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Harvest Moon 3 GBC: A Hallmark Presentation |Main Theme|Box Art| What's so special about this game? Welcome to Harvest Moon 3 for the Gameboy Color. This game is unique in that it suffered from a terribly late release date of November 11th, 2001 in North America- exactly 6 months after the Gameboy Advance came out. It was released before the GBA in Japan, but this still remains one of the latest releases for the console. It also uniquely got a EU release before a US one. Gameplay-wise, it is solid, if not somewhat biased and somewhat limited on story. It is also a game contained in less than two megabytes, being a GBC game, and I'm playing it on an emulator a quarter of that size, so there's also that. The premise of the game is the same "save older relative's farm from being destroyed by corporations" as you usually see except on an island this time, but it does have an interesting twist in the form of an assistant farmer. Oh, and it does some unusual mechanics involving the sea itself. Harvest Moon? Long story short, they go by Story of Seasons now but this was way before the split ever happened. Regardless of what you call it, it's part of a long series in cutesy, simplified farming sim games. They're also usually unrealistic capitalism sims as well. Hold on a sec, what's with the "Hallmark Presentation"? I don't get the joke. Hallmark is a US company known for making greeting cards, but also makes tons of feel-good holiday movies. They all usually involve some sort of rural thing as part of the plot and is usually based on "Boy Meets Girl" and vice versa, which is a perfect match for this game given its Japanese name is exactly that. Ew, the graphics. Actually, these are quite pretty for the GBC era, even though most are re-uses from the previous game. That being said, if you cannot stand older games, you might not find this to your taste. The music and sound design is a bit lacking though. I'll provide music links, but I'll eventually start replacing them with my own appropriate choices given that the soundtrack unfortunately gets old fast. Whatever, I'm sold. How's this LP going to go? I'll be doing this as a narrative SSLP in an attempt to get my writing muscles back into shape. The story is pretty barebones, and this would become very boring fast if I didn't do anything to spice up the updates. This will likely be more lighthearted/comedic in nature, most of the time. It's not a Hallmark Hall of Fame movie, though. Given it's a narrative, no spoilers are allowed for this game, until it's been covered in an update. Talk about the other Harvest Moons as much as you want, though. That being said, I'll be telling the story of these two characters:  And that's where  reader particpation comes in. All the information is in the next post!Updates: Update 0: Participation for Everyone Update 1: Girl Meets Boy (Year 0, Winter 29th - 30th) Update 2: Croissants Are A Lunch Food (Year 1, Spring 1) Update 3: Mistakes Were Made (Year 1, Spring 2-7) The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 16:51 on Jan 19, 2020 |
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Jan 8, 2020 00:17
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Update 0: Participation for Everyone Aside from our various choices we'll make in our farming, animals, and general lifestyle, I need you goons to tell me who these two are, and which one I should play.  This girl, default name Sara, is moving to the island to take care of the farm she grew up on, and left abandoned when her late father, Harry, passed away. She's good with animals, but not as experienced with tools. The mayor doesn't think she can take care of the farm on her own despite having grown up on it, so he's called for... .jpg) ...this boy, default name Pete, to help. He is a supposedly skilled farmer who miraculously rescued his own father's farm not long ago, though he absolutely cannot take care of animals. His only specialty is tools. Fun fact, this is the first time in the series he's given the name Pete- the one that sticks for most of the other games. The main things I'll need: - A name, 4 letters max for each of them, though abbreviation is possible. - A personality for each of them. If you want to throw out an idea or two for their past life as well, feel free. - A choice on which one we'll be playing. - Which of these fine animals is our pet, and their name (4 letters max):  In order: Large Dog, Medium Dog, Small Dog, Pig, Pink Cat, Gray Cat, Brown Cat, Bird This actually affects the gameplay, believe it or not. Other things to vote for: - Our blood type. (A, B, AB, or O) - Our character's birthday.  This will affect an aspect of the gameplay. - And lastly, our clothing colors in RGB numbers. The runner-up will be our secondary outfit.  Note that "Bandana" also changes the girl's hair color. (Give me either a generic color or an RGB 0-255 value, and I'll divide them by 8 to accomodate for the game's limitations.) We'll vote on some farming decisions after this gets decided, and I do the introductory update. For now, I'll be leaving this open for some time, given there's a lot of things to vote for.
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Jan 8, 2020 00:18
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Slaan posted:I never played the actual harvest Moon series, only some of the -alikes. I enjoy video game farming more than I thought possible OOrochi posted:I could never really get into the Harvest Moon Series myself, though they always seemed really sweet. I've spent most of my time with the spinoff Rune Factory series, though I've always really liked the core series for a nice, chill experience. There's something unusually fascinating with running a virtual farm that made the series a part of my childhood. "Song of the Gentle Breeze" from A Wonderful Life is still one of my favorite songs, even if I heard it so much back then. ThornBrain posted:Looking forward to this. HM doesn't get many LPs around here, let alone narrative. Glad to hear it! It looks as if there were some narratives of it in the past, but they were never finished. I suppose the length of the games have something to do with it? I picked this one particularly as it makes a great base to work off of, and its been a recent favorite of mine across the last few months. I'm a bit rusty on writing and I've been looking to get back to it, so it all fits together perfectly for me. ------ Tallying- Player Character: Female 8, Male 2 Pet Choice: Large Dog = 1, Medium Dog = 0, Small Dog = 1, Pig = 0, Pink Cat = 0, Gray Cat = 5, Brown Cat = 0, Bird = 3 Pet Name: Bird = 1 Blood Type: A = 0, B = 1, AB = 6, O = 3 Birthdate: Spring 3rd = 1 Spring 30th = 5 Summer 4th (M) = 1 Summer 14th (M) = 1 Summer 27th = 1 Winter 4th = 1 Color: Default = 1 Purple = 5 Pink = 1 Forest Green (34-139-34) = 2 Kiwi Green = 1 Girl Name: Lillian = 1 Jacqueline = 1 Alex = 5 Claire = 1 Personality: Stubborn and willful, a hard worker = 1 Tomboy at odds with father, finally returning home to be herself, lived with mother in the big city = 1 Boy Name: Pete = 1 Flip = 1 Personality: No votes so far! -- Looks like a young lady named Alex is in the lead, alongside the gray cat! Our farm helper, the boy, still needs a personality, and our pet needs some more name votes! (Though, I'm fine with a cat named Bird!) That being said, wow, I never expected this much participation so quickly for a little GBC game! I'll have the votes for this open for another day at the least, and we'll see where the votes fall by then!
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Jan 8, 2020 06:51
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wokow6 posted:I'm going to second the name Pete for the boy. Siegkrow posted:I second Kronk-Pete. Hmm... maximum Kronk? Ditzy's always been a weak point of mine, but I think might be able to get that to work. It's more fitting than you'd think. (Regardless, it gives me an excuse to watch the movie again after all these years.)
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Jan 8, 2020 21:23
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Alright, I think its safe to say at this point that Alex will be our young lady and protagonist. I'm still leaving votes open for our boy, currently Pete the himbo, and the pet name if anyone still wants to contribute something. That being said, I'll be working on what I can regarding the introductory update. That being said, I might as well start the vote for what our focus as a farmer will be initially. It won't matter immediately, but it'll let me get to the first real update faster. Should we grow Turnips, Potatoes, Asparagus, Stardust, or Grass? If Grass, should we prioritize Horses, Cows, Chickens, or Sheep?
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Jan 9, 2020 03:34
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Looks like we've got about even votes for Potatoes and Grass-fed cows, which is fine since we can do both off the start. We have to make money somehow, anyways. I've working with the colors, and this is what I've got so far:  Clothes are a violet blue while the bandanna/hair is a violet red, though a bit washed out. How does it look so far? I can tweak it if need be. As another thing, it's not a vital detail, but given this is Harvest Moon, is our hair color natural or just dyed? I've been working on the first update and I think I've got writing Pete in a decent spot. He's been coming out both part country boy, part surfer dude, and as Kronk as I can. I should have it out tomorrow, easily.
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Jan 9, 2020 19:29
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silversatyr posted:I've forgotten but if everyone else in town has normal hair, then dyed. Only 2 people have relatively unusual hair colors in town. Pink/Purple hair has never been very uncommon in the HM world though.
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Jan 10, 2020 00:34
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Update 1: Girl Meets Boy Music: Introduction (Intro BGM) I've never been great at diaries, or writing in general, but I don't have much else to do at night so this gives me something to do when I can't sleep. I'll try to write down things as accurately as I can, though I won't guarantee I'll be writing every day. Right, my name's Alex, though my father would've said "Alexandra"... I'll get to that. I grew up on Western Isle, a remote little island town where everybody knew each other.  I lived here with my father, Harry, and mother, Olive, on my father's farm. I don't remember too much of my childhood here, but I know my father wanted me to grow into a proper lady and I think he thought it was a bad influence on me. I always found it much more fun to go swimming in the lake or playing in the dirt. I've just never been much for inactivity, and I think my father thought me too delicate. ...We didn't get along much as result.    Even when we were on good terms, he was always kind of stern. It's just how he was.    He was a good person at heart, just really stubborn. I sort of inherited that from him. When I did turned six, my mother and I left for the big city to live with my aunt. I still really don't know what happened between them, but my Mom always said it had something to do with the education on the island. He only visited from time to time while I was in the big city, but it did mean my mother let me be the tomboy that I wanted to be. I got a public education, and I worked all sorts of high-activity jobs: paper delivery, warehouse lifting, etc. When my dad found out, he put an end to that too. He got flustered and told me if I wanted a job, then most he'd be able to accept was me being a baker- which I did do for some time. I didn't do it for too long, just like many of my other jobs as it felt like something was missing. We fought often, and with both of us being incredibly hardheaded, they went on for quite a while. Though, I can't help thinking now that... well, that I kinda wish I'd known the real him. It always seemed like he hiding something from me, and I'll probably never figure out what it was. He passed away about a month ago, and with him the family farm had to sell off most of what was left. I still don't really know what happened to him, but it all happened very quickly. It wasn't but a week later that I recieved a notice from the Mayor that they would likely have to sell the farm off and compensate us. That woke me out of grieving quickly. I left my life in the city behind on the drop of a dime*, and took off to meet the Mayor as fast as I could. I wasn't going to let my early childhood be erased, and I was going to prove to my father once and for all I could handle a hard life. (*Mom was fine with the idea, I think overjoyed even. Me leaving was a bit tough on her, but it would've broken her heart to lose the family farm.) -- His letter said he was in the next town over from West Isle on a business trip. It wasn't very close to the city, and I'm surprised I made it just in time. Well, "just in time" might be an overstatement considering I barged in on a business discussion.   : ...sell the farm? I mean, it is an intriguing proposition...I...sort of burst into the room. The secretary was yelling behind me, but I didn't really listen to her. I did apologize later, and I still feel bad for nearly giving the little lady a heart attack.    : You can't sell that farm! It was my father's, and I'll work on it! I'll get it back to running in tip top shape, I promise!...At least that's what I hope I said. It's all a bit fuzzy for me, probably because of the adrenaline, but I was rehearsing that in my head on the whole trip there. : You want to work on the farm? It's not as easy as you think, and I know you want to do it for your father. I can understand how... He stopped and looked to the two business men at the table for a time and a melancholy look crossed his face, the wrinkles on his aged face showing slightly. I can only imagine what he was thinking, I must've been quite the sight given he hadn't seen me in 13 years and now I was here, out of breath and asking the impossible. I wasn't crying though, I swear I can hold my composure. Okay, maybe a tear or two, but still!  Then the doors swung open again and barging in comes a man in a suit, who looked pretty similar to Mayor Hans actually. He had a determined look on his face and shuffled forward so fast I think he skipped using his cane more than a few times. Perhaps the shock from my entry had not yet worn off on the mayor, but he seemed much less surprised this time.  : My good lad, Hans, I must have a word with you! : Harry was a good man, m'lad, I daresay I cannot abide to see his farm be marketed off! That little farm is the heart of West Isle, you should know!: Well, I must admit I've had similar concerns...It was at this point he glanced toward me, and one of the businessmen at the table started to speak. Before he finished his first word, Mayor Hans interrupted him. : I do apologize for interrupting, gentlemen, but it seems I still have some considerations to make before I can consider selling off the farm. I'll get back to you if the situation changes.It was with this that the businessmen left the room. One of them looked a bit sad about the whole ordeal and I couldn't help feel a bit sorry for him. The other was scowling non-stop and didn't give me anything but a death stare. : Now, m'boy, you can't let yourself be such a pushover-: I'm not-: -But I've got good news for Harry's old farm, as I've got good ol' Peterson ready to help out! Surely, Harry's daughter there can do it with her help, you have to agree, I'm sure!: Er, how did you know who I was?: This is true, they might be...  : ... in Mr. Heinz's village and he can come here to help you out with it. He's already saved a farm before, so I think you'd be okay if you had him to help.: If that's what it takes, then sure!: He's a guy, will that be a problem?Assuring him it wouldn't be an issue seemed to be all that was left to convince the Mayor. We signed a deal that gave me three years to work on the farm with the condition if I was successful, he'd hand the ownership over to me for good. The two Mayors paid for me to stay the night in a nearby inn while Pete made his way here. The mainland part of West Isle didn't have a train station, so we'd need to take a boat from here. Though Heinz had to hurry back, he did get back to me on my unanswered question earlier: he recognized me because I apparently looked just like my mother. That was nice to hear, though he did pester me about my dyed hair. It was one of the few things I still held onto from the city. Being the energetic man that he was, he left before I had a chance to ask him how he even knew my father or my mother in the first place.   -- The next morning I made my way to the station as quickly as I could, though I do wish I could have slept in a bit more. I hardly got any sleep because of how excited I was last night. The breakfast just made me sleepier. Time creeped along slowly as I waited at the station. I was so ready to go back to the farm I couldn't sit still, and I was getting really restless. Eventually, the guy I was waiting for was supposed to come in on the train, but he hadn't shown just yet.  Eventually, a tanned guy comes walking along, dressed in a dirtied set of purple overalls and a hat cocked to the side. He'd passed by more than once already, I wanted to do something, so picking up a conversation with a random stranger seemed a fine idea at the time. Besides, I was beginning to wonder if he was lost. When I waved him over, I was a bit taken aback. You couldn't really tell from a distance, but I didn't realize how large he was. I've always been the tall girl it seems, but he outsized even me. In spite of his muscles, he didn't cut an intimidating figure given he had this goofy smile and a rucksack tossed over one shoulder like a schoolboy trying to be cool.  : Hey, uh, how's it going? You look like you're looking for something. : I'm just enjoying the nice sea air, dude. Like, don't ya just love it!?It was at this point he inhaled loudly and made a big show of exhaling. : Gotta love that ocean breeze, don't ya know?I could agree with that as I'd missed it myself all these years. Eastside City had an entirely different scent to it, despite it being the same ocean. Though, the way he spoke reminded me of some of the people I met back in the city- I didn't remember anyone talking like that here. I don't remember anyone ever talking like this, honestly. : It's great, I can agree with that. Say, what brings you out to the coast? You seem kinda lost, like you're looking for something.As soon as I said that, his face lit up, like a kid in a candy store. Music: Pete's Theme (Tutorial BGM) : Whooaa dude, spot on! I've been lookin' for my new farmin' buddy all morning, you know? I've been wondering if he's done forgot about me, 'n all.: Farming...buddy? Uh, what's their name?: My buddy back at home, the Heinzmaster, told me I was going to be teaming up with a dude named Alex for some good ol' fashioned farming. Though I haven't seen any dudes all morning, my dude.I really didn't know what to say after that. : Er, my name's Alex.: It's nice to meet you. Though Alex is a dude's name, right?: I get that a lot, but it can be a girl's name too. It's short for Alexandra, but people don't usually call me that.It took him a second to register what this meant. : Whoooaaaaah! Alex is a girl's name too, I totally forgot!: And?: ...And what? I can't believe I forgot that. Like, man, that's crazy. But wait a second...He stopped a second and stared at me seriously. I was completely still, mostly because I couldn't figure out whether to laugh or be in shock myself. : WHOOOOAAAAAAH! You're that Alex? Alex with the farm, Alex? Farmer Alex, Alex?: That's-At this point he grabbed my hand and started shaking it vigorously. He about lifted me off the ground in doing so- if it wasn't for what strength I did have, he'd have probably thrown me to the sky. : It's so nice to meet you, dudette! I've been waitin' here since 9 in the morning to give you a hand, and oh boy, we're gonna have so much fun farming I swear-He'd eventually remember to tell me his name is Pete as I figured. As you might've already guessed, he's perhaps not the brightest spoon in the drawer. : -I helped save my dad's farm too, dude, and I think it's just wonderful what you're doin'-Probably not even the highest drawer in the cabinet. : -and I tell ya, its gonna be great, I know exactly what to do, dude-But you know, I didn't really mind that much. He's a nice distraction that keeps me from getting caught up thinking about my father. : -but oh yeah, dude, I meant no disrespect, Alex, no wait, Ms. Alexandra.: Don't worry about it. It's Alex, please just call me Alex.: Can do, Ms. Alex!: Just Alex is fine. There's no need for the "miss" part. : Huh? But that's what I said, Ms. Alex.:  Somehow , just I knew couldn't win that conversation. : Anyways, by the time we get to that island it'll be too late to start working. C'mon Ms. Alex, I'm followin' you, we gotta hurry!Music: Introduction (Intro BGM) And he was right: despite this being a neighboring town to West Isle, it would already be getting dark by the time we made it there. We grabbed some lunch from a nearby diner and met with the fisherman. Mayor Hans had found a fisherman willing to take us there, though he insisted he was going to keep fishing the whole way. We weren't in a place to argue, given this was all spur of the moment arrangements.  Along the way, I asked Pete about Mr. Heinz, hoping for answers regarding my father. What I got was this: --------  : It's planting season anyways, eh, Pete, m'boy? Just tell me where the seeds you've got are and we'll handle it from there!: Whoa, dude, plantin' season already? I had no idea.: It's marked on your calendar, isn't it, young lad?: It is? Whoa, Heinzmaster, you're more perceptible than I thought!: ...: ...What, my dude?: ...We'll take care of everything here, just go on to West Isle.: Already packed my dude! Alright, see ya, Heinzmaster!  --------- ...It told me more about Pete than it did anyone. I'm...having to wonder if he's a good a farmer as they say. Music: The Sleepy West Isle (World Map Theme) By the time we made it to the island, it was already dark.   It felt good to be back, but I didn't have any time to take in the sights tonight. We headed for the farm from here, and it was nearly pitch black by the time we got inside the farmhouse. The last surprise for the day was waiting for me there. It was something I forgot about the farmhouse.  There wasn't any bedrooms, really. This is just the far corner of the house. It's that old of a building. : Just two beds...?: Aw, yeah, we get to have sleepovers every night! This is just awesome, Ms. Alex!How old is this guy, anyways? : Which one do you want, right or left?: I'll, uh... I'll just take the right one.: There's a wrong bed? Whoa, dude, you're pretty perceptible, Ms. Alex!I... yeah. That was his honest response. I was too tired to bother trying to correct him on "perceptible", so I just let it pass. Trust me, the urge to facepalm when these moments happen is unbelievable. The good news is that he falls asleep easy. : *SNOOOOOORE*The bad news is that it's like I'm sleeping next to a bear. Now you know why I'm awake tonight. ... Well, tomorrow's going to be a good day, I just know it! If I can stay awake during it, that is. _______________ *The next update will have actual gameplay, I promise. Every once in a while and between story updates, I'll cover things I've changed from the source material and the mechanics of the game that I don't have any reasonable ways to cover in the narrative itself. Occasionally, I'll show off a glitch or two in them as well. There's not many, but this game is incredibly exploitable.*
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Jan 10, 2020 20:41
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Rabbi Raccoon posted:I've always wanted to get into Harvest Moon but I always lose interest quick. Which is weird because my Stardew Valley farm is 6 years old and a full functioning Ancient Fruit winery. I'm following this and hope it piques my interest in the series a little more I've seen similar sentiments, and it's always felt odd to me because I'm the opposite. Harvest Moon games are some of my favorites for killing time, but I for the life of me could not get into Stardew Valley. I don't know why, I just couldn't. The gameplay is pretty simple for this game, but it does some neat things of its own. It is for the most part, the same sort of gameplay loop used up until the modern era for the main series games.
