Stardew Valley

Stardew Valley

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Top 14 Best Buildings in Pelican Town (In Stardew Valley)
By PopShoveItQueen
There's a good few buildings in that cool little town we all live next to in Stardew Valley, and since I've ran out of characters (at least in the base game) to rank, this is the next step that I can think of. If you noticed that there's only 12 buildings on the map, that's because of reasons I won't explain until a section which I've said includes spoilers. And as always, please remember that these are my opinions and that this is completely for fun, so take it as such.
   
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Just which buildings are on this here list?
I'm glad I'm pretending that you asked!

(potential spoilers ahead for possibly later in the game stuff)

There are 12 buildings in Pelican town as soon as you start the game, and along with that, it's possible to turn the Community Center into the Joja Warehouse and the Joja Mart into the Movie Theater. I won't be including the Sewers, because I figure I'll find something else to rank that in, and I won't be including the new house that replaces the trailer because I already spent 500,000 undetermined currency on it and therefore don't need to spend any more time on it.
14. Joja Warehouse
Nope, I hate it.

As a building itself? Decent, at best. It's far too blue if you ask me.
But as the idea of what it represents, that being the destruction of not only the Community Center but also the home of the Juminos? I could not place this any higher on the list if you paid me. And speaking of payment, while I'll give you that it's far more straight-forward to complete the Joja Community Development Form by dishing out thousands of gold circles, it takes all of the fun which I'll take about later the the Community Center Bundles entail.

And frankly, why didn't they replace the boiler room in the renovation? I'm pretty sure it doesn't do anything with the big metal thingy busted, so they should have either filled it up with boxes like every other room or fixed the g-dang boiler. Just an all around poor use of space.
13. Trailer
It's almost as though it's a very small space.

Listen. I like trailers. They represent an evolved form of living which isn't tied to the ground, like the inferior house, which can be moved to whichever location you desire much like the mighty snail. Except faster, because vehicles outspeed snails in most cases. However, from a gameplay standpoint the Trailer just doesn't really do anything. It just kinda... y'know... is a house?

It's a fine design, the kind of place I'd be more then willing to live, but there just isn't anything to talk about besides the fact that it has wheels and that's kinda cool. And I mean, the TV seems a bit far from the couch to me. I know having it in the middle of the room might not be practical, but if Pam's gonna sit there and watch it for a good amount of time (at least before bus driving again), I'd think she'd want to see it better. But maybe that's just me.
12. JojaMart
And we're right back to this thing.

Is it a store which sells good? Fine, yes, it is. You are perfectly allowed to bring legal tender to this establishment and leave with products in which you have purchased. However, as someone who has very proudly never made a singular transaction in this building, I can say that it deserves to be here because I don't like it. Honestly, the only reason I've decided to put it here is because of the truck sitting next to the main building, because if JojaMart wasn't here I wouldn't be able to give some random truck driver a rabbit's foot in return for a strange magic charm.

Where did he get the charm? Why does he want a rabbit's foot, something that is only believed to increase luck, rather then an actual seemingly proven to increase luck lucky charm? Why does the potentially same truck driver stay there even when you replace the JojaMart with the Movie Theater? I have many questions about the mysterious freelance truck driver, but lets move on.
11. 1 Willow Lane
This one just barely got here.

1 Willow Lane is pretty basic. There's a family I really don't care all that much about (except for Kent) living in it, but the extra room don't add all that much in terms of ranking. Let me tell you something, there's one reason and one reason alone that this building is better then 3 others.

The ??Foroguemon?? statue.

My man Foro doesn't need any explanation, he exists and that's more then enough for me. I'm pretty certain that Vincent has no idea there's a strange mystical box with a taste for Strange Buns in his room, but because that mystical box decided to call 1 Willow Lane home, then I guess it's a decent enough building. And I mean, the instruments in Sam's room are kinda cool.
10. 1 River Road
Ay, it's my main man George's house!

If you can't tell, we've already entered the Just Regular Ol Houses section of this guide. This is definitely a nice little place, I think the dining table is pretty cool. But let's talk about the most important part of this house, which is without a shadow of a doubt the TV.

