When he was a child, he would run through the fields, watching little insects tumble around the crops. Occasionally, squirrels or birds—those mischievous creatures—would sneak in and steal from the fields.
After over ten years of working in the city, Chiaki Suzuki had nearly forgotten what that life in his hometown felt like.
But this game brought him back to those beautiful childhood memories.
He really loved this game. Even though it looked plain and unimpressive, with its poor visuals, it helped him rediscover his original joy.
Many people shared similar emotions with Chiaki Suzuki, and without exception, they all loved the warm feeling that Stardew Valley brought them.
Some even gained the courage to return to their hometowns after playing this game.
A game made by just one person, selling 50,000 copies at an average price of 1,700 yen.
Battle.net also took this opportunity to promote its revenue-sharing model.
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Game developers could receive 70% of the game's revenue.
At the same time, Battle.net added a special tag to Stardew Valley: Indie Game.
The term "indie game" was easy enough to understand—just like independent films in the movie industry, created by one or very few people with very low budgets.
In film, indie movies had already matured greatly, but in the game industry, very few had ventured into this space before.
Most people subconsciously believed that video games had to be high-budget products.
Perhaps it was because things like programming, illustration, music, and level design were so specialized that most people felt overwhelmed by the complexity of it all. On top of that, the industry had recently leaned more toward high-budget development. Only a few of Gamestar Electronic Entertainment's casual games had been able to win over players outside the gaming community—but the potential of casual games still hadn't been fully realized, and the focus remained on high-end production.
In this environment, no one expected a small dark horse to suddenly appear.
50,000 sales may not be much for a big company, but for developers in a slump, it was like a brand-new door had opened.
Stardew Valley didn't have great visuals, but even so, it achieved modest success.
Professional developers could immediately see that Stardew Valley wasn't difficult to make in terms of development. The only thing it really needed was a good idea.
And if you had a strong enough idea, then high-end visuals weren't really necessary. High budgets became less important too.
That revelation gave a lot of lost developers a brand-new sense of direction.
So success didn't only come from big-budget games after all.
Look—Stardew Valley was made by one person. And creating a game with similar visuals and gameplay wasn't even all that hard.
Yet this game still sold 50,000 copies, bringing in around 50 million yen.
That was roughly equivalent to five years' salary for a well-paid white-collar worker.
Those still struggling in the game development world had their eyes lit up red with envy.
And Stardew Valley's sales hadn't even stopped—it was still steadily growing, which meant the person who made it could continue to earn revenue.
To them, this was the ultimate role model!
In no time at all, Stardew Valley was no longer just talked about in gaming circles—it became a hot topic in game developer communities as well.
Along with it came discussions about the developer: "Nintendo is F***ing the Ruler of the World."
That name was seriously weird.
It seemed like the name was praising Nintendo as being amazing.
But what was Nintendo? Or rather, who was Nintendo?
User1: "The name 'Nintendo' sounds like some kind of centuries-old shop. Only century-old establishments are allowed to call themselves '堂' (hall). That's a Japanese tradition, didn't you guys know?"
User2: "Then what does '任天' mean? Sounds kind of like 'leave it to fate'?"
User1: "Yeah, kind of. So, a centuries-old shop that leaves things up to fate? Why would that kind of store be the ruler of the world? I really don't get it."
User3: "Wait, what are you guys talking about?"
User1: "Oh, another one shows up. Do I really have to repeat this again? Fine, I'll say it one more time. We're trying to figure out what 'Nintendo' means and why the game developer called Nintendo the ruler of the world."
User3: "Is that really the important part? I thought you guys were discussing the game's design philosophy. Got my hopes up for nothing."
User2: "Hey, the developer's name is important too! Why are you looking down on it?"
User4: "Everyone! Breaking news—I just found a historical linguist who says in an ancient language called 'Valis,' 'Nintendo' meant 'Supreme Holy Deity.' So maybe this Mr. Nintendo was referring to a divine being as the ruler of the world?"
User123: "Wait, how did this become about gods again?"
...
Takayuki, who had been aimlessly browsing the internet, stared at this chat thread in total confusion.
Why were these people always so obsessed with interpreting such nonsense?
It was just a joke, a random handle he used. Of course no one in this world could actually understand what "Nintendo" really meant.
And besides that username—"Nintendo is F***ing the Ruler of the World"—he'd also registered a bunch of other troll names, like "Sony Supreme," "Ubisoft Potato Farming Expert," "Ten Years Making Games, Nine Years Making CG," "Crafted With CG, Coded With Feet," and so on.
At the moment, he was using the alt account "Ten Years Making Games, Nine Years Making CG" to browse the forums—only to find a bunch of people seriously debating the meaning of his old username.
Why don't you guys just go play my game instead? Maybe then you'd understand that high budget doesn't always equal quality—a small, polished game can be just as charming.
But simply saying that in this chatroom was pointless. No one would listen to him.
They were too busy obsessing over who this mysterious "Mr. Nintendo" was and why he was the "ruler of the world."
Yup. The imagination of netizens truly knows no bounds. No matter how much he tried to explain, it would be pointless.
Still, watching these goofy discussions was oddly entertaining.
Of course, once he was done reading their nonsense, he had real work to do—encouraging more people in the community to explore indie game development. This world shouldn't just have big-budget games.
This world needs more indie games.