The pre-E3 announcements just keep on coming. Natsume, the longtime development studio behind the Harvest Moon series, announced the next game in the series via Twitter, Harvest Moon: Skytree Village. Few details are available currently, but the game will be coming to the 3DS and playable during this year’s E3.
It will be interesting to see how Harvest Moon: Skytree Village is received in the wake of Stardew Valley, the massively popular indie farming/life sim released on PC earlier this year. Before this year the farming sim seemed to be a very niche genre, but Stardew Valley was able to capture a certain zeitgeist on the internet and developed a huge fandom in a short amount of time.
Ashley Burnett described how Stardew Valley updated many of the elements of Harvest Moon by including both new gameplay systems like crafting and being more inclusive by allowing the player to marry anyone, regardless of their gender. Harvest Moon: Skytree Village may be able to capitalize on the popularity of Stardew Valley, and hopefully it can build upon Stardew Valley’s innovations on the genre.