While farm animals can die from starvation, disease, or old age in the Harvest Moon series, they cannot be physically beaten, harmed, or killed by the player. This is a specific design choice in line with a recurring concept across Natsume's games referred to as "harmony with nature", or living in harmony with and respecting plants and animals. In a 1999 interview with IGN, Natsume president Yasuhiro Maekawa explained that this concept was used not because they wanted to make games with Shintoist beliefs, but because they wanted to focus on niche markets by doing something different from popular "bloody fighting titles" instead of competing with them.