Topic: Harvest Moon: The Lost Valley

"CeeCee;" wrote:

THESE BRIEF ANSWERS COMPRISE PAGES 1-12

The game’s producer is Taka Maekawa. We don’t really advertise the fact that his dad owns Natsume Inc USA (Hiro Taekawa) but suffice to say with both of his parents deeply invested in Natsume Inc emotionally Taka grew up living with Harvest Moon in a very unique way. His position isn’t nepotism, either, to dispel that nasty little rumour: he’s gained invaluable experience working in the video game industry prior to opening Natsume Inc Japan. He worked on a little series you may have heard of called Cooking Mama.
Beyond that, we’re keeping a few secrets about the team behind the scenes so that they can work peacefully on the game. But I will say between the two Natsume Inc offices we’re looking at over a century of Harvest Moon experience.
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Yes, you are able to play as both a male and female character. Their default names are Pete and Claire (names our old-school fans may recognize!) but you can change their names. You can customize your character with different outfits and accessories like hats later in the game. More details on this to follow.
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Development is being done by Natsume Inc Japan. While the office opened mid-2013, the game was in development before that. Release is planned for “Fall 2014”, which is a fancy way of saying “pretty much any time between September and November, we hope, if something insane doesn’t happen.” – When we have a firmer release date, we’ll have it on social media (Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr)
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Fishing – Yes
Mining – Yes
Farming – Yes
Animals – Yes
Collecting wood and stone – Yes
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Same sex marriage: at this time, just looking at the amount of time we have left in development, it doesn’t look like it will make it into TLV. We’ve heard loud and clear this is a much-requested addition, and we’re always taking feedback and looking towards future titles.
Marriage rivals (if any exist) will be revealed alongside candidates; yes you can have a family, and yes your child is more than a floor decoration!
Cameos from previous games are not out of the question but none to announce at this time.

"CeeCee" wrote:

The “three-dimensional” setting refers to the raising and lowering of all the farmland inside The Lost Valley. Traditionally you’ve worked on a largely flat farm; now you’re able to dig down to water and make a fishing pond or well on your farm. You’re able to build up to a plateau and plant your crops in a high field. This isn’t just for show, by the way; plants may end up having a different yield depending on planting conditions.
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Just because I don’t think I’ve specifically noted this, The Lost Valley isn’t the first Harvest Moon game that Natsume developed; Natsume isn’t “just a localizer” and hasn’t been for a long time. We’ve been independently developing or co-developing games in general for many years now and with Natsume Inc Japan we’re able to expand that even further.
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As for how “different” it will be, well, it will be different. AWL was different from STH which was different from BTN.
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Commentary on whether there is a rivalry between XSEED and Natsume:
http://ceecee-natsume.tumblr.com/post/88767424657/i-have-anot...
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The Lost Valley is being developed in Japanese and localized immediately. Because we’re working internally there’s very little lag between getting a translation, localizing it, then reinserting it into the game.
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Iconic characters making a re-appearance (these are not identical characters of past games)
-Harvest Goddess, Harvest King (Harvest God)
-Witch and Wizard
-Harvest Sprites
-???
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Yes, there is a pre-order bonus. Yes, we are selling premium plushies independently of games. More details to follow on both.
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ESRB rating is expected to be E10+

"CeeCee" wrote:

Yes, the game begins in winter and you’ll need to unlock the seasons as part of the storyline. But unlocking the seasons is not the entire game. Also, the King of the Underworld isn’t evil, he’s just MISUNDERSTOOD, honest!
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Demo: unlikely. We want to commit our development time to the game itself, and even doing a couple small tweaks to create an E3 demo (blocking off a couple areas) was time well wasted
Miiverse community: I am going to double check these details. I don’t think a decision will be made until closer to release and I don’t remember who decides (Nintendo or the company or both).
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The demo ran a little fast (in case any videos have leaked out), but expect time to be normalized close to classic games – approximately 1 real-life second is 1 in-game minute. This means if you work from 6am to 5am (maximum day at this point in development), that’s 14 minutes for one day. Personally, that’s what I call my sweet spot; most people won’t play that entire day, but 14 minutes is your coffee break, commute, waiting for a friend, etc. It’s a meaningful chunk of time where we want you to feel you got something done.
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Crops and their seasons: Will be revealing this later.
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The Harvest Sprites are making a strong comeback. There’s seven, each has their own behavior/name/tasks they do all of which are interconnected. We’ll likely have a big reveal of this in the future so I can only hint about it for now.
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Skills/Tool levels: Not revealing yet
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Saving can be done anywhere at this time; bag can hold everything and up to 99 of each item. We will need to extensively bug-test this before guaranteeing it for the final product.

"CeeCee" wrote:

These brief answers comprise everything from page 13-18

Not everyone is happy and bubbly in The Lost Valley. Emily certainly is (why do I keep calling her Erica?!), and I’ve nicknamed her the cheerleader of the lost valley. Hunter is not “a happy person” – he’s somewhat socially stunted. Brutus is in conflict with both of his sons, particularly Alex. April stutters (though we’re finalizing her personality so she may change before launch).
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Harvest Moon on PC: the PC is a completely different market and animal. We’re not saying we will never have a PC Harvest Moon, but it’s not like the console market that we have decades of experience in.
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DLC will have its own FAQ, but to hit the salient points:
*Free and Paid and some in between (we have great examples to look at like FE:A and Conception 2)
*NO content is being stripped out to be DLC
*There’s a gap between end of development and launch of a game when we’ll be tackling DLC
*No one is being taken away from the main game development to make DLC (though people whose jobs are now done for the main game may have already flipped to DLC mode. This is not confirmed, only my personal speculation)
*DLC will be 100% optional. We do not want you to feel “punished” if you don’t want to get the DLC
*Nothing ‘pay to win’ planned. We received phenomenally good feedback about the IAPs in Mystic Chronicles and look to that for and fan feedback for guidance.
*As far as I’ve been told, the bulk will be post-story and/or post-marriage. Largely we hear from the fans “I’ve run out of stuff to do!! Give me more!!” and we want DLC to fill that critical niche.

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No “thin is good/fat is bad” was intended, nor any “short bad tall good”. KOTU’s look is sinister-yet-silly. You can’t see it well in our current posters, but he’s actually not even wearing a shirt! XD
I like to call King of the Underworld “not evil, just misunderstood!” (OK, maybe he’s a little evil. He’ll be a central figure to the plot of why TLV is stuck in winter)
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Automatic actions have a logical order. I’ll go into this deeper in its own thread, but to answer the two specific examples:
Water then fertilizer
Brush, harvest product, pet (this is not final, but even if harvest comes before anything else, you’re not missing out on the love points)