Stardew Valley creator Eric Barone (ConcernedApe) has released a 10th anniversary video revealing, among other things, two brand new marriage candidates being added to the game in the upcoming patch 1.7: Clint and Sandy.
Clint has long been a requested bachelor by the Stardew Valley community. As the valley blacksmith, he’s the one who upgrades all the player’s tools and opens geodes for them, meaning visiting him regularly is pretty common. But players have wanted to romance him largely because of his awkward relationship with an existing marriage candidate, Emily. Clint has a huge crush on Emily that remains unrequited even the player doesn’t marry Emily, but has a few scenes where he seems downright hurt if they do. Giving Clint more of a storyline that his current tactiturn, awkward lines is a much-needed change.
Sandy has also been a requested marriageable villager. She’s the manager of the Oasis in the Desert, meaning players don’t usually see her until they’ve played for a while. And unfortunately she never actually leaves the Oasis, so there are fewer opportunities for interactions with her. However, she’s kind to the player, leaving the fandom hungry for more Sandy storyline and more interactions with her, which they’ll certainly get now.
Additionally, ConcernedApe opened the video by showing off some old builds of Stardew Valley (then “Sprout Valley”) along with his own commentary. The sequence begins with the game’s original 2012 look, six months into development, when he had a “functioning game” that was very rudimentary, and similar to the original Harvest Moon game. Even so, you can see how much the basic design of the game looks very similar, right down to where things are located in Pelican Town, the bus, and more.
Stardew Valley 10th Anniversary Early Development Screenshots
Next, he shows off a 2013 build that looks a looooot more familiar. The art has been significantly updated to roughly the style of current Stardew Valley. ConcernedApe says this version of the game (now titled “Stardew Valley”) was more sandboxy than the current version of the game and less RPG. Additionally, the mines were procedurally generated, and you had to mine into the walls to find ore and secrets. This ended up being too complicated, “too ambitious of a concept for the scope of this game. This should have been a whole game on its own”, ConcernedApe said. He also showed off an underground Goblin Village that was totally scrapped. “Just because an idea sounds cool doesn’t mean it’s fun or the right idea in practice.”
Here, ConcernedApe said that nothing in these early builds should be considered “canon” in the Stardew Valley universe.
2014’s build introduced the Community Center, but other staples such as Joja Mart and Hat Mouse hadn’t been added yet. You also couldn’t decorate the inside of your house yet.
And another build from August 2015, half a year from launch, shows “how much of this came together at the last moment.” To my eye, this looks almost identical to launch day Stardew Valley, but ConcernedApe points out various changes like the location of the mailbox, the shape of the inside of the player’s house, and the final look of the main character.
In a reflection on the game’s launch, ConcernedApe talks about what the release of the game was like for him and meant to him, including sharing that the game sold just under 40,000 copies in the first day alone, at which point he knew it would be a success. He ended the video with a recap of the game’s updates over the years, and by thanking the community for its support over the years.
Patch 1.7 is coming at a later date. ConcernedApe didn’t reveal any further details as to what it might entail for now, but today’s announcement should tide everyone over for a bit.
Today is Stardew Valley’s 10th anniversary, and we celebrated earlier this month already by interviewing ConcernedApe about topics such as why there isn’t a Stardew Valley TV show, and the one secret left that the Stardew Valley community has yet to find. You can read our full, in-depth interview with the creator right here.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.
