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Hometown Story hopes to recapture that Harvest Moon magic
The Natsume booth feels more than a little out of place amid the murder and mayhem that defines the E3 show floor experience. For those weary of the pulsing music, constant explosions and gruff voice-overs blasting from every ear-level speaker in sight, Natsume's display of gentle, colorful games about farming and fishing can feel like an oasis from sensory overload. While they've dabbled in just abut every genre known to man, an unexpected game called Harvest Moon – which hit the SNES long after it withered on the vine – has since become Natsume's strongest brand, with 19 prime series games to date. There's no end in sight for this strangely compelling series, though its creator Yasuhiro Wada has moved on to a new IP called Hometown Story, which he hopes will have the same longevity as the series that introduced the curious addictiveness of simulating mundane tasks years before The Sims.%Gallery-191606%
Harvest Moon Crossing
Harvest Moon DS saw its US release over half a year ago, but the colorful farming sim didn't cross the Atlantic until earlier this month. A TV commercial advertising the game has been airing in the UK, and we were surprise to see how similar its presentation is to Nintendo's commercials for Animal Crossing: Wild World in Japan and Europe.AC:WW was an indisputable success sales-wise in every territory, so we can see why Nintendo would want to mimic its marketing push with Harvest Moon DS. Compare the video clips yourself after the post break to see what we mean.
Harvest Moon: Magical Melody headed to the Wii?
Development director for Rising Star, Yasuhiro Wada, recently confirmed to Eurogamer that they are "working on a European version of Magical Melody for the Wii." Now, with this news, the mind could go into a few different directions. Are we to believe that the game is to be revamped with new controls and features, much like the Wii version of Resident Evil 4, or is the game simply going to be repackaged with a Wii logo (kind of like Radio Alergy)? Of course, the latter choice is probably not one that will come to be, what with it being an incredibly ridiculous option and all.Rising Star's PR folks, including Richard Barclay, were quick to pounce after hearing about Wada's remarks, however, adding a bit more credibility to his statement. Barclay explained they "haven't received official confirmation from Nintendo that Rising Star will be a Wii publisher, and we haven't told Nintendo we've told anybody that we'll be releasing Magical Melody, which was a GameCube game, as a Wii game." So, yes, good chance of it happening.How does this news make you Europeans feel?
Europe gets a little Contact
Better late than never, right? Rising Star Games has announced that they will release Grasshopper's RPG Contact in February of 2007 for Europe -- for those of you who haven't ordered it elsewhere by then. Despite lukewarm reviews, the game is getting its fair share of attention, so such a long delay before European release would be surprising ... if the DS hadn't lately been plagued by delays for the region. Sorry, guys. Just know that we love you equally!
