History YMMV / StoryOfSeasons

** Certain crops yield more gold and are more productive than other crops that are available in the same season (e.g. In ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonBackToNature Back To Nature]]'', potatoes yield more gold and take only 2 days longer than turnips to grow).

* DuelingWorks: With ''VideoGame/HarvestMoonNatsume'' since the split; the games from each side tend to come out within a year of each other, with the first post-split Harvest Moon game, ''The Lost Valley'', coming out before the 2014 ''Story of Seasons''. They don't duel in Japan because [[NoExportForYou the Natsume Harvest Moon games aren't exported there]].

** Skye in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS DS]] [[DistaffCounterpart Cute]]'' was created primarily so that there'd be a "special" marriage candidate for the girl versions, and he's extremely hard to find and talk to. Oh, he's also a [[AllGirlsWantBadBoys bad boy]] [[{{Bishonen}} bishie.]] No surprise, then, that he's become one of the most popular boys in the series.
** Other games have them as well, but with the exception of Skye, most are [=NPCs=] you can't marry. Examples include Flora (''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAWonderfulLife AWL]]'' version), Pastor Carter (''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonBackToNature More Friends]]'' version), Alisa (''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonIslandOfHappiness Island of Happiness]]''), Marian (''Grand Bazaar'') and Eileen (''Tale of Two Towns''). ''Sunshine Islands'' even trolls you by giving Alisa heart events like a marriageable girl, but [[MarriedToTheJob having her turn you down.]] You ''can'' marry her in ''Tale of Two Towns'', though. But [[spoiler:since she is a priestess, no child! (Something that Lara from ''VideoGame/RuneFactoryFrontier'' does opposite.) Hopefully you'll respect her decision at least.]]
** Wizard from ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAnimalParade Animal Parade]]'' certainly seems to be one of the most popular bachelors with the fandom, along with [[{{Tsundere}} Gill]], [[DeadpanSnarker Chase]] and [[TheFool Luke]].

*** Reception for [[DudeLooksLikeALady Marian]] has been overwhelmingly positive for being exceptionally beautiful (despite being a man) and for being a canon gay character that's been handled tastefully. The fact that it's extremely common to find someone mistake him for female, and then be shocked to find out his real gender, certainly adds to his memorability.

* FandomRivalry: With SpiritualSuccessor ''VideoGame/StardewValley''. Unusually, it's mostly onesided. Most ''Harvest Moon'' fans enjoy (or are at least neutral to) ''Stardew'', however ''Stardew'' fans have been known to be negative towards ''Harvest Moon'' (especially since many haven't played ''Harvest Moon'', as ''Stardew Valley'' has been released on PC, Platform/PlayStation, and Xbox while ''Harvest Moon'' was a predominantly Nintendo focused series for years). This in turn causes ''Harvest Moon'' fans to backlash against ''Stardew Valley''.

** Many people refer to any of the male protagonists without an ingame default name as "Jack" despite the fact that the ''[[DarkerandEdgier Wonderful]] [[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAWonderfulLife Life]]'' "Jack" is "Mark", the ''[[LighterAndSofter Magical]] [[VideoGame/HarvestMoonMagicalMelody Melody]]'' one is "Tito", the ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonSaveTheHomeland Save The Homeland]]'' one is "Toy", and most others up until ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonIslandOfHappiness IoH]]'' were called "Pete".
** The ''Grand Bazaar'' protagonists have no official names yet, but the fans call them "Hansel" and "Gretel".

** Doctor's name being "Tim" is this. It comes from mixing him up with another character. In most games he is "[[EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep Doctor]]", but in the DS games he is "Trent".

** There's quite a bit of overlap between ''VideoGame/FireEmblem'' fans and ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon'' fans, probably due to the Support system in the former having similar attributes to dating in ''Harvest Moon''.