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Jan 11, 2020 00:30
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Rabbi Raccoon posted:Farming sims (or at least the only one I've made much progress in, anyways) are great for relaxation. After a stressful day it's nice to get lost in a simple, quiet world for a while. Agreed! silversatyr posted:I've enjoyed both HM and SV. I do prefer RF of the farming sim series out there since it adds a great little gameplay twist and also has great characters who are all just so charming. The RF series is also my preferred farming sim series, and RF3 remains in the top range of my favorite games. I never knew the series existed until I found that in a secondhand game store. To this day, I unfortunately still don't have a box or manual for it. Growing up, I never found the HM series until about Mineral Town/ A Wonderful Life, so those games were always my jam when it came to just kicking back and spending most of a day. I've played the SNES HM since, and it's amazing how strong of a start the series has. Nice to know you're enjoying it so far! The next update's going to be a good idea of what future updates will be like considering I'll have some actual gameplay involved. I should have most of it done by today, given that I didn't have any time to work on it yesterday.
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Jan 12, 2020 15:48
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Lazyfire posted:I loaded Friends of Mineral Town on my snes mini as it is the HM game I best remember and I think the clunkiness of the interface and the QoL deficit between that game and SV are the heavy hitters on why I still like SV better. I remember HM 64 and the HM gamecube game being fun and improving on those points, but there's something "right" about a top-down farming/life sim and SV has sucked in more hours than I would care to admit as it hits all the sweet spots Friends of Mineral Town did while also improving and expanding on most all of what that game did. I can agree to the QoL differences regarding the older games. Most of the early Harvest Moons, even into the GCN era suffer from some really clunky menuing being required, I just put up with it because I'm used to it. HM3 GBC is actually really bad on this regard requiring me to go: SELECT, move down to TOOL, go inside and navigate through a grid inventory, hit A on what I want, all with the processing speed of the GBC. This game is relaxed enough that it doesn't matter too much, but I won't lie that the menus eventually get a bit tiring. Mineral Town at least had the "shoulder button + B" shortcut to cycle through all of your tools, though the incredibly limited bag space makes that a chore. I've mentioned Rune Factory before, and another reason I like it is its drastic increases in QoL in comparison to these earlier games as well. Every handheld game features a rotational menu for your Tools/Weapons, Items, Skills/Spells, a good amount of bag space, quicker farming, and crops you can walk through. The later games, starting with RF3, have a much quicker protagonist, combo capable tools, and a faster cycling bar that lets you micromanage your time by seconds if you want to be that optimized. Cripes, I think I might've just realized why I can't get into Stardew Valley. I think Rune Factory already does everything I'd want it to. ...I should really stop talking about RF and get back to Harvest Moon talk. I mean, it was inevitable that I would start talking about it in the end. ----------- Next Update will be out some time tomorrow for sure. The plan is about a 3-4 day update schedule, though we may find times where it could progress a bit faster.
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Jan 13, 2020 16:34
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DACK FAYDEN posted:Hey, since we're playing the lady, is HM3 one of the sexist ones where if you get married the game ends or was that just uh, More Friends of Mineral Town I think that did that? Yes, yes it is. This is something I'll bring up in the mechanical update, but Alex isn't able to obtain any upgraded tools, can only obtain the Miracle Glove through trade, and its a bit difficult to obtain the means to make yarn, mayonnaise, etc either. But, I can override a good bit of this with some memory editing. Personally, I usually play the female anyways because I like having more control over the animals. The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 22:14 on Jan 13, 2020 |
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Jan 13, 2020 22:09
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DACK FAYDEN posted:That would explain why it's the one that I had associated in memory with that specific flaw! It'll be some time before we get there, but it will have some really odd gameplay implications. There's actually a lot of really strange things in this game, mechanically. ---- In other news, I think I still might be able to get the update out tonight, but it'll be a long one. I'm, uh... still on the first day writing wise. I suppose I just can't help writing more and more- it's always been an issue of mine to be long winded. In my defense, the week itself is frontloaded and character introductions take up most of the space anyways. I still think its an interesting week to show off and you should enjoy it if you found the last one up to par.
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Jan 14, 2020 17:10
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The Flying Twybil posted:In other news, I think I still might be able to get the update out tonight, but it'll be a long one. I'm, uh... still on the first day writing wise. I suppose I just can't help writing more and more- it's always been an issue of mine to be long winded. A correction on my previous statement: tonight's update will be just the first day of the week. It does contain actual gameplay, but it's still kind of a introductory update. Looking at it now, if I did the entire week with this update it would break your scrollbar, so I'm just splitting it into two updates. That being said, it's still being released tonight.
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Jan 14, 2020 22:38
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Update 2: Croissants Are A Lunch Food (Year 1, Spring 1) Twybil's Note: This one's an absolute scrollbar breaker, so I've linked the title to view only this post. Click if needed. Music: The Working Life Spring 1st, Year 1 Today was technically the first day of Spring, though its been warm enough for the last 3 days to call it part of the season. Once I finally got to sleep, I slept surprisingly well. There's something about this old bed that's extremely comforting. Anyways, I woke up at 5:20 and got dressed in the kitchen. Pete was up before me, and didn't seem to understand when I told him closing his eyes wouldn't be enough.  We fixed some breakfast together and he seemed to know more about cooking than I thought. He made these odd, dumpling type things out of pancake batter.  Though I was a bit reluctant at first, they were pretty good. It's not Mom's cooking, for sure, but I couldn't complain. He was as enthusastic as ever. : Yeaaah! Fresh carbs in the morning! Woo!Just a bit after that, we heard an odd sound from outside. Pete said it was a bird, but it sounded a whole lot more like a cat to me.  It turns out I was right, given it was a gray cat probably just a bit older than a kitten. I had no idea where it had come from, though I figured it might've run away from someone in the town. Music: Pete's Theme (Tutorial BGM) : Ooh, Ms. Alex, can we keep her? I know, we'll call her Bird!: I thought we already established she's a cat. She looks more like a Soot to me.: But she acts just like one, look!Sure enough, the cat was sitting there pawing at some old seeds on the ground. It even "pecked" at them from time to time. : Every day just get stranger.: That means we're keeping her, right? : Mrrrow!: I mean, we could but I'm a bit worried it belongs to someone in town. I'll ask around today, okay?: Whoa, dude, I hadn't even thought of that! I don't want to be known as a cat burglar!Before I even had a chance to correct him, we were startled by another unusual sound. Today was full of surprises, I tell you.  : A cow?! Like, when did that get here?: I was about to ask you!Almost magically, there was a cow in the cattle barn standing there next to a big bag of feed. Once I got over my initial wonder, I took a look at the feed bag and it explained this, at least. There was a note there, signed by Mr. Heinz. Mr. Heinz's Note posted:
...Yes, he apparently even writes in his accent. It was slightly patronizing, but I couldn't help being thankful for it. Having animals on the farm was a big part of my childhood, and the one part I know I could handle easily. Though I wouldn't be inclined to call Bess little. She's a Jersey, and probably about 3 years old- she's pretty much fully grown at this point, and a good thing too as she would be less skittish. : Hey, Ms. Alex, what's that note?: It's from Mr. Heinz, it says he bought this cow for us as a gift!I had to yell because he was standing all the way in the doorway. He absolutely refused to get close, and I'm not sure why. : Whoooaaaah, Mr. Heinz? That Mr. Heinz? The told me to come help you Mr. Heinz? The Mr. Heinz that-: Yes, that one!: Right on, Heinzmaster! He's such a good guy, y'know? What a gratuitous person!...I didn't feel like it was worth arguing that one. It was worth a laugh, though. : Well, anyways, I'll take care of Bess if that's fine-: Yeah, yeah, like totally fine, my dude! I'll leave you to it, Ms. Alex!: ...with you. Here, uh, let me show you where the other tools are real quick. My father always kept his tools in side closet in the storehouse. I always thought it got a bit cramped in here because of that, but he sold his inventory quickly enough for it to not matter. There wasn't a fridge, but there was a root cellar, and it was cold enough down there. Music: Tools and Seeds  A collection of his old tools was still left, many of them with wrought iron bases and steel blades. I know this because he never stopped bragging about them and complaining about the quality of the factory produced tools of the modern day. The odd one out was the maul, it probably being made within the last 5 years by my father's hands, compared to the others which were passed down by my grandfather. The maul was capped with metal so it could smash stones as well as stakes. There were quite a few brushes in here, some rather used up, bringing back the faint memories of the old lady who used to make these back on the mainland. The milker was new-ish, and it didn't look like it was used much. I don't think my father needed it much, and I don't think I would either. As much as my father was against me being very active, he never had a problem with me taking care of animals. I still remembered how to milk a cow by hand, it wasn't that complicated and it was one of the last things I got to do before I left to the city. Once Pete took sight of the tools, his eyes widened as if he was opening a present. : Oh, dude, oh, man! Look at these beauties! Whooah, your dad has a great collection- WHOOAH, look at this forgework-It made me somewhat sad actually. He and my father would've talked until sundown had they known each other. : -the edge on this hoe, just wow, man! It's just perfect! Oh, I get to use these, I really do?: Yes, but don't break them, okay? They're antiques at this point-: I'll care for 'em like they were my children, Ms. Alex!: That might be going a bit too far, but thanks. For today, can you clear out some land in the field? Maybe enough for me to grow a few bags of seeds?: Can do, my dude! I'm ready for some farmin'!Hauling a hoe, watering can, and axe all at the same time, he marched on off towards the field with a big grin. Music: The Working Life I grabbed a brush, two buckets, a milk canister, and some udder salve. Stopping by the house, I cleaned out both of the buckets and brought some warm water in one of them. My mother showed me how to do all this, I'd watched her countless times, and I hoped I was doing it the same as she did back then.   Brushing Bess's coat off was pretty easy, she seemed like a pretty neat cow. She liked hearing that, I think. With that out of the way, it was time for me to get to milking. Mom's old milking stool was still in here, though we never had a stanchion like you'd see on some farms. Our cows were usually docile enough to be fine with it.  The process isn't really that bad, it just takes a while. First you wash off their udder from any contaminants to protect the milk, and then you use some salve so you don't chafe them. It's an uncomfortable process as is, so it's best to minimize as much discomfort as possible. It's preferable to give them a bit of something to chew on while you do this. After that you start milking them, starting on one half and changing to the other side once they're done. It's usually best to milk a little bit out of each first before actually putting any in a bucket, that way you can make sure its all clean. When it comes to actually milking, you don't pull on the teat, you just gently squeeze it out, actually. It's kind of like making a fist, but you start with just the index finger and go down one at a time.  Once you've got it all, you pour it into a milk canister, then you pasturize it. Or not, either way. I'm actually used to having it raw, but you'll probably get sick if you're not already used to it. Okay, I'll admit I studied up on this in a reference book last night. But I remembered most of it, honest! Bess gave only some milk- there wasn't that much there, but stress from moving can have that effect sometimes. At least, I think Mom said something about that sometimes.  After that, I gave her some feed for the day. I didn't imagine the pastures are in too great of shape anymore.  Unfortunately, I was right in regard to that. There was some greenery in here, but most of it was shrubs and weeds that she probably wouldn't touch. Winter wasn't kind to this pasture it seemed.  The horse pasture was also in rough shape...  Same went for the chicken field...  And the sheep pasture, too. It looks like I'll have my work cut out for me over the next few months.  It was about 10 AM after I finished checking all of those, so I went and inspected the building next to the storehouse. I didn't remember it being there, so I went inside.   Inside, I found to be more of a fancy fence than a building. There was also my father's best shovel inside, so I suppose he was planning on digging something. Not sure about what to do with this just yet, I decided to head to the town and around the island to check on everything and to see what changed. Music: The Sleepy West Isle (World Map Theme)   The view from this cliffside is only different now in that the half of West Isle on the mainland is a bit larger now. Now that I think about it, calling the mainland town West Isle still is really odd, though I know it has to do with the island's strange history.  The mountains look as calm as ever. They go pretty far up, but I didn't really have the time to look there for today.  Then there's the forest. It's a lot more grown up than I remember it, but it's been over a decade. I only went in as far as what we used to call the "grassland". I had a couple of reasons for this visit, actually.   And I was right to believe they'd still be there. Back when I was little, there used to be the best berries you could find here. They call them "mock strawberries", and I've eaten those before too, but I'd argue these are different. They're really sweet, I swear! The other kids in town and I ate them all the time, though I would agree they taste a bit like watermelon. I found about four bunches of them growing there wildly, so I picked a decent few and went on my way.  The village was my main goal for the day. I supposed a public ferry would be there, given as we always had one as a child, but I also wanted to see if any of my old friends were still around. Music: The Working Life   West Isle village looks surprisingly unchanged. I couldn't see much in the darkness, but the only changes in the town is the few repairs on a couple of the buildings. I didn't see anyone around at first, but then I saw good old Elder Graham standing in his flower garden. He always really liked cultivating the native flowers, especially the scarlet rosmallow hibiscus. I did have to ask him to remind me of the name. I've never been good at plant names.   : ...Wha? If isn't Harry's girl, little girly Alex!: Hey, I'm not short!: ...at least not anymore.I was pretty small when I was younger, but I don't think I was any shorter than the other kids. I got tall really fast though, it was disorienting for a while. : I hardly recognized you coming up the way, what with your head looking like a bunch of pink pansies!: Hey!Was everyone going to get on me about my hair dye? I'm not changing it, either way. : Ahahaha! I'm just a teasing ya, Alex. Long time no see! I heard you'd be taking up Harry's farm from the mayor across the way.: ...That's right, sir.: I've been told you've got yourself quite the helper as well! I bet he's a real handsome lad you've roped in!: W-what!? No, it's not-: Oho! When's your date? : WHAT?!It was about this point Old Graham burst into laughter and didn't stop for quite some time. As embarassing as it was, I couldn't help but laugh a little. He's set to be a comedian or a clown with his love of laughing. : Aha aha... Well, missy, it was nice seeing you again. Brings back a lot of memories, good ones. Well, when it comes to the farm... : Can do, Mr. Graham, I'll see you around!: You as well! Down by the Lighthouse Inn, I found a new face. Where Pete was large due to raw muscle, this guy seemed to have it more in paunch. The finely fitted suit he wore seemed a bit odd for the countryside, but I suppose my hair dye doesn't put me at liberty to complain.   : ...daughter, right? Greetings, my name is Bigbee.: Nice to meet you! I suppose the news about me travels fast.: Well, the Elder informed us you'd be coming soon, hence the prior knowledge. I moved here a few years ago, so this is the first time we've met.: I...I figured that.: Excellent! I'm maintaining the inn for the old couple that used to live here while I work on my writing. The low rate of visitors makes it a beneficial arrangement.: The old couple...Mr. and Mrs. Alamander? Where did they go off to?: Evidence suggests they're living with their nephew back in Northside City.: ...Evidence...?: Precisely. The evidence being my contract and agreement with them. Once the details were factored, the truth became clear.Bigbee is an odd guy, to put it shortly. He's maybe a few years older than me, but that just makes me wonder how long the Alamanders have been away. : However, if you now take residence upon this island, it would be remiss if I did not inform you that you could create a hot spring here.: Hot springs? Since when?: The discovery was made by yours truly. There is a significant amount of geothermal heat here and low aquifers.: Uh, thanks, I guess. I can take a look at making one at the farm sometimes. Anyways, I'll see you around sometime. Bye!: I have determined this to be a probable occasion, so I must agree. Farewell!Such an odd guy. It was about midday, so I decided to head on back to see how Pete was doing. On the way back to the farm, I met another new face.  She was about maybe two or three years younger than me and easily a foot shorter. She had a lot of freckles all across her face, making apparent that she didn't wear any makeup. Back in the city, they would say she didn't really need any- she was plenty pretty as is. I never usually bothered with the stuff personally, mostly because it was such a hassle.   : ...of the farm, right? Alex?: I suppose you've already heard of me, then.: Yep! The Elder was going on and on yesterday about little Miss Alexandra Bethany and all the funny stuff she did as a kid!: Er, that, yeah...: Hehe, don't worry yourself, girl, he didn't say anything that bad. He only told us that your name is Alex. I only found out because I looked at the papers behind his back.:  ...That was just rude. : Aw, don't get in a fuss about it. I'm sorry, but I got curious! Hey, Alexandra's a pretty name and you should be happy!: Yeah, about that...: Hey, if it makes you feel any better, my name's is Katiekins Albertina.: ...Ouch. That first one's not even...: I tell ya what, darlin: I can call you Alex, and you can call me Kate. It's our little secret, okay?: Sure, we can do that. Thanks.: Oh, I've gotta get going! Just so you know, I love milk, so good luck on your farm! Bring some for me sometime! Love the hair! Byeee~!And with that she took off running before I could say goodbye. She definitely has a lot of energy, but I just hope that she doesn't go poking around my private business anymore. At least someone likes my hair color.  After hearing Bigbee's statements, I had an idea I wanted to try. I went back to the little building where I found the shovel and started digging.   Sure enough, there was warm water here! It was surprisingly easy work so I did some more work on it and called it there. It was about midday, so I went to check on Pete's progress. I figured those big arms of his would make a steel plow look bad. I'm not so sure anymore. Music: Pete's Theme (Tutorial BGM)   ...This was about the extent of 6 hours of work, apparently. I didn't know what to say. : It's still a work in progress, but it's pretty rad if you ask me, Ms. Alex.: ...: Ms. Alex, dude, did ya hear me?: Yeah, yeah, but can I ask a question?: Sure can, my dude.: ... How is this all you got done in six hours?: Like I said, Ms. Alex, it's a work in progress. Though I did spend a good amount of time inspecting these tools, oh a and working on my tan and-Today, I think I recieved the biggest headache I've ever had in my life. Facepalming didn't help it much either. : I...I just...d-don't you have something else to be doing right about now?: Uhh...I don't think so- WHOA, IT'S LUNCHTIME, MY DUDE! I gotta get right on that!We never agreed to anything of the sort, but as long as he wasn't around I wasn't going to feel like I was about to have a brain aneurysm. I'm not hallucinating that he's supposed to be an expert farmer, right? ...Nope, that's what I wrote yesterday. If this is an elaborate joke, it's not funny. Music: The Working Life I needed space for crops today, so I didn't have much of a choice aside from doing it myself.   I cleared out some land. That was easy enough by hand.   Then I started tilling out some space...  And kept tilling. I found what seemed like some valuable rocks or old pieces of metal every once in a while. I picked them up, assuming they'd be worth at least something.  I got hungry so I went and grabbed a bit of lunch from the house, not sticking around very long. I don't think croissants are supposed to be lunch, but I tried to not think about it too hard because my headache came back.  I got enough cleared to plant some stuff. That's all I needed, and it took me less than an hour. With that out of the way, I ran back to town to try and catch the ferry to the mainland. There I met with the new ferryman who wasn't there this morning.   : that farmer, Harry. My name's Kirk, nice to meet ya.: I'm Alex, it's nice to meet you as well.: If you need to go to the mainland, I can take you on Mondays and Thursdays from 9 to 6. I unfortunately don't have as much time as the previous ferryman did, so these two days are the only ones I can spare.: I can work with that. Are you open to go right now?: Sure. Jump on.Mr. Alamander was the full-time ferryman before, and Mrs. Alamander ran the inn in the meantime. Kirk's pretty agreeable, if a bit terse.  : Say, have you met my daughter yet? Her name's Kate, and she's about your age, I'd say.: I have, though I think I'm a bit older than her.: Eh, well you're still young. You've got time to grow.There's nicer ways to ask someone to be friends with your kid. Ignoring that, the trip felt surprisingly short- I was at the mainland in no time. Music: West Isle Mainland  : Just get back here by 6 if you can. I don't want Kate to start worrying about me or else I'll never hear the end of it.: Can do. While I was here, I met a guy telling me that morning fairs are held at the docks on Tuesdays and Saturdays, prior to 9 AM. That's far out of Kirk's schedule, so it looks like I won't get to see what these are about. I suppose I'll have to find some way across on my own time.  The sun was starting to get a bit low by the time I got to the mainland, so I needed to hurry and get what I came here for first. The Farmer's Union was my first stop. Music: Mainland Stores   It's a surprisingly fancy building now. The local bank was merged into here at some point it seems.  Among the various things they had in store, they had a "sprinkler" costing 50,000 G. I don't know what sort of magic it's supposed to be, but I'll probably never afford that. They also had a scarecrow, but that was almost all of my savings, so I opted not to.  They were also selling grass seeds... although I don't know if their price made me a bit reluctant or what, because I only bought two bags. I didn't need pasture grass too quickly anyways.  Aside from that, they also sold some medicines and other supplies I didn't have any reason to buy just yet. : Hey, do you know where to buy crop seeds? Aside from grass, I mean. : Just head to the mall, first store on the left.: Thanks!Who ever heard of selling seeds in a mall?   It was bigger than I thought, though surprisingly empty. I don't really know why they needed this big of a building for it, since it's mostly a local storefront from what I can see. Near the entrance was an old man sitting at a table.   : ...lunch?: I think it's a bit past lunch, sir.: Why, I know that! I was wondering what I was going to have for lunch tomorrow!: Oh, okay.I've never seen him around before, or at least, I don't remember him. I forgot to ask his name, unfortunately. It seems like the left half of this room was a diner, and I was drawn in at the sight of a familiar face holding onto a cat.  : Mrs. Chloe Jewel, do you remember me? : Why, if it isn't little Alex Button all grown up! I heard you'd come back to West Isle, but I couldn't believe it until I saw it with my own eyes!: Yes, it's me. How've you been?: Never better, sweetie! As you can see I eventually got my diner started up and it's doing great! How about you? Come back to fulfill that promise you made?: I've been good, but... what promise?: I can't believe you'd forget something so important! You promised you'd marry my dear boy, Billy!: B-b-but, I was five! I didn't-: Haha, I'm just joking with you, sweetheart! Your face went a really beautiful shade of red though, are you sure you're still-: I-I'm sure.Why does it seem like everyone wanted to mess with me today...? : Really? Now that I think about it, you made the same promise to little Ezla...maybe you-: I'M SURE, MRS. JEWEL.  I was five, it's not like I knew what marriage meant, okay? You're in no place to judge, you're reading my diary. Billy and Ezla were the other two kids on the island while I was around. We'd known each other since infancy though, so we had been close for a while, but we lost contact. : Aw, dear, you know I can't help teasing.: ...Y-yeah, okay. How are Billy and Ezla anyways? I haven't seen them around town?: They're doing fine for themselves. Both've taken up fishing, so they're probably out at sea, but I know they want to see you again. : I'll be sure to say hello if I see them sometime! Oh, I almost forgot! Do you know anything about a gray cat on the island? It showed up at my farm and...: Nope! Allison here is my only cat, and I'm the only member of the Cat Club in West Isle, so it must be a stray that hitched a ride on a boat!: What should I do about it?: Keep it, of course! Every farm needs a mouser, my dear! That, and Ally would love to have a playmate!: Alright, I'll do that! Bye, Mrs. Jewel!: Bye, Alex! Be sure to stop by sometime, my... Well, with that distraction out of the way, I went over to the flower shop on the left and immediately got distracted again.   : Welcome to my-: Whoa  : Whoa : Au Natrale 34, cotton pink?: Brave choice, I know- Sky Henna 13, wild nebula?: You... you got it! Hah, someone who finally understands!: You're telling me, girl! Hair dye forever, queenie!: Straight back 'atcha, king! Treads to the pavement, and hit the pedal!Despite how much I loved the country, my time in the city was still part of me. The admittedly strange slang was also still there. : I'd never have thought to find another club rouser like me out here!: Small world, I guess! We might want to hold back a bit on the code before everyone starts looking at us strangely.: True words, there. What's your story?: Saving the farm I grew up on, you?: Living out my time growing the best flowers I can.:  : Well, that helped my mood entirely. It was odd finding someone so relatable, especially when the entire day had been such a rollecoaster. I didn't really have any more time to talk, though. I'd burned more than enough time. : Hey, uh, sorry to cut it short, but what's your recommendation for spring crops?: All cool with me. I'd go for the potatoes. They've got the best flowers. : Good with me! I've gotta jet before I miss the ferry, but before I go, what's your name?: Lukia, you?: Alex! I'll see you around!I wasn't lying, I was running out of time. There was a whole second floor to the mall I didn't get to look at, but I couldn't make the ferryman wait any longer. Something did stop me, though, if at least briefly. : Oh! I know what I'll have for lunch: croissants!: Music: The Sleepy West Isle (World Map Theme)  : Whew, made it back! I didn't get to see everything, but that's fine.: It'd be better if you left earlier next time.: Yeah, yeah. It's my first day, and I'm still straightening everything out.: Just sayin'. Hop on. : ...Say, you're technically a sea captain, right?: You got that right. I just don't wear my hat because I like the wind in my hair.: Okay, Captain Kirk. Hahaha!: ???It was funny at the time. You had to be there to understand. ...Actually, why was that funny again? Eh, I'll remember it at some point. I think I was still a bit giddy from having most of that headache lifted.  Before I got to work planting, I took a brief moment to watch the sunset from the cliffside. I needed a brief rest and I figure it couldn't hurt.  It was nice to see again, kind of like an old friend. I'd sneak out as a child to watch it all the time, and the sunset view here was much better than the sunrise on the other coast. Music: The Working Life  When I got to the field and planted the first bag of potatoes, I realized I didn't entirely remember how my dad did it. So I needed to till some more...  It looked right once planted, so I did that some more.  ...And more.  Eventually, I found a golden colored berry plant I hadn't noticed before. Now these I really remembered being delicious so I couldn't help myself.  I don't regret it either! That thing tasted really good, even if was a bit gritty, enough to give me a real big boost in energy.    I eventually got it all, though! By the end I was completely wore out, though it felt good. I probably wouldn't have done it without that strange berry. I resolved to get the grass planted tomorrow, I didn't need it as much as I would the crops.  All that put me in such a good mood finally that I even gave one of those mock strawberries to Pete. In retrospect, I kinda can't hold earlier today against him, I guess. Music: Pete's Theme (Tutorial BGM)  : Ooh, Ms. Alex, y'know this would be great for lunch! It'd be good with croissants!: : What is it, my dude?: ...Nothing. Just tired. Really, really tired. I'm just going to go to bed now, okay?: Yeah, you should do that, Ms. Alex! I'll be up for a bit, because I'm wacked out at how totally not tired I am. It's just strange dude.: I wonder why.: Oh, Ms. Alex, one last thing! Did you find out if we could keep the cat? The cat outside cat? The outside cat now inside cat? The-: Yeah. It's ours.: WHOA, DUDE, YEAH! C'mere Bird, you're part of the family now! Best day EVER!: Mrrooow!I mean, with a reaction like that, how could I say no? Well, that and there was also the fact that she was already inside the house. On top of me. ...Hopefully tomorrow goes better. Next Update: Mistakes Were Made ------ Next update shouldn't take me nearly as long, and shouldn't be as long. Regardless, enjoy your supersized update and apologies are due for destroying your scrollbar. If you've got any criticisms about anything, throw them my way. Part of this is to refine my writing again, and though this is a bit off from my usual style, any improvement helps. ...And yes, Pete really is this bad at farming. I'll cover as to why in the mechanics update. The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 19:00 on Jan 15, 2020 |
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Jan 15, 2020 03:27
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Commander Keene posted:The what? Don't leave me in suspense now! Curses, I must have forgotten to finish a sentence. I'll, uh, try to remember where I was going with that and I'll edit it in. I sometimes jump around a bit when I'm writing and fail to remember I didn't complete a sentence. It was probably because of this -V- Rabbi Raccoon posted:Sometimes you just need a pretty face to motivate you to get poo poo done. A pretty face with a rockin' body. A pretty face with a rockin' body that's just dripping sweat. A pretty face with a rockin' body that's just dripping sweat and lifts your chin with his rough hand, smiles, and... 
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Jan 15, 2020 18:57
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silversatyr posted:That was a pretty great read tho! I'm enjoying the characterisation you're injecting into the NPCs and going into more detail about farming information (like how to milk a cow) is pretty cool. >.<)b The characterization is just a personal flair to enhance what I have to work with. This being held on 256kb of memory means most of the characters only have a small amount of dialogue to define them, so I'm mostly playing up on what's accessible. They're going to be around for the entire game, so I might as well make them count. For instance, Bigbee's mostly very factual and speaks in short, if not sometimes obvious statements, this being inherited from his few lines of dialogue in the game. --- As for the extra details, I think it adds a nice layer of verisimilitude to the story. Honestly, if I didn't include them or define the characters, this would be a rather brief narrative. There's a bit more to milking I could cover, but Alex wouldn't likely remember/know it yet. That is the actual method for hand milking though, which also applies to sheep and goats, plus or minus one or two details. Just don't walk up to an expert dairy farmer one day and claim you know how to do it from what I've written- I'm no professional, I'm just familiar with the process. Now, as for the crop farming itself... well, that's a story for another day. They're both small details, but the mock strawberry/snakeberry and the crimson hibiscus are also both real. I've had mock strawberries before and I'd say the comparison to watermelon is quite accurate, though it is worth noting that they are very gritty but also function as an antiseptic. I can cover a lot more about the behind the scenes stuff, mechanics or tiny details included, when I get to an intermission update. I think it goes without saying though that I've actually modified a few screenshots and some dialogue. I won't tell you which ones, but you might be able to put that together on your own.
