Good ways to add more content?

SNES, HM64, BTN, STH, A Wonderful Life, Another Wonderful Life, AWL:SE, Magical Melody, Puzzle de HM, Tree of Tranquility, Animal Parade, Frantic Farming, Hero of Leaf Valley, My Little Shop, Seeds of Memories, Lil' Farmers, Light of Hope, Popolocrois: SoS, and Doraemon: SoS.
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Kikki
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So, Somerandom began a thread, and it quickly sparked a new topic, which is basically the topic I am making right now to avoid turning the original one into something totally different.

In talking about how long we play, it morphed into how we feel like we'd want to play our files even longer than we already do. (This probably doesn't apply to people who prefer to complete the story and/or get married and then start a completely new file to make different choices on the same things. This topic is probably more suited to those who would want enjoy their one or main/favourite file for longer, without having to restart/replay.)

I'm interested in hearing everyone's ideas on what they think would be best. Do you just want a bit more content built in from the start...like extra long-term goals or a better achievement system? No DLC required! Or do you want a few small DLC packs that introduce new events or new characters? Do you think they should stick to small enough updates that they could be free, or just go all-in with optional (non-essential to any main story or goals) paid DLC?

~

My personal pipe dream is about two years of regular content updates and/or new DLC on existing games. I'd like to see both big and small options. What I'd really love to see can be summed up as 'Build your own second generation'.

My thought is that, if you buy the optional DLC, you would be able to match-make...and also 'life-make' for those you don't wish to marry off (or for those who are not open to marriage, as I feel at least some characters should not be.) Each character could have, say, 3 or 4 options for people they can marry. Adoption and fostering could be an option for anyone, including some who remain single or for couples who can't have children or etc (like if Megan and Moriya got hitched...they're too old. Actually, I don't know if Megan is single. Can't remember if her husband is dead or just not in the game!)

The children who already exist in the game would provide the older candidates in the second gen. Tigre and Tatsumi, for example, would be about ten years older than your original MC's child, and Colin and Noel could be about five years older (I think their ages could be set by the devs but it doesn't have to be parallel to the order in which you got characters married off or etc. I think it's okay to just pretend that all of this was happening in a natural order rather than ticked off one-by-one by the player. I mean in the game, your child is born, and Tigre is 12-ish. Your child becomes about 5...and Tigre is still about 12-ish...no one else ages while your child does. I think it's okay to just assume that your kid was being born in the flow of time of that world, even if it doesn't match up with the literal progression of how the player was pressing buttons and unlocking things.) Each possible second-gen character is pre-made by the devs and is basically 'unlocked' by getting the right people married and making the right choices, making it so that there are dozens of potential second-gen characters, and only maybe a quarter to half of them would be possible in one playthrough because you can't choose everything for every character.

That'd actually give some appeal to people who prefer to do multiple replays rather than extend their single file, too. Though maybe one-file players wouldn't like not being able to unlock EVERY option in one play. But I just don't see how it could work to end up with 20+ marriage candidates all at once in the second gen!

I'd also like to see non-marriage or childless options, like being able to help someone through events to a life dedicated intensely to their dream/career/etc, and have THAT have an impact on the second gen, too, perhaps in the form of shops, or new clothing or other customization options.

Honestly, I have SO MANY ideas I really think that this wouldn't eliminate the desire for many to do multiple play-throughs, because you'd be able to have a drastically different second generation depending on the choices you make. But you'd also be able to squeeze MANY more hours out of a single play-through, so I think there could be options for everyone.

