WMG / Stardew Valley

As a WMG subpage, all spoilers are unmarked as per policy. You Have Been Warned.

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Stardew Valley is a waystation for dreams/the afterlife

Everything from characters' ages to appearances to pretty much everything else is static, and while there is time, it is also a timeless space where the days, weeks, years are all the same. The residents who are free to travel to/through other places are merely dreaming or temporarily unconscious/tripping/comatose. Those who have chosen to stay have actually died in one life and are waiting for their next, or have chosen to settle in the world as their version of the afterlife. Those who leave have passed through to their next reincarnation, and Zuzu City is symbolic of being reincarnated into a modern world and its troubles rather than choosing the eternal peace of the valley.

• The Farmer died from overwork at Joja or (TW: suicide mention) was Driven to Suicide. Haley's and Emily's parents are still alive in the material world. Kent only shows up after dying in war. The Wizard and Emily can pass through the dimensions due to spiritual practice and/or drugs. Alex is in a coma from a football injury and may or may not survive to go pro in the material world. Sebastian is conflicted - does he want an eternity of static peace with which he is bored, or a life in the material world with all its problems? Etc...
• Joja wants to mine and pillage even the afterlife so people can't even sleep or die without its influence.

The Farmer is a plant-creature disguised as a human.

They photosynthesize, which is why they can survive for days and days without eating. It's also why they always pass out at exactly 2 a.m.—they cannot stay conscious without the sun's rays to sustain them. When you eat food in game, it's comparable to adding compost to a plant's roots and allowing it to absorb the nutrients—this is why you can eat raw, undressed fish without batting an eye.

Haley and Emily’s parents have ALWAYS gone away traveling.

We know their parents aren’t in the game because they’re off traveling the world, but this theory states that they constantly went away traveling throughout daughters’ adolescence. Isn’t it a bit odd that they won’t return for either of their daughter’s weddings? Sort of seems like they don’t care enough to come...

• Their parents constantly being away would also explain their behavior. Emily, being the older sibling, had to grow up faster because she had to take care of her little sister, thus why she’s more mature and levelheaded. Haley, on the other hand, grew up with a lack of parental support, so she turned quite bitter and mean because she felt unloved.

Elliott is a merman.

He has the ability to turn his tail into legs either as a natural racial trait or as the result of a spell.

Sebastian's biological father is Shane.

They look similar, and it would make some sense.

• It would fit in nicely with the theory that Shane was Robin's first husband.
• Another hint: when it comes to gifts, alleged "bad boy" Sebastian despises all types of alcohol. There's another adamant teetotaller in the valley: Penny. Perhaps their reasons are the same: Pam is definitely an alcoholic, and Shane is heavily implied to at least use alcohol as a crutch. It may be that Shane's drinking had a negative effect on Sebastian, just as Pam's alcoholism badly affected Penny.
• It's all but stated that both Sebastian and Shane struggle with depression (Shane giving you practically the dictionary definition of depression when you speak to him at the dock, and Sebastian frequently making worrying comments about whether it would matter if he "disappeared"). Depression often runs in families.
• Possibly a little bit of a stretch, since most of the Stardew music multitasks...but in your heart-to-heart with Shane at the dock, the melancholy tune "Echos" is playing. On the soundtrack, "Echos" is specifically Sebastian's theme.
• On a meta-level, Sebastian and Shane are both the same archetype: the cynical bad-boy loner who's grumpy to everyone until you win them over and discover the hidden heart of gold and kind to animals: Shane dotes on his chickens, and Sebastian pays close attention to the local wildlife and the farm animals (plus there's his penchant for void eggs). As noted above, they even look alike: dark-haired men who favor hoodies. Their main differences are a case of Age-Appropriate Angst: the younger Sebastian's self-esteem issues are largely connected to his family, while the older Shane's esteem issues are down to the general direction his life has taken...but they still have basically the same issue: they are uncomfortable around people and have low self-worth. It's possible that it was done for realism (in real life, you meet people who have similar issues to each other all the time), but in a game with a limited cast, it's unusual to see two characters occupying the same niche unless there's history between them.
  • Not so "limited". 28 people isn't a lot by real-world standards, but that's quite an ensemble in a work of fiction. Giving all of them distinct personalities and histories, especially since you're limited to ones that fit in a rural area (probably wouldn't find a famous movie star in Pelican Town, for example), would be quite a challenge.
• However, if the theory is true, it raises one big question: Why does neither party mention their connection, when Sebastian and Shane are still living right next to each other?
• Jossed. It's been confirmed that Shane is under 30 years old, and Sebastian is described as "of-age", so that would place him at 18+ years old. Even if you place Shane at the oldest he could be and Sebastian at the youngest he could be, Shane would only be 11 when Seb was born.

