Wow, I bet that ConcernedApe never in a million years expected that Stardew Valley would be his ticket to a retirement fund in his 20s/30s. Love the dedication that goes into this game.
Wow, I bet that ConcernedApe never in a million years expected that Stardew Valley would be his ticket to a retirement fund in his 20s/30s.
You mention money in your comment, and it's just a quick thought, but I just want to point out, after viewing/reading pretty much every interview about the guy, that he doesn't really care about...
You mention money in your comment, and it's just a quick thought, but I just want to point out, after viewing/reading pretty much every interview about the guy, that he doesn't really care about money. And it feels weird to see a comment only on that.
Even after years of being a millionaire, the dude just likes to make games. He's mentioned that he enjoys the process of just becoming better, be it music, pixel art, story lines or gameplay. Money is not and never was his driving factor.
And that is precisely why I'm so happy he gets the spotlight everywhere. Stardew Valley is genuinely a very good game. I've played it twice and thoroughly enjoyed it both times. There are elements for everyone and I cannot wait to play Haunted Chocolatier, it's gonna be awesome.
Looking forward to Haunted, absolutely. He doesn't mention money, but given the sales numbers, he did quite well. Money and art are bedfellows I'm afraid, and while it sounds like making games...
Looking forward to Haunted, absolutely.
He doesn't mention money, but given the sales numbers, he did quite well. Money and art are bedfellows I'm afraid, and while it sounds like making games something he'd have done regardless, the success Stardew has seen probably enabled him more freedom on his next project.
Money is part of our entire society, and an instrumental part of designing your life once you get older and plan to stop working.
I don't think that mentioning it here is weird at all.
Indeed. I feel like if someone truly didn't care about money, they would give away their creation for free. Obviously we need money to survive and live comfortably, but at some point, it's more...
Indeed. I feel like if someone truly didn't care about money, they would give away their creation for free. Obviously we need money to survive and live comfortably, but at some point, it's more than enough. That's why we scream about the billionaire class.
Stardew Valley is currently 50% off at US$7.49 due to the Summer Sale. Great discount, but that's still not zero. And I doubt we'll ever see it free permanently. At least not anytime soon.
This isn't a criticism of ConcernedApe. I'm glad they're making the money. It's an excellent, timeless game that's worth it at full price. But it's just how things are. And I don't blame ConcernedApe for being able to make a living and then some off of it.
As it turns out for Eric he basically did do it for free, for years and years; he's done interviews talking about working full- or part-time & putting in another ## hours/week on the game during...
As it turns out for Eric he basically did do it for free, for years and years; he's done interviews talking about working full- or part-time & putting in another ## hours/week on the game during development, starting almost every part over at least once. So the passion was there for sure, but gosh if I ever stuck to something for that long I wouldn't want to give it away for nothing.
And people respect free things less. There's a joke that if you leave a free couch on the curb, no one will take it. But if you put a sign on it asking for $1000, it'll vanish.
And people respect free things less.
There's a joke that if you leave a free couch on the curb, no one will take it. But if you put a sign on it asking for $1000, it'll vanish.
I'm not totally sure why the possibility of making money was ever a questionable motivation in this case. Maybe I just read your original comment wrong. For Chocolate, I'm most hopeful that the...
I'm not totally sure why the possibility of making money was ever a questionable motivation in this case. Maybe I just read your original comment wrong.
For Chocolate, I'm most hopeful that the base-building mechanic is still central. I loved working on the farm where I lived all day - the gameplay loop was sooo rewarding.
Fully agree. Without money, there would be very few games of that caliber. Not because no one wants to do it. But because people have to do other things for money to survive
Fully agree. Without money, there would be very few games of that caliber. Not because no one wants to do it. But because people have to do other things for money to survive
I think that's exactly why Stardew Valley is so successful. This was a passion project, plain and simple. Still is. Every developer hopes for major success, but I'd say he didn't expect it simply...
I think that's exactly why Stardew Valley is so successful. This was a passion project, plain and simple. Still is. Every developer hopes for major success, but I'd say he didn't expect it simply because he just wanted to make a good game.
Fun little tidbit: I first heard about Stardew Valley in an article about how people who pirated it wound up buying it to support him, and asking how to transfer their save files to the legitimate copies. It just shows how that sort of pure passion really does move people in ways that money-driven projects don't.
Congratulations to ConcernedApe and well earned! It's been that long?! On a seperate note, I do hope that the darker elements of Haunted Chocolatier will be optional. From a previous interview:...
Congratulations to ConcernedApe and well earned!
Previously, Portal 2 held this position for 14 years.
It's been that long?!
