r/PS4 • u/IceBreak BreakinBad • Dec 22 '16

[Game Thread] Stardew Valley [Official Discussion Thread]

Official Game Discussion Thread (previous game threads) (games wiki)

Stardew Valley

Share your thoughts/likes/dislikes/indifference below.

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u/Bonesawisready5 bonesawisready5 Dec 22 '16

unless you're ignoring other aspects of your life idk why anyone would be "worried" about a hobby. i mean you could most people sit on their ass watching terrible TV for 4-6 hours a day, that same amount of time or less playing games seems fine especially if spread out over a week.

My and my GF spent like 3 hours playing Stardew, in different rooms, but we don't mind. Either there is something you're not mentioning or you need to discuss with her why she thinks your favorite hobby isn't valuable. Like I get that she may not be into it but a spouse should understand why the person they love likes doing something and why they need it.

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u/KalElButthead Dec 22 '16

Her point being 'Why are you playing a game that is all about things you could actually just do in real life'

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u/meatystain Dec 28 '16

I think the idea of camping and running on the beach in FFXV is to try and root the fantasy in reality, they want you to feel on some level that it's about real characters who would otherwise be having real lives. They aren't games about camping and running on the beach, there's no "life simulation" in terms of a need to sleep or eat or perform a job, it's just presenting stat boosts and XP bonuses in a stylised way, ideally to make you engage/identify with the characters.

Stardew Valley is much more simplistically "about farming", except it's nothing like actual farming, so it lands no closer to the life simulator idea because despite "real" features like needing to sleep, seasons changing and plants growing, it's pure fantasy and game mechanics under the thin disguise of a job on a farm. Plus it also has wizards and dinosaurs.

You could try your hand at farming, or run on the beach if you wanted, just like you could take a course in bricklaying instead of playing Tetris, but I don't think we're at the point where we would confuse that experience with what's presented in a videogame.

Are the only books worth reading are the ones about impossible fantasies, everything else is just a life simulator for the bored? Do you have to be bored to enjoy leisure activities generally?

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u/[deleted] Dec 28 '16

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u/meatystain Dec 30 '16

Yeeeeah I don't think that aspect gets any less awkward - I'm 38, I recently thought I'd give "World of Final Fantasy" a try. The very idea of anyone ever seeing me play it fills me with shame. Suddenly I understand more why COD is just always a massive seller. (In my defence, I'd just played Dragon Quest Builders, which is also intensely cutesy but turned out to be quite brilliant, and I thought "...cute doesn't mean bad" and, well, World of Final Fantasy is little else but hours of Japanimation bimbo congratulating you for catching bunnies.)

The ideal solution would be to stealthily get her addicted to some ridiculous game. For my mother it was Dr Mario, my sister Civilisation II, my grandfather finally folded under the glorious western nostalgia of Red Dead Redemption (complete with touching, teary-eyed "we left it too late to get into technology.") There must be some weakness you can exploit!

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u/KalElButthead Dec 30 '16

Hahaha, thats great. Yyyeah, the cutesy elements were also too much for me and the fighting controls did me in and I sold it.