DS Game: Harvest Moon

I haven't blogged about video games in a while so I'm going back to the topic. The harvest moon series is about farming and making friends in whatever village you are in. This game is set in Forget-Me-Not Valley, and although the playing area is relatively small compared to other games, it makes up for it with a massive amount of content. It's a fairly old game, and it came out around 2005, but it is still a good game. The picture here is the "Harvest Moon DS" menu or opening screen. Now, about the game. Like other harvest moon games, there is no fixed goal. There is a main goal you can work toward, though. Now, the main character,(that's you) is the boy on the lower part of the picture. He's surrounded by little guys. Those are the harvest sprites and if you haven't played the series before, then they are little guys that run around.(and in this game, help you)The (main) goal of this game is to save all 101 harvest sprites. There is plenty of things you can do to occupy yourself in other ways. One of the main problems, especially in the beginning of the game, is money. These are G's. I'm assuming that's gold. Anyhow, this game needs a lot of money, if you want the best of everything in the game. That is, you need several billion G, more than what you need for all the other harvest moon games combined. Yeah, so it seems logical that I start with that first. The main way of making money in the game is selling items you find or grow or get. You throw stuff into your shipping bin and then the next day, the things are sold. You can ship almost every item in the game. There is also a guy named Van, who comes around every once in a while, and he buys items for a much higher price. Of course, you can ship crops and produce, that is why it is called Harvest Moon. The main way of making cash is leveling up crops. Leveled up crops sell for more. Your farm needs to be pretty well developed before you can do this though. I'm probably boring you with this, so I'll move on. Money is not the only problem in the game. Believe it or not, there are dungeons in the game. They are't really dungeons, but mines. Going down them is not necessary, but gives certain advantages. There are four dungeons/mines, each of them varying in difficulty and depth. There are dark creatures that guard the mines though. The first mine has 10 floors. You can breeze through that in a few minutes. The second has 255 floors, and is harder, but still easy enough if you have some energy healers. The third mine has 999 floors. This is where it gets nasty. You need a bunch of stamina healers, but since you can move deeper more quickly, it only takes a little longer than the second. And finally, the grand-daddy of them all, the fourth mine. *sigh* You really don't have to go down it, but it presents the greatest challenge in the mines. Are you sitting down? Cause this mine has an incredible, whopping, 65,535 floors!!! It takes over 24 hours of solid playing. Of course, you can save in the middle of it, so it doesn't have to be finished in one sitting. It has absolutely nothing that the other mines don't have, except for an event at the bottom. I haven't reached the bottom of this mine, and I don't intend to. I can't think of much else in the game that is particularly interesting, so I'll bring this post to a close.