On a seperate note, I do hope that the darker elements of Haunted Chocolatier will be optional. From a previous interview:
"I view [Stardew Valley] as sunny and bright and lush, and Haunted Chocolatier is more dark and mysterious. Not evil dark, but just like mysterious dark, and a little bit paranormal, you know, things that, you're not sure what this is all about."
Emily's kooky crystals parrots are fun and sunny. Juminos are super cute and I wish they were real. Turning your kids into birds is indeed dark and selfish, which I'm glad is optional. I look forward to Chocolatier with some trepidation.
Congrats extend to ConcernedApe’s girlfriend at the time, Amber Hageman (no idea if they’re still together or not). She worked two jobs for years to financially support the two of them while...
Congrats extend to ConcernedApe’s girlfriend at the time, Amber Hageman (no idea if they’re still together or not).
She worked two jobs for years to financially support the two of them while ConcernedApe devoted all his time to development.
It’s been a while since I read Jason Schreier’s Blood, Sweat, and Pixels so the details are fuzzy, but I think I remember that she also gave him a lot of ideas for things that ended up the game. So, in addition to basically single-handedly bankrolling the game, she also co-designed some of it.
Got me curious. They married in 2015, still together, still (apparently) happy ... and she still (apparently) hates the limelight, so I've quit digging.
Got me curious. They married in 2015, still together, still (apparently) happy ... and she still (apparently) hates the limelight, so I've quit digging.
I think the "darker" elements just come with the gameplay. From what I've gathered Haunted Chocolatier has a bigger emphasis on combat, and it's also... Well, about a haunted chocolate shop....
I think the "darker" elements just come with the gameplay. From what I've gathered Haunted Chocolatier has a bigger emphasis on combat, and it's also... Well, about a haunted chocolate shop. Ghosts are part of the package.
I doubt anything will be too bad or dark. I think it will just have more of the mysterious elements like the Junimos, Wizard, cursed mannequin, etc., and present them more prominently.
How simple is this game? I haven't played a game like this since SimCity2000 and that's about how complex I go. I'm always weary when people say simple because it's a broad definition. I mean I...
How simple is this game? I haven't played a game like this since SimCity2000 and that's about how complex I go. I'm always weary when people say simple because it's a broad definition. I mean I love Trials...
If you can manage a city in Sim City 2000, you can definitely manage a farm in Stardew Valley! The game basically hands you an empty plot of land and some basic tools, then leaves you to...
If you can manage a city in Sim City 2000, you can definitely manage a farm in Stardew Valley!
The game basically hands you an empty plot of land and some basic tools, then leaves you to experiment with whatever play style you like. You can spend the whole day clearing your land, you can go and socialise with townfolk, you can buy some seeds and try planting some crops, you can go fishing or foraging, you can go into the mines (procedurally generated dungeon) and fight monsters / dig for treasure - whatever you feel like doing! There are no bills to pay, no people you have to report to and no quotas / time limits save whatever quests you decide to undertake.
There is a day/night cycle each day on a fairly short timer which I think some people find a little anxiety inducing (definitely including me when I first started playing) as there's never enough time in the day to take every option available to you at any given time, but I don't feel like the game ever punishes you no matter what you decide to do. Even if you don't make it back to bed by the end of the day, the consequences are pretty negligible and there's no real "fail state" you can end up in or way you can massively lose progress. You can only ever make progress as you accumulate more money and items, make more friends, complete more quests, automate more of your farming, upgrade your skills and equipment and discover more secrets!
On top of the day / night cycle, there's a seasonal / year cycle too with some events / items only available at certain times, but nothing is permanently missable and if you're willing to just take things as they come and set your own goals instead of approaching everything with a "min/max gotta see all the content as soon as possible" mindset, all this means is that there's a lot of content for you to look forward to as you play.
As other posts have flagged, it's true that there are a lot of optional items, systems and secrets which aren't explicitly signposted to the player - i.e. it's there for you to discover for yourself through experimentation. If that's not your bag, there's also a great wiki out there where you can look up specific elements. I had no qualms at all about doing this for elements I didn't particularly care about / elements I wanted to just skip or automate and didn't feel like this detracted from the game at all.
I'm not really a farming sim guy (I've never played Harvest Moon or the other games that inspired this one), but I really dig Stardew Valley and would recommend it to almost anyone!
Well I'll be damned...I just wrote it off based on another comment and through the door you come. Now it all of a sudden sound manageable and interesting. I gotta admit I always cheated in SC2000...
Well I'll be damned...I just wrote it off based on another comment and through the door you come. Now it all of a sudden sound manageable and interesting. I gotta admit I always cheated in SC2000 so I could focus on just building things. I didn't care much for the "game" in it.
I really appreciate this. I've tried this game a few times and keep bouncing off it. I think I just need to take your advice and drop the goal-oriented mindset.
