Harvest Moon: The Winds of Anthos

this little game is simply amazing and super cute. besides the adorable and colorful graphics, its a very casual game while also having a ton of content and sooo much to do, the map is huge and the activities are endless!! everything starts like a normal farming game, planting crops and taking care of your plants, but as you progress through the story you realize just how much there is to do and unlock. you can even walk around in nature petting animals and feeding them until you earn their trust and have them as pets and you can also ride horses, fish, train your pets, take part in competitions, run your own little shop, have a family and children... its a complete and really fun game. the only thing worth mentioning is that its controller only, so no mouse and keyboard in this case sugar!!

Haven't played a harvest moon game in a while and wanted to see what was new. The graphics are nice and cozy. The story is just meh. There's some silly plot points that are kind of funny and there's points where you just can't take it seriously. Despite the game being open world, it feels very restrictive in terms of cozy farm game sims with how plots are locked in. Many other games you're allowed to set up your buildings how ever you like, but this one you can find other farm locations, but everythings locked in place at those locations. Also the tutorial is 5 hours long. If I had known upfront that the tutorial was 5 hours long, I would not have bought this. I'm very much a "let me try to figure out first and ask for help when I feel like I'm stuck" kind of person. I work a lot these days and really do not want to slog through such a long tutorial. It just really irked me that the starting farm clearly has space for more farming plots, but you can't set more farming plots. Also you could make much more money just chopping tree's and selling the processed wood vs farming early on. Couldn't really find anything of interest to invest my money into on and lost motivation. Also having each area locked to a season is kinda like "huh?" I thought the changing of the seasons through the year was a big part of the game series? I just feel like they could have done more with the game.

*EDIT* *I forgot to mention, when looking at the DLC for the game, you will notice that features that should be in the BASE GAME are being sold as DLC here, to make an extra buck I guess, such as the increased tool level, which, while not required, is something that is ALWAYS in the base game for farming games like this.* so, to start, I WILL continue playing this, but that is really only because I already own the game, and obviously cannot refund it. if you are thinking about purchasing this, DO NOT BUY THIS GAME! not even on a sale, not even for 90% off...... while that sounds extreme, I will explain why below. I have not noticed any bugs or technical issues with the game, beyond the fact that options are almost non-existent, really only being audio, and if you want full screen.... the story, as others already point out, is nonsensical and silly, but that's not entirely a bad thing honestly, and the characters, while extremely one dimensional and offering little to no personality, aren't really bad either, and are nice to look at. But, for gods sake, do NOT believe any other reviews saying "it takes me back to Harvest Moon 64...." or any nonsense like that. the game is designed to work AGAINST the player. for example, this is a farming game.....where you cannot buy seeds in any meaningful way...... you can buy seeds from the shop like, one a week or so, at quantities of 3, AFTER you've already grown about 25 of said crop...... to GET seeds, you have to explore the world, doing a pointless collectathon while traveling, getting seeds mostly in quantities of 1..... to be able to meet the MINIMUM standard of a farming game, of buying seeds from a store, you need to grow 250 of a SINGLE crop...... and IIRC, the home garden, starts you with 30 plots..... Oh, did I mention there's stamina in the game? Or that you start with about 5 hearts of stamina? and lose stamina just by walking? and even MORE stamina when performing any action? This forces you to constantly be harvesting and eating random stuff from your inventory, as cooking anything other than coffee and later fried eggs early game, is not worth the investment, as Coffee is a 1:1 recipe, doubling the items effect....... Mining is in the game now, which I was excited for when introduced to it, thinking it was just like Stardew Valley, but without enemies...... but you rapidly lose stamina, the game intentionally blocks paths in the mines with massive rocks, forcing you to waste stamina, and very often, cave ins will have EVERY SWING of your hammer on those large rocks........ Fishing is fine. It's slightly enjoyable, other than having no real chance of catching anything other than small fish without bait early game, no real complaints there. So, basically, the majority of the game, a FARMING game, is designed to prevent you from FARMING......... It forces the player into exploration of a massive overworld, which would be nice if I wasn't FORCED to do so in what should be a cozy farming game, where my early progress should be centered on my FARM....... but not ONLY that, but due to the home relocation feature.....no area really feels special to me, as I realize, "I can just leave here and not come back" at pretty much any point. Due to the home being moved, you can't have a massive farm like in the OG Harvest Moons, managing a massive field and cleaning and caring for it. You can't go to the store to buy seeds, because again, the focus is NOT on the farming, but exploration....... oh, and did I mention the towns EACH have culture levels? and they are arbitrarily locked behind the story? So, unlike most games of this Genre, and I believe prior Harvest moon games, it's not only that you need resources to unlock stuff, that you can choose to prioritize at your own pace, but you don't even have the option, as things are just locked and nonexistent without progressing into other villages, and doing all the stories/festivals. Which, again, no issue with the idea in of itself for the stories and festivals, but it's the forcing the player to do so just to reward them with features that they should already have.... You also get endless radiant quests from NPC's that do nothing, as again, the town levels have a max, and also a limit at 3 stars....so your request board is just FLOOEDED every time you talk to an NPC you don't have a quest for already...... ALL of that is just to say, yes, this is a BAD game. That does not mean people can't like it, as it does have good parts, such as nicely modeled characters, decent music, good visuals, etc..... however, it's still a game at the end of the day, that tries new things, loses its identity, and goes AGAINST the genre it is trying to be. if you want to play a farming game, you are FAR better off playing literally ANY Rune factory game, Stardew Valley, My time at X series, ETC......

