Stardew Valley creator confirms harvesting in a certain direction is faster – but not for long, as 1.6 fix due

If you’ve ever suspected that harvesting crops in Stardew Valley is faster in one direction than another, validation is at hand. The beloved farming sim’s creator has confirmed that the long-rumoured quirk is real, as its incoming 1.6 update prepares to fix a bug dating back almost a decade.

Eric ‘ConcernedApe’ Barone dropped the detail on TwiXXer as part of an ongoing tease of patch notes and features for Stardew Valley’s massive 1.6 update, which will bring expanded support for modders, eight-player co-op and a new major festival (plus two smaller ones), among new items like a bigger chest and some fresh secrets to seek out, when it arrives on March 19th.

Detailing some of the more behind-the-scenes changes in recent days, Barone revealed that 1.6 will see felled trees now yield saplings that match the fruit quality of more mature trees, which will also mature faster based on the quality level. (Making it easier to replant trees and have them get back to their previous maturity.)

Also being tweaked is combat, with swinging a sword downward now having an increased area-of-effect to override the original decision to match its range with the animation that left players at a disadvantage. Other changes include halving the amount of time you need to spend pushing against a pet before being able to walk through them and adding a one-week “honeymoon” period for NPCs you marry that stops them immediately spending all day in bed feeling sad.

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The biggest revelation, however, came in a seemingly innocuous patch note that confirmed what many players (and speedrunners) had suspected for years: harvesting crops in one particular direction is faster than another.

Barone explained that since Stardew Valley’s release more than eight years ago, the animation when harvesting crops left-to-right has been 100ms quicker than when doing so right-to-left. (Well spotted, Kotaku.) Update 1.6 will finally fix the bug, increasing the speed of the right-to-left animation to make harvesting in either direction equally fast.

There’ll no doubt be many more such details in update 1.6 when it lands next week, which Barone recommends you experience with a fresh save to see all that it offers. It’ll still work with your existing game if you can’t bear to give up your countless hours invested in arranging your garden and courting townsfolk, though.