How does the star system work?

[Syrin]

I place items next to other items, rotate, etc. and sometimes one star will light up on item, sometimes not. I clearly have not figured out this mechanic

[Buntkreuz]

Every item that has a star shows in its description what you need to place on the "empty" star to trigger its effect.
For example, the banana has in its description, that it will trigger faster if placed next to other food items.
The stars around the banana show where you can place the food items to trigger that effect.

In that case, each star around the banana can cover one other food item. If two or more stars go above the same item, only one star will be activated.

[Syrin]

"If two or more stars go above the same item, only one star will be activated."

AH! There's my confusion. I was trying to light up 3-5 stars at the same time

[Buntkreuz]

Originally posted by Syrin:

"If two or more stars go above the same item, only one star will be activated."

AH! There's my confusion. I was trying to light up 3-5 stars at the same time

Yeah at best you try to get a different item for every star to get covered.
So lets say you have the pan and it has 4 stars and you have 4 a bananas, you try to get the stars of the pan to cover only one square of the 4 bananas, so it gets 4 times the buff. Instead of having 2 stars of the pan cover two squares of one banana, as you would get the buff from that banana only once, not twice.