Shane is Jas' biological father.

• It's claimed that he's her godfather/cousin but really he's her actual father. He had something with a girl when he was younger, and she dumped him with Jas, but he's still terrified of messing up her life. So Marnie takes responsibility and Shane came back to Pelican Town from the city to try and become more of a father to her, except it's tough to be responsible when you're drinking your liver into oblivion and contemplating suicide.
• Unlikely, as it is explicitly stated that he is in fact Jas' godfather, and that her parents are dead. This is something Jas herself tells the player, so if this was true... well, the morality in telling a young child her parents were dead in order to cover up an out-of-wedlock birth is pretty messed up.

Abigail is actually the daughter of the Wizard.

There is actually quite a bit of basis for this one in the game.

1. Both Abigail and the Wizard have purple hair. While it's implied Abigail dyes her hair purple (and Caroline says that she is naturally light-brown like Pierre), her hair mysteriously stays purple even if she claims she honestly can't remember the last time she dyed it.
2. The Wizard will occasionally mention that he has reason to suspect that one of the villagers might be his daughter.
3. Pierre will privately express doubt to the Player Character whether Abigail is his daughter, noticing that she doesn't look very much like him.
4. Caroline will mention that she used to go on walks around the Wizard's tower, until Pierre asked her to stop doing so.
5. Caroline often wonders where Abigail got her interest in the occult from, when Pierre and Caroline are such traditional homebodies. Meanwhile, the Wizard is scouting for an apprentice who shares his interests...
6. Abigail is one of the few people who wanders over to the Wizard's Tower — few other characters visit that part of the map at all.
7. The Wizard used to be married to the Witch, and they parted on bad terms. Having a child with another woman would certainly ruin it.

Abigail was raised by Pierre and Caroline to protect her from the Witch

The Witch has an altar which allows someone to turn children into doves. In order to protect his illegitimate daughter from her wrath, the Wizard convinced Caroline to raise their child as if she was fathered by Pierre.

Sebastian is the son of the Wizard.

Based on this tumblr post:

• Whenever he plays the keyboard piano, Sam keeps mentioning that he plays it like a wizard.
• His preferred role in his roleplaying game is a wizard.
• You don't know who was his actual dad.
• He likes to be alone. JUST like the wizard.
• The wizard mentions that his wife put curses on people when they split up and got overly mad.
• Demetrius mentioned that Robin has an extra temper.
  • Alternatively, the Wizard and Robin had an affair together and it was this affair that caused both marriages to split.

Abigail is not the daughter of the Wizard.

• It's actually Caroline:
  • The Wizard mentions to be hundreds of years old so it's possible for him to have fathered a child generations before.
  • Caroline has green hair, only 2 other female villagers have technicolor hair, one is her daughter, and both have a connection with the supernatural.
  • Caroline mentioning her walks around the Wizard's tower could be attributed to her longing for a parental figure.
• It's actually Emily:
  • Emily is one of the other villagers with technicolor hair, she also has a deep connection with nature and spirits.
  • Emily's sister's, Haley, dialog mentions how different they're from each other, and that it's hard to believe they're related.

The Wizard might have been a ladies' man with Commitment Issues.

Given the above two that he sired two children from two different married women, all the while with him being married to The Witch, it's a given stretch.

If the Player Character has purple hair, then he/she is the child of the Wizard.

The only relatives that your PC has is their grandfather and parents. The Wizard had a fling with the PC's mother, and sired a child with him. To avoid the Witch's wrath, and by the grandfather's wishes, the mother and the child had to leave Pelican Town and she got married to another man from Zuzu City afterwards.

The Mountain, where the railroad and the mine is, is Mount Ebott, and the mountain is rumoured to have monsters.

The locals don't call it Mt. Ebott very often. And they highly doubt that there are monsters in there and were sealed in there, even though the locals believe in forest guardians. Yet it's a saying that once you go there, you don't come back.

