Stardew Valley creator Eric ‘ConcernedApe’ Barone might be at work on Haunted Chocolatier, but that doesn’t mean updates for the farming game are over. Stardew Valley 1.5.5 has gone live with backend improvements for mod support, alongside a selection of bug fixes and quality of life tweaks. Barone has also teased update 1.5.6, which will feature further mod improvements, and – possibly – some new content.
In 1.5.5, the thing you’re most likely to notice is that you can now hold control and shift to purchase or craft items in stacks of 25. The full patch notes are available on the official site, but some other improvements include options to place buildings over artifact spots, nudge pets out of the way while doing construction, or buy back items you’ve sold accidentally.
The big change in 1.5.5, however, is that it’s been migrated from XNA to MonoGame. As Barone explains, “this future-proofs the game and allows mods to access more than 4 gigs of RAM”. There have also been “various internal changes for mod authors”.
Barone is working with SMAPI creator PathosChild on the upcoming 1.5.6 update “to add even more modding support to the game, including some long requested ‘holy grail’ changes which should make some aspects of modding much easier in the future. We’ve given PathosChild source code access to help us accomplish this task”.
“There may be some new content in 1.5.6, too,” Barone adds, “but it’s not going to be anything huge like 1.5.”