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Jan 16, 2020 06:57
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Kacie posted:I loved the connecting over the dyed hair, too. Very nice scene, very fun. Glad you enjoyed it, writing that little bit is why I held the impromptu vote on whether it was dyed or not. I won't lie, the female eyes look like brackets to me as well, but I just got used to it. They're probably supposed to look like this:  It's what I refer to as "pac-man eyes", though I know this bit of eye shape probably runs all the way back to the earliest Disney designs. Being limited to 3 colors + transparency makes it hard to give detail. I've done a lot of spriting in the GBC styles, and it's a constant battle of interpretation. ---- It's not as long as this one, thankfully, but its still got lots of content. Edit: Okay, not tonight, tomorrow morning. I've got a few last bits of Spring 7th to write. I admittedly got distracted by Neo Turf Masters longer than I intended. The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 07:02 on Jan 19, 2020 |
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Jan 18, 2020 07:36
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Update 3: Mistakes Were Made (Year 1, Spring 2-7) Music: The Working Life Spring 2nd, Year 1 I woke up sore all over today, but I suppose that's to be expected. None of my last jobs were this labor intensive, and it didn't help that I had to do everything yesterday. We had croissants among other stuff this morning, but Pete and everyone else still seems to insist they're lunch food.  : You know Ms. Alex, it's not good to eat lunch food for breakfast.: : Goin' to milk Bess? : Yeah, do you mind watering the seeds I planted yesterday? It shouldn't be too hard.: Can do, Ms. Alex! Oh, before you go, did you notice the hot spring's been finished?: ...No? All I did was dig a hole yesterday.: Well, uh, it is, I think. I brought Bird outside and she went back to pawing at seeds on the ground. I question whether she'll end up being a mouser at all, but she doesn't seem hungry anytime I try to feed her. I guess she's just doing it when I'm not looking? : *Purr*Still an odd cat, though.   Bess seems to be really docile, which is good for me. She doesn't get herself too dirty either, which makes part of my job faster at least.   She doesn't give much milk, but I suppose that's fine. My mother told me that cows occasionally need to "work into" producing large quantities of milk. I'm a bit worried with how long it's taking me to milk her now, though. Unless I get really good at this, a whole herd of cows is going to have me in the barn from sunrise to sundown!  I brought her out to the pasture with me to see if she wanted to touch any of the existing greenery. It wouldn't be much, but any real grass in her diet would be great until I could get these fields re-established.  Actually, starting work on that was my other project for the morning. The plan was to make enough money from those potatoes to get enough grass seeds to fix these fields to then raise more cows to then- Well, you get the point.   Once the bigger weeds were gone, I moved some rocks and took to clearing out a large stump. It took a bit of effort, but being old and dry made it easier to get rid of than a fresh stump. I took what was salvageable and set that to the side- it'd make for decent firewood.  It really got my arms burning and me sweating this early in the year, but there was a nice cool breeze out that made it quite refreshing.   Before I knew it, it was lunchtime already. I grabbed some leftover breakfast and got back to work.     I even eventually got one of those giant rocks smashed to pieces.  I was on so much of a roll that I took out some of the smaller rocks too. It was about that time that whatever adrenaline I had going wore off and I really felt my arms. Needing a break, I went to see how Pete's progress was. I should've known I wasn't going to catch a break today, but the benefit of doubt is a tricky thing. Music: Pete's Theme (Tutorial BGM)   : I couldn't find the watering can, so I did all of this with my glass from breakfast this morning! You see, I'm a quick thinker, Ms. Alex!: I...why? It's sitting right out in the open in the tool shed.: Oh, er, you see... I kinda lost it, earlier, you know on the way to the field.: ...It's sitting right behind you.: Wait, really- WHOOA, YOU'RE RIGHT! You've got good eyesight Ms. Alex, like, 200/200 or something, my dude! Hey, hey, can you see how well my tan is coming along?...I could feel my eye twitching. : Y-you know what? I'll just take this from here.: Alright, Ms. Alex! Get those muscles working, but don't let the burn get to ya! I'll get started on dinner, gotta make sure we've got maximum protein!Music: The Working Life  So I started watering...  And watering...  And watering. By this point my arms felt like they were going to fall off, so I decided to go take a look around town before continuing any more.  Though, before I did, I stumbled on over to the cow pasture and planted those seeds I was still hauling around. When I did get there, it was already somewhere around 3 PM. Though, I did find two people I had been looking for there... Music: The Sleepy West Isle (World Map Theme)    : ...all the time as kids!: My gosh, Elza! Long time no see, huh?Elza's appearance was a lot different compared to what she used to wear. I remembered country dresses and long hair, but she'd turned that all the way round for flashy, low-cut, sailor's clothing, short hair, and bandanas. It looks gaudy to me, but whatever works for her. : Haha, that's usually the case when one of us runs off to the city for 13 years!: Hey, it wasn't my choice!: I know, I know, I'm just teasin' ya.: I know, but why does it seem like everyone wants to have fun at my expense?: You make it too easy, girl. You need to stand a bit taller, you know?: Yeah, but don't you think 5'11" is tall enough?: Hah, good one! But seriously, we all missed ya. We just can't help it.: Eh, if you say so. We talked for a bit longer after that. Apparently, her older sister went off to be a nun while she stayed here to do fishing as a profession, thus why she was wearing what she wanted to now. Billy was still around as well, as my talk with Mrs. Jewel yesterday suggested, though he spent a lot of time out at sea. Catching him before he left might be a bit difficult. I needed to get back to the farm eventually, so we said our goodbyes. : Hey, before I go, I've just gotta say- thanks.: For what?: For keeping this from feeling awkward.: Naw, that's still nothing. We're still friends, right?: Right.On my way back, I met up with Kate. We didn't have much time to talk, but it was nice learning a bit more about her.  #Kate: like this in the city? I think not! : What's with the funny accent?#Kate: Hehe, just tryin' to sound sophisticated is all. Say, Alex, you've been to the city, right? What's it like? : There's lots of people, but the nightlife is fun if you're into that kind of stuff. It feels a bit cold without trees and flowers though, that and you have to get used to cars driving by non-stop.#Kate: That's what I thought it would be like. Yep, I'd much rather be here enjoying the nice country air! : Same here!I didn't feel like it would be a great idea to tell people how much time I spent at dance clubs and such. I was honestly kind of a different person then, though I guess most of that was peer pressure. ...Now that I think about it, why in the world did my father think me living in the city was going to be a better influence on me than out here?  After that, I made my way back to the farm. Doing all that talking almost wore me out just as much, but then I remembered that hot spring thing. Music: The Working Life  Turns out Pete wasn't kidding. I don't know who did, or even if Pete's being more helpful without me noticing, but it was finished. Rough, but more finished than I left it.   I locked the door and jumped in to see how well it would work for my present aches. I've always been skeptical of these things before, but... My goodness did that feel good. I don't think I left until it started getting dark.  I felt so good, I decided to work on the crop fields some more. I think the first set I planted might be too close to the edge of the farm so I started a new line of plots. Pulling up the weeds were first on the list.  With most of those, it was time to clear up this rock field. I could at least get the big pieces out of the way, even if the ground would stay rocky for a long time.  There's so many rocks out there, and they're frustratingly tough to break. It'd be better if I had a pickaxe probably, but I don't think my father left one of those behind.  And then I needed to clear some more...  And more...  And more...  Then I could get started on it, though it was getting hard to see.  In the process, I found one of those golden berries again. It was enough to keep me working for a little while longer.   Not much longer, mind you. Every part of me felt like lead in a few minutes and I eventually stumbled back home, half asleep. I'd put in more work today that I think I ever have. ...I hoped I wasn't forgetting something.   : How'd it go, Ms. Alex?: NEED SLEEP: Hey, now that's the way to end a good day of farmin' you know?: ZZZZzzzzzzz...Spring 3rd, Year 1 I've had better days, really. Oh, and all this happened a few days ago- I haven't gotten around to writing until just now, on the 7th.  We had croissants for breakfast, and I'm really getting tired of writing that word now. Pete makes surprisingly good breakfast pastries though. I decided to try a different approach towards getting Pete to actually farm today. I was starting to get a bit agitated at feeling I was doing all the work. : Hey, Pete, can you water the seeds I planted yesterday? I'm really trusting you on this. : Alright, Ms. Alex, I won't let you down!: Taking care of Bess is my focus, so it really helps if you can lighten the load on me a bit.: Oh, my dude, did you put Bess back inside yesterday?: What? Of course I-: AAAHH! THAT'S WHAT I FORGOT!   : Bess, I'm sorry, girl! I'm new to this, okay, and I had to work on the fields all night and- No, there was no use talking this out to a cow. I still apologized to her profusely, but she just shrugged me off when I tried to brush her and she hardly let me get any milk from her. I suppose that's fair, but it's a huge let down. I checked a reference manual earlier and they said she'd probably be like this for a few days. Apparently cows can get very tempermental if they're used to sleeping indoors.  : Alright, Bess, I left you extra feed here. I'll have you some real grass soon.When I left the barn, Bird went chasing after something. : Mew!: W-what is it, girl? Whatever it was, I never found out. She ran me to the entrance of the farm and then just gave me a confused look.  : Don't look at me like that! You know it was an honest mistake!: *Sneeze*: And what's that supposed to mean?Conversations with animals aside, I cleaned out the barn before going to see how Pete had done. It was still early in the day, but he should have some work done, surely.   At this point, I really don't know what I expect anymore. Music: Pete's Theme (Tutorial BGM) : Hey, Ms. Alex, pretty good job, right?: ...Can you just go work on lunch again?: Sure can, my dude!: Wait, before you go, if you knew Bess was still out, why didn't you put her inside?: A-ah, w-well, dude, I didn't want to take over your job, Ms. Alex!: Why didn't you tell me, then?: I... I, uh, forgot. Sorry, Ms. Alex...I was trying my best to not get angry with him, but I don't think there was a chance with those sad puppy eyes of his. : R-right. Please just try to remember next time, okay?: Alright, Ms. Alex...:  I swear everything was out to depress me today. It didn't help that my earlier mistakes were coming back to bite me now as well. Music: The Working Life  : I just need to...get by- : Ack! : Ugh...Ow, ow, ow...Trying to even reach the potatoes close to the ledge was practically a safety hazard, and falling seemed inevitable.   I just had to water what I could. I could reach over a few, but I don't think I'd be able to once they grew up. Great. Just great. At least I didn't tell Pete to get those or else I'd be feeling even worse right now... With the necessities out of the way, I headed to town for a while. Music: The Sleepy West Isle (World Map Theme) I've had better days, and I was hoping that reliving some old memories would bring some motivation back.  It was there I met a final familiar face, still with his hair in a curly, wild mass.   : We used to play at the elder's place a lot. A-actually, you probably don't remember me-: Billy Jewel, right? How could I ever forget you, silly? You, Elza, and I got into so much trouble all the time!: Ahaha...I-I apologize for all the scoldings you probably got because of me.: Hey, don't worry about it. Those are still some of my favorite memories, even if it sucked at the time.: H-haha...y-yeah, I guess... W-well, I gotta go, so...Billy was always the introverted type, even when he was younger. I'd caught back up with Ezla pretty well, and I thought it'd be nice if we were on the same terms as well. Besides, it looked like something was bothering him as well. It was only noon, I could still turn this day around, right? : Hey, hey, wait up a second! Can you wait for about maybe 15 minutes?: I-I guess. Why...?: You'll see, just wait!  : This'll cheer us both up. There's no better ice-breaker than old memories. ...Well, provided they're good memories, but still! Another trip back at a fast pace later... #070 : Hey! These...these are those little strawberries we used to eat all the time!: You know it!: W-where'd you find these? I haven't been able to find them since you left?: They're still where the Grassland used to be, but maybe a bit more spread out. It took me some time to find them.A smile broke across his face as he ate it. : Mm! You were always the best at finding these, Alex. Goodness knows I missed these.: Must be a talent, I guess. I'll say they're as good as I remember.: Same here. Say, I really do have to get going, but thanks for stopping by, truly.: No problem!: Oh, and, uh, I hope your day goes better for you... We all have off days, y'know.: H-how did you know?: ...Must be a talent I guess.With that, he gave me another smile and headed off along the coastline. That did make me feel a good bit better.  : You know what? I can agree with that!: Glad to hear it, missy! Hahaha!Music: The Working Life With my spirits lifted, I headed off to do some good today. I set it down in my mind that no matter how tired I am, I'll get the cow pasture tilled up for the next time I have more seeds. ♫ ♪  : Where the road runs down by the butternut grove~ ♫ : -To old Bill Skinner's stream~ ♪ : -Do tell at the noonday bell~ ♪ : -It's time for a summertime dream! ♫ : In a lunch pail town in a one horse way~ ♫ : -You can live like a king and queen~ ♪ : -Let's steal away in the noonday sun~ ♪ : -It's time for a summertime dream! ♪ : Hmm hm hm hmm hm hmm~ ♪ And till it I did. I found 3 more of those strange berries alongside quite a couple of pretty rocks and old pieces of things possibly worth some change. I also sung some old songs I hadn't heard in years. It's been a while since I listened to some folk music like I used to- they don't really have that in dance clubs, unfortunately. I checked in on Bess on my way to bed and she was still in a bad mood. Looks like I've got to deal with this for a few days.  It was dark by the time I got back to the house, and Bird was already waiting for me. I didn't see too much of her during the day- she was off doing whatever and so was I. : Meow! Mrroow!: What, you want to come in tonight? You're probably just going to sneak out again and sleep in that hayloft but whatever. I don't want to wake up with a dead mouse on me, okay?: *Purr* Music: Pete's Theme (Tutorial BGM) : Hey, Pete. I'm headed to bed.: The bed in the back of the room bed, bed on the right bed, the right bed?: Yup.: Alrighty! I'll be headed to sleep myself soon, my dude. First I gotta wrestle with my wrestle buddy! YEAH!: Rowr!True enough, they play wrestled on the floor for a few minutes. I'm starting to wonder what sort of cat Bird's supposed to be, and how old Pete even is. I just don't get either of them. Spring 4th, Year 1 Music: The Sleepy West Isle (World Map Theme) I woke up today to the sound of rain. It wasn't anything heavy, just really constant. I waited around for an hour or two with hope that the rain would clear, but it didn't.  : Hey, hey, Ms. Alex! Where are you going?: Outside. It's still raining, but I still need to go take care of Bess. I've got some work on the fields I haven't finished yet as well.: Alrighty, my dude- I'll hold the fort. This house isn't going to clean itself, you know- WHOA, DUDE, THAT'D BE SUPER AWESOME IF IT DID-: I'll be back.: Hey, little buddy, could you imagine a self cleaning house? Like, whoaaa, dude.: Mrooow. I fed Bess, but she didn't take well to a brush and she started getting really rowdy before I'd really done much milking, so I just let her be for now. Hopefully her attitude would clear up soon. Truth be told, I was already partially drenched just carrying the supplies over for the day, but it really wasn't that bad. The idea of just doing nothing for the day made me restless and I've mentioned before that I'm as stubborn as Dad was.  I'm possibly even more stubborn than he was. I didn't even stop for breakfast.  I remember thinking:  "I'm not going to let rain stop me. Nothing's going to stop me from reviving Dad's farm!"  "Nothing!"  "-Not even something as small as rain or the cold! I'm fine!"  Music: None And...I just kept going, I think. I think I remember getting really tired, I... It goes a bit blank from there. But I swear I heard a voice far away. I don't know who it was, I don't even remember it clearly, but...  : ... You really need to take better care of yourself.: ... Know when to fold 'em, kid. You can only trip and fall so many times before you...: ... You're really not as strong as you think. I'm sorry, but that's just how it is.: B-but-: No buts. We shouldn't meet again until along time from now...: I-I...w-wait-!...They sounded really angry with me. The next thing I remember is:  Music: Pete's Theme (Tutorial BGM) : Hey, Ms. Alex, everything okay, my dude? Heard ya talking to yourself.: Ugh...it's like a really bad headache but...: Phew, good to hear you're doin' alright! You had me worried when you stumbled in here all drenched and stuff.: I...I what?: Haha, yeah, my dude, you've been sleeping for about...It was at this point he looked at the table clock for a second, obtained a confused expression and then replied: : -For quite a while, Ms. Alex. You've got a reaaaaaal bad fever, but don't worry about it though! I'll get everything for you today!: ...Even Bess?: I-I... Er... Oh, right! Almost forgot, Ms. Alex! Open wide for the food train, get it while it's still hot!I hadn't noticed the bowl of soup until that point. He already had a spoon out in front of my face before I could react. : W-what?! You're not spoonfeeding me! I can eat on my own, thank you!I swiped the bowl from him, even though I did feel a bit weak. He had an odd sad expression for a moment, but then immediately popped straight back into his smiling self. : I knew that, my dude! I'll go get to work, see you in a bit!: *Sneeze*: Right on, Birdie, make sure she eats all of it!: *Purr*Spring 6th, Year 1 Music: The Sleepy West Isle (World Map Theme) The dream and all the stuff after it happened yesterday actually. Well, er, on the 5th. It's the 6th now. I think I slept most of the day away, which I think slept away most of whatever fever I had, but I still feel awful. I don't really know what happened, but I'd sure like to not feel this way anymore.  It's raining again, by the way. Noticing that made me think about the song, which I suppose means I'm feeling better. I've spent most of the day writing all this into the diary, because I think I've learned my lesson about working in cold rain.  I took care of Bess as much as she'd allow, but she was extra cranky today. I'm honestly quite sure that Pete didn't go near her at all, but I gave her a lot of fodder on the 4th and today. It's still really bad though. I'll just have to make sure it never happens again, which means I'll never let myself get sick again!  Oh, I tried calling Mom today, but the rain seems to have caused some problems at the operator's side. They can't get any calls out today. Oh, I might not have mentioned that! This place still has operators, which is really neat, though I suppose a bit inconvenient. Living on an island has it's downsides. I'd head to the mainland, but I'm sure Kirk doesn't sail on days like these. Nothing else for me to do than write in this or watch as Pete attempts to teach Bird to do tricks. : Now roll over!: *Sneeze*She sneezes a lot, but she really doesn't seem to be a normal cat in any sense of the word. Usually she directs it at you if she's annoyed. I mean, if I was a cat, I figure you'd hiss. But I mean, I don't really mind that much, it's honestly kinda adorable. Spring 7th, Year 1 Music: The Working Life  I woke up this morning feeling mostly better though something in my chest still hurt. I'm not sure what, but I rightly figured I could power through the day as long as I took it a bit easy on myself. We had some sort of rice cake thing for breakfast. Pete found it in his recipe book and wanted to try it. He had to improvise on a few details, but it wasn't too bad. As a note to myself: Make sure to grab some more food supplies in the mainland tomorrow! Most've what we've brought has run out.  : Hey, can you just water whatever in the fields today? I'll be working in the barn for some time, and I'll get the rest later.: Sure can, Ms. Alex! Glad to see you're feeling better!: Same here!I was in a much better mood, even if that pain persisted for a while throughout the day.  Bess was still moody, but the book assured me she'd be over it soon enough. I could work with that, even though getting knocked off my milking stool was no fun. You see, I have to milk her every day since I don't have a calf feeding as well- an udder has to get emptied somehow. Truth be told, I spent most of the morning working on cleaning the barn.   : I did what you said!: That you did. I'll take it from here, sometime later today.: Aye aye, Ms. Alex! I'll go work on lunch, you know, for lunch!Music: The Sleepy West Isle (World Map Theme)   For some fun, I went and collected some more berries. It was a nice walk at least, even if I walked into a few spiderwebs. That's the risk of walking in the woods, though. After that, I figured I'd keep taking it easy and go to visit the town to talk with folks.   : Eh, somewhat. You?: I'm not doing too much today. Just resetting my poles and fixing a few nets so I can be ready for more fishing tomorrow.: Sounds good! Say, you think I could come along some day?: Haha, if only my little skiff wasn't so little, girl. If you're interested in boats, you'd probably want to ask Billy, he inherited his family's larger boat.: Alright, well, I'll talk to him about it if I've got the time for it someday.: Say, speaking of Billy, he told me you found those berries again?: Oh, right! : Here you are! Went and got some today.: Mm! Thanks, girl. I gave up looking for these years ago!: I guess finding them just comes naturally to me. I'll see you around, I do have some stuff to get back to.: Same here! See ya!On my way back to the farm, I made some smalltalk with Billy and Elder Graham.  : Not too hard, at least for today. You?: Just hanging out, myself. : See you around sometime?: Yep! : Better than all that rain we've been having. How's the flowers going?http://lpix.org/3618612/Elder.png: Going great! Hahaha! Music: The Working Life   Back on the farm, I watered what was possible. Thinking about it now, I'd probably need to do some more planning on how I'm going to be planting.  There was another whole section of fields to work on, which I'd have to get to at some point.  On the other hand, the cow pasture was starting to regrow, though I'd definitely need some more seeds.  ...Although, the other fields were still in rough shape.   After taking it easy for the rest of the day, I found myself on the cliffside while watching that familiar sunset again. This was a rough week, but it was only my first here. I could still turn this all around easily, and I don't think I'm going to forget the hard lessons I've already had.  I'll get it right next week, for sure. Next Update: Behind the Scenes 1 ---- Participation for actions is in the next post! The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 16:53 on Jan 19, 2020 |