Edit: Literally got a game breaking bug after 85 hours, and I am so close to completing mutations and cooking recipes. What a waste of time! All my three saves don't load correctly, can't open map or anything, happened after I loaded the game from saving before sleeping, can't even get core mechanics right??!!! Unfortunately, while there are some really good things here, the majority of things are done/executed horribly. Things I loved: - Can save ANYTIME, and you will get back exactly there after you load. - Collecting wisps to upgrade your Stamina, Bag capacity is a really cool idea. - Map could have been 25% smaller honestly, I did like going around exploring though, only some areas did not have the best layout. - Most things, after you find or buy them, can be located on the map, what an insanely good Qol, I can't tell you how many times I have found things and forgot where I got them from in other games. - Also fast travel is done right. A lot of points + open the map and fast travel, not that stupid go to a fast travel point to be able to fast travel. Farming: It's cute in the beginning, and a very nice idea, to have wisps give you crops for free. It's tough at first in these games to start with little money and you have to buy crops, etc, but later, that is a VERY horrible system lol. I want to plant Turnip for example, and I have to go around collecting it. And that has a problem with it, too, they don't give you a lot + shops sell like 3 only + and the worst one, they don't restock (either of them) every day. What an annoying thing, I don't have crops in a farming game! Sigh. Not to mention, mutations is a really cool idea, but you need CROPS to experiment, but you have none :) Also that is done badly, they tell you to read the crop's description to get a hint, yeah right, ends up being frustrating, and to make matters worse, it's luck based or whatever, I had once 8-10 turnips and only 2 or 3 of them gave me the mutation, the ratio is unbalanced at best. And for the love of God, what is the fertilizer for? It does nothing??? Lol. And used the Flatlands to get a mutation, DIDN'T. What you have to use it EVERYDAY?? Funny thing, you have SO many farm locations, too rofl. Also, a BIG no, crops can die. That's very silly, and a time waster really. Especially when they gave you SO many places to farm, and they don't notify you in any way that they are ready to be harvested. Fishing: Meh, the most annoying thing is the fact that you throw the bait, and fish go onto a staring contest with it for a good 5 - 10 second sometimes, like what is happening? Wasting the player's time, Mining: Good number of mines, though, I have no idea why have that many, last 2 or 3 give you all the ores. 3 would have been better. And they are brutal at the start, when you hit something, it bombards you with rocks and it is very random, it can even happen back to back on two hits, and that can cost you heart, which is a lot in the beginning. Later, you get to enjoy a nice fall and lose 2 hearts, leading to you passing out :) Animals: Honestly, this is a quantity over quality game, so many animals + variants of those animals for no good reason, I don't think we need 100 different color for the horse. + Making me clean the farm EVERYDAY is SO tedious, and to then have the bright idea to put the upgrades for it after you finish the main story (which is long), WHY? Chances are, for most players, you finish main game = you are done with the game. Misc. - Walking slowly towards something not to startle it is fun at the start, but then gets really annoying. - The game has no regional pricing, thank God for Fanatical, got it for 3.30$ (but had to to buy 2 other games) otherwise, I wouldn't have gotten this game, NOT worth 25$ at sale. Coincidentally, the game is again in a bundle as I am writing this. - I like that you have a workshop, but the requirements to build somethings are not the best. Actually, verry annoying to get most of the advanced items, wish it was simpler + for capacity upgrade actually made it 3 upgrades instead of one, and started with easy to hard to get ingredients. - One house upgrade for 100k, barn for 75k and then nothing else to do with money expect for tools which are cheap honestly, you will spend MOST of your money on food recipes, a guy has 7 for 70k!! Almost as expensive as upgrading your house. Edit: So another house upgrade for 150K and more food recipes for about half a mil lol, that should have been the other way around game. - The prices in this game are all over the place. Truffles are really good, 2nd and third ones (white and miracle) if you put them in recipes, they lose their value lol, instead of the food reflecting that you used an expensive ingredient. You will probably make no money form farming rofl. Most of my money is from mining and fishing, one mine run could get you up to 20k, a 2 star fish is 13k. Mutations are expensive, but inexplicably rare ?? - I don't understand the beginner/intermediate system, this game has so many meaningless systems, I don't always fish at least 1 star now, and my fishing level is advanced. I don't get the Turnip's mutation easily and I am also intermediate, like, what is the point of this system?? - One of the least interesting characters and interactions I have seen in a game like this, they feel lifeless. - Quests are too much sometimes, they keep rotating which is fine if they were worth it, most of them aren't and they give you the stupidest rewards for an expensive item. There is a quest where you give her a Rubie, and she gives you 5 Energy Mushrooms ?????????????? - If you lose connection to your controller mid game, you lose all of your progress because the game will not respond at all again! Also, I had a game freeze where it froze my whole pc. - A lot of items are not sold, like milk, butter, you know, simple things. - I like that they tell you the sale, when it happens, in what village, but not in what store, so you have to go check store store lol. Also, why not have the whole village have a sale?? Btw, I have about 65 hours in the game at the time of writing this, but I played offline, just in case Steam doesn't display my playing time correctly.

