How to keep the game fun after the first year?

[Nydas]

I find the fun in this game drops off MASSIVELY after the first year.

At the start, the struggle is real. You can barely have the energy to grow crops while cleaning up the farm. There are trade offs to be made. Do i water crops and mine today? or forage and fish?

By the end of the first year, all thats out the window mostly. Everyday becomes the same thing. Pick crops that have matured, pet animals, and spend the rest of your time fishing, or descending the mines.

Thats just.....not fun.

[ChrillBill]

That's kind of the point with this game being a farming sim sandbox. A lot of rinse and repeat while building your farm, getting to know some npcs and maybe also aim for perfection? Maybe it's simply not the right game for you I am not sure. I actually think the game really kicks off after the first year :>

[Ol' Poopface]

Have you made it to the desert? The mine there is pretty challenging. There's also interacting with the townsfolk and eventually marrying someone if you want.

[Maya-Neko]

Make up your own goals.

- Want to be able to buy everything? Then it's propably better to get as much money as possible.
- Want to have a fully decorated farm? Might be a good idea to rebuild your farms for a few days.
- Want to see, how it looks like to have a farm with like hundreds of animals? Then it might be a good idea to get the ressources for building all that stuff.
- You're a completionist? Then go ahead and catch all fishes, get everyone to full hearts and cook/build every item once.

And the most important things:
- Only the first year is fun to you? Then start all over, since there's no rule, that you can't do that.

Overall it might also be a good idea to reduce the income, so that it takes way longer to get to the point, where you're at at like the beginning of the second year. It might also be a good idea, if you set yourself some limits, like forbidding yourself to use berrys, starfruit, ancient fruit, wine and pigs as a main source of income. You could also limit the time you allow yourself to be awake (like you need to go to bed before 20 o'clock)

[NBOX21]

You could also try slime farming. You can hatch slime eggs just about anywhere in the game using incubators and provided there's at least one male and one female in the same area, they will breed on their own and if you just continue to let them do so over time, you'll eventually end up with more slimes than you know what to do with, which will also continue to multiply after that.

You can even turn the entirety of what is normally a peaceful, quiet town into a monster infested place by doing this simply by repeating the above steps in every area of the map.

[Queen Droxxanna]

giving yourself goals and challenges in the game helps to keep it interesting. Get married, get divorced, get married again. How many times can you do that in a year? Have kids.
when you have completed all the achievements in the vanilla version (which takes some time) then its time to change your goals. How many of the achievements have you got so far.??

You can hire Juminos to do all your farming, harvesting crops for you. You can find Auto-petters to pet your animals for you. That will give you more time to interact with NPC's and build relationships.
How many quests have you done for the villagers?? Have you been to the island?? Made friends with Leo?? Have you succeeded in the volcano and upgraded your weapon and tools? Have you met Mr. Qi and entered his room to start his quests? Have you caught the Legendary fish?? Have you learned how to make Caviar??

have you tried mods yet?? Thats were the game can get challenging and fun. I added SVE and RSV, as well as Multiple Spouses mod. Then I ran a Rich farm challenge, married everyone in the game in one year, and had 18 kids, all by the end of year 1.
How rich can you get?? I had $81M by year 4 and a huge warehouse full and huge orchard, with large greenhouse. All of it was fully automated, making over $100,000/day.

Another challenge: how far down can you get in the Skull cavern?? There is no bottom to the place. I have been to level 1700 so far. ( with help of elevator and tractor mods)

You decide what you want to do in this game and the direction you want to take.
Search in the discussions for Rich Farm Success, and then for Poverty Farm Run. We did completely different challenges and posted long stories and pictures of our games.
How will you challenge yourself??

[DaBa]

If that's not fun then do other things? Did you get married? Did you ship every item, catch all the fish, finished the museum collection, discovered every item? Did you complete the community center? Did you see all the events? Did you even see Ginger island, do you even know what that is? Because it sounds to me like you're just stuck in a gameplay loop of your own creation and are not even looking for any new content, so of course you will keep doing the same thing...

[Amberbaum]

Since nobody said it: Stop playing. Come back if you are in the mood for this game again. Or try out some mods.

If there isn't an ongoing story available then the farming sim grind can be very repetitive. SDV doesn't really have a story per se. So you have to enjoy the gameplay loop or stop when it gets too boring.

Seriously don't force yourself. Marriage won't alleviate the problem. It's a pretty bare feature. If you aren't invested in the townsfolks then the social aspect won't cut it either. I don't care for self-made challenges so I simply stop playing when I had my fill. Eventually I will come back again.

[Bobywan]

Have you completed the community center or joja mart ?
Once you do, you'll unlock ginger island and a whole new farm.
But if you're fast, you "complete" the game by the end of year 2. After that it's rince and repeat, and it's time to install mods ;)

[ChrillBill]

Originally posted by Amberbaum:

Since nobody said it: Stop playing. Come back if you are in the mood for this game again. Or try out some mods.

If there isn't an ongoing story available then the farming sim grind can be very repetitive. SDV doesn't really have a story per se. So you have to enjoy the gameplay loop or stop when it gets too boring.

