Eric Barone's 2016 interview resurfaces — Stardew Valley's origins in his own words

PC Gamer has republished a 2016 interview with Stardew Valley creator Eric Barone, originally printed in PC Gamer #293 (UK, July 2016), just months after the game launched in February of that year. It's a rare look at Barone right at the moment he was realizing how dramatically his life was about to change.

In the interview, Barone traces the game's roots back to his childhood obsession with the Super Nintendo — Mario Kart, Chrono Trigger, Secret of Mana — and especially Harvest Moon, which he credits as the direct inspiration for Stardew Valley. After graduating from the University of Washington-Tacoma with a computer science degree in 2011 and struggling to find work, he started building what was essentially a Harvest Moon clone as a way to sharpen his programming skills. He worked 60 to 80 hours a week on the project — then called Sprout Valley — while pulling part-time shifts as a theatre usher, with his girlfriend supporting them both on her lab technician salary. "She was supporting us," he says plainly. "I think she probably had some doubts, but she wanted to support me and knew this was my dream."

By the time this interview ran, Stardew Valley had already sold several hundred thousand copies, and Barone was still processing what that meant. Features now considered core to the experience — including multiplayer — hadn't shipped yet. The game was built entirely solo, which remains one of the more remarkable stories in indie development: one person, no publisher, years of grinding, and a result that redefined the farming sim genre for a generation of players.

PC Gamer has also pointed readers toward a 2025 YouTube interview with Barone, in which he reflects on the game's release, explains why he still can't stop working on it, and talks about his next project, Haunted Chocolatier. Ten years on, Stardew Valley is still receiving updates — a testament to how personally Barone takes ownership of the game he built from scratch.