Marvelous Inc. is giving a new generation the opportunity to settle down in the peaceful world of Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life, the latest remake of the classic GameCube farming sim. The Harvest Moon (Story of Seasons) franchise can seem overwhelming to newcomers, partly because it’s been around for nearly 30 years and comprises 29 mainline and 14 spinoff games. The confusion is compounded by the series’ 2014 rebranding, when former publisher Natsume maintained the rights to the name Harvest Moon and new publisher Xseed had to come up with a new title.
Things aren’t helped by the fact that some of the entries in the series have been re-released multiple times, and A Wonderful Life is no exception. This latest game is in fact a remake of the 2003 GameCube title Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life, which also got a PS2 special edition a year later with a slightly different name. Shortly after that, the game was released on GameCube again, this time as Harvest Moon: Another Wonderful Life with a girl protagonist.
A Wonderful Life has been one of the more well received of the series, which explains why it’s now making an appearance on current-gen consoles and the Switch. Despite their positive critical reception, however, the older versions of the game had a few annoyances that negatively impacted gameplay, and Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life successfully introduces quality-of-life improvements while also making some questionable adjustments.
The premise of Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life won’t break any records for novelty; it treads the same ground as countless farming sims before it. With her father recently deceased, the protagonist heads to Forgotten Valley, the home of a slightly taciturn but helpful family friend named Takakura. He sets her up with a cozy little shack, a few plots of land, an empty barn, and some tips scribbled in a notebook.
Very little in-game guidance is provided, and the player who wants to do more than toss some seeds on the ground and hope for the best will obligatorily pause to read the succinct but not-exactly-thrilling text tutorials. There’s a lot to absorb — from marriage to birthing a cow to fertilizing crops — forcing an unwieldy pause smack dab at the beginning of the game. But, oddly, the guide still lacks necessary pointers, so many people will inevitably find themselves turning to online guides written for previous versions of the sim.
It would be difficult to write a review without comparing A Wonderful Life with its older iterations, and there are some notable changes, such as the fact that animals no longer get sick or die. Not having to juggle that stress along with everything else might seem like a good thing at first, but it negates the necessity of some mechanics that have inexplicably remained in the game, like the health bar and special fodder whose purpose is to help barn animals “stay healthy and happy.” Players no longer have to plan ahead for when an animal might get sick or worry about losing their livestock, which unfortunately removes a layer of depth from the gameplay.
In that same vein, cows never stop supplying milk. Previously, it was necessary to breed a cow to get her to produce milk for a set duration after giving birth, but that element has been removed. The quality and quantity of the milk change, but there’s just not as much incentive anymore to keep track of a cow’s breeding status. It’s even possible to have a barn full of female cows and still get milk year-round.
This elimination of a mechanic here and there has resulted in a more laid-back experience. There’s still the bustle of trying to cram tasks into a truncated day, but the gameplay overall feels more superficial. Especially after the first year, as the mechanics become clear and a routine is established, A Wonderful Life can begin to feel repetitive. It’s still a decent and stress-free way to pass the time, but the game doesn’t necessarily surpass the competition in any way. It’s generally as fun as the average farming sim but doesn’t differentiate itself from the clutter at all.
Even the “festivals” are somewhat lackluster, minimalist affairs that don’t do much to make the player feel invested in the community. The characters in Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life each have unique personalities that make them somewhat endearing, but after befriending them all to max level in the first couple of years, there’s very little reason to talk to them anymore. And that said, maxing the affection of most of the villagers doesn’t seem to benefit the player at all and is ultimately a waste of time and resources. Perhaps there’s a payoff in the latter years of the game that just isn’t apparent yet.
There have been positive changes as well. Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life had a male lead, and Another Wonderful Life changed the protagonist to female. Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life gives players the choice of gender and even offers they/them pronouns. And this time around, there are limited customization options that include clothing, hairstyle, eye color, skin tone, and the ability to change these elements at any time during the game. It’s not deep, but it’s something.
Unlike the previous games, which limited romance and marriage to NPCs of the opposite gender, players can now woo and start a family with any of eight candidates no matter the gender. Getting married, building a family, and experiencing the cycle of life is the ultimate goal of Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life, and failing to propose to somebody by the end of the first Winter will cause Takakura to force the issue.
However, if by then the player hasn’t romanced anybody enough to accept a proposal, it’s game over, which is actually kind of a nice touch. It makes the first year a somewhat frantic yet fun cycle of scurrying around each morning to talk to everybody, throwing gifts at them to increase affection, and then running off to the next potential beau or belle.
In addition to flirting with the townsfolk, there are cows, chickens, horses, sheep, and maybe a goat to take care of, along with crops to tend. This is where the very welcome quality-of-life improvements of Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life step to the fore. Rather than having to pick a single crop or flower, stick it in the bag, and then tediously pick the next, it’s now possible to spam the A button to automatically grab identical items. This applies to watering, harvesting, and fertilizing and is a much-needed upgrade.
Gathering animals has also been made more efficient in SoS: A Wonderful Life as interacting with the bell at the barn or chicken coop will now call all respective animals at once, ushering the lot of them in or out in one fell swoop. There are still other inconveniences that perhaps should’ve been streamlined, but this single change makes a great difference.
Some of the sigh-inducing aspects of dealing with the animals are minor but still tiresome because they happen multiple times every in-game day. For example, there’s no easy way to tell when a cow can be milked. There’s an indicator next to her name, but checking it requires pressing up to five buttons to reach the appropriate screen. Granted, the player can just approach the cow and try to milk her, only to be rebuffed with a grumpy moo and a little thundercloud over her head. It would’ve been useful to have the udder change color slightly to indicate when it was ready to go.
And most animals have three different ways to increase their affection: brushing, talking, and snuggling. In between each action, it’s necessary to wait for the animal’s heart reaction to play out. This might seem minor, but when multiplied by three for up to 32 animals, it can feel like the whole day has passed (in real life) by the time all the livestock has been hugged and snuggled. Yet for some players, this will not be an optional task because SoS: A Wonderful Life shows the status of friendships with both villagers and animals, and getting those hearts up will be a time-consuming compulsion for some.
SoS: A Wonderful Life also features 121 recipes, 88 “wonders” or achievements, 8 crops and countless hybrids, as well as a variety of fish to catch and archaeological relics to dig up. And it’s all logged automatically in the new encyclopedia, another boon or bane for completionists that will also eliminate at least some of the scrawled notes that usually end up scattered all over the gaming space. Discovering all the items in the encyclopedia will add some challenge and a sense of progression to the game for those who like that sort of thing.
Ultimately, however, this latest entry in the franchise is simply not exceptional. It’s easy to get sunk in and lose huge chunks of time tending crops and animals or befriending villagers. But, overall, Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life is a steady middle-of-the-road offering with nothing to recommend it over anything else currently available in the genre. Almost every aspect of the game is good but not great.
Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life
Put down roots on your new farm in the peaceful town of Forgotten Valley. Bring life to the land by cultivating crops and raising animals, find love among the town's friendly folk, and make lasting memories with a family of your very own.
Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life releases on June 27 for PC, PS5, Switch, and Xbox Series X/S. Game Rant was provided a Switch code for this review.