** In some games[[note]]Specifically, ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonBackToNature Back To Nature]]'', the ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonBackToNature Mineral Town]]'' games and ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS DS/DS Cute]]''[[/note]], you could invest a ton of money into putting grass everywhere you're not planting other seeds. You can technically do it in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonIslandOfHappiness IoH]]'' and ''SI'', but since you have to water grass in those games, it's far more trouble than it's worth.

** ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS DS]]'' has several pointless glitches (tapping the bottom left corner of the title screen where the characters are lining up turns everyone into Leah), several annoying ones (going to the island during a festival results in the bottom screen blacked out) but lots of good bad ones. Examples:
*** The infamous billionaire cheat.
*** Lord Fa's cheat for unlimited wool.
*** Saving, turning off your DS and reloading the game clears out the entire mine floor of monsters (except, strangely, the moths)
** In ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAWonderfulLife A Wonderful Life]]'' you can cause your inventory to become flooded with several dozen copies of literally every item in the game.
** In ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon3'' there's a shipping glitch, where if you have two different types of items, and you had more of one than the other then you could ship more of the thing you had less of. So if you had 16 turnips, but one gold egg, then by this glitch you could ship 15 golden eggs.
** Giving the Harvest Goddess a gift she likes on her birthday in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonANewBeginning A New Beginning]]'' has the code for a portrait change in the text box instead of an actual message.
** A typo in "DS" has Cliff use ''<palyer>'' instead of the player's name during one scene.

* GrowingTheBeard: Depending on who you ask, you may get different answers:

** Some says it started in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonBackToNature Back To Nature]]'' with the number of different collections (e.g. Beauty Stars, Cooking Recipes, House Extensions and Legendary Fishes) and unlockable contents (e.g. Special crops).
** Fans of the newer games would say the game grew the beard in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonTreeOfTranquility Tree of Tranquility]]'', where it became more {{Bishonen}} driven and more [[LighterAndSofter fluffy and flowery.]]

** Can be accomplished between your male farmer and Kai in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonBackToNature Back To Nature.]]'' Have him give Kai a lot of gifts, and then choose Kai to watch the fireworks with rather than any of the girls. The result is some wonderfully HoYay text about "we saw a lot of fireworks together."

** The ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAWonderfulLife Wonderful Life]]'' games gave smaller seasons, long days that run the risk of getting boring, love interests with no rivals who are much quicker to woo, a much smaller town, a huge rucksack, and in general it is very simplified compared to other ''HM'' games. Though, as it's less of a challenge, it is a [[GatewaySeries good way]] for newcomers to the series to get the hang of the general playthrough before going to the harder games.
** ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonGrandBazaar Grand Bazaar]]'' has been called "''Harvest Moon'' For Dummies."
* LGBTFanbase: ''Story of Seasons:Pioneers of Olive Town'' has gained a following in the LGBT side since XSeed, with Marvelous's blessing, makes it where your characters can not only get into homosexual relationships, but also get married as well. This was also present in the ''Friends of Mineral Town'' and ''A Wonderful Life'' remakes.

** There's one where it shows a cat, two dogs, a horse, a cow, a sheep, and a chicken. Those memes usually talk about the ridiculousness of some things of the game. For example, a meme like this might talk about how you can walk into a house with three people and only find one bed.

** "This series hates little old ladies." [[spoiler:Ellen in ''Harvest Moon 64'', Nina in ''A Wonderful Life'', and Eda in ''Story of Seasons'' all are sweet little old ladies who die. Ellen's can be avoided, but there's nothing you can do to keep the other two alive.]]
* MisBlamed: A lot of people mistake Natsume as being the developers of the games, when in reality they are only the localization company for the Americas; Marvelous are the devs. Thus errors and glitches in gameplay that aren't related to Natsume (such as the mailbox being locked in a lot of games) are from Marvelous but get MisBlamed to Natsume. It can be unclear who caused what sometimes, though, as some glitches appear in the North American versions that aren't in the original Japanese.

** Claire wasn't the first female protagonist in the series, Sara was.

** Fans of the older Harvest Moon games claim that Victor Interactive Software made the Harvest Moon game right, before it merged with Pack-In-Video Co. to become Marvelous Entertainment.

