Choices. Choices are an integral part of everyday life, from “Booberry or Captain Crunch?” to “Netflix or Hulu?” or even bigger questions such as “Squirtle, Bulbasaur or Charmander?” These choices engage our minds in ways that are unique to the act of choosing. If I was just given a box of Booberry, that would be the end of it, I would eat my cereal and then move on. But if I’m given the choice, even a mundane choice such as this, my brain weighs the options, and the end is more meaningful, even if I still choose Booberry. I bring up this concept of choice because it is at the core of one of my favorite games of the past decade. Stardew Valley is a quaint farming simulator game from solo developer ConcernedApe, in which the player, burnt out by corporate life, inherits their grandfather’s farm and moves from the city into the small rural town of Pelican Town, located in Stardew Valley. Once in the valley, players are free to do pretty much whatever they like, from fishing to farming to mining. Choice doesn’t end there however, players can also choose to befriend townsfolk, and even romance a number of available bachelors and bachelorettes. These choices are all very open ended, and allow the player to do as they like in the sprawling, alive world. Some of these choices seem fairly complex, “Do I spend the day farming? Fishing? Socializing? Mining? Fighting monsters?” and the list only goes on. But at the core of the progression of the game, the player must make a choice that isn’t much more complex than “Booberry or Captain Crunch?” yet this decision is one of the hardest to make, and at least among my friend group the most debated. Do you help the town restore the old community center, or do you sign up for a membership at the lifeless corporation’s department store and let them turn the space into a warehouse?
Stardew Valley is not a very story heavy game, and is not very restrictive on the player, which makes the fact that the central story piece is also the most restrictive element of the game even more interesting when thinking about interactive media and what choice means for narrative, and not just choice, but how interactive digital media can create a living world in which choice feels meaningful to the player. Stardew Valley does this by not trying to tell a narrative with a typical “Good” or “Bad” ending. Instead, Stardew Valley treats all choices as valid, not only in terms of narrative but in the gameplay as well. The player doesn’t get docked for being exclusively a farmer, or for only fishing and mining, the game allows the user to decide how to play and thus leads to a more immersive experience. Another key to this immersion is the living world and the townsfolk who are, for lack of a better term, “real” people. By playing you begin meeting different characters and learning how the corporation moving in has affected life in the small town, and this is where the complexity of game’s narrative shows itself. Prior to interactive digital media, a story of a large company moving into town would end with the hero saving the day by forcing the company out. This typical narrative can be seen everywhere, from old Western films to episodes of Star Trek. Stardew Valley however sets itself out from these narratives by not having a “good” or “bad” guy, but by just having “people.” The corporation moving into town may be bad for Pierre, the owner of a small storefront who has had to cut back the hours of operation for his store, but it has been good for someone like Shane who is employed at the corporation’s storefront, Jojamart. It can really be summed up in this dialogue from one of the townsfolks, Jodi
Even Jodi, another resident of Pelican town can’t decide whether Joja is good for the town or not. The player feels this inner turmoil as well, and the complexity on which decision to make weighs down on the player. This complexity and immersion could not happen in any other medium, even if the story and the world were kept the same.
I am a big fan of the 1961 film Yojimbo. In the film the main character is a drifter who wanders into a small town which is being run by two crime bosses who are at odds with each other, all to the dismay of the town.
I bring up this film because the similarities to Stardew Valley are striking, though there is no option to kill the owner of Joja using a samurai sword (unfortounatly). Both stories have an outsider coming into a new town and being the deciding factor in what direction the town heads in. The difference however is that in Yojimbo the outcome has been decided for us, and thus the line between “bad” and “good” is drawn quite clearly. In Stardew Valley it Is not set in stone, and as such the line between “bad” and “good” is not so clear, if there is a line there at all. This ambiguity is what makes the choices in Stardew Valley so important, and why the player feels so connected with the town and the choice they make. A movie like Yojimbo is a very good film, but it is nowhere near as deep, and there is no way that the film can have as much meaning for a viewer as a game like Stardew Valley can have for its player. Prior to the advent of interactive digital media, things like film had an impact on the viewer, but with the advent of things like videogames the impact of media on the user has skyrocketed, and Stardew Valley is a perfect example of how the immense amount of meaning is created.
