Review Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town

This is only the second game of the Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons I ever played on the console (the other being the one for N64), as I personally prefer the Handheld games.

The first games I ever played, were Harvest Moon and Harvest Moon 2 for the GameBoy Colour back then. Still being one of my favourites, especially HM2. I did play Mineral Town (not the remake), Harvest Moon Two Towns, HM New Beginnings -another favourite of mine-, Story of Seasons and now PoOT.

It's your typical SoS game, if you are familiar with the game series. I was a bit surprised how easy it is, to archieve things in this game or how fast you have access to different materials and can collect them. Personally, I feel like it's more difficult in the Handheld games. You don't have Animals roaming around your farm to tame them. Your are lucky if you get at least one cow as a gift. Though this game sure reminds me a lot of HMNB, perhaps why I do enjoy playing it.

The village lies right next to the farm, which is nice if you need to buy something or just want to talk to the villagers. Above the village is a little forest area, which is a it too small for my taste. Guess because your farm has a lot of forest, they didn't feel the need to add more. You can also customise your character, which is always a nice addition. I personally love if you can individual your game!

On a sidenote, I haven't played Trio of Towns yet, so if anything I mention as a new addition, that's because.

Animals

You have the traditional horse, cow and sheep, the later added alpacas and angora bunnies and of course, cats and dogs as pets. Newly added are goat and buffalo.Taking care of them is quite easy, as you don't need to build or buy any tools for it (unlike the handheld games). Also the fact you don't even need to buy animals to begin with, as they already roam around free on your farm. That is..quite an interesting way to give you your farm animals. The buildings also already exist, if broken and you need to repair them. But with enough material and/or money, they are quickly repaired.

You can't pick up the smaller animals though.

Kind of funny though, that chicken eat hay here instead of grains.

Crops and Harvesting

Not much to say here, it's the same as always. Buy crops, plant them and harvest. Thanks to the new addition of having access later on to seperate gardens all in different seasons, you can plant any fieldfruit you want anytime! Or you just use the hydroculture plant once you repaired it (this one will take a while though).

Fishing

There is lots of different kind of fishes to catch and plenty of places to do so. I found it interesting that you can now give your fish to the museum, as a donation. Kind of reminds me of Animal Crossing. Fishing itself got a bit more challenging, as you can't just pull them out like in, say, Story of Seasons. You need to watch the colour of the fish and pull it out once it's in a blue colour. But it won't remain like this, so you have to be careful.

Wild Animals

You can take photos of them and give it to the museum, so they can make little statues of them! Sadly, you can't befriend them in this game.

Your Farm

Your farm is seperated in three parts, to which you don't have access to in the beginning. It's once again a bit like New Beginnings, in which you also have three different areas. So, lots of space to do and put stuff into! Each area also has a mine, which differs in size and challenge. Four different kinds of trees can be chopped, as well as four different kind of grass. All of them are important materials you should hoard of, as many as possible.

Your skill-set and awards

That is an addition I quite like. Every skill has 10 levels. The higher your skill becomes, the easier things get. You also earn access to either hidden places or learn to build new furniture, walkways, Makers and other things. Speaking of upgrading your skills: Most upgrades come with little awards, you can get by going to the town hall.

Makers

There are a lot of them! To think in New Beginnings and Story of Seasons, you had seperate buildings for it. Here you have Maker for anything you need. Even big versions you get later on and are quite helpful.

Gnoms

They came in different colours and functions. Once you befriend them, they will not only give you access to different hidden places. You can go and visit their village, with each of them rewarding you with different items once you talk to them.

Marriage canidates

I heard some people saying they are all boring and one dimensional. Not sure if I agree on it. For once I find them all likeable and the more you get to know them, the more you learn about them. Also to be honest, in most games they don't have too much depth to them and often follow a certain pattern. I think the fun part is, to make things up for them yourself. Though I will agree that they are lacking in dialogue and actions. It won't change much, even after you married them. They will only wish you a happy birthday and there are no more -at least implied- kissing scenes, which is funny because in the handheld games you have them. May be because of the whole 'You can marry also of the same gender' and they are trying to play it safe. In case for people who don't like it. But why not include an option to activate it or not. I don't mind it at all, it's a good addition.

Oh right, the kid is also given to you, probably also because of the aforementioned case.

Events

They are a bit lacking. There is no Valentines Day, no Cooking contests, no Animal contests. Honestly one of the weaker parts of the game, as those events become boring quick. Two events just searching for things (automatic, no input from the player), fishing contest, a strenght contest and the rest are just cutscenes.

Clothes

You can produce the materials you need for your new clothes and bring it to the boutique. It usually takes a day to get the new clothes.
This is more akin to New Beginnings, the Story of Seasons, in which you get to make all your clothes yourself.

Now a few things I didn't like much. For example you can't upgrade the boxes to put more items in.

You can put furniture and items only in one direction in your house and only put them down on certain places.

( I do got the big house in the meantime, whith one additional room added, only for items to add in)

Also once you have a child, it doesn't get included in town events and you can't even give a gift to it. That is a bit sad. There is not much interaction there, beside perhaps a little cutscene or two.

And you can't add ä, ö or ü in names in the german version. May be a little nitpicking, but I'd prefer if the game allows me to use them. Otherwise some names look so odd and need more letters. Oh and the game tends to get slow-downs and odd little clipping glitches from time to time.

I'll drop a few more screenshots and end this review. I probably forgot a few things, but that' the most I have to say for this game. I enjoy it and I think fans of these games will mostly enjoy it too. Though of course, there is still room for some improvements.