• It is also theory that the residents are the descendants of the people who sealed the monsters in the first place.
• And they are the townspeople who killed Asriel.
• And the Wizard might have been involved with the making of the Barrier; he just doesn't mention it.
• However, this theory has some glaring holes in it: Pelican Town lacks the golden buttercups stated to have grown in Chara’s village, making it unlikely to be that same place.
  • Chara fell into the Underground a long while before Undertale proper, perhaps decades. The golden buttercups may be long gone. Perhaps the empty "garden" beside the Community Center?
• That being said, if the two games are canon to each other and the Mountain is indeed Mt. Ebott, then due to the implications of your killing monsters in the mines, the coexistence is most secure if it is assumed to be exclusive to Neutral ending timelines.
• It's also worth noting that the Mines have the same temperature zones in the same order as Undertale, along with evidence of dungeon ruins.
  • The skeletons you meet in the "snowy" part of the mines (Snowdin?) also bear a close resemblance to everyone's favourite spaghetti-loving puzzle-maker...

Abigail is related to the Pie Family.

Her eating Quartz, Diamonds, Emeralds, etc. wasn't just an oversight by the developer... her teeth are actually strong enough to bite through those stones.

• Alternately, Abigail might be descended from gem-eating dragons like Spike.

Linus is a liar.

• He claims to constantly be under siege by the locals, but the only scenes that have him interacting with anyone else show them treating him very kindly.
• When you pass out from exhaustion, he'll sometimes leave a note that someone was going through your pockets and he valiantly chased them off, but what exactly are the odds of any of that? One of the villagers stealing from you, him coming across them, and him being willing to chase them off when he otherwise claims to be pretty cowardly?
  • Linus may be telling the truth here simply because he has little reason to take money, since he never buys anything. The person he claims to chase off may be Morris the Joja Mart manager. Morris would certainly be sleazy enough to rifle through a sleeping person's pockets for money, but would care enough about Joja's reputation to run away before he's recognized if caught. He's also up that late, since Morris will also sometimes send you a letter if you pass out.
  • It's very possible that the Dwarf is the one who robs you when you pass out. He's stated that he takes things from the villagers during the night and claims he doesn't understand the concept of personal property.
• He lies to get pity, and once you're in the habit of giving him a blueberry tart or pizza whenever you see him, he'll start acting like a noble savage, telling you that nature provides all that he needs, and it can provide for you if you just learn to listen. They weren't aware that other people's trash is considered part of nature, however.
• Linus might just think everyone is out to get him, despite it not being so. And thus when people try to talk to him or something, he picks up on non-existent clues and reaffirms his belief(s). Or maybe, as the point above mentions, Linus is perfectly happy with his life and doesn't like how people pity him like he's some poor homeless guy.
• He himself says in ocasional dialogue that he used to be a rich businessman and willingly became a hermit. This does joss this theory quite a bit. After all, if he is doing it for pity, why would he say his hermit life style is his choice?

Pierre is a drug dealer.

• His secret stash is drugs. That's why he freaks out so much when the player finds it.
• He has the perfect cover. Kids go grocery shopping and come back with something extra.
• He regularly gets supplies from outside the village. There's nobody in the village in a better position for it than him.
• He is selling Sebastian his weed and possibly Leah whatever gets her into her art-inspiring "trance states".

Pierre and Morris hate each other because they have what the other wants.

The more you get to know Pierre, the more he shows signs of thinking a lot like Morris does:

• Morris is blatantly out for profit. Profit is one of Pierre's favorite topics.
• Morris manages a chain store. Pierre dreams of someday expanding his store into a chain.
• Both of them are workaholics. Morris has no family, while Pierre is implied to be neglectful of his.

This leads to the two of them realizing they're not so different and despising each other because, despite being very similar people, they have what the other one wants. Morris has a chain of stores, which Pierre wants but can't get because he's not ruthless and cutthroat enough. Pierre has a loving family, which Morris wants but can't get because he's a jerk. So with 'which one runs a better store' being the only measuring point they can go by, they constantly try to outdo each other. It's up to the player which one of them 'wins.'

Linus was the founder or a former board member of JojaCorp.

• He was there from the very beginning, when JojaMart was just a small grocer catering to all the products your local mom-and-pop's wouldn't stock, or a more consolidated, convenient version of the many different types of stores you'd find in a city. When the company grew much faster than he'd ever expected, his fellow executives' greed rose right along with it, and it started running local businesses out instead of acting as a competitor, he became so horrified and alienated from society that he decided to become a hermit in Pelican Town.

