Stardew Valley is celebrating its 10-year anniversary right this moment, February 26, 2025. Beneath, we study the way it has remained the chief in a style it helped to revive.
A decade in the past this month, indie developer Eric Barone, higher often called ConcernedApe, launched his debut recreation: a farm and life sim referred to as Stardew Valley. Closely impressed by the Harvest Moon sequence, Stardew Valley offers gamers an idyllic sandbox to develop crops, combat slimes, and work together with a pair dozen NPCs. The recreation was a direct hit, promoting 1 million copies after solely a pair months, and it impressed a wave of cozy farming sims which have dominated the indie gaming scene since. Now, 10 years later, the undisputed finest recreation on this huge style is … Stardew Valley.
PUBG sparked the battle-royale craze earlier than the throne was firmly usurped by Fortnite. Deadly Firm innovated with its extraction-based gameplay, solely to be improved upon by REPO and Arc Raiders. Hand of Destiny gave strategy to Slay the Spire and Balatro. But after a decade of worthy title challengers, from Coral Island to Solar Haven, Stardew has retained its farming-sim superiority, topping each the critics’ lists and gross sales charts, and transport a bounty of a minimum of 50 million copies. It has spawned cookbooks, technique guides, a board recreation, and two live performance excursions. It’s playable on the whole lot from Linux to Teslas. Its attraction stretches past the bounds of normal players: I do know loads of folks whose solely recreation of their Steam account is Stardew. It’s a exceptional story of resilience, however what makes Stardew so particular?
One motive gamers proceed to flock to Pelican City is the constant stream of great updates ConcernedApe offers. Barone added new farms, marriage candidates, buildings, fish, animals, gadgets, occasions, islands, and extra. Huge numbered updates initially rolled out roughly yearly: 1.1 in 2016 introduced new farms and recipes; 1.2 added translations in 2017; 1.3 added multiplayer, the Night time Market, and extra cutscenes in 2018. The charge of updates slowed down barely, particularly after Barone introduced his hotly anticipated, hardly ever seen second title, Haunted Chocolatier, however they grew in measurement and scope, resulting in huge bundles of content material like essentially the most ripe harvest. The whole phrase rely of all Stardew updates exceeds Of Mice & Males by an honest margin. There’s nonetheless no signal of a Stardew sundown. 2024’s 1.6 replace added a DLC-sized space in Ginger Island, with a 1.7 replace on the best way: ConcernedApe has already confirmed there shall be new marriage candidates (I’m hoping for the lovable previous salt, Willy). Barone attributes his decade-long dedication to the sport’s lasting reputation, reaching heights that make it “exhausting to simply cease bettering it when there are nonetheless issues that may be improved”. Whereas a small workforce has been aiding ConcernedApe for the reason that 1.3 replace, he nonetheless handles everything of sure departments of growth, together with music, because it’s essential to “keep a full connection” to the sport.
If, in some way, these huge updates weren’t sufficient to maintain the sport fresh–a massively undeserved label, given Barone might have simply charged an additional 10 bucks for Ginger Island alone–the recreation has developed a substantial modding group, with huge initiatives like Stardew Valley Expanded including much more places and almost doubling the variety of NPCs, and Downtown Zuzu, which provides the oft-mentioned, seldom-visited metropolis as an explorable location. SVE has reached over 3 million downloads, which might be dream numbers for some other indie recreation, additional displaying what a behemoth Stardew has grow to be within the gaming scene.
However Stardew isn’t the one recreation with years of updates, or a energetic modding group. What actually makes this title one of many kings of indie gaming, is that in spite of everything this time, Stardew remains to be Stardew. With each replace, tweak, and addition, ConcernedApe averted altering every bit of his masterpiece till it was unrecognizable: a Valley of Theseus bloated into one thing unfamiliar and unimproved. The gameplay loop remains to be as informal or difficult as every farmer desires. You possibly can select to wander across the forest and decide daffodils to your spouse all day, or you possibly can optimize your loadout to combat these rattling serpents within the decrease ranges of the Cranium Cavern. You possibly can dedicate your self to adorning the city sq. each season, or you possibly can run an Historic Fruit wine empire that turns Pelican City right into a multi-million industrial powerhouse. The characters and storylines nonetheless belie the saccharine visuals and chirpy soundtrack.
Stardew has by no means been afraid to sort out concepts like alcoholism, despair, adultery, and PTSD, which supplies the city residents depth past their pixels. You begin to present Shane pepper poppers as an alternative of beer, though there’s no precise profit to doing so. You fortunately spend cash and sources changing Pam’s trailer right into a home, and also you aspect with the city towards the megacorp JojaMart, though Pierre the shopkeeper is a little bit of a jerk. These are our associates, and we get to know them somewhat higher with each playthrough and each replace. The world can be riddled with secrets–so many who it’s nearly not possible to return throughout all of them naturally. I’ve had many conversations on learn how to get the perfect hidden weapons, or all of the enjoyable issues you are able to do with the mayor’s underwear.
ConcernedApe insists that Haunted Chocolatier is one thing new, and never a Stardewsequel, which is sensible: Stardewis its personal sequel. He has discovered a strategy to assemble a ravishing sandbox and add extra toys with out altering how the shovel and pail work. For all of the pretenders to the farming-sim throne, each valiant and forgettable, none have really pushed the style far sufficient to entice everybody to desert this continuously bettering, already-incredible juggernaut that retains us coming again for another day, another save. We’ll maintain taking part in Stardewfor one other 10 years if it stays recent and improved, and figuring out ConcernedApe, something is feasible.