Seriously don't force yourself. Marriage won't alleviate the problem. It's a pretty bare feature. If you aren't invested in the townsfolks then the social aspect won't cut it either. I don't care for self-made challenges so I simply stop playing when I had my fill. Eventually I will come back again.

I agree with this. Considering how shallow marriage and the whole family feature is I don't think it is going to make a huge difference unless you like roleplaying and make great use of your imagination.

[Banz]

Originally posted by Nydas:

I find the fun in this game drops off MASSIVELY after the first year.

At the start, the struggle is real. You can barely have the energy to grow crops while cleaning up the farm. There are trade offs to be made. Do i water crops and mine today? or forage and fish?

By the end of the first year, all thats out the window mostly. Everyday becomes the same thing. Pick crops that have matured, pet animals, and spend the rest of your time fishing, or descending the mines.

Thats just.....not fun.

So why do you buy a game that's literally that. Farming

[Amberbaum]

Originally posted by ChrillBill:

Originally posted by Amberbaum:

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I agree with this. Considering how shallow marriage and the whole family feature is I don't think it is going to make a huge difference unless you like roleplaying and make great use of your imagination.

Yes, and SDV also struggles with the bane of many farming sims: what to do after year one or two? Most of the time farming sim games give you everything there is in year 1 and then that's it. Maybe you finish grinding up some friendships from townfolks you are missing, but that is hardly fun and the pay-off may be some small sequences.

I think OP may enjoy farming sim games with the SDV flavour in smaller doses. The gameplay loop, the enviroment and the freedom to do x and y are it's major drawing-point. I argue the get-away from the dreary city and dead end job feeling may help a lot for about 50% of it's player-base. If OP already gets bored by that then marriage, getting rich challenge(which is grindy!!!), making your way to the skull cavern (which is just a tougher mine without elevator) won't fix OP being bored with this game right now.

Even Ginger Island won't fix it.

OP, step back from the game. Come back if you want to. Maybe go nuts with mods. Maybe look into My Time in Portia. It's much much more story-driven and you have many clear goals stacked by the the game itself, while still having the freedom to bum around (to a certain extend - not like SDV) as well as the world slowly opening up to you as you progress through the main quest. I was very suprised by how My Time at Portia entertained me for about 110-120h just to finish the main quest on my first playthrough. Which was around early spring year 2. That's a win in my book. MTaP is not a farming sim, but shares nearly all elements from it. It's a building sim.

[ChrillBill]

Originally posted by Amberbaum:

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I totally get it. If you are bored with what you will find yourself doing most in the game, then those other small side elements won't really fix that for you. I also think "My Time at Portia" is a good example if you are more into seeing the world around you change and develop along with your progress. I would say MTAP is essentially a crafting/building sim with minor farming elements and with a good storyline. Though I am a little surprised to hear you finished the main story by spring second year xD It usually takes me at least two years in MTAP. But I also like taking my sweet time :p Anyway it is a good recommendation for the OP if they want something more challenging. There is also quite a lot rinse and repeat in MTAP, but not in the same way as in Stardew Valley I think. In MTAP I have always felt way more "busy" and part of something "bigger" than in Stardew Valley. But I appreciate Stardew Valley for what it is; a super relaxing farming sim sandbox with all the time in the world.

The modding community has also helped lifting the game I think and it is certainly part of why I find myself returning to it when I am in the mood for something relaxing and fun :>

[Amberbaum]

Originally posted by ChrillBill:

Originally posted by Amberbaum:

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-snip-

Yeah, I forgot to mention that finishing the main quest in an ingame year is in the upper bracket on how fast you can finish it. I mostly focused on the main quest and some townies. On my second play-through I gave myself more time and actually invested more time in the marriage/party/social aspect of the game. Which was sweet and not "Okay.. That's that, I guess..". It was way easier for me gauge out how much time I can have with the main missions once I played through it first.

And yeah, SDV modding keeps my interest in this game too. SDV is my most played game currently on Steam. It wouldn't be like that if it weren't for mods to be honest.

Side-note for everyone else reading this: Me bringing up My Time at Portia is not meant to dismiss or crap all over SDV. It's just that I get the feeling OP may like this one more. Not everyone is enjoying the typical farming-sim grind and that's okay.

[Minty Alexx]

Have you heard of ginger island?

[ChrillBill]

Originally posted by Amberbaum:

Originally posted by ChrillBill:

-snip-

And yeah, SDV modding keeps my interest in this game too. SDV is my most played game currently on Steam. It wouldn't be like that if it weren't for mods to be honest.

Side-note for everyone else reading this: Me bringing up My Time at Portia is not meant to dismiss or crap all over SDV. It's just that I get the feeling OP may like this one more. Not everyone is enjoying the typical farming-sim grind and that's okay.

Same here. This is actually one of the best games when it comes to modding I think, becasue there are so many different mods for all sorts of purposes. Some of which really changes the game entirely, which can be very fun. I also don't think you should worry about crapping on Stardew Valley :> That's not what we have done here. I mean I love this game and I admire the developer behind it. But that doesn't mean I am going to blind myself and pretend that there aren't other great games out there that might be a better fit for some and also for myself depending on what mood I am in :D