When ConcernedApe released the 1.6 update for Stardew Valley, a litany of new content was added, making the game feel brand new for even the most seasoned players. The developer recommended players start a new save file after the update’s release to fully appreciate everything added to the game, and though it hit PC in March, players are still findingsmall changes that drastically improve the game.
Just one of these easily missed examples was shared by Reddit user Sn0wwing, who found a feature added to the in-game menu that makes the Feast of the Winter Star a little bit easier. In the bottom right corner of the farmer’s skill screen, players can see who they’re assigned to give a gift to at the winter festival. The villager’s icon will appear next to a little present, reminding the player they’ll want to set something aside for that specific villager.
Previously, Mayor Lewis would send a letter to the farmer with their designated gift recipient a week before the event, forcing players to parse through old letters if they’d forgotten before the festival takes place in the town square on the 25th of winter. It was incredibly easy to forget who the farmer was meant to give their gift to – especially if the player took a break from the game in the middle of the winter season. This small change streamlines the process and serves as a built-in reminder for busy players.
This addition wasn’t the only one made to the farmer’s skill menu that drastically improves players’ quality of life. For starters, the mastery system added to Stardew Valley gives players new ways to grind and better their skills without mods – and to help them keep track of their progress, a mastery bar was added to the bottom of the farmer’s skill menu. This shows how much XP a player has left until they reach the next mastery point, as well as how many levels of mastery they’ve already acquired.
Below that, the player can see how many times they’ve upgraded their farmhouse, denoted by the level next to the house icon. There’s also a tracker for the mines to showcase how many levels deep they’ve ventured (including Skull Cavern). Next to that, there’s an icon showing how many of the game’s seven Stardrops players have collected.
Keeping track of a player’s progress in the Community Center is also infinitely easier with this upgraded menu. In the bottom left of the screen, there’s a junimo surrounded by six different stars. Each star represents a different room in the Community Center. Once the star is filled, players will know they’ve competed that room. This prevents players from constantly running to the building to check their progress, or selecting the golden scroll symbol in the game’s inventory menu and clicking through the different rooms one by one.
Though these changes may seem small – and the game worked perfectly without them – these quality-of-life improvements have helped farmers save time on the little things when trying to maximize their progress in their new 1.6 save file. Unfortunately, Stardew Valley console players are still waiting for the new update, but the developer has promised it is in the works and will be ready “as soon as possible.”
Source: Sn0wwing/Reddit, ConcernedApe/X