Might also explain how he can pay you for delivery quests—Linus knows there are some things that you can't get from nature, like medical attention.

Alex's mother committed suicide.

• The letter to Evelyn implies that she knew something was going to happen to her, assures her she loves them, and apologizes that "you had to go through this." Given what a piece of work Alex's father was, he probably wasn't good for her mental health.
  • Or she simply knew that she was dying from an illness when she wrote the letter.

Stardew Valley is set on a remote human planet from the Starbound-verse

One of the songs from Stardew Valley is a default song for the instruments in Starbound. The modern technology level of Stardew Valley is close to the human prisons and refugee camps that can be found on Starbound.

• Linus is a refugee from another planet fleeing from the advanced technology that summoned Ruin.
• The solar essence in this game does look a lot like solarium stars from Starbound...

As a corollary to the above WMG, the shadow people in Stardew Valley are somehow related to the Shadow villagers found on midnight planets in Starbound.

• Exactly what's in the title.

Stardew Valley uses a different technological pattern from the rest of the world, thus the Schizo Tech.

JojaCorp farms use tractors to plow and plant crops, chainsaws to cut trees, and other mechanized tools, because these things can be mass-produced, run on fossil fuels, and generally play to Joja's strengths (throw money at your problem till it's solved). Stardew Valley, however, has access to a mine that's best explored by skilled adventurers and provides high-quality minerals, including gold and iridium - so that unpowered tools hand-forged in the valley can match the performance of the powered gear used elsewhere, without so much environmental damage or fuel costs. Magic is known to exist in Stardew Valley (even if most of Pelican Town tries to pretend that the Wizard doesn't exist), and the people are stronger and healthier through the use of Stardrops (assuming the average Pelicanian finds a Stardrop or two at some point in their life). So, it's not so much Schizo Tech as a conscious application of the technology that works for them.

Stardew Valley takes place in either the late 80's or the early 90s.

Consider the level of everyday technology seen in various places in the game. The player and a few of the other people in the valley have chunky cathode-ray TVs (though the presence of a Plasma TV as a furniture item helps place the game somewhere in the early 90s), Sebastian can be seen using a computer that also has a CRT display, a couple people have consoles not unlike the Sega Mega Drive or SNES, there's a couple of arcade machines in the saloon, and Joja's building style evokes a sterile, modern-for-the-time style in comparison to the other, older buildings in Pelican Town.
Consider also on a more meta/design-based level, "The Wind Can Be Still", one of the tunes that plays during the Winter. There's certainly a mix of 80's synthwave and Earthbound-style tunes.
Overall, the design within the game helps give the idea that Pelican Town is a rural settlement in a time where big corporations and modern technology (in the form of Joja) are starting to take a hold, and it seems like the late 80s or early 90s would be a perfect fit.

• The internet is mentioned in in one of Leah's heart events, but it is said to be expensive. Mid to late 90s seems fitting in this case, since the internet was just starting to become more commonly used, but still a bit pricey for use in smaller towns. On the other hand, a common junk item fished out of waterways is an "old JojaNet 2.0 trial CD", with the flavor text commenting they "must have made a million of these things". Note the past tense. Said CDs were the way many people hooked up with their first ISP in The '90s, and they were still being manufactured and distributed as recently as 2006.
  • It's probably expensive because they're in the middle of nowhere. To get internet, they'd have to dig up a lot of land to put the cables down.
• In terms of sociopolitical trends, the Green Aesop messages of the game (especially with the emphasis on pollution, littering, and habitat destruction) feels much more 90s than the present environmentalist emphasis on global warming and climate change. On the other hand, same-sex marriage is both legal and socially acceptable enough for the entire village to attend a wedding (albeit there are hints that it's considered a fairly new thing - Lewis seems pretty bemused as he's performing the ceremony; George, Alex's grandfather, believes marriage should be between a man and a woman because he's "old-fashioned"; and Leah says "Oh! you're...? (blushing) Me too. That's good to know" in her two heart event if the female farmer hits on her). The first country in the real world to legalize same-sex marriage was The Netherlands in 2001, and the push for it was very much considered a radical fringe movement in the United States until the mid-noughties.
• Sam seems to be ripped straight out of the eighties, being a skateboarding slacker rock musician who's only missing the sunglasses. None of the genres presented during his heart event are especially modern either.
• There was a Reddit post that asked this same thing. One of the comments noted that since it's a rural village, modern technologies might not catch up to them as fast as in an urban area, meaning it can very well take place in this decade, but the locals just haven't caught up yet. Then again there's magic and alien species in this game, so who knows - maybe it's an Alternate Universe and anything goes.
  • In other words, Pelican Town is the video game equivalent of Napoleon Dynamite in terms of most (but not all) things being Two Decades Behind?
  • Another possibility is, because of the game's extremely long development cycle, adding novel inventions like smartphones to the mix would have been seen as chasing infinity. It's worth noting that inspecting Maru's computer reveals it still uses floppy disks, but presents it as being dated for the time. Early 2000's seems to be a possible setting based on this and other factors.
• The consoles are described by in-game by the player as old-school, so maybe Pelican Town is a bit behind the times, or the owners can't afford newer consoles? Alternately, the owners are retro gamers.

