One good game deserves another, and one good port of a good game deserves a revisiting.
While I am not a fan of Harvest Moon : Another Wonderful Life for revisiting the previous game with only cosmetic changes to the game the same can’t be said about my feelings towards More Friends of Mineral Town. Why? Because while I was not enchanted with the previous A Wonderful Life game, I WAS enchanted with Friends of Mineral Town (mostly because it’s a port of the PSOne Harvest Moon game “Back to Nature” which IS one of my favorite Harvest Moon games)!
To me there is really only two Harvest Moon games out right now that I really really liked.
Harvest Moon 64 for the N64 (which I hope they port (with changes and additions) to the Nintendo DS one day) and Harvest Moon : Back to Nature for the PSOne (which I also hope gets a fresh redress and a porting over to the PSP one of these days).
Yeah. A(nother) Wonderful Life is good for the GameCube, but it wasn’t my favorite.
So sit back as we return to Mineral Town in Harvest Moon : More Friends of Mineral Town.
And it helps the game a little that the beginning is brand spankin’ new (which should have actually carried over abit more into the gameplay but at least there are a few new things).

You are a girl who is tired of the constant rat race. Day in and day out you drag yourself to your 9 to 5 (or so) job and slave away endlessly. You’re sick, you’re tired, and like a certain sailor with a spinach addiction you’ve had all that you can stand, and can stand no more. Something must be done to escape this endless enslavement to the rat race, but what? Well one day as you sit in your apartment dreading the next day of work you run into an ad in the newspaper extolling the wonders of the “simple” life of farming, which sets you off on your quest to live that very “the simple life” as a farmer… (Paris Hilton not included).
Of course, wouldn’t you know it, like in all Harvest Moon games you arrive at the farm only to find that it has seen better days. The ad, it seems, was a bit on the deceptive side and

the Mayor of Mineral Town can’t wait to let you know what he thinks of you as he laughs in your face. So you proceed to beat the (bleep) out of him with your hammer.
Yeah. Pity the game didn’t have more of these moments since no previous Harvest Moon lead has used their hammer in anger before now… let alone used it to harm others (like in this game) and I liked it (for however short the violence lasted that is).

Anyway from this point forward it’s the same as the previous version with only cosmetic changes here and there (since you are now a female lead instead of a male everyone will react differently to you for the most part, though a few staged dialogue sequences are still the same regardless of gender).
Well, that is all this thin coat of new gameplay has to offer I’m afraid. New dialogue, new people to date (the five guys who tried to steal the women away in the previous game… sorry, no gender expanding alternative lifestyle explorations here either… damn), former lovers who are now new rivals to plot against your plans of happiness (and since we’re not exploring alternate relationships here there’ll be no chance to ditch the guys and woo the girls once again). That and a few new tricks here and there complete the package. It’s new, but it’s very thin new… mostly if you remember the last game you’ll do the same thing here with only changes here and there (which you’ll uncover as you play).

Yeah, maybe 80% of this game is the same old same old, which is something I complained about in Harvest Moon : Another Wonderful Life, only this time I guess I’m a little more forgiving of that since this is still a port of one of the two Harvest Moons I raved about (Back to Nature), which isn’t the case with Another Wonderful Life. So yeah, it’s mostly the same old same old but it’s from a port I liked so I am abit more forgiving about this than Another Wonderful Life.
Too bad you need that game to get the most out of this game so there‘s no escaping it.

Yeah, it seems that once again, like in A Wonderful Life slash Friends of Mineral Town, you’ll use your GBA/GameCube link to link

this to Another Wonderful life where you’ll “trade” information.
As in trade I mean you’ll unlock characters from Another Wonderful Life who’ll visit your town and widen your horizons which is a plus for this game. Yeah, it’s simple, and the player of More Friends of Mineral Town makes out like a bandit since there’s more offerings in this game than what Another Wonderful Life gets back from this link. Of course you’ll have to play both in order to make it work though so… oh, well.

One point about this game which is a welcome change is the fact that the game goes on even when you are married. Originally, and I think I mentioned this before when I talked about this in the past, well originally there was an original female led version of this game in Japan (where the character looked like the male character in a wig… uh… never mind) and that game ended the minute your character got married (which is the same way Harvest Moon 3 on the GameBoy Color ends when you play the female character).
In this version the game goes on, even after marriage, which is noted in a letter you receive during gameplay… of course it also helps that you aren’t being pressured to get married in this game also since UNLIKE Another Wonderful Life it’s no cakewalk to get married here! I mean come on! I know about playing hard to get but how hard to get do the guys have to be in this game! Urgh!

Otherwise that’s that, there isn’t much to talk about here. The game is just like “Back to Nature” (PSOne) with a few less cut scenes and no Tomato Festival, and maybe one new replacement show once the TV Shopping Network show goes off the air, I think that’s new.
Still, is it so bad that it’s mostly the same game if the game in question is a good game?
Ok, breakdown time.

Harvest Moon Breakdown the 2nd (GBA Version)
What’s Hot?
Yes! It is still the same game as before, but since it’s still a port of a very good Harvest Moon game (the PSOne’s “Back to Nature”) it’s still a good game.
I don’t know, but I liked the PSOne version, I liked “Friends of Mineral Town”, and I like this one.
If I had to think of a handful

of GBA games I’d take with me on a trip with me this would be one of them.
Nothing like a game that plays good even after it’s second porting.

What’s Not?
Ugh. I didn’t know how much I hated the male characters until I had to try and -- ugh -- “court” them. Bleah. Talk about a lacking motivational factor here, folks! One of these days Natsume will break gender roles and allow a more alternative lifestyle choice for us who chose the female character, and then want her to hook up with a female character. At least that wouldn’t be as much of a pain in the rear as attempting to hook up with these males who make it near impossible to get married! Damn!
I mean come on! It takes FOREVER and EVER to get their hearts up, and then it’s an ungodly pain in the rear to get them to take the damn blue feather for marriage! Come on! I’m already lacking motivation at the start, don’t dim whatever little motivation I have by making the courtship thing a pain in the butt!

Moments to Remember?
Same as before there’s lots to remember, and that’s a good thing.
Still, I wish they brought back the Tomato Festival from the PSOne version, which is still not present even in this port of the game.

What to Ignore?
Hmm… not much, except the damn hard to hitch males. You didn’t have this much trouble courting the ladies in the original Friends of Mineral Town, so what gives!

Overall?
I still like the game. It’s still great. Yes, I know, once again it’s still the same game as before but since it’s still a port of a great game (the PSOne version) so I don’t see any problems here.
Now all we need is for Sony to get back on the ball and port a good Harvest Moon game onto the PSP.
Something as good as the PSOne… oh, heck, let’s see ONE MORE port of “Back to Nature” since they cut out some cutscenes, festivals (tomato battle festival) and so forth out of the GBA game, so I’d like to see a purer (and more intact) port of “Back to Nature” on the PSP please. After all I don’t think you can get enough of this solidify done Harvest Moon game, so one more time please.