Asside from this games bizarre backstoryThe original Harvest Moon games had a unique title to Japan. Natsume, deciding they wanted to make their own farming game, and already own the trademark stateside, made a new game under the Title Harvest Moon. Marvelous, no longer able to release a game under the name Harvest Moon due to Natsume owning the Trademark on the name, is releasing it stateside as Story of Seasons. So Harvest Moon is not actually an entry in the franchise that we have come to know, but Story of Seasons is. , This game is pretty great thus far. Only a short ways in. The Map you do your farming and what not is freaking huge. And customizable! You can 'dig' which adds soil, and actually lowers the ground. You can use that soil to place in other places to elevate it. (You can also buy soil.)
At first it is only you there, and a sprite of some kind. You agree to cultivate the land to revive the goddess. A trader shows up, and it seems depending on what you do, more people start to show up. (After you grow the set of flowers you get, a person shows up who can sell you more flower seeds comes in.)
Not very far, as I said, but I am SO looking forward to writing up a blog about this when I"m done. It may not be the original guys behind Harvest Moon, but Natsume did a good job with the formula. Let's see if they keep this up!