Remember in the Trailer section when I mentioned moving the TV closer to the couch? Well, my main man George has completely changed the game with this one. He's in a wheelchair, meaning he could easily have kept the TV pressed against the wall and simply wheeled up to it, and yet he's decided to have it pulled as far into the middle of the room as possible, and that's nothing less then a power move. Mad respect, George has gone and proven why he's my main man yet again.
9. Mayor's Manor
It's the Lewis House.

I don't know if I'd call this a manor exactly, considering I'm pretty sure other houses in town are bigger then this. Maybe I don't know what a manor is by definition, but it sort of sounds like mansion so I feel like it should be bigger then it is. However, Lewis is also a single person, and considering he won't make his relationship with Marnie public which might cause her to live here and pass the family business onto Shane (providing, of course, that Shane no longer works at JojaMart), I feel like it's good on him to not have a way oversized house.

Overall, while I can't figure out why he has so many chairs at his dinner table, I do know for certain that placing 10 beets in his fridge for Mr. Qi is pretty cool. And, while I'd never actually be willing or able to do it, this building has the divorce option in it, which might interest some of you. But I don't much care for it. I just care about sneaking in those beets.
8. 2 Willow Lane
That's right, Willow Lane was so good they made a sequel.

This is a nice house. I like the wallpaper, along with a lot of the other decorative things. And while I think you only ever see it once, I really like Haley's photography room. Along with that, the little sewing room is really pleasant, and considering it's also functional it gives this place a boost.

But I feel like I need to take some time to talk about Haley and Emily's parents, because like... they're just gone aparently? I didn't know that they owned this house until I started doing research for this ranking, and now I'm a bit confused. And while it probably shouldn't be the biggest concern I have after gaining that knowledge, what was the sleeping situation when they still lived here? Is the double bed in Emily's room theirs, and there used to be another bed in Haley's room? If it were me, I'd give the kids the bigger room to share and sleep with my spouse in the smaller room. But then again, if this were me I'd visit every once in a while, so it might not be my place to talk.
7. Harvey's Clinic
It sure is a clinic.

I'll start by saying I don't really care about the shop, I usually just survive by eating random purple mushrooms I find in cave and spicy eels I purchase from a cool desert lady. However, when it comes to the building itself, there's a lot more to talk about.

Harvey's house it nice, it's a nice little living space. But the actual clinic part, quite frankly, seems to be very much overcompensating. I imagine that Harvey had the 9 waiting room chairs and 3 patient beds ordered before he realized the only thing everyone does all day is stand around and never really put themself into any form of danger whatsoever. It's no wonder that he complains about not having many patients, because I can't imagine you set up 9 chairs that pretty much never get used ever and manage to not be at least a bit salty. But y'know, I can appreciate that he was prepared to help a lot of people, so Harvey's Clinic goes here.
6. Blacksmith
Ah yes, the place where you buy ores and it's a good idea.

I don't exactly see the point in buying ores as apposed to mining them in the mines which is the purpose of the mines, but I supposed different people use their funding in different ways. However, there's a pretty universally agreed upon place to spend money in Clint's business, and that's the tool upgrades. I'm not entirely certain what the tools claim to be made out of originally, especially considering that they appear to be made of steel in the first place, but Clint's ability to put increasingly cooler metals onto them is quite valuable.

And even though they added an automatic geode crushing system, I'll easily be going to the blacksmith for all my crushing needs. It's a matter of principal. But to end off, I'll say that I think the building itself looks pretty cool. I like the bricks and such.
5. The Stardrop Saloon
It's the Junimo Kart place!

Now this is a nice, well-rounded establishment. I don't make all too many purchases from the bar, except for when I need a birthday gift and it's easier to just buy one, but it's nice that you can buy a bunch of recipes from resident cooking guy Gus. Speaking of obtaining things, The Stardrop gets a lot of points in my book for being the place where you get ??Pinky Lemon??. And it really is a good place to meet up with people at the end of the day who I hadn't had time to find earlier.

