For five years now, Stardew Valley has been captivating the affection of players thanks to its relaxing gameplay, charming graphics, and its interesting cast of villagers. However, given how extensive the game is, it is easy to forget that Stardew Valley was created by a single developer named Eric Barone, aka ConcernedApe, who has remained committed to the game since its release.
Of course, it is no secret that Stardew Valley is heavily inspired by the Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons franchise, whose first game dates back to the late '90s. Although Harvest Moon enjoyed its success for many years, its popularity dwindled, opening up the opportunity for other developers such as Barone to revitalize the once-tired genre into something refreshing and new, even to veteran players. Five years after Stardew Valley first welcomed players to Pelican Town, here's an overview of how the game continues to remain relevant today and how it influenced other games in the farming simulator genre.
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One of the best qualities found in Stardew Valley is its charming graphics that is heavily inspired by games from the SNES era. Although most video games today aspire to be as realistic as possible in terms of graphics, Stardew Valley's nod to older games' art style and aesthetics evoked nostalgia among players. This charming art style combined with an excellent soundtrack allowed players to escape reality and be transported in the relaxing environment of Pelican Town.
Another element Stardew Valley has that allowed the game to stay relevant for so many years is its open-ended gameplay. While Stardew Valley technically ends after three in-game years, players are allowed to continue their journey in Pelican Town, tending to their crops and animals and pursuing relationships with the game's bachelors and bachelorettes. But, of course, while the open-ended gameplay helped the longevity of Stardew Valley, it wouldn't work without the many activities players can do in the game. Apart from farming, players can also mine for resources, craft tools, embark on quests given by villagers, and many more.
While the vanilla version of Stardew Valley has satisfied most of its fans, it is no secret that the game's openness to user-created mods also contributes to its ongoing success. Although mods were limited when Stardew Valley first came out, things have grown exponentially since then. Players can install mods that can do all sorts of things, from changing the game's graphics, adding additional characters and storylines and many more.
Lastly, ConcernedApe's commitment to Stardew Valley also allowed the game to evolve despite releasing half a decade ago. Among the many post-release contents ConcernedApe has released so far, the multiplayer mode is probably the most popular, given that it allowed multiple players to work on a single farm together.
Ever since Stardew Valley came out in 2016, the game has received widespread acclaim from players and critics, resulting in numerous awards, which is rare for an indie game. Given its huge success, Stardew Valley set the blueprint that other indie and farming simulator games continue to emulate today. One such game is Coral Island, which is an upcoming farming simulator game from developer Stairway Games.
For the uninitiated, Coral Island started making headlines when it was reported to have amassed over $1.6 million in Kickstarter in just 30 days. Starting at a funding goal of $70,000, backers saw the impressive graphics and familiar gameplay, which resulted in tens of thousands of other players to also give support to the project. Like Stardew Valley, Coral Island implements the basic mechanics of most farming sims: growing a farm and tending to animals while romancing villagers by giving them gifts. However, what sets Coral Island apart from Stardew Valley is its graphics, which are more similar to modern Story of Seasons games.
Apart from Coral Island, many other upcoming and released farming simulators have surfaced on various platforms, some of which were even criticized for blatantly copying Stardew Valley all together. In the end, the future of Stardew Valley looks bright, especially since ConcernedApe remains committed to releasing more updates to Stardew Valley. However, for players wondering whether another ConernedApe game that is not Stardew Valley is in the works, the developer recently hinted on Twitter that he is working on a new title. Unfortunately, details about this new project and what it would entail remains a mystery.
Stardew Valley is available now on Mobile, PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One.
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