I'd also love to see a more compelling achievement system/more reward/recognition for what you do. I mentioned this before, but I'd want to see characters COMMENTING on your achievements. Like if you finally catch every fish, have that added to the pool of things people can say...comments on what an accomplished fisher you are, particularly immediately following you getting that achievement. I want to see in-game impact for achievements! That'd certainly compel me to bother trying to get them. But I don't think that should be DLC. I think a better achievement system should be part of the base game from the start.
Last edited by Kikki on May 28, 2022 3:04 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Code_Name_Geek
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My personal preference is for extended goals to be baked into the game right away. This is largely based on the fact that DLC is a nightmare preservation-wise (as can be seen right now with the 3DS shop closing down which will soon make the 3oT DLC inaccessible by legal means). I think someone should be able to buy a cartridge 20-30 years in the future and enjoy the majority of the game's content rather than having it locked behind a storefront that may someday disappear. (Either that or game companies need to focus a lot more on making that content available for as long as possible, but until that becomes a reality that's my opinion.) Free content updates are less of an issue, but even then those can be hard to access with technology becoming obsolete (for example, I had to jump through a lot of hoops to get my original PSP hooked up to the internet because internet security protocols have changed since it was released).

As for goals, I really like the idea of having more content focused on your kid! Ditto to a matchmaking system, as well as the non-married/childless options. I also don't mind some content being locked until later years, as long as it isn't done excessively (ToTT is the main culprit for that imo, as much as I love that game).

I'd also really like to see a "hard mode" on the opposite end of seedling mode, since I personally like the feeling of struggling to get the farm on its feet and sometimes games speed through that part of the game too much for my tastes.
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Kikki
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DLC *is* bad for longevity, but the thing is, so many games have so many updates, now, that aren't included on the physical form or original release, that I'm not sure I see much point in caring about DLC. For me, anyway.

Like ACNH. Even if it had no paid DLC, they added so much of the base content in dribs and drabs over a year or so...if the eshop went down and you had no place to download the updates from anymore, you'd have a very incomplete game on your hands. I DQB2 had a huge amount of updates, too, not including any DLC. Very few games I've played in the last few years have released with their full content. (The only ones I can think of are the Ace Attorney games. The last two did get DLC cases added, but they're spin-off bits and not important, and everything else was in from the start...not even any performance patches or anything.)

I hate that it's like this, but I don't think DLC is the problem when almost all games are released not-quite-complete, now, and only completed by post-release patches, often many of them. The DLC isn't necessary, after all...Trio is a great game even without the DLC, for example...but those updates and patches often ARE necessary.

Though a game having DLC is a guarantee that you won't have everything from the start. If a game doesn't have it, then you can have some hope of the game being complete on the cartridge. (Though not much, nowadays!)

I like the scrimping and saving part early game, too, where you're catching and selling crickets and tiny fish just to be able to buy one chicken before the first spring is done, lol. Any optional additional modes would be welcome, though I don't think I'd use a hard mode, myself. I only like the scrimping part for the first season, and then I want to make big money fast :)
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Code_Name_Geek
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Ah yeah totally agreed about post-release patches being a bigger part of the issue than DLC but that seemed less relevant to the question. I know some people who lived in residence at school and weren’t able to hook their Switches up to the dorm wifi and therefore couldn’t get the critical day 1 patch in order to enjoy the game they’d just bought… a whole mess, really. (Though at the same time it does in some ways beat the earlier days when patches weren’t possible at all, I just think companies take advantage of it!)
Kikki wrote:Though a game having DLC is a guarantee that you won't have everything from the start. If a game doesn't have it, then you can have some hope of the game being complete on the cartridge. (Though not much, nowadays!)
Yeah, personally I just like having everything available at the start of the game, otherwise I feel like I missed out in the earlier years when a patch/DLC doesn’t come out until I’m already a year or two into the game. So I guess that was the more important thing I was trying to communicate. :)
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Somerandom
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Post  Posted:

Thanks for making this thread Kikki.

Yeah, I definitely understand the sentiment of not everyone has to marry. The only reason I thought it would be that way was due to the old rivals system where only the candidates paired up. In fact in some games I don’t see anyone marrying a character outside the MC, for example HM ANB, RF5 and Poot. Even in Fire Emblem I preferred not pairing up certain characters, I never paired up Peri at all for example (for pretty obvious reasons). I do like the idea of creating your own second generation but having that as DLC separate from the main game.

