I tried playing Harvest Moon on the SNES today and having played Stardew Valley for hours, I thought I’d try and see how tolerable the original Harvest Moon was in comparison. I know and understand it is unfair because there’s a 20 year gap between Harvest Moon and Stardew Valley, while also discrediting Harvest Moon’s later entries since there’s more than one.

Harvest Moon to me is a bit hard to revisit. Having to get used to only carrying two tools at the same time, your farm doesn’t seem as big, you don’t have a way to know that you’re tired as readily, you just have to watch for the signs and the village you visit doesn’t seem as characteristic. It’s a basic farming sim, it has to start somewhere.

But Stardew Valley does so many things that it is easier to revisit.

  • oddspinnaker@lemm.eeEnglish
    20·
    7 days ago

    This is pretty obscure, but the Game Boy Advance remake of Mario Bros. (Not Super Mario Bros.) is more fun than the original.

    You can run, for one thing, and the controls are more responsive in general.

    It’s one of the games on Super Mario Advance, and one of the main reasons I originally wanted a GBA when it came out! I had the original Mario Bros. for the NES and thought it would be fun to have a portable version. I was right.

    They did a great job updating the game!

    • WolfLink@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      10·
      6 days ago

      Yeah the controls in the OG Mario Bros (and even the OG Super Mario Bros, to a bit of a lesser extent) are very clunky compared to modern entries. I’d say SMB3 holds up well though.

      • Buddahriffic@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        6 days ago

        Literally if you’re playing on the original NES controllers made in a time before Nintendo understood the importance of erganomics. The corners dug into hands and even the buttons wore at fingers and I say that as someone who has naturally thick callouses.

        Iirc, they didn’t even have the satisfying button press mechanism most buttons have these days where the button resistance drops as you pass the threshold of a “press”. And many games involved mashing or holding buttons. Like it was painful to watch my daughter try playing SMB and not just hold the B button to constantly run.

        They were iconic but I prefer to see them than use them.