Harvest Moon: The Winds of Anthos (Prerelease Chat)

An open-world Harvest Moon game featuring a large volcano, a pint-sized goddess, and the great Doc Jr. [ Game Guide ] JP release = /shrug. NA release = Sept 2023. EU release = Oct 2023.
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iloverainbow
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Amazon has the game listed with the pre-order plush!

Release date is 12th September 2023 and this could also be just a placeholder date. It's better to wait for the official announcement from Natsume on the release date.

So many farming games I am looking forward to this year!

1. Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life - Day one purchase
2. My Time at Sandrock - Day one purchase
3. Harvest Moon: The Winds of Anthos - will wait for more info before I decide
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greensara
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I just saw the cow plushie! Oh my goodness, so cute!! I am planning to get the game eventually when it comes out, but boy does that plushie make it tempting to consider preordering. It's even cuter than the OW chicken I have. (Would have had the strawberry cow too if I hadn't decided to go digital for FOMT because I couldn't wait, lol.) I wonder if they will have other goodies like the OW music box?
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JustABeautifulGuy
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That cow plushie is so cute! I am super tempted to pre order now. But I must wait until some more footage and early reviews. I also found a new updated description.
Spoiler:
The land of Anthos was a peaceful and harmonious land watched over by the Harvest Goddess and the Harvest Sprites, who protected the inhabitants of Anthos from natural disasters such as storms, earthquakes, and the like. However, one day about 10 years ago, Anthos experienced a severe volcanic eruption that threatened life on Anthos itself, and the Harvest Goddess and Harvest Sprites had to use all of their remaining power to keep the people and animals of Anthos safe. This left the different villages across the land blocked off from each other. Some unfortunate souls even got trapped outside their villages, and were unable to return... Believing that the separated villages and people would one day be reconnected, the Harvest Goddess sent out a bottle with a letter and a magic key, then fell into a deep sleep... Now, 10 years later, you have found the SOS the Harvest Goddess sent to the world in the form of a message in a bottle! With the help of your wacky inventor friend Doc Jr. and many others, it’ll be up to you to revive the Harvest Goddess and the Harvest Sprites, as well as reconnect all of the villages of Anthos with each other! Farm all around Anthos using Doc’s new and improved Expando-Farm! Easily move from place to place and farm everywhere from snowy mountains to beautiful beaches! Keep and raise different kinds of cows, chickens, and sheep in your barn! Find even more exotic animals to keep out in the wild of Anthos!
On a side note, now that the game is listed on Natsume's official Amazon page, their next announcement might be any time now. I'd love to get a trailer showing some more different terrain types with updated textures. They've only shown the Meadow type so far and I like its look but I'm slightly worried about the rest. The desert in One World was an eyesore yet I loved that place the most so I hope a desert terrain makes it and they improve the landscape textures for it as well. The new description seems to confirm snowy mountains and beaches so far.
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I saw the cow plushie while I was having breakfast and totally fell in love!
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Kikki
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For myself, I'm glad the game isn't releasing earlier in summer. Summer is the least beneficial time for a farming sim to release, for me. I have ample real life gardening and farming to do, then...and I'm full of sunshine and real life is just so pretty and uplifting. It's later autumn and all through dreadful dark Canadian winter to the cold and drab mid-spring when I need a digital farming life. Plus there are major titles out now. Tears of the Kingdom is enormous...a far larger game than BotW, and I put 300 hours into that. It's going to eat all of May and maybe most of June as well...I just don't have the bandwidth to play anything else until I'm done with this. I already don't have any gaming gaps in May/June/July (I have 3 games on my list releasing in June and July) especially since I'd rather spend more time gaming in the dead half of the year (November through April) than the fresh and lovely half of the year (May through October).

So for me, September 12, if that turns out to be the actual date, is releasing at a time when it'll be easier for me to have the money, time and situation enjoy it. (Nov/Dec/Jan is probably the absolute ideal release period for farming sims. The absolute pit of darkness, when even a digital light is greatly appreciated.)

It certainly has more interesting looks than previous games (though they were all fairly fun, story-wise.) With SoS: AWL coming out soon I'm sure we won't be hearing about a NEW SoS game any time soon, so any farming sims lined up for the final quarter of 2023 will be appreciated. Though I suspect we'll be having Fantasy Life i around then, and Fae Farm a few months after that, perhaps. Botany Manner is due out in 2023...oh, and My Time at Sandrock, that's a big one! That's also due out 'Summer 2023', which probably also means the very tail end, like Anthos. And Mineko's Night Market is out September 26th, come to think of it, if a cat game counts in the genre. Well, whenever each releases, I hope they don't impede each others' success. We're rich in upcoming farming and gardening sims!

I'm going to have to choose between them rather than being able to buy all of them, so...guess I'll have to wait a little while after release to be able to gather enough info to figure out which are most likely to be worth my limited gaming dollars. It's a good problem to have, though. Used to be we had to just take whatever we got and be glad it existed at all.

