Steam Queue Thursdays: Stardew Valley (2016)

Review for Stardew Valley (2016)
Developed by: Concerned Ape
Published by: Chucklefish Games
Genre: Farming-Survival-RPG

Review
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Developed, Scored, Written by one person over four years, Stardew Valley is the debut (as far as I can tell) game of ConcernedApe. If E.Y.E. Cybermancy is a good case for how a first game can go awfully wrong, then consider this the opposite. Released roughly a month ago, Stardew Valley has remained a consistent bestseller on the Steam list, already breaking half a million copies sold.

I bought this game wanting to see what all the hype was about and found myself sucked in, knocking out several weeks of in-game play just by virtue of discovering everything I could do. This game has that appeal, and to cover exactly why, let's get into the reviewing.



Story

On your Grandpa's death bed, he hands you a note. He says not to open it until "You are overcome by the burden of modern life." Cutting to at least a decade later, you are working at the Joja company, where men watch over you and you work a cubicle office job. You open the drawer and find Grandpa's letter there. You open it and he tells you to go and take his home in Stardew Valley.

Arriving there, you find the farm is a bit overgrown in the years since your Grandpa passed away, but plenty of nice villagers. They reckon all you need is to put in some elbow grease and you can make your old Grandpa proud.

If this sounds familiar, that's because this game is absolutely an indie version of Harvest Moon, the long celebrated franchise of farm simulation.

And that's exactly what you do. Most of the rest of the story has more to do with Gameplay, so we'll cover that there.

Aesthetics

The game, in true indie style, is done with lovingly 16-bit graphics. This aesthetic is in line of being an homage but also is close to the other major influence Terraria.

People often judge games for their graphical quality, but that's more and more of a mistake. Graphics from old school days often hide large games underneath them, and Stardew Valley is no exception.

The art style allows for a big mysterious world to discover, and you'll find plenty of places in Stardew Valley to look at. The rustic background gives it that midwest farmer feeling. It's actually rather excellent how much expression they're able to pull out of this older style.

Gameplay

This is the meat of the game. Stardew Valley is a Farming Simulator / RPG. You are tasked with the day to day operations of running a farm, which at first means clearing out a plot to plant some crops. Once planted, you will have to water them each day until they grow into something you can sell.

But if it was just a matter of planting, farming, selling, the game would lose it's luster really fast. This is actually where the majority of my problem with the Harvest Moon games comes in. Those games existed on a scale of time that felt slow. You had to clear the farm, plant crops, and that was it.

In Stardew Valley, you not only have the farm, there're plants that grow every day throughout the town. There're over thirty characters who you can give gifts and engage in friendship with (which mostly is done by giving gifts). On the second day, you receive a fishing rod, which is meant to give you something to do while you wait for your crops to grow. Eventually, the mine opens up allowing you to spend the day looking for ore and fighting monsters. On top of that, all these activities level up as you do them, adding more and more craftable items and options for spending the limited amount of energy you have all day.

There's a great gameplay loop in Stardew Valley that starts in the first season, Spring, and that the game hopes you have hammered out for yourself by the time Summer rolls around. Characters have birthdays and festivals offer a chance for you to interact with the town more often and take place in little mini-games. For instance, I participated in an egg hunt in the center of town for the Spring Festival.

Your farm is entirely customizable and expandable, which you'll want to do eventually once you get the hang of farming down. For most of my time with the game, I just reinvested into more seeds so I could grow my profit over and over again. You can upgrade your tools, build chicken coops, get cows, brew beer, and live off the land.

You will also come into contact with the Forest Sprites early. These unlock collection quests that will have you contributing portions of collectibles from different types of gameplay (farming, mining, fishing, foraging) in return for special rewards and eventually unlocking different areas.

This may sound like a lot, but I guarantee that Stardew Valley is meant to be played very casually, maybe an hour or less at a time. Days typically cover about twenty minutes if you're getting each and every ounce of energy out of them (though you can go to sleep whenever you like). The main game essentially lasts until the start of year three, but you can continue playing more or less indefinitely.

The variety of things to do in Stardew Valley present a number of options that you'll have to mix specializing and generalizing to make good progress. Eventually, you'll be the local farm empire we all dream of being.

Conclusion

Stardew Valley may not sound like much. But what's running under the hood is more than just an homage or fan game. This may be a perfection of the genre. I'm far more interested in playing more of this than playing any Harvest Moon game again.

If you're looking for a casual, or hardcore experience, Stardew Valley's slow-paced deliberate gameplay is sure to satisfy.

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