I really appreciate this. I've tried this game a few times and keep bouncing off it. I think I just need to take your advice and drop the goal-oriented mindset.
Gramps saw what the office hustle was doing to your soul and that's why he left you the farm. Would Gramps have wanted you to slave over maximizes profit or record time goal unlocked? Nah, man,...
Gramps saw what the office hustle was doing to your soul and that's why he left you the farm. Would Gramps have wanted you to slave over maximizes profit or record time goal unlocked? Nah, man, Gramps wanted you to Chill.
I'll probably come off oddly critical for a thread about how great it is because I personally think it has a lot of flaws, but I'll try to answer your question anyway. Mechanically, the game is...
I'll probably come off oddly critical for a thread about how great it is because I personally think it has a lot of flaws, but I'll try to answer your question anyway.
Mechanically, the game is very simple. You farm, you log, you mine, you fish, you fulfill basic quests, you chat with villagers. It has a great deal of unintuitiveness built into it though. Due to this the level of complexity is related to you want out of it. If you just want to walk around talking to villagers and collecting shells it is simple, but if you want to figure out how to get into the casino it is anything but.
Are you going to realize that red cabbage is mostly RNG in year one, or waste your time confusedly looking all over the place? Are you going to catch all the right fish for a season before it ends, or are you just going to try get a pufferfish in fall and not realize you're blocked on that for a full year? There are so many more examples of this kind of stuff.
I also think it has some weirdly conflicting feeling systems. I always felt in a rush to do everything I could in a day because if I missed the wrong stuff it might be gone for a whole year. The days feel so short though so it feels oddly stressful for what's usually considered a cozy relaxing game.
I happened to mention the casino earlier because that's actually where I quit the game. I had to look it up because I was never going to figure that out as I didn't even think that the place that starts the quest was an accessible area. Then I do get it started only to realize that I'm in fall and the quest requires summer items. At this point in my play through getting to the casino was my main goal, but the realization I'd have to play a ton of hours to do nearly an entire year to meet it killed any motivation I had.
I don't necessarily disagree with your criticisms here (even as a big fan of the game, it's not perfect), but I think they're misplaced in this response given the question being asked. It doesn't...
I don't necessarily disagree with your criticisms here (even as a big fan of the game, it's not perfect), but I think they're misplaced in this response given the question being asked. It doesn't really help someone paint a picture of what type of game this is for someone who hasn't played it and thus lacks the context to understand what your criticisms even apply to.
My opinion is that needing to do outside research for the game to not be confusing, sometimes even frustrating, affects how "simple" I'd be willing to call a game from the perspective of a new...
My opinion is that needing to do outside research for the game to not be confusing, sometimes even frustrating, affects how "simple" I'd be willing to call a game from the perspective of a new player. I think it's somewhat normal for a new player to want to do the community center as their first overarching objective and I think that it is deceptively complicated to a new player.
In a similar vein I personally find Minecraft to be rather simple, but that's only because my head is already so full of Minecraft knowledge. If I look at it's confusing and unexplained systems through the lens of a new player I don't think I could call it simple to them.
Outside research is only needed if you feel the need to have to. The reason it's in the "cozy" genre is because you don't. There is no fail state, there is nothing missable, and you can complete...
Outside research is only needed if you feel the need to have to. The reason it's in the "cozy" genre is because you don't.
There is no fail state, there is nothing missable, and you can complete everything in your own time.
If you want to tend to your farm for the first three years without even looking at the mine, you can do that. You can even ignore the villagers. Point is that you don't have to do anything at all.
Is that true? I've always tried it then shied away due to the time pressures of the days and the years, meaning I could miss things or not get things completed, and I don't like that. Why are...
Is that true? I've always tried it then shied away due to the time pressures of the days and the years, meaning I could miss things or not get things completed, and I don't like that.
Why are these pressures present if they don't mean anything?
Yes, nothing in the game is missable outright. Only temporarily. The day cycle is important for other game related reasons, crops still need to grow by some interval after all. And if you don't...
Yes, nothing in the game is missable outright. Only temporarily.
The day cycle is important for other game related reasons, crops still need to grow by some interval after all. And if you don't care about completing something by season XYZ of year 1 then the passing time is only important for a chance of rain and an incremental change towards a new season. Events don't happen all day every day, so it simply keeps the game moving.
It's also important to prevent people from just completing the mine day 1 or earning end game levels of money in week 1 and stripping the game of all conflict and challenge. Even the most cozy game/film/show/book needs tension, conflict, or change to keep things interesting. This too. It's still a game that has a progression curve, and the day cycle gates the progression.
The gamer in (some of) us is just so harebrained about completing everything as quickly as possible that the timer feels like pressure. It's a negative side effect of something necessary to keep the game interesting. If I remember right there are mods to extend the day to alleviate the pressure people feel.
