History Videogame / HometownStory

A major difference between the two is you inherit a store instead of a farm. It starts out small and your long-term task concerning it is to expand it so you can have more customers and encourage more people to move into town. It also focuses less on romance and more on general bonding than the recent ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon'' titles. While the latter sometimes had limited or inexistent benefits to befriending non-bachelors/bachelorettes, here befriending all named characters is just as necessary to get new items to sell and new people to move in as running a profitable business. There is a catch to this, however: your store is perpetually open from 6 AM to midnight, so you have to find a balance between manning the store and exploring the town to get new stock and befriend your new neighbors. Some game progression events are rewarded with blue feather fragments. With every seven collected, you get a full blue feather you can use to make a villager's wish come true.

* BoobsOfSteel: Lily has the biggest chest among the female cast, is a blacksmith and proves to be physically stronger than both Wilhem and Jack.

* CameraScrew: Up there with the GuideDangIt elements below in the elements that can drive away new players. It can get outright disorienting on the store and waterfall maps and also has angles that are used only in front of house doors; the worse cases of the latter are Jacques and Shinji's houses, that cause an abrubt 180° angle switch, which can easily make the player do an involuntary u-turn.

* SignificantSketchbook: Harvey's sketchbook is important to his storyline [[spoiler:after he dies]].

* InspectorLestrade: Jacques quite regularly does this, but it once happened to Clarissa when they deciced to compete to figure out [[spoiler:who set Jacques' house on fire]]. The PlayerCharacter is better than both of them at solving mysteries, and is a ''ShopKeeper''.

* ShopKeeper: The PlayerCharacter.

* DarkSkinnedRedhead: The hunter and blacksmith familys display this. Personality-wise, Wilhem fits the bill best due being an enthusiastic hunter with an ego that comes off as inflated at times.

A SimulationGame developed by [=TOYBOX=]. It takes place in the same universe as its sister series, ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon'', but otherwise is very different.

!!''VideoGame/HometownStory'' provides examples of:

* EngineeredHeroics: Clarissa sets this up by buying the expensive jewlery, then asking the main character to claim it was stolen so she can "find" it.
* EstablishingCharacterMoment: All new named characters have a scene in which they are shown arriving into town. While some are just seen strolling in, others quite clearly display their quirks. Miyo is seen accidentally dropping stuff while Haruka cleans up behind her and Jacques comes in walking in zig-zags as if he's looking for something.

* GenericCuteness: The Game's art style relies heavily on this.

* SharedUniverse: With ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon'' and ''VideoGame/RiverKing''

* YouALLLookFamiliar: The minor villagers, which exist only to fill up the village and be customers, have a range of different models much lower than their actual number.

* InfantImmortality: [[spoiler:Averted in Dexter's backstory, later with Harvey]].

%%* CharacterCustomization

[[quoteright:250:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/hometownstoryusaboxart.jpg]]

* BigSisterMentor: Lily to Cling and Clang, quite literally.

* {{Expy}}: Sue is similar to Oracle from ''Videogame/HarvestMoonTheTaleOfTwoTowns'' in that both are multiple centuries old, are alchemists, and have purple hair. Although, Sue seems to be less secluded and introverted as Oracle was.

* GuideDangIt: A lot of the game is not properly explained, even in the manual.

* SharedUniverse: With ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon'' and ''VideoGame/LegendOfTheRiverKing''

* ArtStyleDissonance: The game has a cutesy art style, but has some dark moments.
[[spoiler:Harvey's death, for example]].

* PreOrderBonus: As with ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon'' games it comes with a plushy of one of the animals, this time Ember the dragon.

* {{Expy}}: Sue is similar to Oracle from ''Videogame/HarvestMoonATaleOfTwoTowns'' in that both are multiple centuries old, are alchemists, and have purple hair. Although, Sue seems to be less secluded and introverted as Oracle was.

A major difference between the two is you inherit a store instead of a farm. It starts out small and your long-term task concerning it is to expand it so you can have more customers and encourage more people to move into town. It also focuses less on romance and more on general bonding than the recent ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon'' titles. While the latter sometimes had limited or inexistent benefits to befriending non-bachelors, here befriending all named characters is just as necessary to get new items to sell and new people to move in as running a profitable business. There is a catch to this, however: your store is perpetually open from 6 AM to midnight, so you have to find a balance between manning the store and exploring the town to get new stock and befriend your new neighbors. Some game progression events are rewarded with blue feather fragments. With every seven collected, you get a full blue feather you can use to make a villager's wish come true.

!!VideoGame/HometownStory provides examples of:

* CharacterCustomization

* ExPy: Sue is similar to oracle from Videogame/HarvestMoon: A tale of two towns in that both are multiple centuries old, are alchemists, and have purple hair. Although, sue seems to be less secluded and introverted as oracle was.

* SpiritualSuccessor: To ''Franchise/HarvestMoon'' and arguably ''VideoGame/AnimalCrossing''. Due to the presence of monsters, the setting itself comes off as closer to that of ''VideoGame/RuneFactory'', which is ''Franchise/HarvestMoon'' with RPGElements.

* MonsterSlayer: One of the duties of hunters, including Wilhem.

* LostForever: If you go on a date wearing the second free outfit Sunny makes for you, you later get a follow-up cutscene while visiting her. However, the random nature of the game can lead the player to do all nine dating events before even ''acquiring'' the outfit, hence losing the cutscene opportunity.

* LukeIAmYourFather: [[spoiler:Midori is Shinji's mother]]