I have tried playing Stardew Valley three times in my life. Every single time, I went into it hoping it would captivate me like it did to so many others. I tried playing it with my partner as well as on my own, gave it multiple sessions, but I cannot for the life of me get into this game.
The main gameplay element that makes Stardew Valley so hard for me to enjoy, is that it is agonizingly slow to me. From the actions your character can perform to the item collection and gifting systems: the game made me feel impatient. What could contribute to this, is the fact that most other farming simulators/sandbox games I have played allowed you to quickly speed up the gameplay through certain game mechanics or skillful actions, especially at the start of the game. However, Stardew does this differently. The game introduces you to a vast world to explore, but not that many things to do at first. Yes, you can harvest some debris, plant a few seeds and catch a few fish, but you will be doing so for 2 ingame weeks with barely any progress except a bigger backpack. And, the game has a speed limit (walking, watering, harvesting, etc.) that is inexceedable at the start, even though I longed to do so every minute playing it.
Next to that, the energy and day/night mechanics of this game are just a needless constraint to me. Why do I need to get in bed before a certain time to avoid losing items? If I need to be at the other side of the village for whatever reason, why do I need to stress out getting back to bed in time? To me, this just accomplishes the opposite of how people describe this game: relaxing and carefree.
Lastly, I did not connect to the characters of Stardew Valley. Now, I realise this might be the case due to my small amount of playtime, but these characters felt pretty bland to me. More importantly, the "quests" offered by the people in town are mostly fetch quests and "give gift every day" quests. It just wasn't interesting to me in the slightest.
I recognise Stardew Valley is a comfort game to many people. I also recognise that it is quite impressive for one developer to make a game like this. It truly is a work of art. So, my final verdict will be that it is just not for me, even though I think it is a beautiful game. Hopefully, future updates and games made by ConcernedApe will pull in as much joy as Stardew has until now, because that is what video games should strive to do.
The main gameplay element that makes Stardew Valley so hard for me to enjoy, is that it is agonizingly slow to me. From the actions your character can perform to the item collection and gifting systems: the game made me feel impatient. What could contribute to this, is the fact that most other farming simulators/sandbox games I have played allowed you to quickly speed up the gameplay through certain game mechanics or skillful actions, especially at the start of the game. However, Stardew does this differently. The game introduces you to a vast world to explore, but not that many things to do at first. Yes, you can harvest some debris, plant a few seeds and catch a few fish, but you will be doing so for 2 ingame weeks with barely any progress except a bigger backpack. And, the game has a speed limit (walking, watering, harvesting, etc.) that is inexceedable at the start, even though I longed to do so every minute playing it.
Next to that, the energy and day/night mechanics of this game are just a needless constraint to me. Why do I need to get in bed before a certain time to avoid losing items? If I need to be at the other side of the village for whatever reason, why do I need to stress out getting back to bed in time? To me, this just accomplishes the opposite of how people describe this game: relaxing and carefree.
Lastly, I did not connect to the characters of Stardew Valley. Now, I realise this might be the case due to my small amount of playtime, but these characters felt pretty bland to me. More importantly, the "quests" offered by the people in town are mostly fetch quests and "give gift every day" quests. It just wasn't interesting to me in the slightest.
I recognise Stardew Valley is a comfort game to many people. I also recognise that it is quite impressive for one developer to make a game like this. It truly is a work of art. So, my final verdict will be that it is just not for me, even though I think it is a beautiful game. Hopefully, future updates and games made by ConcernedApe will pull in as much joy as Stardew has until now, because that is what video games should strive to do.
imshitting420
5 months ago