Harvest Moon 64 Critic Reviews

On paper it sounds rather banal and routine, but in practice the game is addictive and routine... You're in total control of your destiny, and you become addicted in trying to live the best life possible.

Someone out there obviously thought that creating a simulation of real-life farming was a pretty good idea -- the worrying thing is that they might just be right! It may be all too much like hard work but this game can make growing cabbages seem as addictive as Hagen Das ice-cream!

We had entirely too much fun playing it for hours on end and disregarding all of the ways the game comes up short. An extremely engaging original experience on the N64. Doesn't quite satisfy the RPG-thirst, but you won't be able to put it down once you start playing.

Harvest Moon 64 features no aliens whatsoever. While we’re at it, there are no dancing monkeys for you to "be". Don’t even think about laying waste to some hellish underground network with your super-powered death rays, either. Doesn’t sound like fun? Neither does collecting a hundred and fifty animals but look how well pokemon turned out.

I was never a tamagotchi fan or even an RPG fan but this game actually proves to me why this genre is so involving. You really do dive into the life and mindset of the character. It's fresh, it's different and it's captivating. You'll enjoy it in a strange way. Kind of like how watching the TV show "Cops" is so strangely addictive.

Though admittedly not for everyone, Harvest Moon 64 is a strangely compelling, original little game that makes hours melt away incomprehensibly.

The concept is great and the game's largely fun to play. Harvest Moon 64 does have some technical downsides to it, however, so you may just want to give the Nintendo 64 a rest and fire up your Game Boy -- all in all, that version is generally considered more stable.