Rune Factory 2: A Fantasy Harvest Moon - Nintendo DS

Typically, where novels or films are concerned, a sequel seldom attains the quality of the original. Where games produced by Natsume are concerned, the reverse often is true. This certainly is the case with respect to Rune Factory 2, one of the greatest games of all time, in my view.Rune Factory 2 spans two Generations. In the first, your character is male but in the second Generation, you play as your first character's child, giving you the option to play either as a girl or as a boy.The plot in the 1st Generation is devoted mainly to basic survival and a wealth of courtship opportunities. In fact, the main purpose of your character in the 1st Generation is to choose a wife and have a child. Most Events occur in the course of performing 'Requests' for characters. These are 'Quests' of various kinds that appear on the community bulletin board and offer romance, humour, danger as well as chances to discover more about the other characters in Alvarna.Although you can defeat or tame Monsters in the 1st Generation, it is only in the 2nd Generation that the real 'action plot' unfolds and every area on the map is unlocked. Cooking, forging weapons and accessories and creating other items becomes possible only in the 2nd Generation when your child attends the School built by the father.Do not underestimate the enjoyment of the 1st Generation of the game by mistakenly perceiving it as nothing more than a conduit through which the 2nd Generation game becomes available. The 1st Generation game resembles a traditional Harvest Moon game in many ways, offering opportunities to farm, ranch, fish, mine and court an eligible girl. If there were no 2nd Generation component, Rune Factory 2 in the 1st Generation would be a wonderful game. The fact that it offers two games in one makes it utterly incredible.Characterisations in Rune Factory 2 are even more detailed than those in the original game and the combination of humour, romance and adventure is irresistable.The graphics and music in both Rune Factory and its successor are breathtakingly exquisite. Added touches in the form of showers of cherry blossoms in Spring, the twinkle of fireflies in Summer and colourful falling leaves in Autumn make the landscape truly magical. A player could be content to live in this world for many years!Finally, Rune Factory 2, like its predecessor, stands as an eloquent testament to the fundamental philosophy of Harvest Moon. The message of these games is to learn to appreciate all forms of life, to work with society and the land in creating a partnership that is beneficial to all. Selfishness and greed result in missed opportunities. It is only when your character interacts with every individual in a positive fashion, exercising patience, understanding and compassion, that you will gain the ultimate rewards and in doing so, create a better world for every one.

First off I must say I bought the first Rune Factory and I loved that game. The only issues I had with that was that it was too short but seriously it took me a good 40 hours to still beat it and it didn't even force me to actual marry someone (I just like beating games and not really doing side quests). Which was all well and good for me, because it was very satisfying game.This game is a lot more fun (still playing in fact). First you start of as a boy that needs to marry someone to get to the "real" game. At first I was in a hurry to marry someone so I can have a kid and be that kid. Let me tell you guys, being the first generation is okay, all you experience don't go away it gets transferred to your child. So my communication level was pretty high before I switched over to the point where my animals were hearting me at one a day and that still happened when I transferred to my kid which was a big help! Also if I knew this before - your plants that are in dungeons don't go away, this would have been super helpful to me because the dungeons get a million times harder as the second gen and so having those mana there from crops would have helped a ton!I guess my point is - do not rush through the first gen like me. I'm sort of an impatient person and at first I just wanted to marry one girl so I can move on to what I thought was the "real" game and didn't take full advantage of all the things I could do as the first gen which is the only thing I regret. Though I still had a lot of fun as the sec gen, the dungeons are way harder than the first one.Another interesting thing is things are super more expensive than the first one so it does cause you to "save your pennies" and really think about what you want to buy and if you really need it right now which I thought was a wonderful add on, you're just not all willy nilly with buying things like a lot of other games are. I think this is a wonderful idea to enforce good spending habits on the younger gamers that play this.This game is super fun. For anyone that likes Harvest Moon with a little bit of an RPG spin. As a warning it gets pretty addicting, sometimes I think I'll only play for an hour and 3 hours have gone by, usually I'm pretty good at keeping my gaming time.

Amazing title in the series. I highly recommend coming back to 2 and 3, even if you started with RF4. 2 is the only entry in the series with two generations. The first gen, you play as Kyle who is seeking for a purpose in life by traveling. After marrying someone in the game, it will eventually go to the second generation, where you play as the kid of Kyle and his wife. Kyle leaves for story reasons, so you are left alone with your mom. You go through school life, and choosing one of the girls to date. There is no marriage for second generation.The gameplay is a little slower, in all regards--both farming and combat, compared to Tides of Destiny, Frontier, and 4. Original convos don't always happen daily in this. Sometimes it's repeated things from the previous days. I believe new things they say is either based on events, festivals, and affinity---or it's just random. Despite these few negatives, the game still holds up to this day. The music is amazing and the world is very detailed. There are only 4 dungeons in the part im on, but more might be available later, as the map is fairly big. They are more enjoyable to explore and see, compared to RF4.

