Linkage 1205730551|%e %b %Y, %H:%M %Z|agohover
Ah, Harvest Moon. :P I remember playing that on VBA years ago, I was addicted for a while. :P
Anyway, judging by the one I played, Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town, I would say it's actually closer to a simulator than an RPG. It does of course have some RPG elements like your fatigue and so on, but I think they'd count more as a sub-genre for it than as a major one.
I guess it kind of has a slight adventure element too, like running and finding plants and stuff and also mining to get ore, but that's probably pushing it a bit. :P
hartnell 1205742321|%e %b %Y, %H:%M %Z|agohover
I played one of the really early ones. Would you consider it a crafting game? Where crafting is similar to crafting in a MMORPG?
— Shawn
Linkage 1205742730|%e %b %Y, %H:%M %Z|agohover
What's a crafting game?
hartnell 1205750103|%e %b %Y, %H:%M %Z|agohover
Er… hmm maybe Harvest Moon :)
In MMORPGs, some character classes can craft, meaning they can go out and get stuff (tree bark, candy canes, scarecrow brain) and put it together to makes stuff (evil santa tree). Then they can sell it.
— Shawn
Linkage 1205823995|%e %b %Y, %H:%M %Z|agohover
Ah yeah. Well, there are some cases of that in Friends of Mineral Town, such as getting animals to produce goods, and then sometimes using those goods to make other goods from them (e.g. milk and some other stuff into cheese) and also being able to make items from ore you mine and so on. So yeah, I guess it had some crafting elements to it.
ChibiLeen 1257112038|%e %b %Y, %H:%M %Z|agohover
Sorry for the thread necromancy, but since Harvest Moon has been one of my favorite series for years, I really wanted to speak my piece. :)
To me, Harvest Moon is an oddball. It's really hard to classify: it has simulation elements (farming and date sim); it has RPG elements (mainly through the experience the player gains with the tools, although both spin-offs - Rune Factory and Innocent Life - add stats, even levels and battle in the case of Rune Factory); it has adventure elements (exploration, upgrading of equipment); it has crafting elements (almost all the HM games feature a more or less elaborate cooking system, and have "gathering jobs" like fishing and mining); and it's a sandbox game, since apart from a few exceptions (like Save the Homeland, Rune Factory and A Wonderful Life), Harvest Moon games don't really follow a storyline, and all give the player complete freedom with his or her farm (most can even be played indefinitely, never actually ending).
I think that this is exactly what gives Harvest Moon it's charm: people play the game how they want, everyone can find something appealing about it. And despite all the iterations it has spawned, the formula never seems to get old, at least not to addicts like myself. :)