** In ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonTreeOfTranquility Tree of Tranquility]]''/''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAnimalParade Animal Parade]]'', [[TokenMiniMoe Luna]] and [[AttentionWhore Selena]] are not well liked by the fandom. The former gets more flak mainly because Gill's rivalry scenes with Luna have her act very immature to Gill's calm nature. Doesn't help that if the player tells Luna that she likes Gill, she'll act like a complete bitch to you by saying, "I'm prettier than you." Not something you say to the player that can decide your fate and make you single because of it. Almost all of the bachelorettes act pretty catty when the player discourages them from confessing, but they're really just hated [[DieForOurShip because they marry the most popular guys in the game]], similar to poor [[ShrinkingViolet Sabrina]] from ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonIslandOfHappiness IoH]]''.
** [[TheSlacker Rock]] from ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAWonderfulLife A/nother Wonderful Life]]'' isn't exactly a well-loved character (especially since [[JerkWithAHeartOfGold Marlin]] is a very popular bachelor in comparison), but ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS Harvest Moon DS (Cute)]]'' ranks up Rock's CasanovaWannabe traits to {{Jerkass}} levels. There's a scene in ''[[DistaffCounterpart Cute]]'' where he'll try to ask you out despite the fact that you already have a husband, and if Rock is married to Lumina, there's a scene in both versions where he hits on Muffy, which really upsets Lumina when she walks in on it. In fact, some fans have been known to marry Lumina themselves in ''VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS'' and claim to have done so purely to save her from an unhappy relationship with Rock.

** Michelle in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonANewBeginning A New Beginning]]'' because of her third and final heart events revealing [[spoiler:she doesn't love you at all and just considers you a sucker that's willing to give her free stuff--free ''expensive'' stuff]]. Though due to it only being able to be seen if you start dating her, the hate is mostly from people who either dated her thinking she was the best bachelorette or people that read her event details on a website.

** Seem to pop up with regularity in the DS games, including the cooking mechanics in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonIslandOfHappiness IoH]]'' and ''SI'', the animal mini-games in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS DS/DS Cute]]'', the storage system in ''Grand Bazaar'' and the farm expansion and tool upgrade systems in ''Two Towns''.
** For players that hoard items, any of the games that have it so that an item (crops, milk, eggs, flowers, etc) rapidly drop in quality and become rotten in just a few days.
** The damn ball in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS DS (Cute)]]''. If you sell it, Thomas will come by, scold you and give you a new one. If you leave it out Thomas again will come by and tell you that you lost the ball. You'll have to keep it in your backpack, which is space-consuming, so he will stop bothering you about it. Fortunately, after you've bought the cabinet, you can put it there permanently so you won't have to carry it and Thomas won't bother you about it.
** Ironically, the whole marriage thing in ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon3''. People have asked, even after this game came out, to be able to marry the other main character. In this game the opposite character is the ''only'' character available for marriage. People didn't want the wife to work while pregnant. Play as a boy and the girl won't work for 60 days. Play as a girl and you can't even play past marriage, since the game ends when you do get hitched.
** Marriage in general can be this under some circumstances. Sure, you get a boatload of happiness points and the possibility of children, but in the first game at least, you can no longer stay up into the night to finish crucial farm work without losing your spouse's approval, and a lot of said spouse's dialogue gets replaced with [[WelcomeToCorneria very generic-sounding advice and lovey-doveyness]], regardless of whom you married or [[OutOfCharacterMoment whether it would be in-character for them to say that]]. If you're the kind of player who enjoys characters [[GameplayAndStorySegregation for their personality rather than their gameplay benefits]], you might want to wait a year to see all of an NPC's unique dialogue and behavior before tying a ring on them.
* SequelDisplacement: A large portion of the fandom in the 2000s were introduced to the series through ''VideoGame/HarvestMoonAWonderfulLife'' and ''VideoGame/HarvestMoonFriendsOfMineralTown''. It's thus not uncommon for people to think the series began with either game, though with the release of certain games on Virtual Console, Nintendo Online, and Playstation Network it's becoming less frequent.

