SCLPTURES

thinking about stardew valley

this post will make no sense if you haven't played stardew or aren't familiar with the NPCs. i also hope i didn't accidentally repeat a lot of fiona sangster's words because i like her videos and sometimes i subconsciously repeat points verbatim if i agree with them lol. at the end of the day there's never such thing as an original thought

one of my favourite parts of playing stardew valley is watching people overanalyse the characters because it leaves a lot to the imagination, and sometimes our imagination is sick and twisted. why are we having conversations like these on a retro looking game about farming? i don't know but i'm here for it

i'm a big fan of sebastian, i've seen a lot of takes about him from many sides of the fandom and they're mostly fair. the mean things he said about maru did turn me off at first but i'd be hard pressed to find anyone that doesn't have jealousy towards their younger sibling.¹ i never understood when people tried to frame him as a heartless weirdo because i feel he has some of the nicest dialogue lines in the game, especially when placed next to a guy like shane.² i think we all seem to automatically view introverted personalities as mean, like this mindset of "why are you not entertaining me!? asshole!"

also demetrius is certainly not evil,³ i know... shocking coming from a sebastian defender. i feel like he has so much potential to get along with demetrius and maru because they have overlapping interests,⁴ but then again that's not the point of the game. it sucks when people act like demetrius is hopeless just because he doesn't talk to you specifically about seb, completely ignoring the step-parenting book in his room which indicates that he is trying to make an effort. i feel they both have similar passions but their personalities oppose each other so much that it becomes difficult to get along, sebastian doesn't mesh with anyone around him—not even his own friends at times, as shown in the 2 heart cutscene—so imagine him trying to get along with his step-dad who is basically a stranger he was forced to live with

"but what about that one time he destroyed sebastian's snowgoon!" you ask

again... you need nuance, what did his snowgoon look like? he seems like the type of guy to make a creepy looking snowman just to give the pelican town residents a little scare

my point is that demetrius isn't fully to blame for his tense situation⁵ and i feel bad for both of them. i love a healthy father-son dynamic especially in this day and age where men are severely lacking in good male role models,⁶ so seeing a missed opportunity like this is too difficult to ignore... maybe this is my sign to start writing fanfiction

tl;dr everyone in the 24 mountain road household needs therapy

Footnotes

1. i don't blame anyone for finding it annoying how he's hung up on it as a grown adult, if he's been self-isolating for a while then of course he'll stay in a slightly childish mindset. it still turns me off of him sometimes
2. no hate towards shane by the way, i'm huge fan of his character arc
3. i think the fandom's hatred of him is partially connected to the stereotype of black men being bad fathers. hell i've seen less hate for fucking MORRIS, yeah the guy who works with the corporation actively polluting stardew valley
4. programming, science and STEM respectively... sebastian! go join them and start a cool project already!
5. people infantalise sebastian way too much to the point of completely ignoring what consequences his actions might have, like we're acknowledging how much he dislikes talking to people but then are shocked when someone doesn't talk to or about him
6. when i say "good male role models" i mean ones that aren't hypermasculine womanisers. this conversation could be a whole other blog post