Early Retailer Thoughts On Harvest Moon: The Land of Origin

We won’t see the weekly software sales chart for Japan until Wednesday, but seeing as how last week marked the release of Harvest Moon: The Land of Origin, we decided to sniff around on the blogs of a few Japanese retailers to see what we could gather before the actual numbers came in. Note that most of the retailer posts we read were penned on February 23rd, which is the day of the game’s release, so they only account for its first day.

“Did Harvest Moon always sell this much on the first day?” one retailer wondered on his blog, adding that the game had seen solid first-day sales at the store he works at. “A rare occasion, more than half the customers were female, so it seems like the sales at this store will reach great numbers.”

This retailer also pointed out that a new shipment of The Land of Origin won’t be sent out by Marvelous AQL until sometime during the first ten days of March, so if the game sells out, there will be a two-week wait before new stock arrives.

First-day sales weren’t quite as strong at another retailer. “Harvest Moon sells well as usual, even after moving to the 3DS,” he says. “Although, it’s a slow start as usual. (lol)” This isn’t a rare occurrence, as the Harvest Moon games do usually tend to sell well over time, rather than all at once.

A third retailer says that The Land of Origin’s special edition with the alpaca strap sold out at his store. “Perhaps it’s because the commercials were very effective, but after we sold out, many more people asked for it right up until store closing time,” he shares. He adds that he wanted to buy one himself, but unfortunately, they were all sold out.

Finally, a fourth retail store worker stated that sales were in line with what he expected, adding after that: “Pre-orders included, ultimately the game with the best customer reaction was Harvest Moon.” Note that this one retailer’s experience shouldn’t be taken as an indicator of everyone else’s.

Harvest Moon: The Land of Origin marks the first time the series lets players customize their character and ranch. We’re curious to see whether this has any impact on the game’s long-term sales.

Food for thought:

1. Retail blog, Sinobi, reported a few weeks ago that, while pre-orders for Harvest Moon: The Land of Origin were going well, Rune Factory 4 beat it by a wide margin. It should be very interesting to compare sales of the two titles later this year.

2. What is it with popular 3DS games taking so long to restock? New stock of Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy was unavailable for more than a week after that game sold out, too.