\___________________________________________________________________________ | | | Getting Started | | ___________________________________________________________________________| | / |/Welcome to the game! And welcome to the village, the island, and the world | of Harvest Moon. If you're new to Harvest Moon, this section will help to | to get you up-to-speed on some of the mechanics of the game as a whole. If | you consider yourself a seasoned vet, though, skip down to the next section | (Home Sweet Home: Your Ranch, search for HSH), as this section will mostly | re-hash what you likely already know (or could easily figure out). If | you'd rather go it on your own without step-by-step help (which you really | won't need for this part of the game), just remember this one thing: take | your time and don't be afraid to try things out. After all, this is the | tutorial part of the game - you're not going to screw anything up, and your | decisions here won't echo throughout the game. | |\________________ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ | In The Beginning... | | As the game opens up, you'll quickly receive a short back story for how | your character arrived on the island. It seems that there's a farm on the | island, and you're interested in taking over and revitalizing it! So you | travel on a ship to the island; the ship captain will ask you questions | on the way. | | The way you answer the questions early in the game will, obviously, | determine various characteristics about your character, such as your name | and birthday. You may want to select a birthday that's some time away from | other events, like festivals, so that you have something to interrupt one | of the long festival-less periods. In my opinion, the best birthday dates | are mid-summer (around the 13th to the 15th, to interrupt the 15-day | festival-less period) or early fall (around the 3rd to the 6th, to break up | a 16-day festival-less period. Personally, I choose for my birthday to be | on the 4th of Fall - but, this is really up to you. The date you choose | really won't matter much. | |\________________ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ | Disaster Strikes! | | What? A typhoon in a simple farming game? It must be a clever plot device! | Just enough of a storm to knock you out and make you dream an | unrealistically vivid dream - well, isn't that just incredibly convenient. | It seems either you're schizophrenic or there's a Harvest Goddess | somewhere that needs your help. You have two choices: check into a mental | hospital to see about those voices in your head, or try to help her out. | And it seems the clinic on the island is tragically ill-equipped to deal | with your particular brand of mental illness, so let's try to help her, | shall we? (And in case you're reading this and (a) aren't playing the game | yet and (b) can't detect sarcasm, no, you don't actually get to make that | choice - you're helping her whether you like it or not.) | |\________________ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ | Welcome to Your New Home | | When you awaken, you'll be on the island, and your character will finally | respond to that weird nub thing on the nunchuk. Oh, right, it's called | a joystick. Run downstairs and a scene will play out - at the end of it, | you'll get three options: tour the town with the mayor, tour the town | on your own, or sit around twiddling your thumbs (meaning no tour at all). | If this is your first time playing (which it probably is, considering you | read this much of this section), I recommend touring with the mayor. This | guide will describe most places, but nothing is as effective as a hands-on | tour. Plus, you'll also get an overview of the controls - those tend to | come in handy. | |\________________ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ | Earning Your Way | | After the tour, you're sentenced to two days of slave labor at Souffle | Ranch. Work there for two days (sometimes more, so don't freak out if | you're still there after 2 days), helping out around the ranch and meeting | people in the process - once you're done, the Mayor will offer you one | of three land plots. For more information on which plot to choose, see | the Initial Location section, under Your Property (search for < YPR > | without the spaces). And if you'd like to see that section moved here, let | me know - I couldn't decide where it belonged. | |\________________ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ | Free At Last | | Now that you have your property, you're pretty much on your own. You're | given 250G and a bag of seeds in exchange for your service at the farm. The | sections below will detail the different options you have, but there's no | longer any specific tasks you must complete each day. Harvest Moon is one | of the most open-ended games around - so have fun and make your own life. | If you really, really need help getting started (meaning if you tried once | and failed), see the Getting Started walkthrough (search for < GSW > | without the spaces. | | Before you go though, just a few general tips on the first few days: | | - Get the fishing rod. It's free - just go by the Fishing Co. to pick it up | from Toby. | | - Make the first rainbow soon. It'll likely take a fair amount of your early | money to get the first home extension, the Oven and the ingredients, but | it's worth it: when you make the first rainbow, almost a dozen villagers | move to the village the following season. But in order to make the first | rainbow, you need an apple, which can only be gotten at the Spring market | or in the Fall: so if you don't make it the first Spring those villagers | won't arrive until winter. For information on how to do this, see the | Reawakening the Goddess section (search for < GOD > without the spaces). | | - Forage when you're out. You'll often find yourself passing herbs and other | items that can be sold in your daily routine - pick these and sell them | for some quick additional money. | | - Don't be a workaholic. Chances are you'll enjoy the social part of the | game far more than the farming and ranching, so make a little time each | day to go around and talk to people. |
Getting Started