Highlights

  • Haunted Chocolatier will offer similar cozy, low-stakes gameplay as Stardew Valley, but with a different theme and premise.
  • Instead of being a farmer, players in Haunted Chocolatier will run their own chocolate store, offering unique gameplay and narrative opportunities.
  • The game could feature its own version of the corrupt Joja Corporation, allowing players to make ethically questionable choices that impact the town and their business.

Fans of Stardew Valley are eagerly awaiting Concerned Ape's follow-up release, Haunted Chocolatier, which looks to offer similarly cozy, low-stakes gameplay, albeit with a noticeably different theme and premise. While many expect Haunted Chocolatier to improve upon the core elements of Stardew Valley's gameplay loop and world, the ways in which it will differ from the seminal farming-sim title are arguably more interesting.

At first glance, Haunted Chocolatier looks to be remarkably similar to Stardew Valley. The two games share the same pixelated, retro art style, with a focus on small-town community, multitasking, exploration, and resource management. That said, there are many reasons to believe that Haunted Chocolatier will be markedly different, at least when it comes to the main justification of its gameplay loop and how that impacts the in-game community: rather than serving as a farmer, producing and selling plant and animal produce, players will make and sell chocolate directly from their own store. Aside from being a seemingly solid business model, this premise means that Haunted Chocolatier's workplace sim elements will be fundamentally different from Stardew's, and this could have far-reaching, interesting implications for the overall experience.

Abigail looks shocked as the player from Haunted Chocolatier and a shadowy figure battle against a giat bee.
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How Haunted Chocolatier Could Feature Its Own 'Joja Corporation'

In Stardew Valley, the Joja Corporation is an obviously corrupt, soulless corporation that players can choose to align themselves with, despite the clear damage it does to the economy and community of Pelican Town. In essence, Joja represents a sort of 'evil' path for the character to take, one where they choose to use their resources and skills to service a harmful corporation over the local community. Haunted Chocolatier could feature a similarly immoral path, though it has a unique opportunity to shake things up.

Players Could Become the Corrupt Entity in Haunted Chocolatier

It seems that players will have their own customer-facing business in Haunted Chocolatier, which opens the door to a number of unique opportunities, right off the bat. Aside from the differences in gameplay, Haunted Chocolatier's narrative content could be altered by this key component, as the player-character will have an inherently greater sense of responsibility when it comes to managing their business. Through these workplace and business simulation elements, players could wind up becoming an unethical, Joja-like company, rather than simply serving such an organization.

There is plenty of opportunity latent in this theoretical role-playing system. For example, players could get the option to hire employees, drawing from the pool of town NPCs. From there, they could make a number of choices related to things like salary, hours, benefits, and workplace conditions, all of which would impact the business and the town's perception of it. This concept of ethics could also apply to chocolate production: perhaps players could come across a more cost-effective production method that has negative, significant impacts on the local environment, thus offering a mechanical and moral choice. These ideas would set Haunted Chocolatier apart from Stardew Valley while expanding upon the foundations that the latter has established.

In Stardew Valley , Joja Corporation served a thematic purpose. The narrative of the game is all about the player-character's struggles with modern society, and Joja Corporation represents its allure alongside its toxicity. Ideally, Haunted Chocolatier would echo this deeper thematic significance, if it does ultimately implement a similar dichotomy.

Stardew Valley is often praised for its relaxing, low-stakes gameplay, but it's breadth of unique choice and impressive level of interactivity are what help it stand out from other casual games. The existence of something like Joja Corporation, which Stardew Valley players are obviously drawn to, helps solidify the sense of an immersive, reactive world. Haunted Chocolatier appears to be aiming for a similar experience, so taking a few pages out of Stardew Valley's playbook, while making the appropriate tweaks and enhancements, could go a long way.