Megathread: Secret Hunting – Stardew Valley

Note: I will begin to strike through things tested in the rumor/suggestion section.

As you all (probably) know, in a recent interview the following was said:

• PCG: Finally, are there any secrets in the game that you haven’t seen anyone find yet?
• EB: Yes.
• PCG: Yes?
• EB: Yes.
• PCG: And you’re not going to tell me what that is, probably?
• EB: No, I won’t tell you. [Laughs] I haven’t told anyone.
• PCG: Is it significant?
• EB: It’s not super significant, but it’s kind of just so weird and obscure that I don’t know if anyone will ever do it.

And so begins our hunt! I will be updating everything below as people comment with information.

THIS IS YOUR WARNING. I DON’T WANT TO HAVE TO BLANK ALL THE INFORMATION OUT WITH A SPOILER SINCE IT WOULD MAKE THE TABLES HARD TO READ. THERE ARE SPOILERS BELOW! SPOILERS!!!

Tried Methods/Known secrets

Item and Description:

• Secret box 1

Located behind Blacksmith. Giving it a “Super Cucumber” gets you a statue called “??HMTGF??”

• Secret box 2

Located behind Joja Mart. Does not seem to be intractable at all. Nothing exists in the code to indicate otherwise.

• Secret box 3

Located in the Saloon, behind barrels. Giving it “Duck Mayo” gets the statue “??Pinky Lemon??”

• Secret box 4

Vincent’s chest. Giving it a “strange bun” results in the statue “??Foroguemon??”

• Lonely Stone

Clicking the Lonely Stone on the map produces the sound made when breaking stones. Casting the fishing rod on it does nothing. Nothing in the code seems to indicate there is a use beyond this (so far)

• Concerned Ape Favorite Thing

Choosing “ConcernedApe” as your favorite thing gets a secret dialogue. Img 1

• Concerned Ape Noise

Clicking ConcernedApe when starting the game makes a strange duck sound.

• Galaxy Sword

Collect all four scrolls in the mine and then read the gravestone in town. It will say: Img 2. Taking the Prismatic Shard to the Calico Desert gets the sword.

• Plant in Mayor’s house

Tried every item (excluding weapons, decorations, and furniture) on the plant. Nothing happened.

• Hidden Door

A hidden door is visible on the farm in winter (all the way south).

• Yoba Altar (items tested)

Every item was tried.

Img 1:

Img 2:

Suggestions to Try/Clues/Rumors

Description:

• Try things regarding the legend of Yoba/the altar. Possibly Ancient Fruit. Tested.
• Yoba altar – Try seeds, the ready to plant seed, fruit, wine, jam. Tested.
• The secret statue is able to be placed outside. Might need to find specific place to put it.
• Investigate bear in museum. There is a short rhyme nearby, which includes every type of animal in the farm but sheep.
• Yoba: “After 11 days, the vine bore fruit.” Only Hops and Tomatoes take 11 days. Tested.
• There is a shadow in our farm that is moving over time as you can see here, its only visible if you try to build something from the carpenter there, all of us that have seen it we have it in the same/near the same spot, its not the “invisible tree bug” and it’s not confirmed if it is a bug but you can interact with it, place statue, tilt it and plant seeds etc.
• Green text on starting screen, bottom left with the word “challenge”.
• Secret is “obscure” and “not super significant”
• “HM” could possibly stand for “Harvest Moon”
• “Added a way to modify a rare item” appeared in the patch notes. Galaxy hammer/dagger in the code.
• Becoming friends with Linus get’s dialogue about how ‘If you spend enough time with the trees they may tell you their secrets’ and another about how in winter he gets lonely because the trees are sleeping. Perhaps the secret has to do with trees before winter. What about the large tree below your farm by where the gypsy parks?
• Secret could possibly be triggered by obtaining all the stardrops and then using your larger amounts of energy to do something?
• In Harvest Moon there is an easter egg at 4:44 on the TV. Duck Feathers Item ID is 444, and Wool (the closest gametime ID) is 440.
• HMTGF could possible mean Harvest Moon – The Gracious Few which references a song. The name of the song is Tredecim. The first line is “I am the harvest moon” Lines include: “As summers rapture comes to close, A glow of orange at night” “Your beaches littered with dead and debris” “I have grown older will… By another name” (possible source of Willy?) “I returned a gilded man, My life has made me calendar, My life is flatland” I think it points to an event on the 3rd of Winter at night because of the song name “Tredecim”. And the event is possibly designated by an orange glow. The beach references make me think you need to bring the statue to the Lonely Stone.
• Orange glow on the 13th of Winter
• Tredecim (the name of the song by TGF) is Roman Latin for 13th.
• “Harvest Moon” is a traditional term for the full moons occurring during late summer and in the autumn … The “harvest moon” is the full moon closest to the autumnal equinox (22 or 23 September). This is consistent with the item required to get the HMTGF statue – a cucumber (assuming “HM” is a reference to Harvest Moon); they’re harvested during long warm seasons, much like when the Harvest Moon would be. I guess all we can confirm from this is that the items required to get the Statue are vaguely consistent (i.e. not random bullshittery), although we wouldn’t have that knowledge at the time…this may just be a case of confirmation bias. Stay with me here: Abigail has the closest birthday to the Harvest Moon at Fall 13th. Alex has the only other 13 bday: Summer 13th. Coincidentally they’re both marriage candidates. What we have is a rumoured effect on Winter 13, birthdays in Fall and Summer…so that leaves Spring 13. Spring 13th, at 4:44, use the TV? Or Winter 13th in the Secret forest, with Duck Feathers?
• According to Krobus’ dialogue, Friday is the holiest day of the week for Yoba
• In the secret forest, in the lower secret area, there is another gap in the hedge a little bit to the right which allows you to walk inside the hedge. It’s completely dark, though, and I personally haven’t encountered anything in there.
• Has anyone ever looked at the shape of any of the mine levels? Some are star shaped…Is that anything special? Never really counted how many stars there are total or on what floor they are if there’s a pattern. I broke all the rocks in one once to see if anything happened, nope.
• Also, just read something interesting regarding The Wand: You know that altar to Yoba in Pierre’s? If you use the Wand on it, it powers the Wand up and acts as a permanent “teleport home” tool. Only problem is, I don’t think you can get the Wand! It appears that Sandy is supposed to tell you about when you get it, so I assume you’re supposed to get it from her. It survives in game as some sound effects. Taken from PenguinTod So, the wand has been removed from the game, but it was seen to react with the alter. Perhaps nothing reacts with the alter now?
• These probably aren’t it, but seeing as they aren’t significant & are obscure: Bugs in Skull Cave can be stopped by defending (sword), maybe they can be killed? You can fish after 2:00AM. Can you stay up indefinitely? In summer when it got late, a large shadow flew overhead. I don’t know if you can interact with it? (Shadow is an owl, does not seem to be interactable so far) The big skeleton in the desert, can you interact with that? The dwarf & shadow guy both seem quite “special”… Has anyone tried playing poorly, by joining jojacorp & shooting people with slingshots & losing all your money & giving everyone joja cola? Maybe grandpa will haunt you after 3 years…
• Plaque in Harvey’s clinic resembles the gold thing on Yoba’s Altar. When you observe it you get the following message: “The sign of the vessel. It’s here to comfort those who believe in Yoba.” The little thing on the altar is a vessel of some sort.
• Why the warp totem was there in the Dance of the Moonlight Jellies: Img 3, Img 4
• Two statue bases and the toy beer in the museum have a touchable hand pointer, but no reaction to clicking
• Make a song with the note players/flute/drums?
• Plant in Mayor Lewis’ room, bottom right. Hidden box to the left behind Linus’ tent.
• Alex locker in the Spa
• Golden plaques in skull mine: Img 5
• Item called an Obelisk (obtained it through cheating. It messes up the game)
• Investigate purple duck at playground
• Going through all the files, there are several in the Terrain Features with “Diggable Wall” as part of the title. These range from basic walls, to frost and lava walls, making me think they’re a part of the mines. I’m not sure if this is a feature that was removed later in development, but there was a dev post from 2013 talking about “diggable walls” (dev post #4). The world ‘dig’ isn’t mentioned in any newer posts.

Img 3-4:

Img 5:

Since we don’t exactly know what we are looking for, I’m hoping if we stumble upon it, we can get confirmation. Everyone, feel free to message me if there are any errors or if you have any of the information missing. I’m updating as I go.

Original Link – Continuation of discussion