Natsume is bringing a new Harvest Moon to PS4 and Nintendo Switch

Natsume
Harvest Moon: Light of Hope

Natsume announced that Harvest Moon: Mad Dash, another entry in the popular life simulation genre, is coming to both Nintendo Switch and Playstation 4. We'll get more information on how it plays at E3 on June 11. 

"We are excited to announce a new Harvest Moon game and reveal a first look at its gameplay and features at E3 2019,” said Natsume president and CEO Hiro Maekawa in a press release. “Fans might be surprised at what we have in store for Harvest Moon this year. This different take on the Harvest Moon experience will let players enjoy the classic features of the series in a new and exciting way.”

Natumse said Mad Dash is a spinoff from the regular series of games, we don't have any details on what that means though. Entries usually focus on the player running a farm, building relationships, and starting a family. 

Harvest Moon has been a different series since 2014, when Natsume stopped localizing Bokujo Monogatari as Harvest Moon in the West. The original developer, Marvelous, started using one of their subsidiaries to localize their games and Natsume continued using the Harvest Moon brand with their own titles. The Harvest Moon we knew became Story of Seasons in western territories. 

A completely new group of developers works on games like Harvest Moon: Mad Dash, but they haven't received the greatest reception in recent years. 

No one knows if we'll get a game as magical as Harvest Moon 64 again, but developers are certainly trying to strike gold again. A new Story of Seasons game is currently in development and Yasuhiro Wada, the creator of the original Harvest Moon, released Little Dragons Cafe last year. Here's hoping the series gets back to its successful roots soon.

Looking for something new to play on your Nintendo Switch? Check out our list of the 25 best Nintendo Switch games you can buy right now.

Contributor

Aron Garst is a journalist and writer exploring the future of games and interactivity. Follow him on X at @GarstProduction.

Latest in Simulation
Guitar Hero
Guitar Hero expert finally annihilates world record 200% speedrun of the game's hardest song after trying and failing 50,000 times
Stardew Valley Baldur's Gate 3 mod Baldur's Village
Baldur's Gate 3 director Swen Vincke gives his official approval to the Stardew Valley mod that brings the D&D RPG to Pelican Town
Boro and Alta sit on a bench together in Wanderstop
Wanderstop review: "Exalting the transformative power of tea"
InZOI screenshot
The Sims rival InZoi has 300 people hanging out in each of its in-game cities and they all "interact with each other in real-time"
InZOI screenshot from creation studio demo which depicts a shockingly realistic character model rendered in Unreal Engine 5
The director behind The Sims competitor InZOI spent 20 years making MMOs, but he ditched the massive RPGs after playing life sims with his son
Demon Slayer season 4 episode 2
True to the anime, Stardew Valley's hottest mod adds two romanceable Demon Slayer dudes who are both "rude and standoffish" at first
Latest in News
Jordan A. Mun looks at herself in a mirror in just a vest in Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet screenshot
5 years after starting development, Neil Druckmann says Naughty Dog's new game Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet is "still evolving and changing as we're making it"
Silent Hill f
After 2 years of silence, the next mainline Silent Hill game is getting a dedicated stream this week with "the latest news"
Original Xbox console
Former Microsoft exec says the first Xbox was killed early in favor of 360 because it was "losing money left right and center," but luckily "we could afford to hemorrhage cash"
A Monster Hunter Wilds character holding binoculars.
Despite Monster Hunter Wilds suffering monstrous performance problems on PC, it still outsold the PS5 and Xbox Series X versions in the US
Jordan A. Mun looks at herself in a mirror in just a vest in Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet screenshot
The Last of Us creator Neil Druckmann says Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet will also be about "being lonely," as if his zombie apocalypse wasn’t isolating enough: "I really want you to be lost"
A screenshot of Jordan drinking a soda during the reveal trailer for Intergalactic: The Hertic Prophet.
Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet is "a game about faith and religion," which Neil Druckmann jokes will surely get less hate than The Last of Us 2