Like you both have said I think releasing buggy games and then just patching them is a big problem within the game industry, not as much the DLC. I like DLC when a game interests me and I want more, so the base game has to be loaded with great content and the DLC should just be the icing on the cake. Yes there should be extra achievements in the base game (maybe like trophies in RF4) where you get a physical (optional) item for completing extra tasks. Characters should also recognise your achievements and the existence of your child/children as well. I never got the Trio DLC at all due to me having a European copy of the game, and I was satisfied without the DLC, although it did look pretty good.

I would really like to see extra modes and stories not part of the main game, like a selectable option similar to newlywed mode in RF4S. Maybe a vacation mode, when you finish the main story tasks, you win tickets for you (and your spouse if you have one) to an island for a vacation. When you get there you find only the mayor living on the island running the hotel. He recognises your farming prowess and asks you to take over the farm for awhile. You say yes and begin to revitalise the town. It’ll be like ANB but no pesky time barriers and you would have quite a bit of money to start out with (as the money from your save data is transferred over). You also get to choose who moves in for example when opening a restaurant you get to choose the chef and waitstaff from a few options.
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Kikki
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Yeah :) The base game has to be complete within itself, has to feel like a FULL game, or DLC feels like a rip-off, like 'content held hostage' or whatever that phrase is that people keep using when they're getting mad at a developer, lol. Sometimes this feels true to me, when the base game feels like it isn't complete and that the DLC content should have been in from the start, but other times it just comes across as entitled whiners who want the devs to work on one game forever, with no additional recompense for their time.
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ACNH is a good example since we're all familiar with it. The paid DLC, which is only the Happy Home Paradise part, feels very 'additional' to me...not necessary to the base game at all. But without the free updates, it would have felt like a very incomplete game and if they'd charged for those updates adding holidays back in and adding more furniture in and etc, just to get us back to a similar level to what we had in New Leaf...that would have felt like charging for cut content, to me. I am NOT okay with that. And I'm still not okay with them taking a year to add all that content back, because by the time they were done adding it, I was already bored with the game, so I didn't get to enjoy it. :(

As Code_Name_Geek says, something like that ensures that what you get on the cartridge is an incomplete game, and keeping the game alive past one console generation will be difficult...when the console dies (and the shop goes down), so too does the game(s).

But as long as the base game feels complete in itself, I LOVE DLC. I really WANT devs to keep working on my favourite games, and to able do that, they have to be getting something in return. So yes, I'll pay, and pay, and pay for any DLC that's been made to my liking, to expand the fun I get to have with a beloved game. If they put in the work, I will pay for their work and be glad they're still interested in providing more content.

And when the shops go down and the DLC is no longer downloadable, well, at least I'd still have a complete base game, and only optional side or spin-off stuff would be missing. (Though it'd be better if somehow the company made those permanently available, or sold DLC their own cartridges, perhaps. I do think things regarding eshops and data preservation need to start changing with it now being RARE for a game not to have many patches and updates post-release.)
I think there's an endless array of fun things they could do, as DLC, to give us more time/fun from our favourite games. Create a second generation (including new shops and features/customization specific to the new gen), travel and farm all over again in a new place (like a vacation spot...and if they wanted to do a smaller DLC, not something huge like a second gen or a whole new land, both of which are pretty much entire second games...it could even just be buying and fixing up your own cabin and maybe a market stand.) have some kind of terrible storm in the Trio (or etc) world and have to get all the villagers of all three towns working together to clean up and repair any damage (and maybe give new visual options) along with personal events, attached to the new situation.

Ouch, my back hurts too much to keep thinking of more DLC options, lol. But there are as many ideas as there are people, pretty much. It could be so much fun. I've always wanted DLC to be more to my liking...I find that what devs add isn't to my taste. Like Xenoblade. I didn't like Torna: The Golden Country, and I outright disliked Future Connected. Torna broadened an already huge story even further, but didn't DEEPEN it at all. And Future Connected spent all its time on Melia. When you don't even like Melia, that's a drag! I know why they did it...because of XC3. The added scenes even in XCDE made it obvious that they were retconning-in a link from the first game to the last one. I just wish it didn't have to be via Melia. (Though I know why it does have to be her, with how they've shaped things.)