But to reiterate: No, the game has no end state in which you can miss things entirely unless you choose to not pursue it. If you miss something in year 1, you can do it in year 2, or 20, or even 55.
I do think it is important to add the caveat that years are long. Very long. "Unless you really really love the game the thing you missed is potentially gone for as long as you're willing to play"...
I do think it is important to add the caveat that years are long. Very long. "Unless you really really love the game the thing you missed is potentially gone for as long as you're willing to play" long. I was underselling it earlier when I called it 20 hours as it is probably more like 25-35.
This makes the statement that something can be done next year feel off. Especially so when people say stuff like that it'll still be available in year 50. It leaves this implication that years aren't huge commitments by normalizing big numbers of them, but 50 years is ~1500 hours. Surely only a tiny portion of saves reach even 10% of that.
I missed the casino. Sure, I could just play another 30 hours, but that's a long time. So long in fact that it's further away than if I missed something in many other games and you told me, "oh it's fine, you have infinite save slots so just start over." So even when it's technically true that content can't be missed, it very much feels like it can be.
You know there's nothing that prevents you from going to bed early? A year is only long if you're trying to make the most of every day. If your top priorities are completion and real life time,...
You know there's nothing that prevents you from going to bed early? A year is only long if you're trying to make the most of every day. If your top priorities are completion and real life time, you can burn through a year quite quickly.
This comment seems to be completely missing the point of what I said in my comment -- I said I don't necessarily disagree with the criticisms, but that a comment criticising those specifics does...
This comment seems to be completely missing the point of what I said in my comment -- I said I don't necessarily disagree with the criticisms, but that a comment criticising those specifics does absolutely nothing to communicate to someone who hasn't played the game what type of game it is, what the gameplay loop is even like, or why it's so popular, much less whether the specific criticisms you have are things that will bother them and to what degree.
Admittedly I wrote this in the middle of the night while I was quite frustrated with something unrelated. This painted my tone. I was not trying to be the store page or a sales pitch. I wanted...
Admittedly I wrote this in the middle of the night while I was quite frustrated with something unrelated. This painted my tone. I was not trying to be the store page or a sales pitch. I wanted more to call attention to where it fails the one requested criteria: simple.
My reply probably would've fit a bit better if it wasn't the first though because I did not convey that those failings are attributed to play style beyond a somewhat throwaway line in the middle. This inadequate as it is missing the context that it only applies if you try to stay focused on a specific goal and instead making it sound like the whole thing is a confusing mess.
I do think it's a bigger problem than most fans of the game give it credit for though. We've been trained that the big open objective that a game presents early, such as the community center, is something that can generally be progressed toward at least in the form of sub objectives. It feels very odd that Stardew sometimes had me bashing my head into the wall because I was silently unable to make any progress and that I was wasting my time trying.
I think what you describe is indeed a problem for a particular kind of player, with a certain way of approaching games and a particular playstyle. Different people fall in different places on that...
I think what you describe is indeed a problem for a particular kind of player, with a certain way of approaching games and a particular playstyle. Different people fall in different places on that spectrum, so I can recognize the problems you point out, but they simply do not matter as much to my enjoyment of the game as they do to you. I think a large swath of Stardew players are even more "casual" in terms of their approach than me, and I think the issues you describe don't affect that portion of the playerbase much at all. Ultimately if there's a place where I think your specific criticisms are relevant, it's in a discussion around how Stardew balances (or in places fails to balance) the needs of different types of players.
But my main issue wasn't anything to do with the specific criticisms you had, but rather that if someone asks about what a game is like the way the comment you initially replied to did, a mini essay about your criticisms simply doesn't actually answer that question when the person acting doesn't even understand what the basic gameplay loop is or even, based on their comment, the genre of the game. Even when your criticisms are 100% correct, at least preface your soapbox with the basic context that the person needs to comprehend what you're criticizing.
I think you're mischaracterizing what I answered. You're saying it was a request to be told what the game is like, but it was actually just the question "How simple is this game?". I wasn't trying...
I think you're mischaracterizing what I answered. You're saying it was a request to be told what the game is like, but it was actually just the question "How simple is this game?". I wasn't trying to convey what the game is like, and never claimed to, because that wasn't the question I was answering.
I think the question, particularly the comparison to SimCity, indicates such a low level of knowledge about the game that it functionally amounts to a question of "what is this game like?"
I think the question, particularly the comparison to SimCity, indicates such a low level of knowledge about the game that it functionally amounts to a question of "what is this game like?"
Something that I should have clarified is that the hidden complexity comes specifically from focusing on goals. The core gameplay loop isn't hard. Where I was taking issue with calling it simple...