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Jan 19, 2020 16:38
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Week 2 Participation: Time for particpation again, as always! Due to this terrible week, none of our potatoes were ready for sale and we would've been nearly bankrupt if it hadn't been for her habit of finding valuable junk buried in the field. That being said, we have 3530 G for spending. Yes, all the mistakes were intentional, though I couldn't help myself doing the cow pasture right. Crop seeds we can buy: Turnips: 120 G, Potatoes: 160 G, Asparagus: 320 G, Stardust Flower: 400 G, Grass: 600 G (needed for animals) If we buy Grass seeds, I'll also need you to say where to plant them. (Horse, Cow, Chicken, or Sheep Field.) As a reminder, we need 6 bags worth of fully grown grass in a field until they'll let us purchase more animals. Chickens only require 3 bags worth. We could also buy a Scarecrow for 3200 G, though it would mean we'd have little money left. We could also buy Cow Medicine for 1000 G, which could be useful in the future. As for our actions in the future, should Alex (pick any you want to see): Clear out the lower field? Focus on clearing out the other animal fields? Continue giving gifts to her old friends? Talk more with some new friends? Go explore the forest? Go see a movie at the Theater? (1500 G per ticket) Take a look at part-time jobs/ shipping quotas? Gather lots of berries to sell to improve income? Do some archaeology / mining for some more income? Extra: Other things we can afford, though probably not very useful: Flower Vase - 3000 G Small Rug - 3000 G Saddle - 1000 G Chicken Medicine - 800 G Sheep Medicine - 1500 G Horse Medicine - 2000 G Fodder Bag (32 Uses) - 500 G Shampoo - 800 G Clippers - 2000 G Farm Story Book - 2000 G (Lets Pete till in a U shape.) Farm Story Book 2 - 2000 G (Lets Pete till in a = shape.) --- Also, the next update in a few days will be touching on mechanics and some of the places I changed from the original game. If you've got any particular questions about the game or my narrative, ask away now and I'll answer them inside that update as well. The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 17:55 on Jan 19, 2020 |
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Jan 19, 2020 16:49
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Black Robe posted:Is there an option to smack Pete over the head with the shovel and bury him in a crop field as fertiliser? I don't care if there's a mechanical reason why he's essentially useless, it would annoy me far too much if I was playing. Pete's skull would probably break the shovel. I'll admit it's somewhat annoying, and long term all he's really useful for is watering so you eventually get in the mindset that he's just a free few tiles watered per day, basically. We can elect to just leave him in the kitchen and tell him to not bother working. Sara/Alex as a partner is mostly better due to a lower workload, though she still easily forgets to do any of the work you assign. He'll eventually get better at it. It's worth noting (and I just ninja edited it in) that we have to have the grass fully grown to buy animals, even if we can support them with fodder bags. We can plant 3 bags of seeds on Monday, but they're rather picky and sometimes inconsistent as to when we can get more animals. I opted to not put the animal prices on the list because we can't purchase any presently. The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 18:06 on Jan 19, 2020 |
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Jan 19, 2020 18:04
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hopeandjoy posted:Yeah grass for chickens makes sense since chickens are the cheapest animal choice, generally. The cow will be mad for about 1-2 more days. Falling out sick and not being able to feed her extended the time period a bit. There's some specifics, but its worth noting that Pete isn't helping in the slightest.
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Jan 19, 2020 19:51
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biosterous posted:Why does everyone want to do a violence to my idiot son? To be fair, I like Pete Kronkson. But I am the writer so I might be a bit biased.
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Jan 20, 2020 04:42
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Bonus 1: Behind the Scenes 1 As this is a narrative playthrough, I'm taking a few liberties here and there to match the game to the story I'm trying to tell. This being a GBC game most characters talk rather stilted, and though this game is comprehensible, sometimes the dialogue doesn't head in the way I need/want it to. Mechanically, I'm expanding on what I can through the narrative. HM's never been the most complex/realistic farm sim, but that's because it's balanced to provide a rewarding experience in minutes rather than hours and days. All of that being said, I'm going to be showing you what's going on in the actual game and not Alex's Adventure Island. I'll show some story bits up first and I'll get to the hard mechanics in a minute. Intro:   Meet Cl(ai)re and Flip. They're each off in their own universes, trying to re-establish a farm that's either theirs or not. Claire was one of the other names for Alex, and I knew a Claire, so I went with that. Flip was the only other name given for Pete, based off of a coin flip. Their colors were the only others outside of default voted for. Forest Green will see it's use soon enough in the main story.  In the character creation we are told that "Girl will be your partner help you with the farming." We are told basically the same thing for choosing Girl, though we know she's not going to be getting much help from Boy.  Blood type has from what my experience says, no effect on gameplay whatsoever. A short conversation on another forum suggests that having "compatible" blood types with your partner would trigger an event where'd they'd propose to you early. They also note that the game always makes you have "incompatible" blood types with your partner. My memory editing skills won't take me far enough to patch it into the game, even if this supposed code is there. Oh and here's a list of blood type descriptions taken from the same place, if you wanted to know. Blood Types posted:Type A - Calm and orderly, but serious and stubborn. Japan believes it affects personality types. I, uh, forgot about it entirely for the purposes of writing Alex in favor of the decided personality for her. In the end, she's hardly an AB and much more an A. Pete is absolutely B, though.  The pet choice had more mechanical implications than I led the thread to believe. Since Bird the Gray Cat will be with us for the game, I felt it would worth noting what the other pets do. The 3 Dogs: All the dogs act the same by helping to reduce the chance an animal gets grumpy when left out overnight. It's guaranteed to work as long as they have mature grass in the field and its not raining. As result, this wouldn't have helped Alex out with Bess. The 3 Cats: All the cats bring various seeds to the player. Pink Cats bring Spring seeds, Gray Cats bring Summer seeds, and Brown Cats bring Fall seeds. More on this in a minute, but Bird (the cat) actually matches up with the mechanics. The Pig: Each morning the pig brings you small amounts of money. I don't think it's enough to offset the potential value of a seed-bringer. The Bird: The actual bird will bring you seeds associated with any season at random. I believe the chances are much lower, given I usually play with the bird and have rarely ever gotten any seeds. --- This being said, you're never notified they brought anything. You have to check your inventory every morning to look for changes. It's also worth noting that the only seasons with pet-only seeds are Summer and Fall, so the thread picked wisely. (I still don't know how Alex ended up with a random bag of asparagus seeds in her inventory. It shouldn't be Bird's fault, right?)   Narrator: Flip has successfuly revived the farm and has lived there trying to find another goal in life. But one day...  Heinz: -as usual? I have something to ask you today. My friend owned a farm on an island, but he recently passed away. Now his daughter decided to work on the farm but she does not know anything about farming... Heinz: So, I would like you to help her! Can you do it?  They give you a choice. This is equivalent to the choice they give you in More Friends of Mineral Town, namely that if you say NO:  Heinz: - how to revive a farm. Can you please do it?  I would like to note this makes me feel much more awful than the one in MOFMT.  He asks again, saying NO nets you this:       Er, world record, right guys?  So yeah, it even goes to the credits sequence. It's an actual ending. Let's uh, rewind time a bit and say YES instead, giving a bit of encouragement. Heinz: She's hot. Flip: Deal.  Heinz: -please head to the island tomorrow morning.  Heinz: Everyone in the village will take good care of it. Narrator: This is how Flip's new Harvest Moon Adventure began.  It opens with Flip walking out of the station and looking around a bit before Sara walks up. Sara: -guy who will help me on the farm? My name is-  See, this is how you know it's not Alex. Sara: It's too late to start working by the time we get to the island, so let's start tomorrow.  Sara: There is a ferry.  Then they just walk off. It fades and opens to her conversation saying you can tell her to help with animals and bam the game's started. ---- I'll explain the mechanical differences when playing as the male character in a later update. For now, let's go check on Claire to get an idea of how it was for Alex.  The intro scene with Harry is entirely unedited. I thought this little bit of backstory was neat, especially so since they even made that riding on the back animation for it. From there, it immediately cuts to this:  Hans: -sell the farm? Claire then  Hans: -not as easy as you think... You still want to to it for your father...? I can understand how you feel, but...  Hans: He will help Clre...? They might be able to do it together... OK!  Hans: -in Mr. Heinz's village and he will be coming to help you. Pete is a guy, will that be OK?  No, we don't get a choice here. Only the guy is allowed to be a jerk. From there we cut to the same intro as on the Boy's side. Pete: Hello. Are you the girl Mr. -  Pete: I'm Pete. I think you've heard about me from Mr. Heinz. By the time we get to the island, it'll be too late to start working. So we will start the work tomorrow. Let's head to the island. Unfortunately, he doesn't give the deadpan "there is a ferry" statement. From there we also cut immediately to the intro conversation at the farmhouse. He starts off with this: Pete: Hey, Clre, are you-  Pete: I think it's best if you-  As we all know by this point, that's a very bad idea. He continues on from here to ask about whether you want instructions on how to tell him to do stuff, etc. ---- That gives me a perfect segue into the other part of this update: mechanics, and also why Pete sucks at his job. Why Pete Sucks At His Job:  You've seen a few screenshots of this. Basically, the game gives you this nifty full-scale view of your fields and lets you select 4x4 areas and tell Pete to work at that location. He can clear land, till it, water it, harvest grown crops, or sow seeds if you have any. This all sounds great on paper, but in practice he's horribly incompetent at it. The underlying reason is that he hates your guts. No, I'm not kidding. Okay, he might not hate you, but he doesn't like you enough to bother doing respectable work and instead does just enough over bare minimum to annoy you into leaving him alone.  Fortunately, I can change that with a little bit of help. Set DA32 to FF and...  : Can you clear some of the field for me? : For you, I'll clear all of it. Er, well, he got most of it. Somehow he ended up creating this green square that has collision. That code instantly maxes out, with FF, the internal love values between you and your partner. I didn't make it though, so don't get on me about it. I'm sure it's also tied internally to each of the separate character event completions. None have actually happened thus far in the narrative, thus why Pete sucks at his job. I tested out going through the events and seeing his progress after doing so (I told him to till a few spots):  : ...Wow.: Great, right?: No.Regardless, either he doesn't improve very much or my cheating doesn't really help out. I'll look into it some more, but it's needless to say he's not great at his job and won't be for likely a long time. The thing is, I'm not entirely sure how it works even though I've played pretty far into this game. Once I realized how little help my partner was in the beginning, I just stopped asking. All the guides claim that they get better due to friendship, but I'm almost wondering if they just improve over time regardless. Whatever the cause, It'll still apply to the narrative for reasons yet to show. But, since it was raining, I can cover another thing... ----- Getting Sick: To demonstrate sickness, I tilled a single 3x3 at 9 AM while in the rain. That's all I did that day. The next day: The moral of the story is "don't gently caress with rain." I think some of it is involved with at what time you do the work, but there's really not much in terms of specifics here. In the past, I've gotten away with a decent bit of work, but I've been taken down for just tilling a few tiles. Basically, don't bother with fieldwork if it's raining. Handle your animals and call it quits for the day. Rain is merciless and will put you down if you even try to stand against it in the slightest. Alex will be a lot smarter about this in the future and will probably opt to not bring the wrath of rain upon herself again. ------ Animals Getting Sick: Presently in the story, Bess is cranky and people have also expressed interest in how long this will last. If you leave an animal outside without a dog to protect it, or if they're outside in the rain, or if there's no food out there to eat, or you outright don't feed them at all, it will get sick for 4 days. You can't collect anything from them or even brush them until this time limit is over. If you fail any of the above conditions, it will restart the timer. Alex would have been fine if she hadn't had a sick day herself, because Pete will absolutely not feed the animals in my experience. Bess should be happy again in a day or two though. Medicine for cows instantly cures them but also puts you at a total loss of 400 G more than if you just gave them fodder every day, calculating fodder as free and providing that the cows only produce Small Milk (150G). If your cows produce L Milk, it's a different story since that's worth much more. ----- Wild Berries & The Grassland: Every time you visit the Grassland, you can find 4 Wild Berries. They sell for 30 G, I believe and only serve as pocket change or really minor gifts. Everyone likes produce more than wild berries, unfortunately. The Grassland itself also has infinitely respawning stumps, so getting wood isn't too much of an issue either. (There's also infinite boulders and weeds, but they don't serve a real purpose.) --- Field Design and Crop Collision In Harvest Moon games, especially the earlier ones, you can't walk through crops. The same goes for this game, though it's worth mentioning that while the crops were in their first sprout stage, I could reach over them a bit. As they hit their second stage of growth, their colliders were a full 8x8 pixels. It's enough to keep me from using that strip of grass above the ledge as a path around, which is annoying. Given that seeds throw in a 3x3 centered on you, it means that you'll always have at least one crop get lost in the end, unless you have a level 2 watering can. We can get around this with a special item later on, but for now we need to employ tactical tilling designs to minimize losses. Alex's farming thus far is far from optimal, and it was done intentionally to show off the mistakes you'd reasonably make in the game without prior experience. I'll cover more on actually making the best of your crops in this next story update, actually, so look forward to that. --- Power Berries and the Hot Spring: Power Berries are a staple in HM games, and are hidden collectibles that improve your character's max stamina, allowing for you to do more work throughout the day. There's 10 in this game and we've found 6 already, but that's nothing given that the first 6 are randomly found throughout your fields somewhere. The other 4 are a bit different, and more difficult to get a hold of- we won't likely see any of them until much later. The number you have is denotated by the flowers in this "secret garden" outside your kitchen window. http://lpix.org/3628218/083-18_01.png On the other side of stamina restoration is the springs, traditional to Japanese games everywhere. The hot spring restores stamina, and supposedly only restores it upon jumping in. According to that theory, jumping in and out rapidly is the best way to restore stamina. It's entirely free and it just requires you to dig out that hole in the shack. The next day, your partner will ask if you noticed the hot springs were completed and sure enough it will be. I didn't make that part up. There's no explanation given as to how, it just magically pops into existence. --- Edited Screenshots: Sometimes I don't have enough to work with, or I need to show someone where they're not. Maybe I need to change a few words in a dialogue picture; it's not much of a secret that I occasionally edit some screenshots to match the narrative. Some are easy to guess, such as this one from the second update that was supposed to be there but somehow didn't end up changed:  Some maybe not so much: They're usually small. I made the font of the game into a TTF that mostly works plus or minus a few spacing issues. It's a bit weak of a topic to make a section for, so have this:    : You forgot a word.: Did not.: Did too.--- Character Names and Songs: Just as an ending note for this update, a few of the characters names have jokes or references hidden in them. They're not that obvious or special, but it's just a bit of having fun on my part. If you can guess any of them, I'll let you count a vote twice. One of them should be pretty hard to guess and is worth two double votes. Four songs have been referenced so far as well, if you can list three of the four songs and their respective artist, you can get another double vote. If you get all five right, you get three double votes. Yes, it's a scavenger hunt and it's also random trivia. It'll help to keep pushing these updates over to a new page, though.  ------------------------- Next time we'll have one of these will probably be at the end of Spring, if I feel it's necessary, or I need more time to write up full-size updates. (Still took me 6 hours to do this, so it's not that efficient.) Voting wise, it seems like we'll primarily be growing grass for chickens, checking out the forest, and trying out some mining/archaeology. If we've got time, we'll try to make some new friends and invest in potatoes, but also turnips this time around. Next Update: Acadecultria
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Jan 22, 2020 17:21
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Kacie posted:This is why the partner irks me. Er, this next update might surprise you then. It seems there's more than a 00-FF value hiding behind the friendship system, though I'm not sure how far the rabbit hole goes. I might have to play around with the variables sometime to see how in depth it is. It might even become a bonus update of its own. (That being said, the game is going to troll us at more than one point, especially regarding Pete, unfortunately.) Black Robe posted:Chloe Jewel's son Billy is presumably Billy Joel? Nothing else caught me. Except maybe something about salamanders. Yep, that's one of the names. You've earned yourself a double vote! I'll admit some of them are minor/obscure, but hey, where's the fun without a little challenge? --- I've already recorded this week's events, and the good news is we're doing significantly better than we were. The bad news is that the definitions of what the Farmer Union demands for animals is still unclear. Also, it turns out that random Asparagus seed bag I couldn't explain was actually Bird's fault. I figured it was a typo when the guide I use claimed Gray Cats bring summer seeds in spring, but apparently it's not. That also means pink cats are possibly the least useful pet of them all. Why would I need spring seeds in summer? I'll remedy these errors in my next bonus update. Also Bird is major credit to team. The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 07:23 on Jan 23, 2020 |
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Jan 23, 2020 07:17
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DACK FAYDEN posted:Bringing Summer seeds in Spring actually seems great, because while it's delayed it gives you time to get everything up and running / find the six power berries on the farm before you have to plant all your cat-gotten gains. It's pretty nice considering that some of the summer seeds take a long while to grow. I just initially figured it would be bring seeds for the present season. I still can't fathom the mechanical use of a Pink Cat, though. There aren't any pet exclusive spring seeds and it only brings said seeds to you in the summer, which means you've got another 2 month wait before they're useful. Bird, a gray/summer cat has been bringing non-summer seeds though, so I have to wonder how correct these old guides are.