Joja Corp is really evil.

Why quit at them being bad bosses? Joja clearly makes everybody who slaves for them miserable. They cause landslides and dump sewage. You fish up their cans of Joja Cola on a regular basis. So, they're really evil, and not just trying to set up another mart, but get a foothold in this magical valley for evil purposes - maybe to enslave the Junimo?

Clint will become a marriage candidate.

His Heart Event arc will involve him dragging you into his (unsuccessful) attempts to court Emily. In his eight-heart event he'll be despondent because Emily turned him down on their date at the carnival, but thank you for being such a supportive friend... then get nervous when he realizes he might have developed a sort of Matchmaker Crush on you.

Stardew Valley shares a universe with Welcome To Night Vale.

And is just outside of the Night Vale desert area. Its name fits seamlessly with the locales of Night Vale, Desert Bluffs, Red Mesa, and Pine Cliff (which is probably its closest neighbour). The town is a weird place and, once visited, becomes nearly impossible to leave, except for trips to nearby areas of similar weirdness.

Stardew Valley's alternative world map and countries aren't a contradiction as such: Night Vale already exists in a version of America that hasn't heard of Michigan, so the Valley is simply located in another subworld, linked to Night Vale's world and the real world by Route 800, which acts as a kind of Portal Network, Yggdrasil-style.

Strex Corp Synernists Inc are a majority shareholder of Joja Corp, which is infiltrating Pelican Town in the same way Strex infiltrated Night Vale. Joja Corp's logo even features the Smiling God!

Sebastian has mixed ancestry.

This kind of leans on some fanon/fan interpretations of his character in art, but many people seem to interpret him as half-Asian or having Asian heritage (or the Stardew Valley equivalent of Asian).

• If the Gotoro Empire is the Stardew equivalent of Japan, like some theorize....

Everybody in Pelican Town is vegetarian.

They don't eat meat, since the only food closest to meat is fish, and cheese and eggs are the only ones eaten, they might be vegetarian.

• Vegetarians consider fish to be meat. If the only meat someone is eating is fish then they're actually a pescatarian. NPCs or players who do not eat fish may be vegetarian.
• It's also worth noting that Linus cooks some mystery meat on a spit. It could be interpreted as an especially large fish, but removing the fins is very uncommon for that style of cooking.
  • The Luau also clearly has a baked ham and a roast bird of some sort on the buffet tables.
• Going north at the Fall Festival shows Gus operating a large grill; chatting with the tourists and with Harvey at the petting zoo confirms that the meals he's serving are hamburgers and barbecue pork ribs.
  • Are the PC or locals able to eat them? If not, chances are Gus cooked them specifically for tourists and out-of-towners.
• Evelyn is almost certainly vegetarian; she dislikes most fish-based dishes and openly complains about the lack of vegetarian meal options at the Fall Festival.

If you side with Joja, they will eventually ruin the valley.

(Note that "siding with Joja" refers to buying a Joja Membership instead of completing the Community Center.)

Pelican Town has very few people, thus a Joja Mart probably won't be very profitable. But, the surrounding area is incredibly rich in natural resources. If Joja gets control over the area, they will probably strip the valley of all its resources. Since the Player Character is the only person in town who can really stand up to them, it's simply a matter of waiting 'til you're gone...

• This is likely, as they already have a mining operation near Pelican Town which is implied to have caused a rock slide, and they even have enough pull with the government to have legislation passed specifically for their company, so if they really do want to plunder the valley, there isn't much that can stop them.

A future update will focus more on Clint's crush on Emily.