But, hey. While Xenoblade is a very different animal from any Bokumono game, DLC is still optional and you don't have to buy it or play it, so if I don't LIKE what they produce, I'll feel disappointed...but not cheated.
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simside
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I love DLC and expansions! Not too worried about patches and preservation myself, for various reasons that are off-topic. I just found out that the free DLC from the original DS was all preserved and can be fetched the same way you got it originally, which is great news for modern systems.

For Harvest Moon-style games, I think my favorite type of post-release content would be additional crops and quests, similar to what One World did. Stuff that is nonessential, but adds more small goals to the game for me. I don't like these to be terribly plot-heavy, or to add content that diverges too wildly from farming, or would throw off the flow of the original story. Post-game characters and marriage candidates are usually poorly-integrated since they can't be part of the town for non-paying players, and their otherness always makes me a bit sad. One World is sort of my gold standard for adding characters, since the game was designed not to have much overlap between villages, so the add-on village is pretty seamless, and the candidates still show up in festivals and events elsewhere.

The thing that I always think of when I imagine the best possible expansion/DLC content is Pokemon Gold/Silver, which contain the entire first game once you beat the new content. I'm not sure how possible this is with game sizes now, but I think a really great expansion would be throwing part/all of a village from a previous game in, with the same characters, and having the second generation "move to grandpa's farm" that way. I would absolutely be willing to ignore that all the villagers hadn't aged since "grandpa" lived there, though I'm not sure how many other players would be okay with that. ^_^; You could probably add a few new candidates to keep it interesting, but I would definitely keep playing a game like that, and would pay for the expansion.
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Super late on this, and I think DLC has been pretty thoroughly discussed, so I'd just like to make a case for modding. I really wish modding was more readily a thing in farming sims. A lot of modding can be questionable, but... not all of them. Modders are some of the most dedicated people in gaming.

If modding was a thing in Harvest Moon back in the day, I think I would have gotten into it myself. There was so much of it in the Sims that I never felt like it was necessary to make my own stuff, but... Harvest Moon would have been great. Clean up some of the more tedious parts of the games, add new plants to grow, etc. With the right tools you could pretty easily turn fan fiction into a mod. We might have seen something like Stardew a lot sooner with a modding community.

Probably a lot of it came from games being locked to consoles, but that's less of an excuse now.

If that still can't/won't be a thing, I want to see smart reuse of assets. Which can be done. Playing/watching a bunch of Elden Ring has given me a better idea of how (Fromsoft are the masters of it). Consider that the first Dark Souls game came out 11 years ago. That means this midsized company has managed to release 3 Dark Souls games, Bloodborne, Sekiro, and Elden Ring in 11 years. Which basically can't be done without smart asset reuse. (Not that there hasn't been accusations of crunch at From, either.)

Probably Monolith Soft is another good example of that. Not quite to From's level, but pretty close.

Oh! And as I'm writing this, I would love to see a thoughtfully designed NG+ option in a farming sim! I don't think it's ever been (properly) done before. But if it could be, that would be awesome. Some way to minorly mix up the content, to encourage you to replay, to maybe engage with something you didn't on your first playthrough. Not exactly new content, but...not exactly not either?
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While DLC would be nice, what I’d like is a port of a game onto the switch. The 3DS eshop is going to be gone soon and most of us hasn’t used their 3DS in a hot minute.

Yes, I know that wasn’t the topic but I don’t want to make a thread just for that statement.

On the DLC side of things, maybe a pack with your kid becoming a teenager and useful? It’d optional and those who actually wants the kids to grow can get it while those who doesn’t can ignore said pack.

Likewise, rival marriage pack. It’d work the same and it wouldn’t effect the main story.
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