Starmaker: The moar I know. I haven't played Harvest Moon (never had a console) and I thought those games were more kid-friendly and relaxing/forgiving.
In the SNES game, after about 2 and a half years of in-game time, your parents return to the farm. I thought I did a pretty good job when I finished it for the first time, but mom was crying, and the character's father was all like "son, I disappoint". I guess a wife, children, a vastly improved farm house, stables filled with various farm animals, and a considerable amount of money earned through farming weren't good enough for them. Must be a Japanese thing. Or maybe they expected the player to turn the place into a casino, or shopping mall, not some hippie community farm.
I later started again, trying to "work" much more efficiently, but I never finished that playthrough. Each in-game day took too long to complete, and it just wasn't much fun that way. So I figure, if you want to have fun with this kind of game ( which is arguably the point ) just play it any way you like. That also goes for most other games -- If you try to get everything perfect on your first playthrough, and look up game guides all the time, you just ruin the experience.
