Stardew Valley (Nintendo Switch)

You’re going to love this!

I waited a couple days before writing this review because I wanted to explore as much as possible before reviewing. I think I’ve already clocked in about 40+ hours of game play and I’ve had it for less than a week. I’m already in fall of year one and I think I’m obsessed. I like games that let you explore and this game is so vast. It’s actually almost overwhelming at first, how large and sprawling the game map is, and I remember definitely feeling that there’s a major learning curve.

Right from the title screen, I knew this game would be something special. It really allows you to customize your character in depth, from clothes to hair, and you can go feminine, masculine, or androgynous (although there are only two gender options to choose from). You also get to pick cat or dog and where you want your farm to be (there’s a farm surrounded by water for fishing, a farm where monsters come out at night, a farm in the forest for foraging, etc.). It’s also structured a little bit like an RPG in that you can tune your character towards certain attributes as you level up by making choices.

If you’re familiar with SoS or Harvest Moon, you’ll know the plot. You inherit a farm in a town where people are working through emotional issues (poorly) and there is some sort of supernatural element at play. Here, there’s the added bonus of an antagonist in the form of a Big Box Store who wants to bulldoze over the old community center and basically drive all the small business owners out of business. #rude

So here are some of the things that I think are neat. As with SoS: Friends of Mineral Town, this game allows you to be married to people of the same gender. As with Rune Factory, you can fight monsters and get drops. As with Animal Crossing, there’s a museum you can donate to and you can decorate the whole town (I may have screamed). As with all of those games, there are crops and plants that grow on a seasonal rotation, which you can use for recipes or crafts.

The game is designed in a kind of old-fashioned looking way, with little sprites that remind me of Gameboy Advance games. I really like the look and luckily the music doesn’t sound like an old MIDI file. In fact, I love the music a lot. It’s really pretty, almost orchestral, in a way that reminds me of RF4. I particularly like the autumn songs, they’re so haunting and lovely.

I really like how the game is structured and how you unlock new achievements and recipes virtually every day, so it never feels stale. You can do odd jobs and favors for the townsfolk and unlock cut scenes as you get to know them better. They also have likes and dislikes that they are pretty vocal about. I joked that it’s like if the characters in Harvest Moon were all a bunch of moody introverts, but you know what they say about jokes… They’re funny because they’re true. I have to admit that for a while, I was a little skeptical about Stardew. It seemed like just another farming clone. But man, I really get the hype now. I really do.