Stardew Valley- The Best Game for a busy dad?

Game	Game Name
Platforms	PS5, Switch, Pc etc
Genre	Horror, Cozy gaming etc
Price	$14.99 USD example
Completion Time	150+ Hours
Best For	Dads who want to relax

Category	Score
Short Session Play	10/10
Long Session Play	7/10
Story/Narative	6/10
Relaxing Factor	5/10
Pick Up and Put Down	9/10
Variety	8/10
Polish	0/10
Completionist Score	2/10
Value for Money	6/10

On the surface, Stardew Valley is a simple cozy farming game. You spend your days tending to crops and animals, going fishing, exploring the mines for resources, or interacting with the locals. But as you play you will discover a richness and depth that’s hard to match in todays gaming environment.

You will watch as your farm slowly grows from a messy patch of land into something personal, profitable, and entirely yours. You can focus on planting seasonal crops, building barns and coops for various farm animals, or spend days decorating your farm. Some players opt to go even further and create wineries, orchards, breweries and even creameries. You can even turn your farm into a mass exporter of coffee if you wish.

Stardew Valley is a game that makes no big demands of the player. You can sit down for a single day, solely focused on sprucing up your farm. Or you can be as efficient as possible and work to the very last minute, diving deeper in the mines. That’s why Stardew shines for a busy parent.

Short Session Play

Stardew Valley is one of the best games on the market if you only have 15-30 minutes to play. Each in game day last 14-18 minutes, with pauses for fishing and while in menus. This allows for a natural stopping point if you wish. While it may not sound like much time, you will be surprised just how much you can get done.

Every day there are new micro task that make you feel like you’ve accomplished something. A day may consist of you waking up to water your crops and tend to your animals. Then you might spend the rest of your day either fishing or exploring the mines for resources, or maybe even foraging for wood and seasonal items. You might then cap the day off by heading to the saloon to socialise and gain friendship points with the villagers.

Long Session Play

Stardew is one of those games that has you saying ‘one more day’. With an endless amount of jobs to be done, it’s easy to let a day turn into an week.

It’s especially easy with the changing of seasons to keep momentum going. Every 28 in-game days, the season will change, introducing new crops, new fish, and other seasonal events. It’s easy to get caught up at the start of a season, organising your farm for the latest crops, or spending entire days fishing for seasonal fish. Likewise, the end of a season tempts you to play extra days to get yourself sorted for the coming season.

You will also find the game introduces bigger task as you progress. For example, once you reach the bottom of the mines, a new area is unlocked, with new resources and monsters to face. There is also the first major objective, restoring the community centre, that will keep you hooked. More on the community centre later.

Story/ Narrative

While Stardew Valley’s Narrative isn’t its core component, it still a surprising amount of heart and depth to it. You drive the story by building relationships with ‘Pelican Town’s’ residents, each with their own background and unique personality.

When you invest some time into talking to a resident and giving them gifts they like, they will eventually begin opening up to you in the form of ‘Heart Events’. You will see a cutscene where you will learn more about them in a deeper way. Your bond with them will grow, and they will also send you recipes and useful items in the mail.

There are also a few bachelors and bachelorettes in Pelican Town. After reaching certain friendship levels, you can begin dating, and eventually marry them. They will then move in with you, adding a cozy sense of progression and making the farm feel more alive over time.

The community also comes together for different events throughout the year. From Easter in the spring, to ‘The Feast of the Winter Star’ in winter, the celebrations add warmth and comfort to Pelican Town. They also give the player a much needed break from the daily chores on the farm.

Relaxing Factor

Stardew Valley is one of the most relaxing games in the cozy genre. The controls are simple and easy to learn, while the warm pixel art and soundtrack make it a very easy game to settle into after a long day.

A big reason for this is the freedom the game gives the player. There is still challenge and progression throughout the game e.g.. exploring deeper levels of the mines or unlocking later content. Even so, you are never forced to do anything. There is also plenty of tools, items and food buffs the player can use to make everything much more manageable.

Stardew Valley is as relaxing or as demanding as you want it to be. Some players will naturally play more efficiently and progress faster. Others will prefer taking things slowly and enjoying each day as it comes. Neither approach feels wrong, and the game never pressures you into playing a certain way.

Pick Up and Put Down

Stardew Valley is easy to jump back into after a break and easy to stop playing when life gets in the way. The controls are simple to relearn, and every day begins the same way with your character waking up at home.

The day cycle also creates a natural stopping point. Once your character goes to bed, the day ends and the game saves. This works especially well for shorter sessions. If you only have 20–30 minutes before bed or before work, you can comfortably play through a single in-game day and stop there without feeling like you are leaving things unfinished.

The biggest issue comes after taking a longer break from the game. It can be difficult to remember what tasks you had planned for the next day, or what you had just finished working on. You can make this easier by keeping a gaming journal, or by following my Dad Tip below.

Variety

There is an impressive amount of variety in Stardew Valley. While it is at its core a farming game, you can also fish, forage, go mining, and fight monsters. These activities also have multiple items and task related to it. There are various crops to plant, fish to discover, and unique monsters to slay.

Each activity also feeds into another system. Crops can be turned into recipes that provide useful buffs. Ore and monster loot can be used to craft machines, tools, and farm equipment. Those crafted items then help you gather resources faster or unlock more options for progression. The game constantly gives you new goals to work towards without making it feel overwhelming.

The amount of decoration and customization is also impressive. There are hundreds of items for both the interior and exterior of your farm, allowing you to shape the space into something personal. You can even unlock a sewing machine that lets you create clothing by combining cloth with different items you find throughout the game.

Stardew Valley also has a wide range of quests that encourages you to engage with every skill the game offers. You may need to catch a rare fish or grow a specific crop to progress.

There is so much to do in Stardew Valley that it is easy to spend hundreds of hours playing and still discover something new.

Completionists Friendly

This is where Stardew can really be divisive.

The journey towards perfection is one that each player must decide for themselves. It takes an incredible amount of grinding, patience and knowledge of the game to achieve. You will need to craft every item in the game, sell every single crop, catch every fish and complete all main questlines.

You will also need to cook every recipe, max all hearts with all villagers, discover every artifact and then you will also need to complete near everything on Ginger Island. All of this is a huge undertaking. And this is just the start.

For some players, perfection is the ultimate end goal, often taking years in game to achieve. For others its something not worth the effort. I admit on my last playthrough perfection became all too much, and the end game felt pretty lonely. I had tried to bite off more than I could chew, and was still so far away from achieving it.

While I do think perfection is a rewarding achievement in itself, it shouldn’t take away from the experience of enjoying the game. My recommendation would be to tackle it slowly, and enjoy the process. Keep it in the back of your mind always, but not at the forefront, at least not to start.

Value for Money

Stardew Valley offers incredible value for money. Even at full price, it costs less than most indie games while easily offering hundreds of hours of content if you decide to fully invest yourself into it.

It has great replayability and there are plenty of different activities to do. It’s an easy game to pick up when you’re looking for a chill game to play, so you will get plenty of play time. But you’re also not being left disappointed if you only manage to finish the first year.

Want help with Stardew Valley?

Here are some Stardew Valley Guides to help you start your cozy farm journey:

• Beginner Tips Guide
• Early Energy Tips
• How to get Coal Fast