Something that I should have clarified is that the hidden complexity comes specifically from focusing on goals. The core gameplay loop isn't hard. Where I was taking issue with calling it simple personally is that playing a year takes like 20 hours and it is absurdly easy to accidentally get yourself into a state where you just have to wait out that entire duration to make any progress on any goals you've set. Or even worse if you don't know you're blocked and spend your time fruitlessly looking for things you won't find.
If you do play it, here are some things to know:
Some flat-looking open objectives are actually ordered. This really threw me because I thought things like, "they wouldn't have one room of the community center blocking another, right?"
There are some quests that just need to be blindly picked up. I recall seeing at least one timed quest that I repeatedly skipped because I'd never before encountered what it was asking for and so I didn't want time pressure added to that thing. Turns out it never triggers without the quest.
Having requests for things does not mean they're accessible. In most games if you can't find something it means you haven't looked hard enough, but in Stardew it sometimes means you need to give up looking. Famously there's an item that you get an untimed request for starting on I think day 1 that is RNG until summer of year 2.
I mean, whether you play the game is your prerogative. But it seems hasty to make that decision based solely off the information you get from this thread. The degree to which the flaws they...
I mean, whether you play the game is your prerogative. But it seems hasty to make that decision based solely off the information you get from this thread. The degree to which the flaws they criticize impact your enjoyment of the game is gonna vary a lot on a person-to-person basis depending on your personality, your taste in games, and just what annoys you most. An actual picture of what the game is like and whether it might be the kind of game you'd enjoy would have to be acquired elsewhere.
SimCity isn't all that similar to Stardew Valley in terms of genre, which makes it hard to really compare them in terms of complexity. Harvest Moon is the usual comparison if you ever used to play...
SimCity isn't all that similar to Stardew Valley in terms of genre, which makes it hard to really compare them in terms of complexity. Harvest Moon is the usual comparison if you ever used to play those. You control a character who can build/tend a farm, get to know the locals, explore and combat monsters in the mines, catch fish and forage for items, and more. Since its release Stardew Valley has had such an effect on the industry that it revived this genre when it had previously been more or less dead, and it serves as the benchmark that pretty much any game in this or a related genre will be compared to.
Yeah, I'm a big fan of city-builders (though SimCity itself is really before my time) and I've put plenty of hours into Stardew, but they really are quite different beasts and it's hard to compare...
Yeah, I'm a big fan of city-builders (though SimCity itself is really before my time) and I've put plenty of hours into Stardew, but they really are quite different beasts and it's hard to compare them to each other! I find Stardew a bit more relaxing in general, but I also tend to play more punishing/complex city-builders, so ymmv. Stardew doesn't really have a failure state the way those games do.
I think Stardew's design has pretty broad appeal and that you'd get a good sense of whether it's something you might like from watching someone else play a bit of it. Or just waiting for it to go on sale and trying it out then -- Steam still has those generous refund windows.
Wow, I bet that ConcernedApe never in a million years expected that Stardew Valley would be his ticket to a retirement fund in his 20s/30s.
Love the dedication that goes into this game.
You mention money in your comment, and it's just a quick thought, but I just want to point out, after viewing/reading pretty much every interview about the guy, that he doesn't really care about money. And it feels weird to see a comment only on that.
Even after years of being a millionaire, the dude just likes to make games. He's mentioned that he enjoys the process of just becoming better, be it music, pixel art, story lines or gameplay. Money is not and never was his driving factor.
And that is precisely why I'm so happy he gets the spotlight everywhere. Stardew Valley is genuinely a very good game. I've played it twice and thoroughly enjoyed it both times. There are elements for everyone and I cannot wait to play Haunted Chocolatier, it's gonna be awesome.
Looking forward to Haunted, absolutely.
He doesn't mention money, but given the sales numbers, he did quite well. Money and art are bedfellows I'm afraid, and while it sounds like making games something he'd have done regardless, the success Stardew has seen probably enabled him more freedom on his next project.
Money is part of our entire society, and an instrumental part of designing your life once you get older and plan to stop working.
I don't think that mentioning it here is weird at all.
Indeed. I feel like if someone truly didn't care about money, they would give away their creation for free. Obviously we need money to survive and live comfortably, but at some point, it's more than enough. That's why we scream about the billionaire class.
Stardew Valley is currently 50% off at US$7.49 due to the Summer Sale. Great discount, but that's still not zero. And I doubt we'll ever see it free permanently. At least not anytime soon.
This isn't a criticism of ConcernedApe. I'm glad they're making the money. It's an excellent, timeless game that's worth it at full price. But it's just how things are. And I don't blame ConcernedApe for being able to make a living and then some off of it.
As it turns out for Eric he basically did do it for free, for years and years; he's done interviews talking about working full- or part-time & putting in another ## hours/week on the game during development, starting almost every part over at least once. So the passion was there for sure, but gosh if I ever stuck to something for that long I wouldn't want to give it away for nothing.