** Because they lack [[PairTheSpares rival couples]], ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonANewBeginning A New Beginning]]'', ''Tale of Two Towns,'' and ''VideoGame/StoryOfSeasons2014'' are the few installments in the series where the bachelors/bachelorettes are shipped with each other as often as they are with the protagonist, as fans take to imagining who the likely [[OfficialCouple canon]] pairings would be if they existed.

** In ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAWonderfulLife A[nother] Wonderful Life]]'', if you haven't proposed to a girl by the end of the year, the game will simply throw the character with the highest affection at you when the time comes, and hit you with a NonStandardGameOver if you balk. In other games, there's frequently little to nothing stopping you from marrying girls the moment you get their affection high enough, which means they'll [[FourthDateMarriage agree to marry you even if that's really the first they've heard of your feelings for them.]] However, this is averted for Nami, who initially marries you for a more political reason if you don't propose to her.[[note]]She wants to stay in Forget-Me-Not Valley, but she's out of money and can no longer stay at the inn, making her only option to go back home and live with her drunken father. Marrying you means she would be able to stay there and prevents any unfortunate implications that an unwed woman staying at an unwed man's house may cause.[[/note]]

** It's better executed in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAnimalParade Animal Parade]]'': as you build up hearts with a marriage candidate, they actually ''woo you back,'' giving you gifts, sending you love letters, and even going on dates with you!

** In ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonANewBeginning A New Beginning,]]'', ''VideoGame/StoryOfSeasons2014'', and ''VideoGame/StoryOfSeasonsTrioOfTowns'' you must officially "commit" to a bachelor/bachelorette before you can see their later heart events and work your way towards proposing. Unlike in ''Tale of Two Towns,'' both bachelors ''and'' bachelorettes will eventually [[LoveConfession confess to you]] and propose if you don't take the initiative.
** In ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon3'', you can only marry Pete or Sara, the other protagonist that you didn't choose. What's even worse is that their personality isn't all that deep and if you get married while playing as Sara the game ends after the wedding. At least you don't really have to think about the decision!

** ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS DS']]'' Fourth Mine. So very much...
** The Swimming Contest in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonBackToNature Back To Nature]]''. You will be reloading and replaying that one A LOT.

** Some fans view on the games after ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoon64 64]]'', and to a larger extent most fans views on [[VideoGame/HarvestMoonBackToNature BTN/FOMT/MFOMT]]'' compared to ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoon64 64]]'' and ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS DS/Cute]] compared to ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAWonderfulLife AWL/AnWL/AWL:SE]]/[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonBackToNature FOMT/MFOMT]]''.
** Many HM fans seem to feel that way with ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonIslandOfHappiness IoH]]'' and it's many "innovations" (the all-stylus controls, the Fullness meter, the weather/crop growing mechanic, the reduced [compared to other games in the series] cooking system, etc.). ''Sunshine Islands'' adjusted some of these mechanics and was better received for it.
** In general, fans don't take well to the system in later games like ''Tale of Two Towns'', ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonANewBeginning A New Beginning]]'', and ''VideoGame/StoryOfSeasons2014'' in which the time passes in exact seconds, catching bugs and the quality rank of the items you pick up.
** The art style has changed quite a lot over the course of the series. Just compare the bachelorettes and bachelors between the early 2000 titles and early 2010 titles. Some fans say the series is just adapting to the newer styles in Japanese anime and games while others think they're intentionally pandering to people who prefer bishonen and bishojo characters. The art style and character designs in newer titles is a source of debate-- with older fans often preferring the cuter, less flashy designs and later fans preferring the newer designs.
* ToyShip: Stu and May (''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonBackToNature BTN and Mineral Town]]''), Hugh and Katie (''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS DS (Cute)]]''), Charlie and Eliza (''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonIslandOfHappiness Island of Happiness]]''), Rahi and Ying (''Tale of Two Towns'')
* ValuesDissonance: As the series has gotten more bishoujo, some of the bachelors and bachelorettes (like Luna or Fritz) have looked a bit ''too'' young. This {{squick}}s out many western fans but cute, OlderThanTheyLook characters are popular in Japanese games.