I'm a really huge fan of the Rune Factory series! In fact Rune Factory 4 was the first DS game I ever bought and played. So what's good about Rune Factory 2? The second generation for one. This is one of the only Rune Factory games that really makes the "having a child" thing a meaningful part of the story. Other Rune Factory games like 4 have added areas that only "families" can enter and you can take your child out fighting monsters to give purpose to having a child but it's small and not a story aspect. In 2 you need to have a child because it's integral for the story to progress. Yes that is kind of annoying in some regards if you just wanted to take your time and progress slowly but I really enjoyed it. Finally a reason for having a child in these games! The story is layered and wonderful I also really enjoy that. The characters also feel very 3 dimensional, I never get too bored with them. Now there are some things that are not so great with this game. In the first generation where you play as Kyle you cannot level up past 10. In the first generation all the area dungeons have very similar (low) level recommendations to enter which isn't a bad thing, that just means you can go into them all regardless. This is only s***y because once you get into second gen the level requirements for these dungeons change drastically. Now you can't go into Messinah Valley and fight monsters because it's danger level is no longer 2 stars, it's 4 meaning the level you have to be fight these monsters without dying is higher but it wasn't like that in first gen which you're probably used to by now because first generation takes such a long time to finish! As well in second generation when you die you don't go to the clinic you die, game over, you have to start from your last save point. Compare this to first generation where you wouldn't, you would just wake up in the clinic! This is extremely frustrating if you went into an area like Messinah Valley (that you didn't realize had it's difficulty ramped up for second gen) and you die. Like oh s***, when was the last time you actually saved?! The story doesn't really pick up until second generation either. All first generation is, is marrying someone, farming and chopping stumps to meet all of the money and wood requirements to build a school and have a child so second generation can begin. You will also have to grind a lot in second gen if you choose not to do Tanya's monster fighting quests. Because of this I highly recommend doing her quests because a) you can get really awesome items, my favourite sword came from her as a reward and b) it makes the grinding less painful because it's disguised as fun little quests with rewards. The crafting system isn't utilized until second gen because it's in the school and I didn't find myself using it like in Rune Factory 4 where I was always crafting something. Befriending monsters for anything other than resources was pretty pointless because it was so hard to get them to level up for fighting. And is it just me or was the fences as a blockade for areas that you aren't allowed to go yet in first generation silly? The excuse that because Kyle's child is tiny they can squeeze through is kind of silly. Don't tell me you couldn't jump that fence Kyle. It's wonderful to be in second gen and to see characters from first generation and the people they married and children they had! It's also nice to have a marriage rival, though they weren't too big a obstacle. Overall I love the series and the story so I can forgive these annoyances. With any other game I might not be able to forgive them. If you're new to Rune Factory I wouldn't recommend that you start with this game, try 3 or 4 first. They don't have to be played in order because they don't have an over arching connecting story. If you're a Rune Factory fan I definitely recommend playing this game if only for the unique use of a second generation and the fun characters and good plot.

My favourite Rune Factory game. I've been looking for it for a long time and I was delighted to find it here. When I recieved the game I was worried as it had and "E" rating (the US rating system) and on the back it even said "For sale, rental and use only in USA, CANADA, MEXICO and LATIN AMERICA". After some research I tried it out and it does work fine on my PAL 3DS XL. (Bought from seller VGP_VideoGamesPlus.-Emma.

Ich spiele immer wieder gerne Harvest Moon und nwollte diesmal gerne etwas anderes ausprobieren.Rune factory ist in einer etwas anderen Umgebung angesiedelt und man muss zusätzlich noch gegen Monster kämpfen.Es gibt verschiedene Dungeons und denen man ab und an für die Dorfbewohner Quests erfüllen muss.Finde das Spiel wirklich gut gemacht und das man später als sein eigen Kind weiterspielt ist auch eine tolle Neuerung.Für jeden Harvest Moon Fan ein toller Titel.

Rune Factory 2 was the very 1st Rune Factory game I've ever played so I'm really glad I found a copy. The controls might be a bit clonky but I love that game a lot, the story and the 2 generations concept are great. And my order arrived early, so it's great! I'm looking forward to playing this game again and finally finishing it 🙂

great game, fun casual concept, just right for killing time in the evenings ( or mornings, or afternoons...!)