XSEED Games have revealed that gay marriages were only added North American and European versions of Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town.
We originally reported how when the game released in Japan, it was revealed that the game had gay marriages. Relying on a third party, Google Translate, and based on new information, that may not have been the case.
XSEED Games have posted the first of their “Localization Blog” posts for the upcoming Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town. Along with discussing the game, they discussed how they approached the localization.
“While we were concerned about messing with fans’ nostalgia for the world and characters of Mineral Town,” the blog post states, “we realized that we needed to approach the translation as a completely new project, without referencing the original English localization at all.”
Some names were changed to be more accurate to the original Japanese. In addition, compared to the original English translation on Game Boy Advance in 2003, the way characters speak now “will no doubt be different and more contemporary in subtle ways.”
The blog then discusses the same sex marriages. It reveals that the Japanese version only allowed players to be “best friends” with the same sex, even though the ceremony involves a church and wedding clothes.
However in the North American and European versions (with the support of the game’s producer), this will be marriage even when both characters are the same sex. Players will also be able to know their romantic affinity for same sex relationships, even before dating.
“One major change between both the original version and the remake, as well as between our version and the Japanese version, concerns what has been called the ‘Best Friends’ system in the Japanese release, where the player character can form a lifelong partnership with a character of the same sex. In our version, this will just be called ‘marriage,’ and the relationship between same-sex couples will be given identical treatment to opposite-sex couples. This has been a very long time coming in the STORY OF SEASONS series, and the producer has been supportive of our decision from very early in development. One minor but important change for the North American and European releases of Friends of Mineral Town is that the ‘heart icon’ indicating a marriage candidate’s romantic affinity for the player will display for all marriage candidates from the start of the game, where in the Japanese release it will only display for same-sex candidates after you confess and start dating.”
Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town is available on Nintendo Switch in Japan, and Summer 2020 in North America.
