A Satellaview research blog.

Merry Christmas! Your present is some Harvest Mooning!

For Christmas, my extra-generous gift shall be a ROM release that people might actually have fun with. 🙂

I’ve upped some Gameplay of it on Youtube! Wanna see?

It’s Harvest Moon!
Well, to be more specific, the ROM Header identifies it as 牧場物語 第2話 (Bokujo Monogatari Dai-2-wa) .

My immediate searching on that lead to the listing of it’s premiere date in Kameb’s site;

1996/09/09

1996/09/13
BS牧場物語
第2話 大地と心に溢れる実り!

So this is supposedly a Soundlink series based off the cult hit. So, what’s peculiar about it? Well, if you see the video you’ll spot a few of the things – You start with a slightly pre-formed set of farmland, and you can’t leave it. You’re in the summer season, with some pre-plowed land, a gold hammer, a gold axe, a watering can and a seemingly infinite supply of tomato and corn seeds…
… and pretty much all you can do is grow tomatos and corn, and destroy things around you. There is no livestock, no point to getting money, no plowing, no women-wooing…
… no timer? No game-locking up after an hour? Where’s some of the quirky ROM behaviors commonly associated with Soundlink ROMs? Sure, there’s no sound at all, still, but… huh…

The game even runs on my Super UFO ROM copier, and I’m betting a SNES Powerpak can run it fine as well henceforth.

That all being said, considering some the strange things that occurs if you keep playing long enough, I do -not- think the game is playing the way it’s meant to. But for the moment, let me start by posting some of the more normal pictures.


Yes, it does rain sometimes.


Of course, the corn grows A-OK..


As do tomatos. You can even sell them, although the money is seemingly pointless.

Now, here’s where things start to kinda fall apart… I tried playing all the way through the “Summer’s” end, and got into the fall seasons…


Well… what do I do now?
My endless seeds do not grow, and I quite literally can’t do anything more, except… keep skipping days!


Here’s your humbugging Christmas picture, guys! Yes, I went into winter, and it’s even mooreeee pointless.


Eventually you can skip into spring, and even go back into summer, and seemingly start the process over again. Does it loop endlessly? I don’t know, I didn’t play that far, because I already knew when I couldn’t do anything in the fall that I was going way beyond the point I was supposed to be playing.

I suspect a large chunk of data may be absent from this ROM dump – Perhaps data that controller most of the Satellaview-specific handling, like a timer, new sound code, or automation of gameplay. Unfortunately I can’t verify much of that, as besides Kameb’s site, I can’t find much information on this entry in the series. Also, it’s rather weird that the removal of such data keeps the game as playable as it is…

So, ROM downloading time! This one will boot in nearly anything, even real hardware, with seemingly identical results.

BS Bokujo Monogatari Dai-2-wa
BS牧場物語 第2話
ROM DOWNLOAD


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