Stardew Valley has managed to sell over 10 million copies - plus it's cheap right now

Be honest, how many hours have you put into this charming game?

If you must know, I've put 6.3 hours into it according to Steam. Massive numbers right there. :D

Be honest, how many hours have you put into this charming game?

207. ^_^ A bit over half of that's on my first, solo, farm, where I'm going for all the achievements I can reasonably get (still need a few recipes and artifacts and to get the last Stardrop, and beat Journey of the Prairie King), the rest is playing with a friend.

Um... was around 140+ last I looked... and I only got it in December. ^.^;;;

This game is ruining my life and I should feel more ashamed about it. ... And stop being tempted to look up mechanics guides. (mrph... how does the fortune telling work... is it a base luck indicator or a bonus/malus on your basic hidden luck stat...?)

Okay, who's got the best spouse and why? I can't talk because I chose Harvey. Nerdy, geeky, neurotic guys are a thing for me, but kind of hard to say he's "best guy" when there's loads of more (apparently) mentally adjusted people to pick from. :P

307 hours.

I'm in the middle of a new farm with a friend. I started playing on 2017 and I replay it from time to time with friends. Playing it alone is just not fun anymore.

My gf finally got a pc so we will play it together soon too.

This game is perfect. Eric is amazing.

Amusingly in hindsight, I chose Leah in my first solo game about two years ago; I say "amusingly" because, totally unsuspected by me at the time, I'd be taking up painting as a hobby IRL about 7 months later due to a chain of events that hadn't started yet. (Then, in her new 14-heart event from last month's update

Spoiler, click me

she teaches you to paint,

which I thought was both hilarious and adorable.)

I'm not entirely sure how luck works, but the fortune teller gives you an idea of how it'll be on any given day. It affects things like, e.g., the chance of finding a ladder each time you break a stone in the mines, or the average time between fishing strikes, that sort of thing. So you generally want to save your mine trips for high-luck days, for example.

Too many hours on Steam; and another, unknown number on my phone. Worse, it seems you can get it to run on the Pinebook Pro (it's a C# application) - nowhere is safe...

According to Steam I've got just shy of 500 hours on it, although that does include some degree of idling in the background while I did something else. So realistically, it's probably in the 400 - 450 range.

As to spouses, I've only married three. Leah is great all around, and probably my favourite so far. Maru is a surprisingly good mother, which is something she doesn't really hint at beforehand. Penny is...nice? She's a little too "perfect 50s housewife" for my taste really, but to a degree it makes sense for someone with her background to really want that kind of stability.

Nearly 200 hours, my most played game on Steam. I received it as a gift and loved it so much, I have purchased it 2 more times as gifts for others ^_^

As to spouses, I've only married three. Leah is great all around, and probably my favourite so far. Maru is a surprisingly good mother, which is something she doesn't really hint at beforehand. Penny is...nice? She's a little too "perfect 50s housewife" for my taste really, but to a degree it makes sense for someone with her background to really want that kind of stability.

I start being curious about this game... :S:
This does sound... complex?


Last edited by Eike on 24 January 2020 at 2:13 pm UTC

As to spouses, I've only married three. Leah is great all around, and probably my favourite so far. Maru is a surprisingly good mother, which is something she doesn't really hint at beforehand. Penny is...nice? She's a little too "perfect 50s housewife" for my taste really, but to a degree it makes sense for someone with her background to really want that kind of stability.

I start being curious about this game... :S:
This does sound... complex?

It's actually not all that complex really. Sure, there are ways to min-max things but that's not the point of the game. Farming is straightforward, crafting isn't complex and materials are generally pretty easy to get, and the friendship/romance system is maybe a little *too* simple (it's basically just giving people gifts a couple of times a week, and keeping tracks of what they like). Overall it's very chill, but there are loads of different things you can do if you feel like it.

I only have 23 hours in Steam. I launch the game outside of Steam as well, so I am not sure what my total hours are. Either way, plenty of fun time compared with the cost of the game. But the real kicker is my kids. My guess... gotta be around 100 hours for each of them. It would be more if we didn't limit their screen time.

10 million copies?! Holy shit. ^_^

Am sure I have several hundred hours of playtime in at least two longterm games. Lots of fun.

I do tend to get a bit jaded after around 3 years when I'm rolling in money, but Skull Cavern is a nice distraction. I liked the recent introduction of fish ponds too. Not big money makers, but they look nice.


There is something to be said for safe environments for you children too :)



Last edited by Pangaea on 24 January 2020 at 4:23 pm UTC

I have not really played it myself, but my twin brother's girlfriend does, and has showed me some of the game. As someone who actually plies his trade as a farm labourer and a rancher himself I can't help but laugh at it though. Accuracy was never the point of the game, so I am not trying to slight it by saying this, but I suppose some of the magic is lost when you actually know what it is you are supposed to be doing.

It is little things like how she installed Mayonnaise Machines inside her chicken coop to save on walking, which makes perfect sense given the logic of the game, but would crash badly in reality when you get shut down by the local food inspector for health violations. Or how she has to go water her plants every day but for some bizarre reason never has to weed them. Or how she never needs to muck out her coops and barns. Or how you only raise pigs to find truffles.

I could go on, but you get the point. Again, as a charming diversion for those who can appreciate it the game succeeds marvellously and that is all that really matters. It just makes me laugh. When I first met my oldest friend of eleven years she even went as far as to ask me if my life was just like Harvest Moon. Seeing as how I have yet to be offered my own personal choice of love interests, I would have to say no. :P


Last edited by Hamish on 25 January 2020 at 3:28 am UTC

True, it's pretty simplistic in terms of actual real-life farming -- but I'm glad it is. Otherwise it would have been boring as hell, and feel more like actual work than it already does (sprinklers help a lot!). But on that note, I've seen pictures of those basically automatic tractors that drive up and down gigantic fields, with a farmer inside playing Stardew Valley. That was pretty funny I thought.

Having grown up on a small family ranch, I actually avoided Stardew Valley for almost two years after it came out for similar reasons. I've been hauled out of bed in the middle of cold, rainy, winter nights because "The animals escaped again!" enough times that I didn't find Stardew Valley's well-trained animals who return to their buildings at the end of a day (or who politely don't eat your delicious crops!) very amusing. (I've also manually dug enough fence post holes to last at least six lifetimes, so I really appreciate when your spouse gets up and fixes all the fences before dawn! :D)

When I finally picked it up, however, I realized that, for all that it's nothing like real farming, it does manage to capture the spirit of some aspects of farming like that warm feeling from giving friends your own home-grown crops and eggs. ^_^