You could end up trying to play matchmaker with them and maybe Clint could even become hostile towards the player character if they end up marrying Emily themselves.

A future event will feature Linus seeking shelter after his tent is destroyed in a storm.

It could be a heart event and take place on a rainy night after the player tries to go to bed.

Joja is the reason for all the town's troubles.

Penny mentions they're lucky to have a library in a small town, but when you arrive all the books are lost and the artifact shelves empty. Morris stole the books and artifacts and hid them around town and threw them in the mines.

The potential spouses are so paranoid about gift-giving because of Caroline and the Wizard's affair.

Caroline and the Wizard used to give each other gifts under the guise of being friendly or neighbourly. Their affair became an open secret, and although Caroline is well-liked by the townspeople and Pierre has forgiven her, it's a small town, people talk, and small-but-significant events like a cheating couple can hit a community hard. Even if they were born after the affair ended, the spouses heard the gossip right from when they were kids and came to think that giving someone else's spouse a gift was something to worry about.

The bus is out of service because Pam crashed it, possibly while driving drunk.

The highway has skid marks and a broken fence.

The Wizard is a grown-up Frisk.

The Wizard has some knowledge about the likes of the Dwarf and Krobus, as well as other otherworldly creatures. Who's to say they didn't come from the Underground? It helps that he forces the Dwarf and Krobus to put aside their differences and settle for peace, which is something (Pacifist) Frisk would do.

The person Linus stops from going through the player's pockets is Morris.

In one of the random notes you can get if you pass out, Linus mentions finding you while someone was going through your pockets for money, but they get away. Linus doesn't know who it is, though. Well, one of the other people who can potentially rescue you is Morris, and Morris charges you a fee which he presumably takes out of your pockets for helping you home. Linus and Morris also wouldn't recognize each other, since Linus never goes to JojaMart and Morris never goes to town events, so they never cross paths. Linus just happens to interrupt Morris when the latter is 'collecting his fee' and Morris legs it.

Marlon is a Witcher.

White hair, Facial Horror, adventurous monster slayer, has a lot of cool swords and armor. Gil might be one too, possibly Marlon's mentor when he was young.

Sebastian is part Japanese.

We don't know the identity of the father or what he looks like, and since he never visits, it could easily be interpreted that he lives in another country. Sebastian has dark hair and dark eyes, which contrast greatly with his green-eyed ginger-haired mother. Dyeing his hair would not be out of character for him, but unlike with Abby, no dialogue indicates that it's dyed, so it very well could be natural. He also complains about how easily he tans in the summer, while Robin's dialogue about working in the sun indicates that she burns easily instead of tans. Asian people tend to tan before they burn. He is also a fan of JRPG-style video games and board games, and one of his favourite foods is Sashimi.

• The Sashimi and tan lines do make sense, assuming Sebastian isn't simply a nerdy weeb, but it raises a question on what having black hair and brown eyes has to do with being Asian. Tons, tons of Europeans have dark eyes and dark brown/black hair. Most Europeans do, actually. Otherwise, his skintone is pretty consistent with European paleness vs East Asian paleness.
  • Most Asian people have dark hair and eyes, and it would be nice to have an Asian character is all. WMG's don't have to provide iron-clad proof, they can just be for fun or for headcanons.

Pam and Willy are related.

Points for:

• They both enjoy fishing.
• They both refer to their late father as "Pappy" and share his advice/recipes as the player befriends them.

Points against:

• Willy and Penny do not seem to know each other, which seems unlikely if they are related.
• Willy isn't originally from Stardew, but rather hails from the Fern Islands.

Sebastian's father is Morris.

Nobody talks about it because nobody wants to talk about it.

Stardew Valley takes place on a different planet.

