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

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. ^_^