As Cute hits the shelves tonight, I realise that many players will be most interested in the romantic aspects of the game. This information is included both in my Courtship and Marriage Guide and my General Guide for Cute, but it may be worth posting separately here.
As stated elsewhere more than once, a daily routine of giving a Favourite or Most Favourite item as a gift to all bachelors is the best general strategy for increasing Affection Points, thereby raising heart levels.
There are some special actions and occasions whereby AP can be raised higher than it could be at any other time:
1. Change your outfit daily to increase the AP of every bachelor in the Valley (including any visiting Mineral Town bachelor) by 200 points.
2. On the occasion of the Fireworks Festival, speak to every bachelor at the beach to increase the AP of ALL bachelors who are there by 2000 points.
3. On the occasion of the Winter Thanksgiving, FIRST give a regular Favourite or Most Favourite Item to each bachelor and THEN give him either Chocolate or Chocolate Cake. A traditional recognised Thanks-Fest gift of Chocolate or Chocolate Cake will increase AP by 1000 points.
If you give a regular 'Most Favourite Item' as a gift first, the regular gift will increase AP by 800 points. A 'Favourite' will increase it by 500 points. If you THEN give Chocolate or Chocolate Cake, AP will increase by an additional 1000 points, making the total increase for the day 1800 AP or 1500 AP, depending on the item given. If, however, you give the Winter Thanks-Fest gift FIRST, AP will increase only by 1000 points and any items given afterwards will not affect AP at all.
4. On the occasion of an individual's birthday, given him a Most Favourite or Favourite item as a gift. The value of any item given on an individual's birthday is multiplied by x5. Bear in mind the fact that it is only the first item that will affect AP. Secondary gifts will affect only FP. If, however, you give a 'Most Favourite Item' to a bachelor on his birthday, its value will be 4000 AP as opposed to the usual 800 AP. This is quite a significant increase! Only bachelors and Magical Girls have Affection Points or AP, but an item given to ANY ONE on his/her birthday will have a value of x5 its ordinary value in terms of FP or Friendship Points.
5. When you have made a certain number of offerings to the Harvest Goddess at the Goddess Spring, she will offer to raise the AP of the bachelor of your choice. There will be two lists from which to choose, one for the Valley bachelors and the other for the Mineral Town bachelors. Rather inexplicably, Skye is not included in the list of Valley bachelors. The Harvest Goddess will raise the AP of the bachelor you choose only once. Further offerings only result in the High/Low guessing game and a gift of a random number of seeds of a randomly chosen level.