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[Zihark]

RUNE FACTORY 3: OFFICIAL THREAD

Platform: Nintendo DS and its many variations
Genre: Action RPG
Developer: Neverland
Publisher: Natsume
Price: 29.99
Release dates: Japan Oct. 22, 2009
North America November 9, 2010
Europe ???? Two years from now, probably.....
Story: Following in the fine time-honored Rune Factory tradition, the main character, Micah is also an amensiac gifted with a farm.

FAQS:
Isn't this Harvest Moon: No, it spunoff from harvest moon and has gained its own identity. Unfortunately, Natsume refuses to recognize it, hence their title.
If I play this first, well I be confused with the story? No, for the most part each RF game has new characters and story. There are cameos in the form of the appearances of Mei and Yue, the Eastern wanderers from Rune Factory 1 and 2.
The main looks like a girl--- its a girl right? Wrong, he's a boy- a girly boy nonetheless. One who is half human and can turn into a beast.
What a beast, huh? Yes, in the beast form you can engage in hand-to-hand combat.
So whats new? Trophies, multiplayer dungeons playable in singleplayer, 3 ways to receive sidequests- bulletin board, mail, monster village, improved npcs A.I., rune points level up, new skills, new weapons, etc...
Have they fixed the slowdown, lag of the previous ones? Yes.
Can you play as a girl? No, not this time.
So what about the girls? 11 bachelorettes, hitting just about all the requisite RF stereotypes from Eastern traveler to rich girl.
Argghhh, those stupid runnies don't return do they? Yes they return, but not like they are in RFF.

Main Character:

Bachelorettes/ Marriage Candidates:

Previews: http://www.wildgunmen.com/blog/2010/10 /27/the-scoop-on-the-upcoming-rune-factory-3/
http://www.siliconera.com/2010/08/23/natsume-on-rune-factory-3s-localization-and-pre-order-bonus/
http://www.n-sider.com/contentview.php?contentid=4104
http://www.siliconera.com/2010/11/09/rune-factory-3s-producer-talks-improvements-and-changes/
Videos: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSxy0kr2fi4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uyp6wAIOeds
Screenies:

Boxart:

Helpful sites: http://natsume.com/coming_soon/games/rf3/story/index.html
http://www.fogu.com/hmforum/
Reviews: Famitsu 9/8/8/8 33/40. For comparison's sakes RF1 had the same score, RF2 30/40, and RFF 29/40

 

[Man God]

It is HM though, just with slightly easier farming/livestock raising and a neat little gauntlet like game tacked on.

 

[ExtraKr1spy]

Fuck Yeah

After 230+ hours of DQ9 I think I'm ready to play something else on my DSi.

Hope there's actually something to spend money on. RF2 I make shit load of money and never anything to spend it on.

 

[ronito]

God I love Rune Factory. I just wish it was possible to play it and not feel like such a pedo.

 

[Sqorgar]

Why do all the girls look like they are eleven years old? RF2 at least had one female character with secondary sexual characteristics. I like these games, but I'd like them better if I didn't feel like buying them put me on an FBI watch list.

 

[Cow Mengde]

Is it true that you can go on battle dates with your girl? Someone described as taking a girl to the dungeon and having her fight along side of you.

 

[WillyFive]

Sounds great.

 

[RuneFactoryFanboy]

I won't be to this party for a while. I love the series and all but I played Frontier so much that I burnt myself out.

However I offer my moral support and endorse this thread. The girls are very cute this time around and the main girl might just be cuter than Mist. You may want to make the thumbnails of them a bit larger.

Turning into one of the sheep monsters looks cool. I'm interested if they sped up how relationships build from Frontier as that disappointed me.

Will be waiting for some impressions!

 

[Einbroch]

I played the first and really wanted to finish it, but I got busy and then distracted by other games.

May be picking this one up.

 

[ronito]

I won't be to this party for a while. I love the series and all but I played Frontier so much that I burnt myself out.

However I offer my moral support and endorse this thread. The girls are very cute this time around and the main girl might just be cuter than Mist. You may want to make the thumbnails of them a bit larger.

Turning into one of the sheep monsters looks cool. I'm interested if they sped up how relationships build from Frontier as that disappointed me.

Will be waiting for some impressions!

Yeah Frontier was fun, but it was just so freaking huge it took forever to get anywhere. I think I clocked like 120 hours before I just called it done.

I think I put in 30 in the first rune factory and maybe 40-60 in the second.

 

[Lavpa Jasai]

I love this series (and Harvest Moon too!) but between the stupid unicorn girl and the turning into a sheep thing, I'm not really thrilled at where the series seems to be going.

I bought and LOVED frontier until I realized what a chore with the whole Runeys system and got turned off and haven't picked it up since. Which is a REAL shame as I loved the game and it would have been AMAZING w/o those stupid little shits. Was there every a strategy that required limited effort in maintaining those stupid little things while keeping the population stable?

 

[Metal Gear?!]

So this is the first lesbian Rune Factory?

Oh, what's that? That main character is a guy? Oh.

