Many mods for Stardew Valley seek to transform entire aspects of the game. They make farming or fishing significantly easier, add new specialized areas to the player’s farm, or expand the entire experience with new in-game locations and characters. Empty Spouse Room by Lerura is not one of these mods. Its sole function is to remove the decor from the small room the spouse adds on to the player’s house after marriage. The only thing that remains in the room is Emily’s parrot, and players can add whatever furniture they like as long as they keep a path to their spouse’s favorite spot free.
On the surface this mod seems trivial. Some players, myself included, obsess over customizing and controlling every part of their farm to the tune of spending ten million gold on the golden clock to prevent debris after each season. For these players, this mod grants an increased ability to control the decor in-game. After all, who wants to look at Alex’s questionable interior design choice of a bright green floor or Shane’s spilled beer cans and muddy footprints? Emptying the room for player customization would appear to be the ideal fix for players who care about their home’s aesthetic cohesiveness.
However, beneath the promise of increased home customization, this mod alters the player’s relationship with their spouse in-game in ways I had not considered until downloading the mod. The spouse’s room is added specifically for them, represents their unique hobbies, and is where they spend a significant amount of time after marrying the farmer. In stripping the spouse’s room of its decor, the player destroys an element of their spouse’s personality and changes the balance of their relationship. Marriages in Stardew Valley become more defined by what the spouse can offer the player than by an equal partnership. Without their dedicated room or an ability to alter other parts of the house that the player can’t proceed to overhaul, the spouse loses any autonomy and identity they previously had.
Compare this to the beginning of the game: upon meeting the marriageable characters, the player is required to gain two hearts of friendship with them before the farmer can enter their bedrooms. The bedrooms at this stage represent a personal space where the player learns about the character through the room’s decor and heart events. For Sebastian, my personal favorite bachelor, this is where he tells the farmer of his dreams to leave Pelican Town for Zuzu City.
Barone writes each marriageable character as a distinct person with big dreams, including moving to the city or becoming a star athlete, author, or inventor. The heart events reinforce their individuality, providing background and revealing character traits the player was previously unaware of. Although their coding predestines them to remain in Pelican Town, it is reassuring to believe they are quietly working toward their goals in the background. With the exception of Penny, who dreams of leaving Pam’s trailer, marrying any of the characters distances them from their dreams. Upon marrying the player, the spouse sacrifices their own goals.
Examining the development of the farmer’s relationship with their spouse reveals that the spouse has little autonomy after marriage. Downloading the mod to empty their specialized room further deprives them of any individual identity they have left. Having already sacrificed their own dreams to live on the farm, the spouse also loses their connections with others in the town as they spend most of their time in the player’s house. Sebastian only rarely visits his mother and friends, and remarks that he “used to be” closer with Sam. His comment about the city being a “romantic fantasy” begins to sound like a rationalization for his choice to stay on the farm. Seeing him return to what was his room to stand in a random space becomes a haunting reminder of the control he lacks while on the farm.
It makes sense why players may want to change aspects of their spouse’s room. For example, Shane’s sloppiness with beer shows a regression after the player helped him with alcoholism. However, the player does not need to clear the entire space to do this. It is likely Lerura made their mod in response to players’ frustration with mismatched interior designs. They were likely not concerned with anything beyond resolving this, but their mod introduces important questions about how the player views their character’s relationship with their spouse. Theoretically, the player selected their spouse for their unique personality. Seeing a player erase this personality as it manifests in the spouse’s interior design choices implies that either the player is focused more on marriage itself as a completion aspect of the game or cares more about the utility the spouse can provide than the spouse as a character.