• This is why things like Junimos, the ability to warp to places, Yoba, etc. exist, and why the level of technological development is such a case of Schizo Tech.
• Also, the elements on this planet have slightly different physical properties, which is why gold tools are stronger than steel tools, and iridium is (relatively) common enough that you can make entire tools out of it.
• The Fantasy Gun Control is a result of either no firearms technology ever being developed in this world (and it seems like no archery, either), or Pelican Town does not allow private ownership of firearms.
• The year is only 112 days, less than a third of a normal Earth-year.
  • This raises some questions about aging and lifespans; do people live in Stardew as long as they do on Earth, so someone can be 300 Stardew years old? Or is aging a year on Stardew like aging a year on Earth, so someone 90 Stardew years old is only 30 Earth years old?
    • That actually raises an interesting point about the passage of time itself. One can assume that time is simply accelerated in order to facilitate gameplay, but there's the possibility that days really are only about 17 minutes long on this planet. This would also explain why nobody ever seems to age despite several years going by in-game; a full year of Stardew Valley time is only around 31 hours and 20 minutes of Earth time. Yet they still age at the same rate as normal humans, so someone who appears to be, say, 20 years old is actually close to around seven thousand years old in Stardew Valley time. This, incidentally, also explains the Hyperactive Metabolism present in the game; because the people of this planet have had to adapt to such a rapid day/night cycle, their metabolisms work at lightning speed to compensate. This also neatly explains the lack of toilets anywhere in town: because the people's metabolisms work so quickly, it's likely that they leave little to no waste, having to utilize every last ounce of their food in order to generate as much quick energy as possible. Hence, Nobody Poops.
• During Maru's astronomy event, a ringed planet or moon is visible in the sky, even without the telescope.

A future expansion pack/DLC will allow the players to travel to other locations.

• Possible locations? Zuzu City (which the players can travel to by train from the station), the Gotoro Empire (which the player can travel to by boat from the docks), the Fern Islands (also accessed from the docks, where the player can visit Willy's hometown), or a town that is a mirror version of Pelican Town where the opposite path the player chose in the game was chosen in this town (IE if the player restores Pelican Town's community center, the other town will look like what would have happened if the player took the Joja Mart path).
  • If the Gotoro Empire becomes a location you can visit, you would either have to sneak over there, or a peace treaty will be signed with them at some point in the game.
  • If you can travel to Zuzu City, you can meet people you knew from when you lived there.
• 1.5 confirms Ginger Island, part of the Fern Islands. However, it's accessed via boat docked behind Willy's shop, and there's no sign of Willy's home. As a bonus, though, the townsfolk will visit once the resort's unlocked, and they'll bring swimsuits.

A future addition to the game will allow the player to Pair the Spares with the other bachelors and bachelorettes.

• If needed, a new character will be introduced after the player gets married to make an even number of potential spouses among the singles in Pelican Town.

At some point in Year 1, a ceasefire is signed with the Gotoro Empire, but the war hasn't technically ended.

• This explains why Kent is able to return home in Year 2 after being a prisoner-of-war, but goods still have to be smuggled out of the empire (if the Traveling Cart merchant is telling the truth); prisoner exchanges have taken place, but wartime sanctions and trade embargoes are still in effect.

Abigail actually IS Pierre and Caroline's daughter.

• But why the purple hair? Because humans in the Stardew Valley universe who have an affinity for magic develop purple hair. And the potential apprentice the Wizard mentions will be Abigail.

The person harassing Linus' home is Morris

• Linus will occasionally mention to you that he has to deal with unknown people throwing rocks at his tent while he's sleeping, or trying to destroy it. This seems far too cruel and nasty for even the grouchiest of Pelican Town residents, but it fits right in with an unscrupulous business toady like Morris, especially since real-life corporations are known for viewing homeless people as an eyesore and trying to discourage them from being near their property.

The stone cabin was originally going to be the village temple.

• Look at its appearance after the second upgrade. Pretty church-y, no? The walls are reminiscent of a medieval cathedral’s, its top window is stained glass and the two bottom windows are shaped like church windows. For one reason or another, the idea of the temple as a separate building was scrapped during development. The “temple” became the shrine room in Pierre’s, and the finished sprite was recycled as the stone farmhand’s cabin.

At some point, Demetrius took one of Seb's sarcastic comments at face value and has been ignoring him ever since.

The only interaction Sebastian and Demetrius are ever said to have had is the one where Demetrius made Sebastian take down his snow-goon. They don't talk in-game and Demetrius never says anything to acknowledge him (either as part of the family, or a presence in their home), so it seems pretty clear that Sebastian's feelings of alienation aren't based on nothing, but there is a book about being a first-time stepdad on his shelf. Demetrius seems to be somewhere on the autistic spectrum, or at least takes things fairly literally. He married Robin and set himself the goal to "become a parent", but once Maru was born, that caused him to literally become a parent instantly, which (to his very literal mind) satisfied that goal right away.

