This 12 months’s Stardew Valley 1.6 replace offered a large number of issues to the smash-hit indie recreation, together with frogs, wasteland fairs, and inexperienced rain. That is all very thrilling, however one thing else arrived with the most recent replace that probably turns the sport on its head. In the most recent model of Stardew Valley, you’ll pay for perfection.
For individuals who don’t know, Stardew Valley has a perfection ranking, and should you get to 100%, you release a last cutscene to spherical out the sport. To get there, you wish to have to craft the whole lot, befriend everybody, in finding all the ones pesky golden walnuts and Stardrops, and typically end each and every process the sport throws at you. That seems like a large number of effort, and I will let you know, as any person who’s accomplished it prior to, it’s. So, I assumed, what if I simply bypassed all of it and finished the sport whilst doing as low as imaginable? What if I paid for perfection?
This would possibly now not appear to be this kind of crime to the uninitiated, however as any person who’s liked Stardew Valley for years, it feels adore it may well be the worst factor I’ve ever accomplished. You spot, this recreation gifts you with a somewhat binary selection proper from the outset: you’ll repair the group heart and convey Pelican The city again to lifestyles by means of running along the paranormal Junimos, or you’ll give in to the nice beast of capitalism and signal as much as the Joja Company – suppose Amazon or Walmart – to show the dilapidated heart right into a Joja warehouse along Morris, the native JojaMart supervisor. In all my years, I’ve now not as soon as opted for the latter possibility.
It’s simply now not the accomplished factor. To finish the group heart, the sport forces you to take a look at new issues: fishing, mining, or foraging uncommon pieces. In the event you cross the Joja path, all you need to do is make sufficient cash to give a contribution to Joja, and you’ll do this just by rising probably the most profitable plants and not speaking to a soul in Pelican The city out of doors of Pierre, who is nearly depressingly unaware that your movements are contributing to the expansion of his greatest rival. It turns a recreation that’s necessarily a birthday celebration of anti-capitalist beliefs into one thing that will make Jeff Bezos grin with satisfaction from atop his ivory tower.
In spite of my herbal inclination to strengthen Pierre, Mayor Lewis, and the remainder of the Stardew Valley characters, I assumed that I’d give the brand new path to perfection a cross, simply to peer the way it made me really feel. I feel I already knew the solution to that query, however within the identify of science, I began a brand new save, skipped via the entire heat fuzzies about the way you in finding your strategy to Grandpa’s farm, and were given to earning profits. Thus my disheartening quest had begun.
The early a part of the Joja perfection path is beautiful simple. All you need to do is make 135kgold to finish the entire Joja Group Building Initiatives, which in flip fixes the native bus, the quarry bridge, the minecart device, and your farm greenhouse whilst additionally demolishing an obstruction within the river that lets you pan for treasure. Then comes the primary demoralizing cutscene. As soon as the whole lot is completed, you sign up for Morris to have a good time the of completion of the garage facility. Particularly, nobody else from the city is provide.
Already at this level, I felt some way I’d by no means felt prior to whilst enjoying Stardew. I felt somewhat like a traitor. As I make beautiful transparent in my Stardew Valley evaluation, this recreation manner a really perfect deal to me, and I’ve identified characters like Gus, the native barman, and Clint, the lonely blacksmith, longer than I’ve a few of my closest buddies. So, to show my again on them and have a good time the outlet of the warehouse along Morris and his Joja lackeys felt like a betrayal. Sadly, this was once simplest the start, and it was once simplest going to get more difficult from right here on in.
The next move concerned attending to Ginger Island. The tropical island, which arrived as a part of the 1.5 replace, is a large deal within the Joja run because it holds the 2 ultimate items of the puzzle. First is the Golden Joja Parrot. Typically, you’d have to assemble 100 golden walnuts to release Mr. Qi’s Walnut Room, the place you’ll monitor your perfection ranking prior to discovering the general 30. Alternatively, because of the Golden Joja Parrot, you’ll merely quit 10k gold for each and every walnut you don’t have, and the chicken delivers them in a single day. So, after spending neatly over a million gold, I had the entire walnuts.