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Jan 23, 2020 20:05
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Lazyfire posted:Maybe the pink cat is like some sort of weird hard mode option? There are a few games I can think of where there isn't anything like a set difficulty level, but you can make choices about things that effectively create varied difficulty levels. If you wanted hardmode, you could just leave the pet indoors. Their abilities don't function inside, as far as I've been told. Regardless, its really odd and I'd like to find out more because something's telling me these 17 year old guides aren't completely accurate. This being said, the next update is coming, but I've had my hands full with a few other things that decided to briefly show up. It'll take me some time to get it done, but it'll be a decent bit late in regards to the schedule. Apologies for this, but the next update should have some interesting stuff in it to compensate. Edit on the 29th: The next update is still coming along. I've got some of it done, though I'll need a good bit more time to get it done. I've had my hands full recently, and though that cleared up, they're a bit full again. It doesn't help I've been a bit sick recently. It'll take another few days to get it done, but I'll have the next update out eventually. Apologies! The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 02:37 on Jan 30, 2020 |
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Jan 26, 2020 06:16
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Cripes, it's been nearly a whole week already? Again, I apologize for the delay. Long term, I'm likely going to migrate to a once a week schedule for a bit until I've got a lot more time on my hands, but I'll still need some time to get this one update finished. I've got a good bit of the update done already, but it'll take me another day or two to finish it up. I've got some other projects that gained some creative momentum recently, but feel free to blame this delay on my other LP. In the meantime, I believe I've discovered that the cats act a bit different than most of the guides suggest and what I previously thought. It's a minor spoiler, but Bird brought only spring seeds so far for this week, including a rare one. I won't know for sure until next month, but our Grey/Summer cat brings Spring seeds for Spring. I don't know if it's a typo or what, really. Again, there's unfortunately a lot of conjecture on my part as only one of the guides for this game is majorly detailed, but it's even filled with some inaccurate information. I've never played with a cat before, always a bird, and it never brought anything. Ever. The requirements for getting animals still seems a bit unclear, but I'll see what I can do. (And I was also wrong about there not being spring exclusive seeds. There are two flower types I entirely forgot about for Spring.) Also, archaeology proves to be incredibly effective and has earned a large amount of money on its own. It's not very interesting, but I can't complain with it as an easy supplement to our cash flow.
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Feb 5, 2020 02:49
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Update 4: Acadecultria (Spring 8 - 10) Spring 8th Music: The Working Life  Bess is acting a bit better, though she's still being fussy. I think things are going to be looking up for me. It was just a rough start, that's all.  The grass in the cow pasture is starting to grow up pretty well, but I did some thinking this morning and I'm thinking it might be better if I go for chickens first. The paperwork from the Farmer's Union had less strict requirements on getting them.  I needed to kill some time until the stores on the mainland would be open, so I went ahead and started cleaning up the chicken field.   It was mostly a lot of breaking rocks. I still kinda wish I had a pickaxe, but the maul works alright enough.  At about 10 AM, I went and checked on Pete's progress. I'd asked him to clear up a small section of the lower field for me.  The results were about as expected at this point. : Nothing like farming to get you woke up in the morning, huh, Ms. Alex?: ...Sure. It's a start, at least.: Oh, and we've got some good lookin' potatoes as well, my dude! : They're underground, how do you know what they look like?: Uh...the flowers are big and pretty! That's why!: Really?: Yep, yep, Ms. Alex! It's a guaranteed fact!I mean, it's plausible, but with Pete I really just don't know anymore. : I'm going to get these and head to the mainland for a while today. I'll take it from here, I guess.: Aye aye, captain! I wouldn't know how to define a good looking potato, but they looked fine enough. Not great, but fine. I wish I'd ended up with more as I hardly broke even with what I had today. Once I bought seeds and supplies for the week, I was going to head for the bookstore I'd heard about in the upper level of the mall. I was hoping they'd have something on planting there- a gardening book even, anything to help me figure out how to set this up better. I mean I thought this is how my father did it when I was young, but I guess I'm misremembering a lot of things.  I wish I had a bigger bag, though. I'm not going to lie that it's a bit of a hassle to run back and forth all morning just for a few potatoes. I figured I'd be able to save some money on supplies for the week, if I opted to keep a few potatoes around. Some baked potatoes could keep us going for lunch. When I gave them to Pete, I got an unexpected response to say the least. Music: Pete's Theme (Tutorial BGM)  : Do you think we could use some of them for lunch throughout the week?: I... woah...: Pete? : WOOOAAAAAAH! We grew these!?: Mrrrooooow!: I mean, I guess you technically helped-: Woo! These are like, the best looking potatoes I've seen in a long time! This is the best day ever, EVER!: I think that's a bit hyped for some-: There's never enough hype for farm grown carbs! Mixed with greens and some protein and you've got the best food in the WORLD!: ...Right. Well, uh, here you go. : I'll get right to making lunch!: Make it dinner. I'll be a bit late coming back from the island.I don't know what to do with this guy anymore. I mean, they're just potatoes, right? After whatever that was, I was more than ready to head to the island.  : Any particular time you're planning on getting back?: In a few hours. Be ready by... 2 PM, maybe?: I'd prefer a more specific time, you know.: 2 PM on the dot, then.: Haha, fine. I'll hold you to it.Music: Mainland Stores   The first thing on the list after making what money I could off those potatoes was to buy some more grass seeds. I don't know why they're always so terribly expensive, but I guess long term it seems milk sells better than crops. I clarified some stuff about the shipping process while I was at the Union: I just needed to call them and tell them what I had to sell the day before I came to town. Oh, and by this point, the phone to the island seems to be fixed, but it doesn't seem like they'll have the line open for a while. I should probably write some letters to Mom in the meantime, but those stamp prices are pretty bad.  Before I got too far, a lady at a table near the flower shop waved me over.   : Hi, I'm Daisy! You're a farmer, am I right?: Yeah. How'd you know?: Well, you're dressed for the part. Anyways... : ...am I right?: I'd say so. What I planted came up pretty well.: Ah, thank you! I mean, for answering my question.: It's nothing really, but couldn't you have just asked the store owner?: True, but I work in sales and I'm... er, checking the public opinion first. After all, one's going to promote what they're selling as much as possible, am I right?: Uh, sure, I guess?: Oh, have you tried their turnips yet? I've been wanting to grow some of my own but I want to be sure of the quality.: I haven't yet, but I was planning on it.: If you do, tell me how they turn out! Anyways, thanks for your time!That was an odd encounter to say the least. Luckily, I got it clarified pretty quickly.  : Long time no see! How's it been, Alex?: It's been good, and you?: Well, I can't complain. Don't worry about her over there.: Daisy, you mean?: Yeah. I don't know what she told you, but she's actually one of my seed suppliers.: Huh. So she's checking out how well her stuff sells then?: Mhm. She's a bit eccentric, but she has her heart in the right place.: Yeah, I'd say so.: Say, I could swear I've seen those hips swinging in the step fields before. Were you ever at Magnolia's?: You might have seen me there before. I've used this specific dye number pretty often and I was at a lot of the clubs.: Well, if you ever end up with some time off, maybe we can have a girl's night out.: Heck, it's only been a few weeks for me. Anyways, I'm pretty busy most of the time with the farm, but sure. If ever get some time, I'll call!: I doubt we'd be running any monarchies any time soon, but reliving some old memories would be nice. See you around Alex!: Catch you later, Lukia!You know, after spending some time away from the club scene it's only really just struck me how odd the slang is. I mean, I knew it was odd before, but it really feels that way now. Mrs. Jewel looked busy so I only called out to her for the time being. That, and I really needed to check out this bookstore before it got too late in the day.   Going up the stairs, I came face to face with what I think is a small furniture store. The owner hardly made eye contact and spend most of his time reading through this rather large book, though he seemed a bit fidgety.  : Hey, hey, how's it going? I'm Lucus.: Alex. Nice to meet you.: I mostly sell furniture and appliances here if you're ever wanting for that kind of thing. I've got some other odds and ends around as well, so feel free to take a look around.: Alright, but I must say I'm pretty tight on money right now. I probably won't be able to buy anything.: No worries, this is just a day job for me anyhow. He did have some nice things for sale: some carpets, a televison, and even a saddle (which is what I suppose he meant by odds and ends.) It just seemed a bit odd that he had so little for sale. I didn't bother prying into it, but it still bothers me.  : I wonder what channels we'd get on the island... : Just the news, missy.: I'm sorry, what?: They've only got the news on the island.: Er... thanks.: Don't get me wrong, Lisa's got some of the best news around. Oh! Apologies, I'm one of the cable men around here. I've got a habit of being nosy, apologies for that.: ...Right. Well thanks for getting the phone lines to the mainland fixed.: Not a problem, missy. Hey, if you've ever got the cash... I'm not one for prejudice, but the cable guy was rather intimidating. Actually, the whole furniture section made me a little bit uneasy, and I'm not sure why. Needless to say, with only a bit of change left in my pocket I headed for the bookstore. I'm sure they'd just let me browse for now.  Upon seeing me approach, the young lady at the counter took her eyes from the magazine she was looking through and gave a friendly smile my way. I could tell it was practiced, but it felt a lot nicer than the reaction I got from Lucus.  : Hey there, welcome to my little bookstore. Got anything you're looking for today?: Do you have any gardening manuals? Something specifically related to working in the fields?: I'm sure I've got something on the subject in here. There was this one older book...here, give me a second and I'll find it.: It might be a bit of an odd question...but I'm a bit short on cash. Do you mind if I just read the book here?: I don't mind at all. I always wanted a library, but my mom said I had to make at least a little bit of money. I hardly sell anything to begin with, as I'm really more of a collector.: ...Er, how are you still in business then?: That's easy: my mom owns the whole mall. She doesn't really charge that much anyways, but its not like I have to pay anything.At this point her polite smile had been replaced with a wide grin. She really liked talking about her money, and judging by the diamond earrings I caught flashes of from underneath her hair, she liked showing it too. She's spoiled rotten it seems, but at least she's not mean about it. : Anyways, here's the book I was thinking of. It was bound by hand and everything, one of a kind, never published.: Thanks! I'll take a look at it.It definitely looks like it had been written a long time ago, and the only name written in it to suggest an author was "Alexander". Though you could tell the pages were aged, it was in great shape and the words upon them were greatly helpful. I didn't have nearly enough time to read through it all, but I did find some precise answers to crop layouts alongside some clarification on things I still wasn't sure of. I copied the most important parts onto a sheet of paper that I tucked into my diary. Music: Tools and Seeds "Excerpt from Alexander's Almanac" posted:
: Find what you needed?: Yep, thanks! Say, do you have something on geology? I've got some rocks-: Ooh, really?! No need for a book there, I can tell you anything you want about them! I collect those too!: Really?: Yes, now c'mon and show 'em to me!Apparently, she collects a lot of things. While she went over the rocks and metal shards I had, she rambled on and on about all the things she collected and also more about herself. If you haven't noticed at this point, she really likes talking about herself. She did tell me which of the things I had were actually worth something, so at least I know now what to not bother picking up. : You found some pretty good pieces there, nothing terribly expensive, but definitely some good pieces. Alright, how much do you want?: Huh?: You heard me, I'm buying these for my collection. That is, they are for sale, right?We ended up striking a deal and I left with more money than I thought I'd have. Honestly, it was more money than I'd gotten from farming! It was about time to head back, but I did strike up one last conversation on the way with the other girl at the bookstore. She was shy, but she didn't seem too bothered by me.   : ...book, I've got... a friend who I was thinking of knitting a sweater for.: That sounds like a nice idea for a gift.: Yes...well, my friend is very...large. It might take me a while...: There's still two seasons to go before it gets cold, I'm sure you'd have time for it. I'm never been great at knitting though, so I don't think I'd make it past the first stitches in that time.: Haha...Keep at it then, I was that way too...After that, I used my newfound money to buy some more crop seeds and left for the harbor. That conversation did give me a funny thought, though: how many sheep would you have to shear to make a sweater for Pete? I mean, you'd have to have a whole flock or something to get enough yarn for that.  I didn't see anyone on my way back to the farm, but that was fine as I really needed to get planting. If last time taught me anything, I'd need all the time I could get to get these planted. Music: The Working Life  First thing to do was to set up my new rows. I went going for the most efficient design, those rows with the U shape cut in them, as I have a farm to save.   Unfortunately, where the maul had been designed mostly for smashing rocks, it didn't do too good at removing tilled areas of land. As unusual as it sounds, dropping a wide rock seemed to do the job. It also did a number on me with all that lifting, but hopefully I wouldn't have to do it again any time soon.   After some more work, I got one row done. It had hit about 3 PM, so I figured it would be good to go ahead and plant some while I could see. That way, if I couldn't get it all finished today, I'd at least have some seeds in the ground.  Strangely, I found a bag of seeds in my bag I didn't recognize. It looked a lot like the asparagus seeds at Lukia's store, but I can't be sure. I...I really don't know where they came from. Maybe she gave them to me by accident? I decided to plant them anyhow- I could pay her back later if that was the case.  The first row is all turnips, leaving me with about two bags left.   I realized I didn't yet have all the seeds I'd need to truly capitalize on the long row method, so I did the traditional method in the upper left of the field for a few of the bags. It let me save a bit of time by using more of what work I'd already done. I still could've done the long rows, but some of those potatoes from before were still growing and I didn't want to waste them.  Nearby, I even planted those asparagus seeds.  It started getting dark pretty fast after that, so I ended up staying up pretty late watering the crops.  I got them all in the end, which I'm pretty proud of. Though, I have to admit I was so tired I did this whole journal entry the next morning.  Oh, right, I was up until midnight planting grass seeds in the chicken field. I kinda had to call it there for the day, given the day was officially over. Spring 9th  I woke up pretty groggy this morning, but no sickness like that rainy day. I suppose I should take that as assurance to stay out of the rain from now on.  I'd had an idea yesterday, and even though I was still somewhat exhausted, I wanted to try it out. I got Pete to help me clear out the area for it some. : ...do you think you can manage that? It's a change of pace from watering.: Shouldn't be a problem, Ms. Alex!: Alright, thanks! Just get what you can done, there's really no rush for it. With Pete helping to clear that portion of the field, I went off and collected my usual set of supplies to handle Bess.  Like some sort of miracle, she was fully back to her old docile self. There wasn't any hassle milking her or brushing her, she was just as calm as ever. I suppose she finally got over that one mistake of mine. With a significant amount of good quality milk, I think this week's really looking up.  The grass in the cattle pasture seemed to be taking well. Hopefully I'd be able to arrange something with the Farmer's Union soon, because for all the work I've been doing in the fields, I've hardly spent much time with the animals.  I planted the rest of what I had in a bag there. I know I needed a good amount more of grass before they'd let me get another cow.  On my way to the cellar under the storehouse, I saw Bird doing her usual thing by upsetting dandelion puffs and chasing down the seeds. I've tried feeding her, but she usually doesn't take anything before. Pete has a bit more success, but it seems more like she's not hungry. I guess there must be more mice and such than I thought.   : Did a good job, didn't I, Ms. Alex?: Er, sure.: Okay, I'm headed off to get started on those baked potatoes!: Yeah, that'd be great.You know, I would be able to give him a better answer on that if I could actually tell any work got done. I don't think even a thing changed. ...One day, I'm going to have to have a talk with him or something.  Anyways, I got to work harvesting all the potatoes that had finished growing. There was a lot more than I thought there would be, so I figured I'd keep a few around to give to some folks. What can I say? I was in a good mood today.  It still takes forever to drag all of these over to the root cellar.   With so many crops, watering them all takes quite a while, but I don't really have anything else taking up time.  I did realize that this one potato would be in my way if it grew up, so I had to accept removing this one or having the potato conundrum happen again.  It's really only because of the slight curve in the field near the water.   With that done, it was time to work on the project I'd thought up.  After clearing all the weeds out of the spot, I started to make a border for it out of rocks.   With it all clear, I'd have it ready to work on tomorrow. The plan was to do some digging in an area to see if I could find any more of those rocks and metal shards. It was starting to get late though, so I didn't have time to worry about doing it now.  Setting aside that mining or whatever you'd call it for tomorrow, I decided to work on more rows now that I had some of the potatoes out of the way.  Once you get used to it, the layout's not that hard to do, surprisingly.   