And he can turn into a sheep? Well, that's progressive in a way. Clearly this is the first beastiality Rune Factory then.

 

[I should be doing hw]

Why do all the girls look like they are eleven years old? RF2 at least had one female character with secondary sexual characteristics. I like these games, but I'd like them better if I didn't feel like buying them put me on an FBI watch list.

I agree with this, I could barely start 2 because all the females looked the same. I confused many of them for the same character pretty much. Looking at the selection now it seems much better.
I'm playing through Frontier now on Dolphin and it's pure crack so far and looks beautiful. Hopefully 3 will tide me over until Oceans comes out for PS3.

 

[Zihark]

Is it true that you can go on battle dates with your girl? Someone described as taking a girl to the dungeon and having her fight along side of you.

Yes you can have bachelorettes and other npcs accompany you in battle- they have their own weapons- some really weird- and they can level up alongside Micah. Heh from some import impressions i heard, some of the characters may cause more damage then Micah.

 

[ElectricThunder]

This'll be my first Rune Factory game...and oddly enough likely the last DS game I'll be purchasing unless some really surprising things arrive stateside prior to the 3DS. I suppose it is a bit nifty that I'd close out a platform with a series I have no history with versus otherwise. :lol

Just waiting for the Amazon pre-order to ship.

 

[Salsa]

Im in

 

[Brandon F]

Liked Frontier, but only played about 10 hours before the sluggish pacing really set in and I gave up.

I didn't really follow or understand the 'wisp' system, and comments in the OT for that game made it sound like a really disjointed and obtrusive micro-ey subsystem that no one eventually enjoyed. Any word on how or if that stuff enters into this game?

 

[Brandon F]

This'll be my first Rune Factory game...and oddly enough likely the last DS game I'll be purchasing unless some really surprising things arrive stateside prior to the 3DS. I suppose it is a bit nifty that I'd close out a platform with a series I have no history with versus otherwise. :lol

No Sonic Colors? Seems that is the next big DS 'thing' if the OT has anything to say about it...

 

[zigg]

Thanks for making this!

I'm pretty much insanely hyped for this game. There's a huge emphasis on speed and efficiency going on here from what I can tell. It's been awhile since E3, but I did just get done playing Lufia: Curse of the Sinistrals (also by Neverland); poking a bit at my old RF2 post-game (everyone's either telling me to stay away from monsters or that

Spoiler

they're happy Kyle's back

, heheh) illustrates just how far Neverland's come since then—and RF3 is no slouch either, from what little I'd played. Beyond the much-improved feel and speed of combat, there's a ton of little improvements like being able to stack up to nine of something you're picking up, then putting it all away/shipping it from a good 20 feet away in one move.

You can actually catch a few interesting tidbits from TV Tropes of all places. :lol http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RuneFactory3

- You can buy furniture for your house, and then when you're done with it, chop it with your weapon into wood for your stores.

- You don't brush monsters anymore to tame them, but throw food at them. If don't want to be friends, you can apparently throw poisoned food. :lol

- You can upgrade staves with boss drops to Mega Man their abilities. Costs a lot of RP though.

Anyway, yeah, really looking forward to this one. Would be interested to hear about retail availability; I have a local friend who wants a copy but I'm not sure what that situation is going to be.

I didn't really follow or understand the 'wisp' system, and comments in the OT for that game made it sound like a really disjointed and obtrusive micro-ey subsystem that no one eventually enjoyed. Any word on how or if that stuff enters into this game?

Those were runeys, and yeah, managing them was hell, even if the actual science of it wasn't that bad. It was just that the tools sucked. Runeys are in this game in name, but they work completely differently, I hear—shouldn't be a problem.

 

[Zhengi]

Awesome! This comes out tomorrow? HYPE!!!!

 

[Cow Mengde]

By the way, why is the title 3rd time's a charm? It's the 4th game even if it is called RF3. I'm still slaving away at Frontier and it's a damn good game.

Rune Factory Ocean looks shitty though.

 

[bon]

The main character looks funny as a sheep. I like it better than his human design.

 

[hosannainexcelsis]

I'm definitely down for this. I've only tried the first Rune Factory, which had potential but was too unpolished for my tastes. This looks to be worlds better though.

 

[jj984jj]

I'm hyped! Can't wait to play this.

 

[I should be doing hw]

By the way, why is the title 3rd time's a charm? It's the 4th game even if it is called RF3. I'm still slaving away at Frontier and it's a damn good game.

Rune Factory Ocean looks shitty though.

How so? It looks a bit different granted. I don't think the character designs are any worse than what you can find in RF2 or from what I've seen of 3.

 

[zigg]

How so? It looks a bit different granted. I don't think the character designs are any worse than what you can find in RF2 or from what I've seen of 3.

I'm not a huge fan of the RFO designs myself, and I'm not really entirely sure about the game either... opinion might change as we get closer to an NA release, if any, though. Particularly if RF3 proves to be as great as I think it's gonna.

 

[ccbfan]

Does this game force you to use wifi to get the best things like rune factory 1 and 2?