Then it was once time to fulfill my ultimate companion and Joja Particular Products and services Department consultant, Fizz. While you’ve unlocked Mr. Qi’s Walnut Room, you get a letter from Fizz, who asks that you simply seek advice from him in Ginger Island’s watery cave. That is the place the magic occurs. For 500k gold, Fizz can build up your perfection ranking by means of 1%. Unsurprisingly, I used to be simplest at 4% of completion after I first met the shady Joja rep, which means I’d wish to put in combination 48 million gold to transparent the general hurdle.
So, I went business. I used the entire loose land at the Ginger Island farm and within the greenhouse to develop Starfruit, probably the most profitable in-game crop, and toiled for a number of seasons to make it occur. It wasn’t as labor-intensive because the early a part of the run, as I had the assets to craft numerous sprinklers, but it surely was once uninteresting. The regimen consisted of planting loads of Starfruit plants prior to dozing for 13 days, harvesting, and repeating. I can have most probably accomplished it faster, however the thrilling a part of this experiment was once necessarily over by means of this level.
After weeks of in-game dozing, it was once accomplished. I trotted alongside to Fizz, passed over the 48 million, and I went again to mattress. The following day, I strolled down Ginger Island’s seaside for the ultimate time, now not even bothering to drag my sprinklers out of the bottom, and I checked the perfection tracker. 100%. After all. All that was once left to do was once go back to Pelican The city, head north, and step as much as the summit, the name of the game space of the sport simplest noticed by means of fellow perfectionists and people who’ve spoiled it for themselves on YouTube.
So, how did I believe stepping as much as the summit to look at Stardew’s fabled 100% perfection cutscene? Unsurprisingly, I didn’t really feel just right, now not just right in any respect. Worse nonetheless the sport blatantly calls you out for taking the Joja path all the way through the general moments, rubbing salt within the metaphorical wound. I’d technically accomplished one thing, positive, but it surely felt hole. For hours, I simply farmed and farmed and farmed, ignoring nearly the whole lot that makes the sport considered one of my all-time favorites and turning it into one thing altogether extra monotonous and soul-sapping.
Nonetheless, whilst reaching perfection this fashion made me really feel not anything just right, it was once just for a second. Following the large disclose of the general cutscene, I merely returned to the name. From there, I jumped again into the save document the place I’ve a farm stuffed with lovable animals, the place I’ve made a house in Pelican The city for Pam to rebuild her lifestyles, or even my Stardew Valley youngsters, who, admittedly, I hadn’t overlooked all that a lot, but it surely’s great to grasp they’re there. Sure, taking the Joja path to perfection has given me a rejuvenated appreciation for the whole lot Stardew Valley can also be and what it manner to me.
In the end, I will perceive why ConcernedApe made it imaginable to succeed in perfection this fashion. It really works against the overarching message of Stardew Valley, and I guess a undeniable view of learn how to reside your lifestyles: doing issues the exhausting method, however the way in which that feels proper, is nearly at all times extra rewarding than the extra handy selection. With one path, you be told some classes alongside the way in which, make some buddies, and would possibly even discover a sense of group, with the opposite, you sleep, paintings, and that’s about it. Additionally, with the latter, your simplest actual pal is Morris; let’s be fair, we hate Morris.
So, if you wish to have my recommendation, don’t pay for perfection in Stardew Valley. Whether or not ConcernedApe supposed the mechanic to provide the philosophical catch 22 situation I’ve interpreted it as or simply to provide the ones determined to finish the sport an out isn’t transparent, and I don’t know him so I will’t ask. Both method, it’s now not value it. It makes me recall to mind that drained outdated cliche, about how the actual treasure is the buddies we make alongside the way in which, however on this example, it’s in fact true. And who needs to be buddies with Morris?
There you’ve got it, my revel in with paying for perfection in Stardew Valley. In the event you’re in search of extra video games just like the indie farming hit to play, be certain to try our guides to the most efficient comfortable video games and the easiest video games like Stardew Valley whilst you’re right here. Or, should you’re in search of a console the place you’ll check out some Stardew Valley mods, see our checklist of the most efficient Steam Deck possible choices.
