Stardew Valley, developed entirely by ConcernedApe (Eric Barone), is a Harvest Moon inspired country-life RPG. Spend your days farming, fishing, exploring, and forging relationships. Everything from the story to the music is meticulously designed, and comes together to create a perfectly nostalgic experience.

PREMISE

Your main objective in Stardew Valley is to live your life as a simple farmer. You’ll be accomplishing a number of tasks, like restoring your grandpa’s old farm, pursuing a love interest, or helping the village become prosperous again.

STORY

The story of Stardew Valley immerses you as soon as you begin. It starts out with a well-designed cutscene of your passing grandpa giving his farm to you in his will. It’s basically your grandpa’s dying wish that you take over the farm, and only the soulless could ignore such a heartfelt request. Trust me, you’ll spend the rest of the game trying to make your grandpa proud.

VISUALS

The visuals in Stardew Valley  take me straight back to playing Harvest Moon on the Nintendo64. ConcernedApe did an absolutely amazing job designing this game. The graphics are vibrant, constantly changing, and flawlessly nostalgic. Painstaking attention to detail abounds, from the subtle animations you notice while fishing and farming, to the nuanced changes that take place as the seasons change.

MUSIC

There is over two hours of completely unique music in Stardew Valley. Every season has its own playlist, which I thoroughly enjoyed. The music perfectly complements the visuals and style of the game and adds so much to the experiences you have during gameplay. I particularly liked the peaceful music playing while farming, fishing, and roaming around.

Overall, Stardew Valley is another amazing game that deserves five hammers out of five. I highly recommend checking it out for yourself.