Since he achieved the goal of Becoming A Parent, that meant he no longer had any reason to try to be anything to Sebastian, and since Sebastian (as a moody teenager with legitimate reasons to be upset and no apparent allies in his home) is comfortable telling others to leave him alone, he might easily have made a sarcastic comment referencing his parents' obvious favoritism that Demetrius interpreted as Sebastian's correct understanding of the family dynamic and an expression of his wishes. Something like "leave me alone" or "just pretend I'm not here" ended up being taken as a literal direction of how Sebastian would like to be treated, and, having no interest in his stepson anyway, he happily complied, and has been living a blissfully Seb-free life ever since.

There will be a 'Future and Death Chapter' update

After many in-game years, there should be a day where the kids begin to grow up, the residents age and the valley begins to change. However, this is entirely optional, and can be triggered as a Point of No Return.

This final chapter in the farmer's story will include lots of action and heartrending moments.

Depending on how the player dealt with Joja: if they stay, the Valley will start to become polluted and there might be a chance to repent and fix what they caused before it's too late.

And if they used the machines to get rid of their family or cheated, their relationships with others will sour as rumors will spread of their unfaithfulness.

In the end, the tone can go from Died Happily Ever After to an outright Utsuge Downer Ending. Upon this playthrough's conclusion, New Game Plus will be unlocked.

Stardew Valley takes place in an Urban Fantasy RPG where The Hero is actually a Hero of Another Story and the Player Character is a nameless/minor NPC in a backwater town far away from the main conflict

Monsters and magic not only exist, but are treated as a fact of life to the point where Stardew Valley is a fantasy instead of merely having fantasy elements. Even though they're mods, Stardew Valley Expanded and Ridgeside Village recognized that fact and continue the fantasy aspect of the game. In addition, there's a bunch of references about the conflict between The Republic and The Empire.

When you consider the above, the setting for Stardew Valley has all the hallmarks of a tried and true RPG. While The Hero and their friends are off saving the world from The Empire or possibly a larger threat, the Player Character is a hyper competent NPC who is just minding their own business and doing their own thing on a farm far away from the main story.

• As a point of interest, this is basically the concept behind Diaries of a Spaceport Janitor (albeit in an RPG-flavored space opera world, not a modern one)

The player is limited to two children because there will be an update where they grow up and start helping out around the farm

Being able to have too many kids will unbalance the game otherwise.

There will be a war update where Stardew Valley faces invasion from the Gotoro Empire

The valley is directly north of the Empire, making it a likely target in the event of an invasion. However, since this is a family-friendly game, no warcrime will occur and the invaders will merely occupy the town peacefully until they are driven back. The player can either choose to be a patriot and undermine the occupiers every step of the way, or be practical and do business with them. Doing the former will earn the player hearts from a conservative like George and or a former soldier like Kent, while doing the latter will improve relations with greedy people like Pierre. Since many goods from the Empire are illegal in the Valley, this will also be a good opportunity to acquire rare items from the Empire.

The Ferngill Republic is the aggressor in the war with the Gotoro Empire

Kent returns home from the front, and it's implied that the lines are in Gotoro territory. Nobody in town or anywhere else seems willing or able to explain what the point of the war or its objective even is.

Does a Putin-like figure rule the Ferngill Republic, and is Kent part of an army akin to the Russian invaders in Ukraine, the Americans in Vietnam or Afghanistan, or the Germans in the USSR? Like those examples, the invaders are bogged down (see Sam's event with Vincent where he wonders out loud if his father is coming back alive and "everyone's heard the reports"), and Ferngill is losing the war and headed for a humiliating withdrawal?

• Seems logical to me. For one, there's a book in the library that says "Is war with the Gotoro Empire really worth it?" Nobody's likely to ask that in a defensive war. And of course, the Ferngill Republic is very much the USA, which hasn't been in a defensive war in almost 80 years, but we've been in countless offensive wars, official and unofficial.

The region of Stardew Valley rose up in the aftermath of a Dwarven civilization.

"But isn't that canon?" Not in this specific way, no. The Shadow People are the remnants of the clowns that routed them. They held occasional trade with a far-off Elven civilization, hence the elven jewelry. But once the dwarves were for all intents and purposes gone, humans moved in. It's even arguable that "Stardew" was the human translation of the dwarvish name Mulzatobes.

Photo on top of Grandpa's fireplace

If you look closely in the intro, you can see a photo of an old woman that looks like Evelyn on Grandpa's fireplace. Evelyn also allows the player to call her Grandma. Evelyn could be Grandpa's sister or other relative, or perhaps he was her secret lover.