The Stardew Valley board game is very good if you have time to play it

I pre-ordered the Stardew Valley board game immediately after it was announced. One of my favorite video games in board game form? Sign me up.

I was absolutely jazzed when it finally arrived. I love an overly complicated board game that comes with a long manual, so the sheer heft of the Stardew Valley box was promising. I took my sweet time unboxing it, patiently punching out all the pieces, unwrapping the cards, and just taking in that satisfying new-board-game smell. There’s a lot to it, with a bunch of different decks (including one for the villagers, with some beautiful portraits), cardboard pieces, and a whole intricate board that maps to Pelican Town. I just loved looking at it.

And that was even before digging into the game itself. It’s basically a condensed version of Stardew Valley, one with a finite ending and more of a concrete time limit than the video game. To win the game, you have to complete four of Grandpa’s Goals (objectives picked from a deck at the start of the game) and six Community Center bundles (donating items, like in the original game) by the end of the year. Each season’s events are determined by drawing four season cards, although instead of one month, they last for one week. Rounds correlate to each week, and as players, you work together to figure out what you’ll do each round.

Most of the mechanics from the video game (including my beloved fishing) are present in some way, though achieving iconic milestones like marriage might not happen in one playthrough, since the opportunities to interact with villagers might be determined by the cards you draw. Still, there’s a little bit of everything, and I was very eager to try my hand at all of the mechanics and see how they worked in board game form.

Photo: ConcernedApe

But my euphoria was short-lived when I realized one crucial thing: None of my local friends are big board game people. At least, they’re not the type who get excited about huge rulebooks and sitting around a coffee table for hours. I do have friends like that — they’re the ones I play D&D with via Zoom and Discord, because they’re spread across the world. If I wanted to play Stardew Valley with them, I would want to play it in person, not try to finagle a session virtually.

My partner and one of our good friends knew how excited I was about this, so they both rallied for me, despite not being board game or Stardew Valley fans. Unfortunately, around hour three, my partner had to call it quits, since that was about the limit he could sit still and do one task. My friend lasted a little longer, and we jointly played for my husband, but it was approaching midnight and she really did have to go home. But still, we pushed through, and even though everyone around me wasn’t really vibing, I still had a fantastic four hours. (Thanks, guys

Overall, it was very fun to draw cards to see what I mined, shuffle the fish bag to see what was available that season, and place the forageable tiles in their designated spaces on the board. I also loved to see what randomly drawn events each season held — would I get a festival, rain, or a crop upgrade? It was all a bit more random than the video game, but that presented a different challenge, one I was very eager to take on.

But I didn’t really want to do it by myself. You can play the Stardew Valley board game solo, but setting up the whole board and going through all of the hullabaloo on my lonesome made me just want to pick up the original instead. Ideally, I’ll one day find three people who (1) love long board games, (2) love Stardew Valley,and (3) have a few hours to spare on a nice weekend. And then, we’ll tackle saving Pelican Town, collaborate on how to maximize our resource gathering, and have a wonderful time with the Stardew Valley board game.