EDIT: Oh wait, and RF3 Special, on September 5! :shock: I'm not planning on getting that one, but it's another game in the genre releasing in the second half of 2023, and I know there are people here who'll be getting it... And Sun Haven may manage to squeak onto the Switch within 2023 as well. It's already been underway for a month or two.
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JustABeautifulGuy
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They have officially announced the pre-orders and interestingly enough, the release date is listed for September 26th on their website. So atleast this confirms the September release. I'm personally happy about it now, I am invested too much with Zelda right now and SoS:AWL will definitely take many people's attention this summer so it's nice they've decided to take some time but they've still got competition left with games Kikki just listed. It's sorta overwhelming now if you think about it. But being a huge fan of this genre, I'll most likely go through them one by one slowly because we're eventually going to reach a time where there won't be any farming sim coming out for a while.

Talking about pre order exclusives, there's also a mystery gift with the cow plushie if you pre-order exclusively on their website. And one of the new features listed is that you can have a camera in game and take photos as well as selfies.

Edit: Some more features that have been confirmed:
- Different types of mounts are confirmed
- 10 contests and festivals
- Harvest Wisps return
- There will be falling rocks to avoid while mining
- You can fast travel using Harvest Goddess’s Warp Statues

https://twitter.com/Natsume_Inc/status/ ... 3131464706

Also there's official artwork as their website background.
Spoiler:
ImageImage
Edit: There's also a new press release so this is probably the announcement for this month. They've stated that the game is releasing this September, and there's a premium edition on NISAmerica which contains a disc for the original soundtrack, animal lapel pin sets, a collector's box alongside the plushie. https://store.nisamerica.com/harvest-mo ... -of-anthos
Spoiler:
Image
Edit 2: So many updates today haha, Gematsu uploaded some new screenshots. Most likely Natsume gave it to them exclusively. They look good I suppose. Aolani might be the first marriage candidate I really like so far. Seeing that close up photo with the Goddess, I wish they did something closer to SoS AWL than the 3D portraits.
Spoiler:
ImageImageImageImageImage
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midnighttherabbit
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The plush is REALLY cute, it's enough to tempt me just a little.

Those pictures are nice, the graphics still look way better than OW, though I do think the light is a little bright / harsh which was a problem I found with OW as well - the heavy shadows made everything seem much flatter. It might look better in motion, though.

The character portraits are still confusing me, though, I can't tell if they're oddly drawn 2D pictures or stylistically flat 3D models, it's a little uncanny.
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So it is going to be One World Part 2 after all. Makes me wonder why they decided to stick with this formula. I'm glad they did because it does look fun to play with so many different areas but I think the world is still going to feel empty. Making a game with one quality town and some exploration areas surrounding it would've been much better for them I think. The graphics look good imo, and my only complaint would be the portraits and the characters themselves. They feel so bland :(( That red-haired guy is probably a bachelor and I don't like any design so far...
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FarmingForDaysMan
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What’s up with the Tiny Harvest Goddess? Is that a new thing for the series? Since seeing that image, I’m assuming you have to put some Tiny Harvest Goddesses together to make a full-sized Goddess? :lol:

But anyways, that Tiny Harvest Goddess is adorable :3
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StormFire
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Popping in to say that everything I’m seeing so far has me so excited for this release. :) Glad they seem to be taking their time with this one, as I think I recall OW releasing at the same time as SOS.
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iloverainbow
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My goodness! Those screenshots got me hyped! It definitely looks way better than their previous releases.

I am not really into collecting plushies but I really want the collector box... Those pins look really good as well. Really hope they won't disappoint with this one.
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greensara
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FarmingForDaysMan wrote: May 23, 2023 1:57 pm What’s up with the Tiny Harvest Goddess? Is that a new thing for the series? Since seeing that image, I’m assuming you have to put some Tiny Harvest Goddesses together to make a full-sized Goddess? :lol:

But anyways, that Tiny Harvest Goddess is adorable :3
She's adorable! Almost getting Dessie vibes. I thought her design in OW was beautiful, but I think I like the mini even better, lol.

I wonder what the secret bonus gift for people that purchase directly from Natsume is going to be?
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FarmingForDaysMan
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greensara wrote: May 24, 2023 8:11 am
FarmingForDaysMan wrote: May 23, 2023 1:57 pm What’s up with the Tiny Harvest Goddess? Is that a new thing for the series? Since seeing that image, I’m assuming you have to put some Tiny Harvest Goddesses together to make a full-sized Goddess? :lol:

But anyways, that Tiny Harvest Goddess is adorable :3
She's adorable! Almost getting Dessie vibes. I thought her design in OW was beautiful, but I think I like the mini even better, lol.

I wonder what the secret bonus gift for people that purchase directly from Natsume is going to be?
YES. Baby Harvest Goddess was my initial thought, but then I saw the statue behind her. I’ll have to look up a picture of the OW Goddess :0 She’s a teeny tiny little fairy 🧚‍♀️
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simside
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I was really hoping for the music box-style deluxe preorder for this one as well, but I'm always happy with plush. I'll either get the collector's set or order from Natsume and bet on the secret gift!

The new screenshots also look great to me. Can't wait to see more characters and areas. Also really happy the harvest wisps are coming back, though I read that as "wasps" first and was very excited, and spent a minute figuring out how that would work. XD
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JustABeautifulGuy
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Really just waiting for a gameplay trailer now before I can pre-order this. I need that cow plushie! Marvelous already dropped a teaser footage for the next SoS that will most likely come out in a year or two and here we don't have a trailer from a game that drops in 3 months :lol:
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