Melody was released on the GameCube in 2006 in the US. Rising Star Games, Marvelous's European branch, then ported it to the Wii with new motion controls, releasing that version in March of this year. This makes sense for Europe, since the Wii was out by the time the GameCube version would have been released.
According to a Siliconera interview with Natsume president Yasuhiro Maekawa, the company is considering an American release of that ported Magical Melody. "If we were to release the Wii version of Magical Melody", Maekawa said, "we would most likely be looking at a limited release aimed at our hardcore and loyal fans.We have had quite a few requests to release this game and are looking into it." Limited-edition releases have the power both to tempt fence-sitters and to save money for publishers, so this approach is a smart one.
The rest of the interview discusses the history of the series and of Natsume's involvement, and is an excellent read for anyone with an interest in fake farming.
Harvest Moon: Tree of Tranquility is a big game. The first thing that I noticed was just how large the game world is. You aren't restricted to just one farm, instead able to spread many a seed across many a land. Aside from that, the game very much feels like all of the other Harvest Moon titles, which can be a good thing or a bad thing, depending on whether you're a fan of the series or not.
After seeing this new Rune Factory Frontier video (not to mention the new screens in our gallery below), we can't help but crow onagain about how wonderful this game looks.
We haven't learned many new facts about the game at E3 -- at least, not yet. We did find out, though, that the little fairy-like creatures hanging around in certain screens are actually spirits. As more spirits gather, you might run into larger and rarer creatures.
While we know Frontier won't be a sandbox style game, the video makes it look like there will be a lot of exploring to do. This could become a pain in a Rune Factory game (having to plant certain crops in a certain dungeon because of its season, and then constantly having to run around and take care of those crops), we love the idea of having a big area to feel out. We really can't wait for this one -- 2009 won't come fast enough.
Check out the screens in the gallery if you'd like, but make sure to click on the "High Res" button to get a feel for their full beauty.
This week brings plenty of videos for you to watch on the Everyone's Nintendo Channel. From a look at how All-Play works in Tiger Woods 09, right down to another video of Alyson with Wii Fit. So, check out the list below, situated in handy bullet-point form:
Harvest Moon: Tree of Tranquility already features some wild and exotic animals not usually found in the adorable farming series, like friendly ostriches. The newly-announced sequel seems to be going even further down that wacky path. For one thing, it's called Bokujou Monogatari: Waku Waku Animal March (Harvest Moon: Exciting Animal March). For another, animals like a lion, a giraffe, a hippopotamus, and a zebra can be seen in the art found on the new game's website.
Other than the new animals and a new, older-looking pair of player characters, Waku Waku Animal March looks strikingly similar to Tree of Tranquility. Check out the screens at Famitsu and more at Dengeki. It will be interesting to see if Natsume picks this up for localization or if the new Marvelous USA takes care of it themselves (through XSEED).
Natsume is celebrating the ten-year anniversary of the Harvest Moon franchise* in the best possible way: with new Harvest Moon games. They released new screens today of the Wii farming game Harvest Moon: Tree of Tranquility, which feature all the best parts of Harvest Moon: planting stuff, caring for animals, riding around on an ostrich -- wait, what? In case all the tomato-growing hadn't quite lured you into the world of Harvest Moon yet, maybe the allure of awkward livestock vehicles may do the trick.
*They say it's the ten-year anniversary, but Harvest Moon came out in Japan in 1996 and the U.S. in 1997. It is the ten-year anniversary of the PAL release of Harvest Moon SNES, so it still counts!
Rune Factory Frontier is looking too hot for its own good, as evidenced by these newest screens. We gobble up every piece of Frontier media with such frenzy, it's as if we grew them ourselves! Get it? Growing, eating, the whole Harvest Moon thing? Funny? No?
These images need a wee bit of explanation. The above menu represents the new ring command system, allowing for maximum efficiency while harvesting those sweet, sweet runes. Different items can be assigned to each slot in the item ring, so you can grab anything you need on the fly. It's not the most mind-blowingly original feature (any attacking runes for massive damage?), but rather more evidence that Rune Factory Frontier won't disappoint. More screens after the break!
Lack of press? Lack of press? Why, that's all wrong ... now. The latest trailer for Harvest Moon: Tree of Tranquility has surfaced, in English and everything. Well, there's only five spoken words from the cheerful announcers, but the gameplay content features some items the harvesting hero is working with, like "perfect turnip" and "used hoe."
It looks like a lovely, peaceful game (aside from the vicious attacks). The mix of farming and socializing has always been a great feature of Harvest Moon, and the wait for a full-fledged title on the Wii has been agonizing. Not long now -- August 26th is the time to plant to evergreen seeds of fun. And tranquility.
More beautiful Rune Factory Frontier screens have surfaced, and we're still pining over this lovely-looking game. Between the farming, monster slaying and collecting, flying whales, and glowing creatures, we're pretty much in awe of this RPG-meets-farming-sim hybrid.
Granted, not everyone who played the first title in the series for the Nintendo DS appreciated the gameplay, but we thoroughly enjoyed it. Just by sticking to those basic tenets and adding visuals like these, we doubt we'll be disappointed. If Marvelous adds some extra goodies as well, that would just be icing on this agricultural cake.
You only have to check past the break to see the rest of the pretties.
There's been a disturbing lack ofpress about Harvest Moon: Tree of Tranquility. In fact, we've probably seen and heard more about Rune Factory: Frontier than we have about Tree, which came out in Japan last year.
What we do know is that preordering the title through Amazon will get you an adorable cow plushie. Of course, it's difficult to tell when you'll actually receive the game and plush doll; Natsume lists "Summer 2008," Gamestop lists late July, Gamefly lists early August, and Amazon lists late August, to name a few of the scattered release dates.
Still, for Harvest Moon fans who were planning to buy the game anyway, a cute cow plush is a nice bonus that might make preordering through Amazon the best way to go. It's certainly not the greatest gift ever, but we think it will definitely appeal to the Harvest Moon crowd ... mostly because we're in that crowd, and we want one for ourselves.
Harvest Moon fans (like us) are probably drooling at the thought of Rune Factory: Frontier, which is releasing in Japan sometime this year (and not in other territories until forever, we'd guess). Yet by now, you should be used to the "look but don't touch" mantra, with all the screens we show you week after week.
As far as Rune Factory: Frontier goes, being restricted to looking is especially painful because the screens are nothing short of lovely. We only wish that Marvelous was quicker with the whole localization thing.
In other news, the game's official website is open for business. Since the site isn't offering anything tangible at the moment, though, you can just click past the break to see the rest of the pretties.
