Stardew Valley (PC) Revisited
Jul. 9th, 2018 10:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroI have a zillion games, including five on a brand-new system. So what do I do? I play another full play-through of Stardew Valley. Duela took over her grandfather’s farm and made an impressive go at it.
Though I managed to finish the Community Center plotline in around the same playtime as last time (and at the same point in the year—mid-summer, when I finally had some gold-star melons to finish the Quality Crops bundle), this time I actually paid attention to the social aspects of the game and started working on giving gifts and making friends. Linus was my first five-star friend, because he likes blackberries and I got a ton of them early on. Then I figured out that Pam likes them too, and she was actually my first ten-star friend. I used the wiki to determine everybody’s preferences and then made a game of setting up for the best birthday presents ever. (And a gold-star “loved” birthday gift can jump you three stars of affection with someone!) This also meant I saw a fair number of friendship scenes, which I hadn’t last time; and I also got a lot of recipes in the mail.
(Upon reflection, I think one of my biggest complaints about the cooking system in this game—and I typically love cooking systems—is that most of the recipes require either watching TV on the right night, or playing the social game with everyone. There’s no guessing or experimentation, just recipes as prizes that you then have to gather more crops/fish/forage to make. And my unwillingness to constantly hike to the desert to give gifts to Sandy keeps me from getting all the recipes!)
Though there was briefly some competition, I opted to date and marry Leah, who set up her sculpture studio in our home and who I lavished with goat cheese and wine. (Pragmatism: Marry someone whose favored gifts are something you’re good at making.) We married in late summer of Year 2 and eventually adopted two kids.
As before, I built a coop early but put off building a barn until the second spring; and though I planted larger gardens than last time I still made my fortune in mayonnaise, cheese and eventually truffle oil. I found there wasn’t a significant difference in selling the iriduim-star truffles straight versus turning them into oil, so I stopped processing them in later months. The end-game big moneymaker is Starfruit: Buy seeds in the desert, grow it in the greenhouse, use kegs to make wine and then age it in your basement.
I basically stopped playing after I unlocked the greenhouse last time, so I didn’t realize how broken it is: You can plant the perpetual crops (like blueberries, tomatoes and peppers), set up iridium sprinklers to cover them all, and just rake in the produce. I also ringed the outside with fruit trees. I bought the sprinklers from Krobus in the sewers on Fridays, as I was always struggling to find any iridium ore. The skull cave is really hard, even compared to the 100+ levels of the mine! (I also wonder if I just didn’t spend nearly enough timing mining / fighting. Even after I’d long maxed the other three skills, I was still struggling to get mining and combat up to level 9.)
Random thoughts of things I’d change: The mill should be a craftable device, not a building, so making your own flour and sugar was actually a worthwhile choice. The existence of rabbits makes sheep redundant, especially since you don’t need shears to get rabbit wool—maybe they need to produce a unique good?
I eventually “ended” this play through when I had 78% of the trophies—I was still three recipes short of all of them (but wasn’t willing to play two more seasons to get the last few ingredients), three artifacts short of a full set (but that’s praying to the Random Number God to complete), and four crafting recipes short of all of them (again, I needed two seasons worth of ingredients and a randomly-dropped artifact to finish). If I’d planned better, I could have finished several of the achievements much earlier.
Overall: Man, this game is addictive. I think I might have a spare key if anyone wants it.
Though I managed to finish the Community Center plotline in around the same playtime as last time (and at the same point in the year—mid-summer, when I finally had some gold-star melons to finish the Quality Crops bundle), this time I actually paid attention to the social aspects of the game and started working on giving gifts and making friends. Linus was my first five-star friend, because he likes blackberries and I got a ton of them early on. Then I figured out that Pam likes them too, and she was actually my first ten-star friend. I used the wiki to determine everybody’s preferences and then made a game of setting up for the best birthday presents ever. (And a gold-star “loved” birthday gift can jump you three stars of affection with someone!) This also meant I saw a fair number of friendship scenes, which I hadn’t last time; and I also got a lot of recipes in the mail.
(Upon reflection, I think one of my biggest complaints about the cooking system in this game—and I typically love cooking systems—is that most of the recipes require either watching TV on the right night, or playing the social game with everyone. There’s no guessing or experimentation, just recipes as prizes that you then have to gather more crops/fish/forage to make. And my unwillingness to constantly hike to the desert to give gifts to Sandy keeps me from getting all the recipes!)
Though there was briefly some competition, I opted to date and marry Leah, who set up her sculpture studio in our home and who I lavished with goat cheese and wine. (Pragmatism: Marry someone whose favored gifts are something you’re good at making.) We married in late summer of Year 2 and eventually adopted two kids.
As before, I built a coop early but put off building a barn until the second spring; and though I planted larger gardens than last time I still made my fortune in mayonnaise, cheese and eventually truffle oil. I found there wasn’t a significant difference in selling the iriduim-star truffles straight versus turning them into oil, so I stopped processing them in later months. The end-game big moneymaker is Starfruit: Buy seeds in the desert, grow it in the greenhouse, use kegs to make wine and then age it in your basement.
I basically stopped playing after I unlocked the greenhouse last time, so I didn’t realize how broken it is: You can plant the perpetual crops (like blueberries, tomatoes and peppers), set up iridium sprinklers to cover them all, and just rake in the produce. I also ringed the outside with fruit trees. I bought the sprinklers from Krobus in the sewers on Fridays, as I was always struggling to find any iridium ore. The skull cave is really hard, even compared to the 100+ levels of the mine! (I also wonder if I just didn’t spend nearly enough timing mining / fighting. Even after I’d long maxed the other three skills, I was still struggling to get mining and combat up to level 9.)
Random thoughts of things I’d change: The mill should be a craftable device, not a building, so making your own flour and sugar was actually a worthwhile choice. The existence of rabbits makes sheep redundant, especially since you don’t need shears to get rabbit wool—maybe they need to produce a unique good?
I eventually “ended” this play through when I had 78% of the trophies—I was still three recipes short of all of them (but wasn’t willing to play two more seasons to get the last few ingredients), three artifacts short of a full set (but that’s praying to the Random Number God to complete), and four crafting recipes short of all of them (again, I needed two seasons worth of ingredients and a randomly-dropped artifact to finish). If I’d planned better, I could have finished several of the achievements much earlier.
Overall: Man, this game is addictive. I think I might have a spare key if anyone wants it.
no subject
Date: 2018-07-18 11:54 pm (UTC)