And people respect free things less.
There's a joke that if you leave a free couch on the curb, no one will take it. But if you put a sign on it asking for $1000, it'll vanish.
I'm not totally sure why the possibility of making money was ever a questionable motivation in this case. Maybe I just read your original comment wrong.
For Chocolate, I'm most hopeful that the base-building mechanic is still central. I loved working on the farm where I lived all day - the gameplay loop was sooo rewarding.
Fully agree. Without money, there would be very few games of that caliber. Not because no one wants to do it. But because people have to do other things for money to survive
Responding to the wrong person? That was my only comment in the thread.
I did - my bad!
You're good!
I think that's exactly why Stardew Valley is so successful. This was a passion project, plain and simple. Still is. Every developer hopes for major success, but I'd say he didn't expect it simply because he just wanted to make a good game.
Fun little tidbit: I first heard about Stardew Valley in an article about how people who pirated it wound up buying it to support him, and asking how to transfer their save files to the legitimate copies. It just shows how that sort of pure passion really does move people in ways that money-driven projects don't.
Congratulations to ConcernedApe and well earned!
It's been that long?!
On a seperate note, I do hope that the darker elements of Haunted Chocolatier will be optional. From a previous interview:
Emily's kooky crystals parrots are fun and sunny. Juminos are super cute and I wish they were real. Turning your kids into birds is indeed dark and selfish, which I'm glad is optional. I look forward to Chocolatier with some trepidation.
Congrats extend to ConcernedApe’s girlfriend at the time, Amber Hageman (no idea if they’re still together or not).
She worked two jobs for years to financially support the two of them while ConcernedApe devoted all his time to development.
It’s been a while since I read Jason Schreier’s Blood, Sweat, and Pixels so the details are fuzzy, but I think I remember that she also gave him a lot of ideas for things that ended up the game. So, in addition to basically single-handedly bankrolling the game, she also co-designed some of it.
Got me curious. They married in 2015, still together, still (apparently) happy ... and she still (apparently) hates the limelight, so I've quit digging.
I think the "darker" elements just come with the gameplay. From what I've gathered Haunted Chocolatier has a bigger emphasis on combat, and it's also... Well, about a haunted chocolate shop. Ghosts are part of the package.
I doubt anything will be too bad or dark. I think it will just have more of the mysterious elements like the Junimos, Wizard, cursed mannequin, etc., and present them more prominently.
How simple is this game? I haven't played a game like this since SimCity2000 and that's about how complex I go. I'm always weary when people say simple because it's a broad definition. I mean I love Trials...
If you can manage a city in Sim City 2000, you can definitely manage a farm in Stardew Valley!
The game basically hands you an empty plot of land and some basic tools, then leaves you to experiment with whatever play style you like. You can spend the whole day clearing your land, you can go and socialise with townfolk, you can buy some seeds and try planting some crops, you can go fishing or foraging, you can go into the mines (procedurally generated dungeon) and fight monsters / dig for treasure - whatever you feel like doing! There are no bills to pay, no people you have to report to and no quotas / time limits save whatever quests you decide to undertake.
There is a day/night cycle each day on a fairly short timer which I think some people find a little anxiety inducing (definitely including me when I first started playing) as there's never enough time in the day to take every option available to you at any given time, but I don't feel like the game ever punishes you no matter what you decide to do. Even if you don't make it back to bed by the end of the day, the consequences are pretty negligible and there's no real "fail state" you can end up in or way you can massively lose progress. You can only ever make progress as you accumulate more money and items, make more friends, complete more quests, automate more of your farming, upgrade your skills and equipment and discover more secrets!
On top of the day / night cycle, there's a seasonal / year cycle too with some events / items only available at certain times, but nothing is permanently missable and if you're willing to just take things as they come and set your own goals instead of approaching everything with a "min/max gotta see all the content as soon as possible" mindset, all this means is that there's a lot of content for you to look forward to as you play.
As other posts have flagged, it's true that there are a lot of optional items, systems and secrets which aren't explicitly signposted to the player - i.e. it's there for you to discover for yourself through experimentation. If that's not your bag, there's also a great wiki out there where you can look up specific elements. I had no qualms at all about doing this for elements I didn't particularly care about / elements I wanted to just skip or automate and didn't feel like this detracted from the game at all.
I'm not really a farming sim guy (I've never played Harvest Moon or the other games that inspired this one), but I really dig Stardew Valley and would recommend it to almost anyone!
Well I'll be damned...I just wrote it off based on another comment and through the door you come. Now it all of a sudden sound manageable and interesting. I gotta admit I always cheated in SC2000 so I could focus on just building things. I didn't care much for the "game" in it.
