As a Mac Gamer, I came to Stardew Valley a little late, though I had been following the excitement from my PC friends for what seemed like the amount of time it takes to delve all the way to the bottom of the mine.
Now that I’ve gotten my fingers green, so to speak, I can’t help but feel that we’ve all been playing the game wrong. Tomorrow is Halloween but it’s the middle of Spring in Stardew Valley! The incongruity alone leaves me convulsing on the floor. Stardew Valley is seasonal, so our playstyle should be seasonal too!
Here is what I propose: Only play Stardew Valley when you’re in the correct season. Limit yourself one day in-game per day in real life. Now you have twenty eight in game days a season, but a season in our world is roughly ninety days, so you just have to find 28 days for a little vacation in Stardew per 90 days of crushing life. You could play every third day as a reliable pick-me-up, or pop your days at random whenever you feel some farm work would do you good.
Next step is to make sure your Stardew Holidays are aligning with our arguably less inspired versions. So when Dec. 25 hits, you will have the joy Christmas (if you celebrate it) AND the thrill of the feast of Winterstar (which we all can celebrate).
Think of everything that will be improved by this method. Now when you’re choosing someone to marry, no one can say it is a rushed decision because you’ve known them for years of real time. Now when you decide to put up that big barn, you’ll know the perfect place because you started dreaming about it since your freshman year of college and now you’re graduating. The ebbs and flows of quiet farming life isn’t something that we should play for every waking hour for three weeks straight until we burn out—not that your humble author did that mind you! It is something that should carry with us as a source of serenity year after year. The small light at the end of our long day grinding away at our own private Joja Corp.
If you don’t play this way, you’re wrong.
