As something of a Stardew Valley veteran, quite a lot of the almost 1000 hours I’ve put into the game has been in co-op mode. However, there is something very curious I’ve noticed when it comes to playing in co-op mode over playing in solo mode: it’s almost as if I’m playing two completely different games. Usually in games with multiplayer options, having more people is more of an add-on to the base game, perhaps having more hands around to more efficiently fight bosses or complete objectives.
However, with Stardew Valley, multiplayer itself transforms a game set by objectives (as far as I like to play it) into more of an open-world type of sandbox game than how I ever play it by myself. While Stardew Valley in itself doesn’t change in multiplayer mode over solo mode except for adding a few extra players, the dynamic seems to change completely. In my experience, somehow multiplayer mode seems to take off a lot of the stress of completing tasks that the solo game puts onto the player. But why?
I think there is something to be said when it comes to the very dynamic that arises out of having multiple people play on one farm. There’s less need for trying to water the crops as quickly as possible in the morning, as it can be done 4 times as fast as usual–there’s less need for grinding fishing to get money, as everyone could try 1/4th as hard as on solo mode, and still yield the same results. Even with completing the Community Center, there is almost no urgency, even as seasons pass without collecting the required materials, as it’s not difficult at all to get them later on with everyone in tow. Because of all of these factors, Stardew Valley becomes almost a utopia of anarchy–objectives are seemingly lost. If one person wants to complete the Community Center, then sure, they go ahead, but a sense of almost directionlessness covers the game like a blanket.
So, what is the benefit of playing co-op mode, then? Is it solely to take off the pressures of being a single farmer on a large plot of land, having to take care of anything and everything yourself?
From my experience, the most beneficial part of co-op mode is truly the world that it creates–it’s almost like a meeting place, just to hang out and fish and talk about our days. My most recent experiences with co-op actually come from the past few years of quarantine, being that I’ve contacted old friends of mine and we’ve fully reconnected over playing Stardew Valley together. It’s not like we pay full attention to the game–we end up spending hours just talking about how our lives our going while maybe saying a few things about odd happenings of the day–but it somehow feels like we actually are occupying the same space. Is this due to the very design of Stardew Valley‘s co-op mode?
The lack of pressure that comes from co-op mode truly makes Stardew Valley into a “cozy game”, in my opinion. In some ways, it actually becomes more of a virtual hangout space over a game with set objectives, and this is something I find very beneficial when it comes to playing co-op mode–there are few other games that I can think of that create a space like this in such a simplified style to reconnect friendships. Critically thinking about Stardew Valley as a whole, having friends around to occupy the world outside of the computer-generated speech really elevates it to the “cozy game” it is advertised as, as the pressures that relate too much to the real world of having too many problems and not enough help evaporate.
(art by me 🙂 )