At least 1 was just the level of the weapons. 2 I couldn't get a bunch of weapons (usually best) and items period.

 

[zigg]

Does this game force you to use wifi to get the best things like rune factory 1 and 2?

At least 1 was just the level of the weapons. 2 I couldn't get a bunch of weapons (usually best) and items period.

I have no idea, but I did do pretty darned well in RF2 without trading to speak of.

 

[Caesar III]

LOL! Forgot about this one. Two are preordered and should be dispatched soon. Can't wait.

 

[zigg]

Curious if anyone got this today. Best Buy doesn't have any record of it in their system, GameStop says no stock for 100 miles around here, Amazon does say in stock and shipping.

 

[Zihark]

Curious if anyone got this today. Best Buy doesn't have any record of it in their system, GameStop says no stock for 100 miles around here, Amazon does say in stock and shipping.

There are people on fogu who got it, they say main character's va is good, he giggles........
My order hasn't shipped from gamestop- ugh so slow.

 

[ScrubJay]

Oh wow, I had no idea this was coming out in NA at all, let alone today. I guess I'll have to keep a lookout for this in the next week at Gamestop or Best Buy because I didn't preorder. I got lucky with the first Rune Factory but a niche game like this might be a little hard to find.

 

[Caesar III]

Play-Asia has it tomorrow according to their webpage. I hope they ship it tomorrow.

 

[zigg]

Oh wow, I had no idea this was coming out in NA at all, let alone today. I guess I'll have to keep a lookout for this in the next week at Gamestop or Best Buy because I didn't preorder. I got lucky with the first Rune Factory but a niche game like this might be a little hard to find.

I picked up the first RF at Best Buy myself, impulse buy actually It might have been an easier sell back then; today Best Buy doesn't even have it in their system.

 

[Hobbun]

Curious if anyone got this today. Best Buy doesn't have any record of it in their system, GameStop says no stock for 100 miles around here, Amazon does say in stock and shipping.

I actually picked up a copy today at my local GS. Did not preorder it but they had received two copies.

 

[matmanx1]

I picked up a copy today as well on a whim. My only other experience with this series is Rune Factory Frontier for the Wii which my wife has tons of hours in while I have only watched her play.

I've gone through the first couple of days now in RF3 and I already like what I am seeing. There are lots of little convenience upgrades over RFF (being able to see where everyone is in town on the top map is a huge help) and the graphics and sounds actually hold up really well in comparison to the Wii version. I also appreciate that the first request (quest) is to go around town and introduce yourself to everyone. The family that says the opposite of what it really means is quite funny!

There are ALL kinds of clickable things to interact with around town and in everyone's houses (read the lazy girl's diary, it's worth a chuckle) and I can already see myself becoming attached to some of these characters. There's alot of charm invested here and I can see myself putting many hours into this one!

 

[Mejilan]

My Amazon copy shipped.
Could have sworn it was coming out next week though...
*shrugs*

 

[Cow Mengde]

How so? It looks a bit different granted. I don't think the character designs are any worse than what you can find in RF2 or from what I've seen of 3.

It's not just the character design. The screen shots themselves just scream generic RPG. It doesn't look like a Rune Factory game.

 

[Clevinger]

It's not just the character design. The screen shots themselves just scream generic RPG. It doesn't look like a Rune Factory game.

Outside of the artwork, all of the DS games look pretty generic.

 

[KJ_Wii]

Woot loved every RF game and this one fixes/improves so many things!

 

[IlliterateBookworm]

I went to pick this up right after school, saw a good 20 or 30 people outside of the store in a line that extended in, asked the guy trying to get the line organized if they were going to let people have a separate line for things besides call of duty or whatever came out, was told it was going to be another 30 to 40 minutes or so, and went home empty handed instead.

Blah.

 

[Stage On]

Darn Natsume can't seem to get games out in Canada at the same time as the states.

Lord if I have to wait an extra month like I did with Lufia I swear I'll scream

Their is no excuse for this crap when other small publishers like Atlus and Xseed manage to release day and date in Canada just fine.

 

[Luigi87]

I very much want this, as it looks to be a fantastic installment of RF, but alas my bank account says otherwise, so I must wait... and wait.. and wait.

 

[Pinko Marx]

None of the marriage candidates are slutty enough for me. Pass.

 

[Atlagev]

None of the marriage candidates are slutty enough for me. Pass.

 

[Night_Trekker]

I can't wait to get this, and I haven't finished any of the other RF games :lol

Shame the direction the series is apparently taking now. I guess that makes 3 all the more special.

 

[JWong]

None of the marriage candidates are slutty enough for me. Pass.

Marry yourself. F'ing sheep form is HAWT!

 

[Hobbun]

I can't wait to get this, and I haven't finished any of the other RF games :lol

Shame the direction the series is apparently taking now. I guess that makes 3 all the more special.

What do you mean?

 

[faridmon]

Will wait for the European relase.
On the positive side, i have graduated by then :lol

 

[I should be doing hw]

What do you mean?

Schizophrenic trannies?

Spoiler

Honestly, I'm for it