Harvest Moon: Animal Parade

Harvest Moon: Animal Parade, the spiritual successor to last year's Tree of Tranquility, takes place in the land of Castanet, and like most Harvest Moon games, the plot is simple. The Goddess Tree that keeps the lands fertile is dying, and The Harvest Goddess has called upon you to help restore the tree by ringing five bells to bring life back to the dying lands. Along the way, you construct a profitable farm by growing crops, raising animals, and building relationships with people in town. It's a long-running series that doesn't change much with each iteration, but Animal Parade introduces a few new ideas to keep things fresh. The circus, which comes to town once a month, gives you quests to locate lost circus animals around town. You can also adopt any of the pets you encounter, ranging from cats and dogs to pandas and snakes. In order to gain affection from pets and from townspeople, you must give them presents. The more you give gifts the more they will like you, until the animal decides to be your pet, or a person becomes romantically interested. However, this is an extremely slow process. Bringing gifts everyday still requires you to wait over a month for an animal to become your companion. There's still plenty to do, but you spend most of your days in a pattern of farming in the morning, giving gifts, and then trying to make money.

We get a hands on look at the latest Harvest Moon iteration.