But most importantly, this is the place where I can kick back and play some good ol arcade games while laughing at the concept of the Joja Vending Machine ever being used. Junimo Kart and Journey of the Prairie King have caused me a lot of anger in my day, and while I'm still yet to beat Journey of the Prairie King all the way through, I've found enough success in Junimo Kart to consider it a nice thing to go in a play for a bit when I'm bored. And sure, I could just play it at home, but where's the fun in that when compared to going out and playing some arcade games at the saloon?
4. Pierre's General Store
We've reached Abigail's former home.

That's right, it's the best store in town, with amazing stock such at Grass (TM) and the bouquets I use to initiate a stronger relationship with literally everybody who'll except one. It's also the place where you can find Caroline's super cool greenhouse room, where she's growing tea and potentially weed if my fan theory is correct. It's hard to point out flaws in this place considering it's the only place I get seeds and such, which are at least somewhat important in this farming simulator.

But considering we're ranking buildings here, let's get to something important. How exactly, Mr. ConcernedApe, are people within any part of Pierre's General Store supposed to reach the balcony? There's quite clearly no way inside that leads to it, so are you just supposed to whip out a ladder and climb up? In that scenario, where does the door lead? I know I really shouldn't care about this so much, but I hope to one day be able to proudly stand upon that balcony.
3. Museum
It's also a library, how fun!

What a nice little place this is, I can kick back and read a book that I found in the ground somewhere and returned or look at a wide collection of minerals and artifacts that I collected for Gunther instead of selling them for profit or using them to make something. But hey, you do get a pretty g-dang nice selection of items for donating to the museum, both functionally and for decoration.

I do wish it included a bedroom for my man Gunther so he had a better chance of becoming a befriendable character, but overall, it's a pretty solid building that I enjoy visiting. And it's definitely a good place for Penny to take Vincent and Jas, so you've gotta appreciate it for that.

2. Movie Theater
(Psst... hey, bud. If you've been paying attention, you might know which building is number one by now. But just between you and me... lets pretend you don't. Thanks <3)

Wumbus.

Now this, this right here, this is a good looking building. Talk about inviting, with the bright purples and the cool little movie posters. And as if the outside wasn't already enough to put it high on the list, the inside only makes it better. It's a neat little way to pay for a bit of friendship and also get to see a high-quality feature film, especially when top tier movie Wumbus is in the theater. I also kind of wish I could have some of those epic looking treats outside of the movie theater.

And c'mon, you know I've gotta talk about the crane game. Talk about a place where I'll shell out money no matter how not particularly useful the things I get in return are. Y'know, leave it to Stardew Valley to make a crane game, which could have easily just been a bunch of prizes randomly sitting in an empty box, into a really pretty and fun to play experience. Like, there's trees and grass inside it, and I legitimately don't know if they're real or not. I bet they are.
1. Community Center
Yeah, it's just not much of a choice to me.

I love how this place looks through every step, from when it's a vine-covered and tiny apple guy infested mess to when it's restored into a pretty purple building that's full of life in an entirely different way. It's incredibly satisfying to me to go through the process of fixing it room by room, seeing it slowly become the lovely Community Center it once was.

I just love this place, to the point where I can't even bring myself to go through the Joja path for the achievement. It's one of my favorite parts of the overall Stardew Valley experience, because even if I'm not that good of a player despite playing the game for a while, I can feel like I really accomplished something by helping the Junimos. For me, it earns it's spot at the best building in Pelican Town, if not the whole game.
Hey, you got to the end!
Thanks for reading this guide! I put what I think I could call a pretty decent amount of time into it and I'm pretty proud of the result. And hey, if you enjoyed this you might enjoy some of my other Stardew Valley guides, like Top 6 Flyest Honeys and Top 6 Finest Fellas.

I'll probably be ranking some other buildings sometime soon, but after that, I'd love to have some suggestions of what else within this game I could rank. I have a lot of fun making these.
3 Comments
Sha6k Aug 10, 2021 @ 11:27am 
Weres the fishing shop and The one dudes house on the beach
atwonders Aug 4, 2021 @ 9:46pm 
You could do areas in the game (cindersap forest, the beach, ginger island, etc), dungeons (or groups of floors in the mine), rewards from the bundles, produce in each season. There are lots of good options.
kismuth Aug 1, 2021 @ 11:56am 
wulaloo