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“Stardew Valley” is a game that I have sunk way too many hours in, and still. I just can’t seem to get enough. So, having put in over 200 hours in the PC version and working towards the true end goal of the game. Married, two kids, million-dollar brewing company even ran into some content killing bugs, mainly not being able to use the bus. No going to Skull cave or the Oasis for me, unless I start a new game. Work that I didn’t really want to put in as I was already rolling in a pile of cash.

“Stardew Valley” is with no doubt a really great open-ended 2D country-life RPG/sim, and the game fit the Switch just perfectly (“like a glove! “, as Ace Ventura would have said).

However, something changed with the launch of the Switch. “Stardew Valley” was ported over shortly after the launch of the console and became one of my first purchases. Not only that but I am far from the only person that did this, as the game is still on the top ten in the best sellers list. Is this proof of just how the game is? Is it proof of how good the port is? Well, let’s all find out together.

Every time that I would wake my game up, I would be forced to deal this screen.

Right off the bat, just to get to the part that annoys me the most about this port really annoys me to death. Especially since it’s just something that only takes up about two seconds of my time. Nevertheless, it is annoying that I have to go through this every single time that I turn on the game. I mean, it doesn’t matter if the game was in suspended mode, or it was just started up. So, what is this annoyance that I’m referring to? (so you may ask).

Well, I’m talking about the fact that I have to connect my controllers every single time. Yeah, hitting R1 and L1 followed by the A button takes me less than two seconds to deal with, but still, it shouldn’t be needed to be done at least this often.

Just like in the PC-version of “Stardew Valley”, you can level up in five different areas (and those areas include farming, mining, combat, fishing, and foraging).

Activities are all through the game, really these activities can be at times more important than anything else in the game. All of these activities, of course, have skill points that lead to increased abilities with these activities. What are these activities and how were they really changed?

Fishing is something that I always try to avoid in games. In the PC version, it really wasn’t fun at all. I know that people gave the fishing mini-game accolades, but it really just wasn’t good. Hold the left mouse button for power and release, because the further out that you can cast the better the catch. When getting a hit left click to hook the fish and button mash the mouse to keep a green bar on a moving fish. I don’t know about you but my pointer finger just isn’t a good button mashing finger, on top of using a mouse clicker.

You can travel deeper underground via mysterious caves, and when (if) you do that, you will most likely encounter new environments, weapons, deadly monsters, valuable gemstones, raw materials and much more.

On the Switch version, it really isn’t that bad. Instead of the mouse clicker, you get to use an actual button, the Y button to be exact. While my pointer finger isn’t that fast at mashing, my thumb, on the other hand, is very good at this (years of training is why I’m sure that’s the case). In other words, it became something that really isn’t all that annoying to do anymore, in fact. Fishing may be the first thing that I master.

Strangely enough, combat has been improved by the use of a controller. How it works on the PC is the mouse cursor would decide the direction that your character faces and a left click to swing your weapon. This had thrown me off many times, especially when I needed to move really fast. Now with the controller the character swings in the direction that you are facing. While combat isn’t something that “Stardew Valley” focuses on, really at all it does, however, make combat a lot better.

I have spent over 200 hours on the PC-version of “Stardew Valley”, and so far I have spent about +60 hours on the Switch version. So, yes, I think it’s safe to say that the game is really good and addicting.

With combat, the switch to the controller was very nice, and in ways, so it is with farming. Except that the process is slower either plowing fields or watering crops. Point and click are much faster and the mouse cursor that is on the right analog just moves far too slow. Accuracy does increase where I am replacing my sprinklers while plowing my fields, but the mouse cursor does allow for multiple lines to be plowed without moving. So it really is a toss-up on which system is actually better.

Besides day-and-night cycles, players will also find the four different seasons in the game (such as winter and Summer, for example).

The story, of course, is unchanged and is a very simple one. You inherit a farm after your grandfather died, and the city life is crushing your soul and set out on an adventure. Giving up your pen for a shovel, wanting to see what the simple life is really about.

Meeting several people and creating friendships some of which has romance options. My only real complaint here is that more dialog is needed when it comes to the interactions with NPC’s, after a while, you’ve read what everyone has to say several times over and talking to the townspeople just becomes something that you click fest to get through.

Nevertheless, ” Stardew Valley” is still with no doubt a really good and addicting 2D country-life RPG/sim. In other words, it’s most definitely worth picking up if you like games of this kind.

Pros:
+ Unending play
+ Relaxing, Stardew and chill
+ Playable at any skill level
+ Different music track for each season

Cons:
– Music can be repetitive
– Not enough NPC dialog
– The story is very short and intermittent

Gameplay: 4/5
Graphics: 4/5
Sound/Music: 3/5
Controls: 3.5/5
Replay value: 5/5
Port score: 4.5/5

tgg grade 4 out of 5

Verdict: 4/5
Stardew Valley for the Switch isn’t about pushing any limits or being the best. What it is, is simplicity at its finest, where all you want to do is just sit back and relax. So it is an amazing in-between-games type of game, or the kind of game that helps you to unwind after work. As far as ports go, there are just a few little nitpicky things here and there, but in ways, there are minor improvements and just some slight annoyances. So if all you want is to just chill, then Stardew Valley may just be the game for you.

Title: Stardew Valley
Developer: Eric Barone/ConcernedApe
Format: Nintendo Switch
Genre: Farm simulator/RPG
Resolution: 1080p
Release date: 2017-10-05
Difficulty: Normal
Spent time: +60 hours
Average grade internationally: 87.78% via Gamerankings.com
PEGI age rating: +12
Price: 14,99 USD via the Nintendo Eshop