anotherwonderfullife2

[anotherwonderfullife2]

I was surprised to see Cecilia's cutscene where she discusses Vesta's desire to arrange a marriage for her. Not only is that an extremely outdated mindset to see at all in a 2023 game with a global fanbase, but it's also hypocritical as fuck. Vesta is literally a middle-aged unmarried woman herself, running a farm. Why can't Cecilia just live with her indefinitely as live-in help? Maybe make her her own lil cabin. It was sad to see that Cecilia considers herself dependent on Vesta, when.... she dedicates her life to working on Vesta's farm. 🤦‍♀️

[anotherwonderfullife2]

Revisiting AnWL’s Original Bachelors

Before I state my own opinion on the bachelors, I’d like to address this:

So with everything else in AWL, the game’s original three bachelors (Rock, Gustafa, and Matthew) have received a facelift and slightly updated dialogue/cutscenes. I’ve seen a lot of back and forth online on whether people liked the big changes made to Matthew and Gustafa’s appearance (Rock’s appearance changed very little from 2004 to now) and I, for one, welcome our new(old?) bishie overlords. To really put this topic in perspective, I think we gotta keep in mind that when Another Wonderful Life came out, it was more-or-less 98% the same as A Wonderful Life, just with a re-skinned female PC and male marriage candidates. I have the strong suspicion that Gustafa, Rock, and Matthew (Marlin in the OG) were never originally designed or written with the intention that they would become the hottest bachelors in a female-led game. A lot of this can be seen just by comparing them to their female counterparts - all of the bachelorettes (aside from Nami) have a traditionally cute appearance and warm personality. The bachelors don’t follow this pattern as rigidly. Matthew is stand-offish, if not outright rude; Gustafa isn’t handsome; and Rock is.... well, flakey?

This isn’t to say the bachelors didn’t have their own charm at all. Rock shows his inner heart of gold on occasion, and is always honest. Matthew is a hardworking man just trying to contribute to his sister’s farm, and dealing with his own baggage. Gustafa is light-hearted and easy to please.

I think their facelifts in the most recent game just signals Marvelous’s commitment to appeal to more players within their target age range. Gustafa and Matthew look younger and bishie. Rock’s dialogue has him slightly more sympathetic. I don’t think these changes could be considered bad at all - just a sign of different times, with Marvelous understanding their players better.

Anyways, on to my opinions on the latest version of each of the three original bachelors: (I’ll give Gordy, the new bachelor, his own post later!)

Matthew is the first I wanted to talk about, because on the outside, he’s definitely changed the most. Gone is the bad-boy 90s delinquent hairstyle and demeanor that seemed more fit for a shonen manga than a farming sim - now he’s an office-worker bishie, but still struggling to make his own way in a new village, just like in 2004. Unfortunately, his updated looks don’t save him from his crappy attitude. One of his first rival cutscenes is him yelling at you for simply trying to carry on a conversation with Cecilia. You only get, like, two sentences in before he jumps down your throat. Ugh. That on it’s own way enough to discourage me from continuing to pursue him as a love interest. It’s just obnoxious and possessive. Would you believe this guy is 32 and still acting this way? In traditional fashion, other NPCs don’t call him out on his behavior, even Vesta, who knows how ‘he can be about Cecilia’ - and you’re just supposed to put up with it. I’m not sure if further cutscenes eventually remedy any of this, but his behavior is off-putting enough that I didn’t care about finding out.

Gustafa remains as chill and groovy as ever. He’s looking a little more John Lennon than elf/leprechaun these days, but the overall aesthetic is the same. They took his original shrugging animation away and replace it with the same generic arm-wave as everyone else, but not everything can be a victory. He has some expanded dialogue that freshens his character up a bit, and the love song he sings during the romantic cutscenes makes more sense in this translation than the first game. Gustafa was always my favorite in the first, and he continues to be so in this remake - always gentle and kind, and a good spouse and father. If only he could play more than one melody on his guitar. I just hope he bathes more often this time around.

Ah, Rock, the would-be playboy of Forgotten Valley. Still getting up at noon exactly. Still getting chased by the dog. His dialogue has been reworked to make him a little more humorous this time around, instead of mildly-annoying like before. The translators did a good job with him, and I was always interested in what he had to say, even if it was useless. Unlike Matthew and Gustafa, his design was almost entirely unchanged - his pants are slimmer and that’s it. His voice has also mysteriously deepened... though I wouldn’t put it past him to use a voice changer to try to entice the ladies. Just like Gustafa, his unique animation of gesturing with both hands was also removed for the generic arm-wave. He’s genuinely fun to talk to, just to hear what he has to say. His slacker attitude is off-putting as far as romance goes, though, even if none of the marriage candidates actually work on the farm. It’s about the attitude, people!

[anotherwonderfullife2]

AWL: Character Creation

I was really happy to see the remake would be updated with a fully customizable player avatar, including the pronouns. Japanese games traditionally don’t allow for as much diverse character creation options, from skin color to hairstyles, so I was really impressed with AWL embracing customization fully, down to having gender neutral pronouns. There is only one body type available, which I noticed does change slightly to have wider hips when wearing the classic ‘female outfit’ (from the original Another Wonderful Life) but the PC doesn’t appear to have breasts in any outfit.

I do wish there was more variety with the outfits offered for feminine-presenting PCs. At the end of the first in-game year, and including the DLC which adds 4 outfits, there’s only two outfits that skew feminine. Most of the first outfits available for purchase at the in-game trader are recolors of the ‘male outfit’ (from the male protagonist’s outfit in the original A Wonderful Life). I would love to see more options for feminine PCs!

As a sidenote: the iconic ponytail no longer bounces when you run around, but remains static. I miss that little detail.

[anotherwonderfullife2]

Welcome to my AWL blog!

I played the original Another Wonderful Life when it was first released in the US for Gamecube. It was one of those few games I kept returning to periodically over the years, and one that has a special place in my heart. I was overjoyed to hear there was a remake in the works, and I have so much to say about it that I decided to make a tumblr blog dedicated to it! Feel free to message or interact any time with your own thoughts and feelings on the game~

PS This blog is not spoiler-free, and spoilers will not be marked!