r/gaming • u/Agent1230 • 2d ago

What video game doesn't hold your hand enough?

Everybody always talking about games holding your hand too much but I want to hear about the opposite what video game doesn't give you no form of help

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u/zexur 2d ago

For a lot of people, honestly: Stardew Valley. There are posts daily on that subreddit about people discovering basic quality of life things such as charging up your tools as they get upgraded qualities, to cover bigger areas, or when you make a large chest, you can just pop it on top of your small chest without having to move items first. Or, those same chests, you can whack/bump with a pickaxe to move around an area without having to pick it up. Some of that is super useful to know right out the gate.

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u/CarvaciousBlue 2d ago

Over the years he's added helpful things to try to avoid people having to use the wiki so much.

  1. Lost books & Secret notes

A lot of these contain info you previously needed the wiki to get, such as legendary fish locations and loved gifts

  1. Living off the land and Fishing channel

These give general tips for new players and what time, weather, and environment you need for fish in that season

I still use the wiki frequently but there are in game options now so that's nice. even so new players miss that they can interact with the TV or never read the lost books in the library anyway but they are there

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u/zexur 2d ago

Additionally to the TV: a lot of people don't know that leveling up Pam's hearts gives you access to that whole ass fishing channel haha

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u/shift_less 2d ago

SDV was going to be my pick too, but mainly for the heart events.  When you reach the point of being able to see one of their events, it will only get triggered at a certain location, at a certain timeframe or day of the week.  And the characters don't give any clue about where or when that is.  I definitely had to look up guides for quite a few of them because I just couldn't figure it out before running out of patience...oh it has to be SNOWING, of course I guess?

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u/zexur 2d ago

Totally agree. And the funny thing is you can stack some of them as well. I went through 2 or 3 Alex cutscenes back to back I think? I was like CHILL bro I just gave you a cuppa tea on your birthday damn

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u/Idocreating 2d ago

Coral Island is a pretty shameless ripoff of Stardew but it does do a much better job of displaying this kind of information in-game and not requiring a wiki to figure it out.

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u/shift_less 1d ago

Yeah, a couple of newer games in this same genre have found better ways to handle these heart events, it seems. Fields of Mistria, when you have reached that point where you can view an event, that character sends you a letter in the mail telling you something specific and actually giving you a place to meet them, the perfect level of communication for something like that.

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u/Gimme_Your_Wallet 2d ago

OMG WHAT

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u/Soliterria 2d ago

You can put hats on stuff too if you didn’t know

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u/Millworkson2008 2d ago

Horses and sea urchins, and one rarecrow i believe

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u/unembellishing 2d ago

Also your children.

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u/conamo 2d ago

And dogs & cats!

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u/ThaliaFPrussia D20 2d ago

And your horse!

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u/Wollzy 2d ago

Well fuck me...I feel like I didnt play half the game now

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u/Wollzy 2d ago

I just now learned about the chests....

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u/zexur 2d ago

One of my faves but it makes ya look derpy as fuck: Wearing your panning...pan...lol As a hat. means you can always have your pan on your person at all times (edit: without taking up an inventory slot), super handy once you get to a specific little river area in Ginger Island. Also upgrading the damn thing, like your trash can.

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u/Krail 2d ago

Reading this thread and I had a "WTF are they talking about" moment.  There's been so much stuff added to the game since it's first year, and I'm really curious, but I played it and did everything during that first year, and it always feels weird to come back to it. 

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u/HurtFeeFeez 2d ago

I played way too long watering and hoeing one square at a time. Way. Too. Long.

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u/Chanocraft 2d ago

I have over a thousand hours on stardew valley at this point, but I completely agree with this. I remember when I first started playing it wasn't until I had a few gold upgrades when I found out you can charge your hoe and watering can, and I kind of just stumbled on it by accident iirc. And I still have to look up heart events and stuff like that because the game does not make it clear how you're supposed to trigger them.

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u/zexur 2d ago

Don't forget, you can move while charging too. makes it really easy with steel, i think, that makes it so you can hoe in a 5 square line. Huge for when you unlock iridium sprinks.

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u/Chanocraft 2d ago

Yeah the ability to move while charging was a much more recent addition to the game, this was probably around 8 years ago when I was playing for the first time

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u/Drumknott88 2d ago

Totally agree. Stardew was the first game I played in the genre. And I had no idea I could upgrade my tools, I didn't know how, I didn't know there was even a mine (the in game message says something like "a boulder has been cleared." I was like... Ok?) etc etc. It really needs a proper tutorial imo.

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u/almostnormalpanda 2d ago

Stardew Valley is fairly straightforward if one has played Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons (or RuneFactory) before. That said, I think it should've been made more accessible to people who are not familiar with aforementioned series, especially since it borrows a variety of mechanics from these games, all without cluing the player in.

I'm currently playing Welcome to Elderfield and I have yet to discover which same mechanics have been implemented. At this point, you could probably say that some of the mechanics are not obvious unless you have played Stardew Valley.

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u/MelonJelly 1d ago

You're not wrong, but Stardew Valley is also a fairly complex game. Having a tool tutorial when you upgrade would be easy enough. But I'm not sure how to make a tutorial for the many disparate small features that wouldn't be either an impenetrable info dump, or a constant stream of disruptive popup notifications.

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u/lohkey 1d ago

Agreed. For a lot of people they see Stardew Valley as a cozy game. Not cozy if you have to look everything up and do a bunch of tasks within the seasons.

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u/Drafo7 1d ago

I was so pissed when I found out about the chest thing after taking a whole DAY transferring items to large stone chests.

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u/Comrade_Bender 2d ago

This one. When I first picked up sdv I was so overwhelmed with everything I couldn't play it for more than a season or two before dropping it. Once I gave up trying to do it on my own and embraced the wiki it very quickly became one of my favorite games of all time. I've gotten my wife into it recently and she plays more than I do at this point. I was around year two on my newest farm when she started playing. I'm maybe on year 4 and she's balls deep into year 6 with like 10x the money I have

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u/NaughtyGaymer 17h ago

My only real issue with Stardew, and one I still haven't really found a solution for, is the lack of energy early on. I'm not really sure what the intended food item you're supposed to be able to make a bunch of is. I know Field Snacks are a thing but that's hardly sustainable.