The cheats/mods are pretty easy to add. One of the most popular lets you freeze time, so folks who do want to min max can do so without stress.
I really appreciate this. I've tried this game a few times and keep bouncing off it. I think I just need to take your advice and drop the goal-oriented mindset.
Gramps saw what the office hustle was doing to your soul and that's why he left you the farm. Would Gramps have wanted you to slave over maximizes profit or record time goal unlocked? Nah, man, Gramps wanted you to Chill.
I'll probably come off oddly critical for a thread about how great it is because I personally think it has a lot of flaws, but I'll try to answer your question anyway.
Mechanically, the game is very simple. You farm, you log, you mine, you fish, you fulfill basic quests, you chat with villagers. It has a great deal of unintuitiveness built into it though. Due to this the level of complexity is related to you want out of it. If you just want to walk around talking to villagers and collecting shells it is simple, but if you want to figure out how to get into the casino it is anything but.
Are you going to realize that red cabbage is mostly RNG in year one, or waste your time confusedly looking all over the place? Are you going to catch all the right fish for a season before it ends, or are you just going to try get a pufferfish in fall and not realize you're blocked on that for a full year? There are so many more examples of this kind of stuff.
I also think it has some weirdly conflicting feeling systems. I always felt in a rush to do everything I could in a day because if I missed the wrong stuff it might be gone for a whole year. The days feel so short though so it feels oddly stressful for what's usually considered a cozy relaxing game.
I happened to mention the casino earlier because that's actually where I quit the game. I had to look it up because I was never going to figure that out as I didn't even think that the place that starts the quest was an accessible area. Then I do get it started only to realize that I'm in fall and the quest requires summer items. At this point in my play through getting to the casino was my main goal, but the realization I'd have to play a ton of hours to do nearly an entire year to meet it killed any motivation I had.
I don't necessarily disagree with your criticisms here (even as a big fan of the game, it's not perfect), but I think they're misplaced in this response given the question being asked. It doesn't really help someone paint a picture of what type of game this is for someone who hasn't played it and thus lacks the context to understand what your criticisms even apply to.
My opinion is that needing to do outside research for the game to not be confusing, sometimes even frustrating, affects how "simple" I'd be willing to call a game from the perspective of a new player. I think it's somewhat normal for a new player to want to do the community center as their first overarching objective and I think that it is deceptively complicated to a new player.
In a similar vein I personally find Minecraft to be rather simple, but that's only because my head is already so full of Minecraft knowledge. If I look at it's confusing and unexplained systems through the lens of a new player I don't think I could call it simple to them.
Outside research is only needed if you feel the need to have to. The reason it's in the "cozy" genre is because you don't.
There is no fail state, there is nothing missable, and you can complete everything in your own time.
If you want to tend to your farm for the first three years without even looking at the mine, you can do that. You can even ignore the villagers. Point is that you don't have to do anything at all.
Is that true? I've always tried it then shied away due to the time pressures of the days and the years, meaning I could miss things or not get things completed, and I don't like that.
Why are these pressures present if they don't mean anything?
Yes, nothing in the game is missable outright. Only temporarily.
The day cycle is important for other game related reasons, crops still need to grow by some interval after all. And if you don't care about completing something by season XYZ of year 1 then the passing time is only important for a chance of rain and an incremental change towards a new season. Events don't happen all day every day, so it simply keeps the game moving.
It's also important to prevent people from just completing the mine day 1 or earning end game levels of money in week 1 and stripping the game of all conflict and challenge. Even the most cozy game/film/show/book needs tension, conflict, or change to keep things interesting. This too. It's still a game that has a progression curve, and the day cycle gates the progression.
The gamer in (some of) us is just so harebrained about completing everything as quickly as possible that the timer feels like pressure. It's a negative side effect of something necessary to keep the game interesting. If I remember right there are mods to extend the day to alleviate the pressure people feel.
But to reiterate: No, the game has no end state in which you can miss things entirely unless you choose to not pursue it. If you miss something in year 1, you can do it in year 2, or 20, or even 55.
I do think it is important to add the caveat that years are long. Very long. "Unless you really really love the game the thing you missed is potentially gone for as long as you're willing to play" long. I was underselling it earlier when I called it 20 hours as it is probably more like 25-35.
This makes the statement that something can be done next year feel off. Especially so when people say stuff like that it'll still be available in year 50. It leaves this implication that years aren't huge commitments by normalizing big numbers of them, but 50 years is ~1500 hours. Surely only a tiny portion of saves reach even 10% of that.
I missed the casino. Sure, I could just play another 30 hours, but that's a long time. So long in fact that it's further away than if I missed something in many other games and you told me, "oh it's fine, you have infinite save slots so just start over." So even when it's technically true that content can't be missed, it very much feels like it can be.