** Poor Muffy seems heartbreakingly lonely at times, especially in games where the protagonist doesn't marry her and rival marriage isn't an option, like in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAWonderfulLife AWL]]''.
** Mira in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAnimalParade AP]]'' is miserable [[TheMourningAfter without her husband]] and won't even go back to work without encouragement at first. Even after the protagonist befriends her and she cheers up a little, she still remarks on how much she misses or loves him at most festivals. Similarly, Galen from ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAWonderfulLife AWL]]/[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS DS]]'' after [[spoiler:Nina dies.]]
** Grant in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS DS]]'' in particular, where he's obviously struggling to raise his daughter alone after his wife left them and [[{{Jerkass}} Kate]] isn't grateful for it ''at all'', berating him constantly and blaming him for every little thing that goes wrong. Admittedly, she ''is'' somewhat of a JerkassWoobie herself, but the fandom still tends to [[TheScrappy dislike her]] for her treatment of her father nonetheless.

** An IronWoobie example. [[spoiler: If you raise Candace's heart level in ''[[VideoGame/HarvestMoonAnimalParade Animal Parade]]'' while playing as a girl or when you're married as a boy, Candace says that Luna didn't cry when their parents died in order to help Candace and Shelly cope.]]

* FandomSpecificPlot: A game series that has a loose plot of "go to the country, be a farmer" opens itself up to lots of people writing SelfInsertFic about life in a small town--good or bad--and pairing the player character with the bachelor(ette) of choice.

* FandomSpecificPlot: A game series that has a loose plot of "go to the country, be a farmer" opens itself up to lots of people writing SelfinsertFic about life in a small town--good or bad--and pairing the player character with the bachelor(ette) of choice.

** Tell a casual western ''Harvest Moon'' fan that the videogames were created by Victor/Marvelous. You'll be surprised by how many of them say "No, it's made by Natsume". This has caused some troubles after the split between ''Harvest Moon'' and ''Story of Seasons'' occurred.

** Despite popular belief, Marvelous didn't create ''Story of Seasons''. The series was originally owned by Pack-In Video, which merged with Victor Entertainment. Marvelous later brought Victor Entertainment.

* FandomSpecificPlot: A game that has a loose plot of "go to the country, be a farmer" opens itself up to lots of people writing about life in a small town--good or bad--and pairing the player character with the bachelor(ette) of choice in that town.

* GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff: Japan isn't fond of the rival marriage system, which is why several games lack rivals. The English-speaking fandom, however, is overall very fond of the rival system and wish it was in more games. This stems from two different ways of thinking: Japanese players feel bad about "stealing" someone's love interest and leaving them single from that point on, while international players enjoy seeing the other characters pair up and think it adds depth and doesn't leave everyone single except you. Notably the full rival system hasn't been present since ''Tale of Two Towns,'' outside of cut scenes that will play, but won't result in a rival marriage and only activate to a certain level.

** A large part of the fandom has been alienated again by the Switch era. Only one all new game was made, ''Pioneers of Olive Town''; two games, ''Friends of Mineral Town'' and ''A Wonderful Life'', are remakes of older games, while two are cross overs with the ''Manga/{{Doraemon}}'' series. Futhermore, ''Pioneers of Olive Town'' was not well received due to a lot of changes that appeared to be influenced by other farm sim games especially ''VideoGame/StardewValley'' and ''Franchise/AnimalCrossing''. The overreliance on item processing and having characters that, while pleasant, lacked the depth of personality that older games gave to the townsfolk were two of the largest complaints, along with a considerable lack of interactive festivals, including removing any harvest festivals (and thus making the player's farm seem almost disconnected from the town next to it).

* AudienceAlienatingEra: The DS-era is considered a mixed bag amongst fans due to the reliance on gimmicks.