What is surprising is the revelation that I had another set of asparagus seeds in my bag that I hadn't noticed. I don't know where they're coming from, but given that it seems my assumption about them coming from Lukia wasn't correct, I decided to just plant them whenever they showed up.    The rest of today was just me taking a break. I took a bath in the springs, went and collected some more berries to cool off, and by that time it was more than dark enough for me to get home. Here's to hoping tomorrow goes just as well! Spring 10th Music: The Working Life  Pete's been using those potatoes a lot, given we had hashbrowns and that odd rice thing again this morning. He's really into carbohydrates it seems, but I always thought it was supposed to be protein that big guys like him were all over. Of course, if you mention protein, he goes off into his tangents as well. : -Hey, Pete, do you think I could get you to help with some watering today!: Oh, yeah, like, sure! It's what I'm here for, Ms. Alex! : Can you get the crops in the upper left field?: Sure can, my dude! With that done, it was just another nice morning of me and Bess with the daily chores. I can't begin to express how much nicer it is to have her acting nice and calm.  I did a count of the potatoes we had so far, and it was far more than I'd imagined. Despite how much of a struggle that first week was, I was still going to make some profit off of it.  : ...Ms. Alex? : ...It'll lower the workload on me some, at least.: Say, you've got a whole lot of crops growing- when are we gonna fill this whole field up like I did back home?: When I have the time and money, maybe. I'm still trying to get everything on the animal side fixed up. Those pastures don't have nearly enough grass yet.: Sounds like you've got a plan, dude! Well, Bird and I are headed off to cook lunch!: You go do that.He was getting...better, maybe? There was an actually noticeable number of crops watered this time. This week really is looking good for me.   Though it does seem like a few of my crops didn't take. I... I'm not sure why, but maybe conditions just aren't right. Once I got them all watered, I decided to take a trip to town. I hadn't had time to hang around in the last two days, and since my schedule was open, I didn't want to be a stranger after all.  Music: The Sleepy West Isle (World Map Theme)  : Hey, how's it going?: Pretty good! I've been pretty busy, but I don't mind. How about you?: The fishing could be better, but I think I've got a new place to try it at. You won't hear me complaining.: Hey, you think your mom would want some potatoes to cook with?: H-huh? I mean, I guess so, but don't you need those to sell?: Nah, I'm good. I ended up with more than I thought I would, and I really don't have that much space in the cellar presently.: Well, in that case I guess I'll take some off your hands. : No problem! : It's like, totally my girl, Alex!: Hey! What's with the accent this time?: Just trying to talk like that total hunk I met the other day.: What hunk are we talking about, now?: Somebody back on the mainland! He was the dreamiest guy I ever met! So big and muscular...and that fashion sense...: Hey, you might want to snap out of it before you drool on your shoes.: Wh-what!? N-no, it's not like that! And- and I wasn't drooling either!  : You were starting to! Little Kate's got a crush it seems.: H-hey! I've only met him once! I haven't even spoken to him yet! And, and...and you're not much older than me!: Alright, alright... I guess that's why I didn't see you here on Monday?: Yeah...Hey, do you, um...: Hm?: Do you think you could give me some, er...advice about...guys...? : I'm not really the dating type... but I could tell you what I know, sure. Not today, though, I've gotta get going here.: Hehe, thanks Alex! It was nice seeing you!: You too!Truth be told, I don't know how much younger Kate is than me, but you'd meet a girl in the city with a crush like that every other week at the very least. I never was much of one for the dating scene, even at the clubs. I was mostly there to dance anyways, and I usually managed to blend into the crowds. There was one or two guys I can think of, though...  Music: The Working Life Er, right. Back to farming.  With nothing else to do for today, I took to digging that spot I set aside. It wasn't too difficult of work, though there was a lot to do. I did turn up results within the first few swings though, finding what amounted to a decent bit of pocket change for only a half and hour's work.  Once I dug a significant area, I went back through with a stone and flattened it back out. After doing that, I dug it back up hoping it would turn up anything I might've missed.    It gets pretty exhausting after a while...  ...but who am I to complain with these kinds of results?  Once it got dark, I checked on Bess and headed in for the night. When I went inside, I found Pete dancing alongside Bird. Music: Pete's Theme (Tutorial BGM) : "...twistin' the night away~! Twistin'~!": Mrow-wow!: "Twistin', yeah, twistin' the night away~!": Mrooow-wow~!: Sorry to interrupt, but what are you doing? : Come on, Ms. Alex, dance with us!: I...I think I'm fine for the moment. I'm a bit tired, honestly.: No worries, me and Bird've got this talent show in the bag! Yeah, ain't that right, my little dudette?: Mew!: ...What talent show is this exactly?: Don't know yet, Ms. Alex, but I know there will be one! You can never be too ready!: ...R-right. Well, I'm going to write today's entry and I'm going to bed.I'll never know what's running through that guy's head. I suppose the reason I see so little of that cat is because he spends all of his time with her. His dance rountine was surprisingly practiced, though, which might explain why he hardly ever gets anything done out in the fields. ...It's not a bad dance, but Pete's not necessarily the best singer, so... Next Update: Pete Does A Thing ---- Apologies for taking so long to get this out folks, but I've had a lot of stuff going on and the brief bouts of sickness I had really didn't put me in the right frame of mind to work on this when I had time to. I know it's only 3 days, but its 90 screenshots and nearly 600 lines, so that's enough for me to call it and split this week in two. I'll have the next part out soon enough, hopefully in about a week. Just to note, yes "mining/archaeology" is actually just me digging the fields constantly to profit from random money gains. Those profit numbers are slightly inaccurate, as we probably only made 1000 G that day. Voting on what to do next will be in the next update, of course.
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Feb 8, 2020 18:54
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Charlett posted:I really enjoyed this game a lot, I would spend hours on it, playing it secretly in my bed when I was sick. When mom came to check and see if I was sleeping I had to slide it between the mattress and the frame and pretend I was sleeping. I'll admit that I did this a lot when I was sick too. The Gameboy's simple design made it really good for hiding, same for the GBA. You just had to be sure to not accidentally turn the volume up while hiding it. What? No, that never happened to me! Of course not!
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Feb 8, 2020 18:58
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Fun times and great memories.
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AngryRobotsInc posted:While I still enjoy the older games, the change to let you actually walk through crops makes growing them so, so much easier in the later HM/SoS games. Same here. This whole calculation about efficiency and gaining one crop overall per 7 tiles is completely out the window then. I mean, it's realistic for a lot of real life crops, but I doubt people play these games for realism. It's part of the reason why I hooked onto the RF series spinoff more, because it doesn't have crop collision and the later games lets you farm impressively fast. Kacie posted:Do the crops not take, or do crows eat the seeds? I'll go ahead and say that it's crows. Their existence is probably already known due to me including the Scarecrow on the purchase list/ Stardew Valley, but I was keeping it a bit of a secret. Occasionally, you'll get an event where you find a crow outside your door and it flies away. I don't know what it means, given they eat your seeds randomly anyways. Actually, they'll eat whole crops too, the greedy buggers. They're actually probably the most realistic thing in this game, or would be if your scarecrow didn't actually work. Crows suck when you're trying to grow fields.
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Feb 8, 2020 22:55
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100 HOGS AGREE posted:Fat C or This, I like. (I made those in traditional form because I like them more- I had plenty of space to make more of the hyper-efficient design, but gotta stick true to childhood.) AngryRobotsInc posted:I know I'm not playing them for realism! Mostly for chill farming fun. I play the HM games if I really want a chill experience. I've done actual fieldwork before, and at the least I can say it's a very different experience. I find a certain kind of entertainment in it, but it's far more strenuous than sitting back and killing a few hours on Harvest Moon. RF1 is very rough around the edges, and can honestly end up being slower than some HM games depending on what you're trying to do. (It's beatable in 16 minutes, if you're speedrunning, though.) I still enjoy it, but I honestly wouldn't recommend it to anyone that's not a dedicated fan. I'm one of those people who personally didn't like RF4 at all. For me, it was a giant bundle of missed opportunities and design decisions I disagreed with, most of which I think were the result of Neverland's looming bankruptcy. It's also more of an "anniversary game" given it references good chunks of content from the previous games and also spends a lot of time congratulating itself for all the little changes it made and things it can do as proof of being on a new system. That being said, I'm not sure what I even think about the new one in development as I've hardly looked at it and the series has been going downwards for me as of its last two entries. It's worth noting, though, that I have very strong opinions and a heavy bias towards RF3- it's the one I will consistently claim to be the best in the series and serves as my base line of judgement for the games. So...yeah, take my words about the series with an appropriate grain of salt. I can throw out my opinions on the other games if anyone wants me to, but I'm not looking to start a giant debate over it. (I've seen it happen, believe it or not. Also, I'd like to avoid entirely derailing my own thread.)
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Feb 9, 2020 02:39
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Kacie posted:Oh, I'm sorry - I didn't realize that was meant to be a reveal later. I've played Stardew Valley where crows are a Thing, and was wondering if it was crows or the also realistic "some seeds don't sprout." Don't worry about it, it's not much of a reveal anyways. The crows here just randomly destroy growing crops, until you buy and put down a scarecrow- I was sure a lot of people would think of it due to Stardew Valley. One guide assures me that one covers the whole field, while another assures me that it only covers a 9x9 area. These guides aren't that helpful sometimes. Black Robe posted:I'm amused by a farming sim where you're more successful if you ignore the farming entirely and just dig up rocks over and over. Do they eventually run out if you dig the same field enough? No, it's effectively infinite. In the actual gameplay, whenever you till a tile it rolls on a random table and shows one of four things: nothing, a small bag, a gold coin, or a mole. The bag and the coin gives you a certain amount of cash (either 10G or 100G), but I don't know what the mole even does. The first 6 power berries were also part of that random table, but they're very easy to find. I wrote it in as collecting valuable rocks and artifact pieces as opposed to Alex finding random piles of cash buried in the fields. Money-wise, up to a certain point, digging for money is actually more profitable than growing things provided you have good luck. If you've got a field filled with crops, your long-term profits might end up being better than just digging. Although, we have more than enough time now to dig a section of a field twice, so why not do it? (There's another moneymaking method we haven't gained access to yet, and it's even more effective- to the point farming struggles to keep up with it.) In the real world, this is actually incredibly bad for the soil. Potential erosion aside, you'll eventually end up leaching all the nutrients out of it, making it very hard to grow anything there. The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 15:54 on Feb 9, 2020 |
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Feb 9, 2020 15:38
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Hey, folks, it'll take me another week or so to get this next update out. I'm working on some other stuff to get it out of the way, and I should have it done soon enough. When I've got it done, I should have plenty of time to work on this again. Apologies for the delay! Edit: The thing that was slowing me down is entirely off my schedule now. I'll just find a way past a little bit of writer's block I've got, and I'll be good to get this next update out in a day or so. Don't get me wrong, I've got ideas on where to go with this, I'm just getting caught on the intermediary stuff like I usually do. I might've figured out a few little things to help me with that, though. We'll see how it works out. The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 16:03 on Feb 23, 2020 |
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Feb 16, 2020 04:06
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Update 5: Pete Does A Thing (Spring 11 - 14, Year 1) Spring 11th Music: The Working Life  It was just another Thursday, but luckily today wasn't rainy like last week. That means I'd be able to go to town today, and sell what I've got. Actually, I spent a good bit this morning just getting my rock samples sorted. Despite all the work from yesterday, I was feeling pretty energized. : Say, Ms. Alex, what's the deal with the rocks?: Oh, right. I found a girl in town who buys these, and these turn up in the field pretty often. It's helping me afford some more seeds.: Ahey, expanding our horizons? Sounds good to me, my dude!: Though I don't really see why they're so valuable.: Honestly, neither am I, but I'll take it. I'll be heading across today to sell what we've got, and then I'll be back to work on the field rows a bit more.: Got any work for me in the fields?: ...Hm. I think I've got it all for today. Thanks, though! : *Mrrooow!*: Sounds like my little buddy wants to keep working on our routine!: *Mew!*: Oh, you want a rematch for the other day? You're on!I left Pete to settle what contest he was having with our cat while I went to work on the daily chores.  Bess was still acting nice today, and I can't express how much of a relief it is. I never thought cows were that moody. She's a good girl now, so I'm fine with leaving all that in the past.  With that done, it was time to gather up what I had available in the field so far...  And to water what I had growing so far.  It doesn't seem like any more have disappeared, so I'm happy. It's all actually turning out so well, I can't believe it. Music: The Sleepy West Isle (World Map Theme)  With that out of the way, it was time to check out the town again on my way to the mainland.  : Not too busy, but it's going well so far. How about you?: Getting my stuff ready again to head out to sea as always. Been looking for a new spot to fish at, trying to see if I can beat Billy.: What, you two have competitions?: Well, in either trying to bring in the biggest haul or the most valuable one. We do it from time to time to keep things fresh. After all, we both enjoy fishing as a relaxed occupation.: Sounds like a good idea to me. Maybe one day I should give it a shot.: I remember that you can't sit still for long though, might be a bit hard for you.: Hey, I could do it if I tried. Though, you're right, it might not be up to my speed.: Well, you never know until you try. Anywho, I gotta get back to setting up or I'll never set sail.: Alright, well, see ya!I'll think about giving fishing a shot when I'm not so worried about making ends meet to keep the farm afloat. Which, being honest, I'm not too worried about right now, but it's still early. It's hard to believe I haven't even been here a whole two weeks! You know, I'd probably also need at least a fishing pole. Music: West Isle Mainland  : I know it might be a bit much to ask, but do you think you could make today's trip somewhat quick?: Hey, I usually come back on time.: What? Oh, no, that's not what I meant. I've got some other business I'd like to get to today, the sooner the better.: So you're saying I take too long?: Yes, but most people do, so that's nothing against you. So, what do you say?: You know, for asking a favor, you could sure be a lot nicer about it, Captain. : But, fine, I'll make it quick today.: Thanks.I was hoping for more than just a "thanks" there, but its fine. I suppose business-wise I don't really have to spend that much time on the mainland. I mostly only had time for some minor chat as result, but most of everyone was rather busy today. I did kinda have some other things I wanted to do today as well  : Their pink noses are just adorable!: Hey, I think Bird's nose might be pink.: You mean you don't know, dear?: Well, not for sure, at least. I don't really see much of her, come to think of it. She's always mousing, I think.: Hmm! Sounds like you've got yourself a hard worker there! I must ask, why "Bird" for her name?: You'd have to ask my partner. I've no clue.  : Now, this Pete, is he just a helper or is he a "partner" partner?; H-huh? He's just a co-worker, nothing's going on.: Are you sure? I'd hate to break the news to my little Billy-: HE'S JUST A COWORKER, MRS. JEWEL.  : ...time and read another book?: Sorry, can't today! In a bit of a hurry, but I did bring back some more finds though.: Aah! Do show me, I want to see!: Say, aside from collecting, do you ever do anything with these?: Of course! Sometimes I'll take the ones shape isn't important to and get them converted to some fine jewelry.: Sure, it might be unconventional, but no convention is resistant to being broken. Besides, it makes it easy to find other true connoisseurs such as myself! Can you believe...Needless to say, I had to work my way out of that can of words I opened. Lyla's nice, but that girl can gab for way too long. If you ever needed a way to burn a few hours, or heck, a whole day... I made it back to the ship in not too long. I'm not sure how long it took me, but Kirk seemed appreciative. He didn't give me much more than another thanks, but he seemed pretty sincere in giving it.  When we got to the port, he didn't take long in all in tying the boat down. Whatever it was, he was in a hurry.  Music: The Working Life I for one, also had something I needed to get back to. A good amount of the grass I had already planted in the field had grown tall enough to cut for hay. It seemed like it should've taken longer, but I'm not complaining.  I also planted some more seeds I'd bought back in town. I should have enough for another cow sometime soon. Probably by the end of the month, I'd guess.    With my father's sickle still being so sharp after all these years, it cut through the grass like hot butter. It's honestly a bit scary. I still remember he'd sit in a chair in the late afternoon and slowly go about treating the edge with a whetstone. I suppose I'll need to figure out how to do that sometime.  After doing some more work in the field, it had gotten dark pretty quickly as some clouds rolled in. I still spent some time digging around anyways. Wasn't much longer until I could hardly see where I was swinging, let alone what I unearthed, so I headed back inside. Back at the house, I'd found Pete staring outside at the clouds.  : This little farm's up and running pretty well already, you know, Ms. Alex?: I suppose it is. A bit of a rough start, but I'd say we're getting there already. You getting homesick?: What? Me? Nah, my dude! I'm all for this farm- wherever there's crops growing, it's like home to me!: Why do you look so... less happy, then?: Whoa, dude, there you go being perceptible again! It's nothin' really, I'm just seeing these clouds and hoping a nasty storm hasn't hit my farm while I was gone.: Oh, huh. Are big storms common there, then?: Wow, how'd you know?! Yeah, occasionally we pick up a bad hurricane or two, sometimes they'll surf in a season early.: Well, I wouldn't worry yourself about it. I'm sure it's still just as you left it.: Aw, thanks, Ms. Alex! You sure know how to cheer a guy up!It was at this point he started shaking my hand, though I think he was going for a hug at first. I mean he already practically threw me into the roof as is, but it was better than being crushed in a bear hug, I guess. I sometimes forget Pete comes from a farm, I think even his father's farm too if I'm remembering right. It's easy to given he does so little farming. Aside from cooking, I don't really know what he's doing most of the time. : *Mrrrow!*: Aw, c'mere Bird! I'll shake your paw too, little buddy!Well, that and he acts like a kid most of the time as well. Spring 12th Music: Pete's Theme (Tutorial BGM)  This morning, I was met with an unexpected conversation from Pete.   : ...to meet in the future! Why don't we try and get like, 3 of each animal, maybe?: Uh...sure? Where's this coming from exactly?: Oh, and, uh...300! Let's ship 300 crops too!: That doesn't answer my question.: Huh? C'mon and catch up, Ms. Alex, we've gotta set long term goals for ourselves! It's what I did back on my farm!: Oh, okay. That makes sense I guess. So three of each kind of livestock and 300 crops shipped by when?: Uh...hmm....: ...: ... Next winter, maybe?: Yeah, sure. That'll be do-able, I think.: YEAH! That's what I like to hear! Goals, get ready to be met! Woooooo!Sometimes he gets excited by the smallest things. The crop shipping quota shouldn't be too hard to meet. The animal one, possibly a bit more so, but I've got plenty of time.  Music: The Working Life Anyway, the daily chores for the day were just as usual. Bess is still producing good again, and she's really liking the freshly grown grass.  The grass in the chicken field is looking nice. Hopefully I'll be able to have some soon.  I was met with the sight of a whole lot of turnips when I went to the crop fields.   I went ahead and started watering the other crops first, given as the weather had been warming up a bit recently. I'd rather be pulling turnips in the sun than hauling a heavy watering can across the fields.  I thought these turnips had grown awfully fast, but was a bit surprised to see how large they were in full. There must be something in the ground around here, or I'm just doing things right.  There was about thirty something of them. I didn't really bother counting yet, I'd just do that on the morning I bring them to the Farmer's Union. I was planning on keeping a few for myself anyways.  With that done, I went on to do some more digging. Turns out some of those clouds from yesterday stuck around, and it kept the sun off pretty well for most of the morning.  I must've gotten carried away, because I soon found it was already about 3 in the afternoon by the time I stopped.  I could dig all I wanted to, but I started getting a little bored of it after a while. I was still in a working mood, so I went around cleaning up the rest of the field a bit. Perhaps Pete's goal-setting energized me today, as I sure got a lot done. I guess there wasn't much to write about for today, though. There's only so many times I can say "then I picked another turnip". Spring 13th  We had some turnip related things for breakfast, though I can't say it makes much of a breakfast food. They're still pretty good though. Pete had already set his mind to pickling a few, which I can't complain about either. It'd make a good palate cleanser, I suppose.  There wasn't many crops left for this week, so I sent Pete to have a go at watering them. : That's all you need me to get?: Well, pretty much. It's the mystery asparagus and a few potato plants. There's really nothing else out there to get.: Sounds like you need to stock up on more seeds, Ms. Alex! Don't worry about the crops, I've got 'em!: You do that. Bess is still giving good milk, and she's really settled into our schedule now. She's usually waiting on me every morning now, and what fidgeting she does do is hardly anything to how she was before.  After cleaning out the barn, I went to go check on the field and found Bird chasing after dandelion puffs again. She really seems to enjoy it, I suppose. And I did check, her nose is about 3/4 pink. She's got a little freckles in the upper left side. I don't know why I felt compelled to check, even though it seems every conversation with Mrs. Jewel leads to embarassment somehow.   : : Ms. Alex, you there? You look like you saw Bird fly!: Huh? Oh! Y-yeah! Um, great job today!: Aw, I'm just doing job is all, nothing to be surprised about, my dude. Well, off to make lunch!I neglected to mention the most surprising part was that he noticeably did his job for once.  Everything was watered, only a few spots could benefit from a bit more. I quickly covered those in no time, and I guess I stood around in disbelief for a bit longer before heading off.  The sun was getting a bit hot, so I decided to head the eastern side of West Isle to explore the rest of what used to be the grassland. There were a few trees here before, but it was a straight-up forest now.  Music: Twisting Roads and Undergrowth (Far Wilderness Theme) There were visible trails through the forest, goat paths really. I didn't know which direction to head in first, so I just started going.   I don't think I could tell you the path I took on my first way through.   The paths were a bit twisty, and I'll be honest in saying I didn't know what direction I was facing anymore.  I just kept following the paths, figuring they'd eventually lead somewhere. It eventually straightened out, though, and made for a pleasant surprise.  Whatever path was that I had taken, it brought me to the pond we used to swim in as kids. It was nice and secluded now with the forest around, and was surprisingly not that difficult to find the exit of the forest from. I did get spooked now and then from a suddenly fleeing squirrel or bird, but it was interesting seeing how the island had grown up.  However, it seems I somehow dropped my watch out there along the path, so I went looking for it.  Now, I'm pretty sure I was heading along the same path as last time, but it really didn't look like it.  I did find my watch, but it's location only confused me more. I was very sure I'd never seen the section of the forest before that I found it in. I mean, I looked all around in a circle, but I absolutely don't remember seeing any of it. It's... really strange, actually.   ...Especially since I quickly found myself back at the pond from a one way road, from the same entrance that brought me to it the first time. Either my memory is bad, or I'm very terrible at navigation, it seems. I don't know what else to say. I felt like investigating this a bit, so I headed to the town.  Music: The Sleepy West Isle (World Map Theme)  : Social obligations define that I should inform you of the typical and obvious objective state of the weather in expectance of mutual agreement. Thusly, nice day, isn't it?: Uh...Sure. I wish there was more of a breeze going. So, how's that novel of yours going?: If by "novel", you refer to literary medium and my endeavors of it, I shall inform you that it is "going well" to refrain from complaining, unless prompted.: So...how's it going, really?: There is a statistical likelihood it could be progressing faster and it is not. Therefore, I have a moderate amount of annoyance in regards to it.: That's... unfortunate, I suppose. Say, do you know anything about the forest on this island, by chance?: I must inform you that I do not. Is there something worthy of conversational note regarding it?: I don't know if it's just me, but it feels like the pathways changed behind me.: Highly unlikely, thus I implore you to explain.: Well, I dropped my watch while I was walking through, and it was in an entirely different place when I found it. It was a spot I'm sure I never went to.: I must ask, did you check your bearings while doing so?: Yep. Didn't recognize a thing.: Hm, this is an intriguing anecdote regardless of its possible meanings. I have no further elaboration upon the topic, but I am inclined to ask if I could use this as inspiration for my novel. Would you permit this?: Um... sure. I don't see why not.: You have my gratitude, for I believe my idiomatic "writer's block" has been alleviated.: You're welcome, I guess.I asked around town some more, but I didn't find anything out of note. At this point, I'm willing to assume it's a mistake on my part. Either way, it made for an entertaining distraction, so put that thought away for the day.  Music: The Working Life After all that, the sun had run down a bit, so I got to digging again. I'm thinking I should probably try digging in a new spot for a while and see what I find. Maybe I just need to wait for it to rain again.    My arms are actually starting to get decently worked up from all of this extra tilling, so there's at least still a benefit to it.  It definitely makes me ready to sleep by the end of the day. Spring 14th Music: Song of the Gentle Breeze (Personal Arrangement) A Letter to Mom posted:Dear Mom, Next Update: The Third Week of Spring
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Feb 25, 2020 02:18
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Time for participation again! Purchases (We have 5620 G): Crop seeds we can buy: Turnips: 120 G, Potatoes: 160 G, Asparagus: 320 G, Stardust Flower: 400 G, Grass: 600 G (needed for animals) If we buy Grass seeds, I'll also need you to say where to plant them. (Horse, Cow, Chicken, or Sheep Field.) We have planted what is said to be the requirements to buy animals, but it seems like we might need more of it cut as fodder first too. That'll just take time. (This thing's really inconsistent sometimes.) We could also buy a Scarecrow for 3200 G, though crows haven't been too much of an issue. We could also buy Cow Medicine for 1000 G, which could be useful in the future, though Alex likely won't be making any mistakes anytime soon. Future Actions: Should Alex (pick any you want to see): Clear out the lower field? Focus on clearing out the other animal fields? (Horse/Sheep) Go see a movie at the Theater? (1500 G per ticket) Take a look at part-time jobs/ shipping quotas? Gather lots of berries to sell to improve income? Shall we continue digging for valuables? Alex has met quite a few people so far, is there anyone she should spend more time with? (Who should I write more about?) - Pete, our unpredictable helper and supposed farmer - Bird, our odd cat - Billy Jewel, the mild childhood friend, - Ezla, the louder childhood friend, - Bigbee, the peculiar inn owner, - Katiekins (Kate) Albertina, the excitable country girl, - Lukia, the fellow hair dye enthusiast, - Daisy, the flower seed supplier, - Lucus & Gen, the strange folk in the furniture store, - Lyla, the chatty rich girl, - Mary, the quiet girl from another town, - Sea Captain Kirk, Kate's terse father, - Mrs. Jewel, Billy's mom and cat enthusiast, - Elder Graham, the jolly flower enthusiast and island leader, - Mr. Hans, the busy mayor of the mainland, - or Mr. Heinz, a friend of our father, but somewhat of a stranger. - We could also possibly get in contact with one of our friends from the city. Lastly, I've just been writing in my "creative writing" style the whole time. Is there any adjustments to it you'd like to see? Extra: Other things we can afford, though probably not very useful: Flower Vase - 3000 G Small Rug - 3000 G Saddle - 1000 G Chicken Medicine - 800 G Sheep Medicine - 1500 G Horse Medicine - 2000 G Fodder Bag (32 Uses) - 500 G Shampoo - 800 G Clippers - 2000 G Twybil's Comments: Pete's Sudden Usefulness: So, work done by the partner also seems internally influenced by the number of gifts given. I've been handing Pete potatoes every once in a while off-screen, and we must've hit some sort of threshold. I know for a fact that my memory editing does affect the relationship, because the relationship events would trigger every day. So apparently the game stores both relationship and gifts as separate values...? I'll look into it when I get some time. It's either that or a list of flags. The Arrangement: That arrangement isn't much really, I did it a long time back and it's mostly just a well tuned synth to a midi. It's the main farming theme from Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life.
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Feb 25, 2020 02:21
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Commander Keene posted:Bigbee reads like some sci-fi android or space alien, and it's kinda terrible to read. Nobody talks like that. I get that you're going for "uses a lot of big words in order to sound smart", but maybe tone it down a bit? Thanks for catching that. That was probably the part I was most sure about. Part of it is that he's supposed to be overly factual and speaks primarily in statements as all of his original dialogue is simply stating the obvious. That being said, I was pretty sure I'd gone a bit overboard with it since I haven't done any writing involving him for a few weeks now. He needed some screen time, so I went with whatever note I could hit there. I'd never write uselessly roundabout dialogue like that unless its intentional, and it's definitely something that would require an editing pass. That being said, I haven't confirmed either of those possibilities, so we'll see where we get to. The advantage of being able to talk to the readers and this coming out like a serial story is that I can find ways to roll with the punches. Slaan posted:We could continue focusing on getting animals so plant grass for chickens in the chicken field We should have enough planted to get some chickens in time, but they're the least consistent and clear of all the animals. There's no good definition of how much growing grass or stored fodder that you need for them. That being said, any grass planted now still leads to fodder later, and 6 patches of grass seems to be the usual for most animals. A lot of the difficulty in this game is from the old fashioned problem of obscured mechanics. I've played through to near the end of the game at least once, and I still can' t tell you what's exactly necessary to get animals.
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Feb 25, 2020 13:42
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Serenity Dove posted:Just want to say I’m really enjoying the LP. I ended up getting the first two Harvest Moon games on Gameboy/GBC as a kid and they literally ate my life for a few months. I actually went back and played the first one on Virtual Console (harvest moon gbc is the name) and oh man, although it was great to play for a little bit for nostalgia it’s not aged terrible well. Plus I have no idea how you can feasibly use all the field space you’re given. I’m now onto playing Grand Bazaar that I’ve never played before, (seeing the thread has kicked me off on a play through of some of the HM games I’ve never played.) These games were quite great for their time, but I'll agree they definitely haven't aged all too well though they're still great in my eyes. If I wasn't doing this in narrative form, then I'd have far less material to show. Glad to hear you're enjoying it though! HM3 did get a European release, it's just it's release time was incredibly late into the lifespan of the GBC, as the Advance already had been released in Japan by that point, I believe. I'd have to check again to be sure. Being able to explore different places is neat and it makes the game feel a little less claustrophobic than, say, A Wonderful Life's small map, yet the locations for the most part only serve a few purposes. The Grassland is just for infinite berries/weeds/ and wood, the Forest Lake is for a mechanic we haven't seen yet (it's fishing), the Cliff is only for a few character events, the Mountain has one purpose we'll see far later into the game, and the rest of the locations around town are either stores or have similarly minor uses. We will, however, be able to explore a lot more later on, but it'll take a few seasons before we get to that point. Speaking of, I'm closing the poll on this week's update so I can get to recording sometime here soon. It looks like we'll be buying a rug, a lot of potato seeds, and a little bit of grass seeds; clearing out the lower field will be a goal; and the 3 new girls, Lukia, Kate, and Lyla are going to be our focus in conversations! Oh, and we'll try and see if we can bond with Pete over potatoes, seeing if he becomes a ripped farming machine.
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Feb 27, 2020 23:18
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I've got an update for you, but it's just a status update this time, folks. I've gotten all of this week recorded, and I think it'll make for an interesting update. Some news of note is that we got a chicken, some more Primerose seeds, and Pete's doing okay-ish at watering. Unfortunately, we'll only have a small amount of money for our Monday purchase and summer's too close to grow any more potatoes. But hey, we do have cow and chicken purchasing available now. It seems that having a large amount of stocked fodder is the key. (We've already capped out, by the way.) Edit, as of 3/4: With my other LP entirely out of the way now, I'll be onto working on this a whole lot more. I've been dealing with a bit of writer's block, but then again, I started this LP to fight back against it. Doesn't help I've got a few other things going on, but I should be able to work past it. I'm really just getting started on it now, but I have an outline and that means I should hopefully have it out in a few days. Edit, as of 3/8: You know, every time I say I should have it out soon, something always comes up. I haven't been able to catch a break these last few days, but hopefully it'll start looking up. The Flying Twybil fucked around with this message at 17:24 on Mar 8, 2020 |
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Feb 29, 2020 02:26
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| # ¿ May 10, 2024 16:57 |
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So the good news is that I'm back working on this again, which is great. I've written up maybe a third of the next update in the time I've had today. The bad news is that something funky is going on with my screencapping all of the sudden. In the past, all my screenshots were PNGs and retained a very low filesize, because of the highly limited color palette. For reasons I haven't yet determined, my screenshots are coming out a 150 - 200KB size now. Nothing's changed about them, they just insist on being far larger now. Now you might be thinking: "Well, heck, Twybil, you sure are fretting a lot over what really ain't that much." To which I reply: "Gee golly, that's just how I am!" But the point of the matter is that this is really way too high considering a usual update has about ~100 screencaps, and each page usually has about 2 updates on it. That amounts to about 40MB a page and that's a bit ridiculous for an LP of a GBC game. If anyone's got any ideas about what to try, don't hesitate to suggest something in the meantime. I can do a partial conversion that'll run the size down to about 70kb presently, but I'd really like to have my 9KB screenshots back. I'm still proceeding with working on this regardless, so let's hope I find the magic solution to whatever is going on here. At least all the other stuff that was hindering this is mostly out of the way now- money isn't easy to make these days.
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Mar 15, 2020 00:05
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