You know there's nothing that prevents you from going to bed early? A year is only long if you're trying to make the most of every day. If your top priorities are completion and real life time, you can burn through a year quite quickly.
That is a very fair addition and I should've added that context.
This comment seems to be completely missing the point of what I said in my comment -- I said I don't necessarily disagree with the criticisms, but that a comment criticising those specifics does absolutely nothing to communicate to someone who hasn't played the game what type of game it is, what the gameplay loop is even like, or why it's so popular, much less whether the specific criticisms you have are things that will bother them and to what degree.
Admittedly I wrote this in the middle of the night while I was quite frustrated with something unrelated. This painted my tone. I was not trying to be the store page or a sales pitch. I wanted more to call attention to where it fails the one requested criteria: simple.
My reply probably would've fit a bit better if it wasn't the first though because I did not convey that those failings are attributed to play style beyond a somewhat throwaway line in the middle. This inadequate as it is missing the context that it only applies if you try to stay focused on a specific goal and instead making it sound like the whole thing is a confusing mess.
I do think it's a bigger problem than most fans of the game give it credit for though. We've been trained that the big open objective that a game presents early, such as the community center, is something that can generally be progressed toward at least in the form of sub objectives. It feels very odd that Stardew sometimes had me bashing my head into the wall because I was silently unable to make any progress and that I was wasting my time trying.
I think what you describe is indeed a problem for a particular kind of player, with a certain way of approaching games and a particular playstyle. Different people fall in different places on that spectrum, so I can recognize the problems you point out, but they simply do not matter as much to my enjoyment of the game as they do to you. I think a large swath of Stardew players are even more "casual" in terms of their approach than me, and I think the issues you describe don't affect that portion of the playerbase much at all. Ultimately if there's a place where I think your specific criticisms are relevant, it's in a discussion around how Stardew balances (or in places fails to balance) the needs of different types of players.
But my main issue wasn't anything to do with the specific criticisms you had, but rather that if someone asks about what a game is like the way the comment you initially replied to did, a mini essay about your criticisms simply doesn't actually answer that question when the person acting doesn't even understand what the basic gameplay loop is or even, based on their comment, the genre of the game. Even when your criticisms are 100% correct, at least preface your soapbox with the basic context that the person needs to comprehend what you're criticizing.
I think you're mischaracterizing what I answered. You're saying it was a request to be told what the game is like, but it was actually just the question "How simple is this game?". I wasn't trying to convey what the game is like, and never claimed to, because that wasn't the question I was answering.
I think the question, particularly the comparison to SimCity, indicates such a low level of knowledge about the game that it functionally amounts to a question of "what is this game like?"
It kinda did though...in a "I probably wont play that game" kinda way
Something that I should have clarified is that the hidden complexity comes specifically from focusing on goals. The core gameplay loop isn't hard. Where I was taking issue with calling it simple personally is that playing a year takes like 20 hours and it is absurdly easy to accidentally get yourself into a state where you just have to wait out that entire duration to make any progress on any goals you've set. Or even worse if you don't know you're blocked and spend your time fruitlessly looking for things you won't find.
If you do play it, here are some things to know:
I mean, whether you play the game is your prerogative. But it seems hasty to make that decision based solely off the information you get from this thread. The degree to which the flaws they criticize impact your enjoyment of the game is gonna vary a lot on a person-to-person basis depending on your personality, your taste in games, and just what annoys you most. An actual picture of what the game is like and whether it might be the kind of game you'd enjoy would have to be acquired elsewhere.
You’re absolutely right. I just enjoy reading other people’s opinion on games here.
Valid!
SimCity isn't all that similar to Stardew Valley in terms of genre, which makes it hard to really compare them in terms of complexity. Harvest Moon is the usual comparison if you ever used to play those. You control a character who can build/tend a farm, get to know the locals, explore and combat monsters in the mines, catch fish and forage for items, and more. Since its release Stardew Valley has had such an effect on the industry that it revived this genre when it had previously been more or less dead, and it serves as the benchmark that pretty much any game in this or a related genre will be compared to.
That pretty much sums up how unknowable I am about games today. I haven't tried Harvest Moon but I get the gist of what you're saying.
Yeah, I'm a big fan of city-builders (though SimCity itself is really before my time) and I've put plenty of hours into Stardew, but they really are quite different beasts and it's hard to compare them to each other! I find Stardew a bit more relaxing in general, but I also tend to play more punishing/complex city-builders, so ymmv. Stardew doesn't really have a failure state the way those games do.
I think Stardew's design has pretty broad appeal and that you'd get a good sense of whether it's something you might like from watching someone else play a bit of it. Or just waiting for it to go on sale and trying it out then -- Steam still has those generous refund windows.