I had low expectations, like with every Natsume produced Harvest Moon game (which has nothing do with pre-2014 HM games made by Marvelous) and yet this still feels like a mobile shovelware you can play for free. I might come back to this game when modders fix the lack of resolution and graphics settings as poor antialiasing is distracting, but that probably won't happen.

It's awful. Major down-grade from One World. I've played most HM games. The stamina management is impossible. Earning money and progressing takes forever. I don't recommend playing this for casual players. The story is not good either. I like that treasure hunting is new and fun, but this needs stamina adjustments. I also don't like the fact that seeds have a limit of purchase. Now I have to go search multiple areas to get a good amount of the seeds. On top of that losing all of my stamina in the process then having to start a new day just to repeat. Ridiculous. A truly rinse and repeat for seeds. Don't even get me started on the mining system. Trying to get to any floor below 30 is difficult. Good thing cheat engine exists. You waste stamina doing trivial things and waste many in-game days trying to progress. Yeah, carry food on you. Doesn't help when you blow through it so fast.

The game tries to offer a bright, expansive world, but ultimately ends up feeling like a chore more than a fun farming adventure. The Bad: The first thing you’ll notice is the painfully slow movement speed paired with an enormous, mostly empty world. Traversing the map often feels like a slog, and the terrain design can be frustrating getting stuck on awkward slopes and having to loop around large obstacles becomes a regular annoyance. Despite the size of the world, there’s very little to meaningfully interact with. Tasks feel basic, repetitive, or downright pointless, and the characters rarely leave a strong impression. Overall, the game has the energy of a “salary man” of the genre, punching the clock, going through the motions, but lacking heart. The Good: There are some positives. The world is colourful, and there’s a pleasant brightness to the visuals that can be relaxing at times. There are plenty of items scattered throughout the world to collect, though unfortunately the game doesn’t give you much interesting to do with them.

Fun game! Lots of running around, but exploring is fun. More story/quest based than farming.

A 3D game should put more into controls and camera movement. It all feels counter-intuitive. I really tried to get this game to work for me. Maybe it's better on console than PC. Manages to be worse than Save the Homeland and nowhere near as good as titles like Wonderful Life, Innocent Life, and Legend of the River King.

My daughter and I have fallen in love with this game! However, with much time spent in it, sadly, the game glitches and is no longer enjoyable or even functional towards the end. I wish the NATSUME team would address this issue and fix it.