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otome-loli · 5 years

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The SOS:FOMT remake and why the designs make SENSE part two

So like I said in my first post, I’m back again with part two.

Like I’ve already mentioned, I am analyzing and explaining why the redesigns make sense for the Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town remake and how overall, their new designs better suit their roles and personalities in FOMT in comparison to HM64.

For this post, I’ll be looking at Mary, Eli, Trent/Doctor and Gray.

In HM 64 Mary:

Is known as Maria

Is the daughter of the Mayor and the Mayor’s Wife/Anna

Your rival for Mary is Harris

From HM 64 to FOMT Mary didn’t change a lot minus her parents changing and the name change. In FOMT, she still serves as the local librarian and is working on her own novel in FOMT. Personality and role wise, she didn’t change as much as the others.

In HM:FOMT Mary:

Is known as Mary

Is the daughter of Basil and Anna

Your rival for Mary is Gray

Between HM64 and HM:FOMT, Mary really doesn’t change a lot. She’s one of the characters who undergo the least amount of changes. She remains the daughter of Anna but her father changes, however, she still remains the local librarian and remains a shy and introverted person.

In fact, her new design remains relatively the same as her old one, except just more updated to be a more modern outfit. Just about everything about her has stayed the same which makes sense as someone who has undergone the least amount of changes in terms of personality and role in the games. She even retains the same color themes as her previous designs. The only thing is that she doesn’t look a lot like a mix of both of her parents similar to how Karen does and her primary resemblance with her mother is her dark hair and the fact that her clothing incorporates stripes and how her bangs frame her face, similar to Anna’s

But doesn’t look a lot like Basil.

In HM64 Elli:

Works in the local bakery

Still takes care of her grandmother Ellen, but has no younger brother

Your rival for her is Jeff.

Similar to Mary, Elli didn’t really undergo many changes in terms of personality when it came to going from HM64 to HM:FOMT. In FOMT, the biggest change for Eli is her job and family as she has a younger brother now and it’s implied that her parents, or at least her mother, have died. Personality-wise, she remains roughly the same.

In HM:FOMT Elli:

Works at the clinic.

Now has a younger brother, Stu

Your rival for her is Doctor/Trent.

Once again, like Mary, Elli didn’t undergo a lot of changes. You can see here her outfit stayed the same and her personality did as well, except now she just works in the clinic alongside the doctor. Her grandmother remains Ellen but now she just has a mischievous younger brother Stu.

Her new design pays a lot of homage to her original one with the apron and long dress underneath it, it even keeps with her original color scheme. Similar to Karen and Popuri, her outfit retains small and simple patterns and designs, making her fit in with the thematic approach for girls in Mineral Town and giving her outfit some more, but simple, design elements. They even made her bow look like little angel wings. Which she is.

In HM:64 Doctor:

Actually doesn’t appear in HM:64

The closest to him as himself is Back To Nature

Is a bit of an outlier and his closest equivalent is Degas in 64.

Sooo... Degas is the closest equivalent we have of Doctor in HM64, however, Doctor doesn’t actually appear as himself as we know him until HM:BTN. If we were to use Degas as his equivalent, we could clearly see how much Doctor changes from HM64 to FOMT. In HM64, Degas is the grandfather of Stu and Kent and runs the potion shop is the closest to a clinic that you have.

In HM:FOMT Doctor:

Appears as himself as he was in BTN

Still an outlier, being a relatively “new” character by this point in the franchise.

Has completely changed if we use Degas as his “original” counterpart

This is (one of) the first time that he actually appears as himself as he initially appears in BTN, Harvest Moon Boy and Girl, etc. which are effectively ports or remakes of the original 64 game, or at least BTN is which set the standard for their new personalities from HM:64 to FOMT. In my initial post, I explained the reasons that I wasn’t using their BTN counterparts was because from BTN to FOMT nothing had really changed as it was BTN that changed their personalities and roles from the original HM64. So it would be a bit of a redundant point to use BTN and FOMT as opposed to 64 (which would be the original “original) and FOMT where their roles and personalities were changed.

As a result, he is a bit of an outlier. In fact, from 64 if I were to use Degas, he is a completely different character with Degas being pretty much scrapped come to FOMT as opposed to someone who had the same appearance as the original but different roles and personalities. However, there isn’t much to reference “back” for him in terms of personality.

But getting on with the point, his new design in Story of Seasons makes him look like a more modern doctor. He still retains his lab coat, except now it isn’t and closed and his outfit isn’t all white either. His look maintains the serious yet still calm and kind outlook he has towards being a doctor. However, they still couldn’t give him an actual name as “Trent” so, in SOS, he’ll still be known as Doctor.

In HM64 Gray:

Is the son of Doug, Ann’s brother and cousin of Rick.

Works on a horse ranch and used to be the jockey for Cliffgard.

Socially awkward and quiet but otherwise nice.

In HM64, Gray has familial ties with Doug, Ann, and Rick. He’s described as a quiet and socially awkward guy who is cold but otherwise actually pretty nice. He was already quiet before the horse-riding accident and it just left him even quieter. It’s pretty clear he works with horses quite a bit considering that his hat says “Uma” which is Japanese for “Horse” and wears something akin to a tracksuit, although, it’s more so suit for farmwork similar to the MC rather than riding horses.

In HM:FOMT Gray:

Is the grandson of Saibara and has no familial ties to Doug, Ann, or Rick.

Moves to Mineral Town from the city.

Is rude as a result of his frustrations with Saibara rather than being socially awkward and quiet.

You can see that despite no longer working with horses or on a farm, he still retains his original design. Given that his jumpsuit looks to be made of a thick, insulating material from how the wrinkles are drawn, it would be too hot to actually use for blacksmithing work and making tools or accessories.

Of those introduced for this batch, he has actually undergone the most changes going from HM:64 to FOMT. In his new design, he ditches the jumpsuit for what appears to be a denim jacket and work pants, shoes, and gloves, something that’s more appropriate for working in as a blacksmith while also still retaining the fact that he’s someone who isn’t actually from Mineral Town. It looks like he’s wearing a type of reinforced shoe as well.

While he loses his hat, his color scheme pays homage to it by giving him a red, white, and blue color scheme, similar to what his hat was and on the shirt, it looks like it says “Uma”. So in a way, his hat will live on. Given that he doesn’t have any ties to Ann, Doug, or Rick, it makes sense to further distinguish them from each other.

A few people have criticized or pointed out that his outfit is too stylish, however, it fits within the same style range as someone from the city (as the city naturally offers more “stylish” options when you go cloth shopping even if you don’t care for it personally) while also still being similar to Rick’s in that they both do labor-intensive jobs and opt for wearing denim and work clothes. Denim is a common material used for work clothes and actually has a history being used for work clothes due to the fact that it is structurally stronger than other material and doesn’t have insulating properties.

When you compare his outfit to actually stylish characters such as Kamil/Cam, Gray’s clothes are actually less stylish and are just more plain similar to Rick’s or even Doctor’s. From what we’ve seen so far, stylish characters such as Sasha, Anna, Jeff, etc. lean towards having simple patterns and designs on their clothes such as stripes or zigzags.

As I’ve already mentioned in my previous post, it’s important to remember that this is a remake, not a remaster or port of the game and is, as such, treating the characters as if they are new people rather than just keeping the same nostalgic designs that we’re used to. Given that their personalities and roles in the story of Mineral Town have changed from their Flowerbud counterparts, I think that it’s the right direction to go in.

Part One - Karen, Popuri, Rick, Cliff

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