Haunted Chocolatier 'More of an Action RPG' Compared to Stardew Valley, ConcernedApe Says

Eric Barone, aka ConcernedApe, has briefly discussed the difference between his all-conquering indie game Stardew Valley and his hotly anticipated follow-up, Haunted Chocolatier.

Barone announced Haunted Chocolatier back in 2021, but amid ongoing work on his phenomenally successful Stardew Valley, progress on the follow-up has been slow going. Indeed, in June, Barone admitted to feeling somewhat embarrassed to have to keep on saying he was still working away on the game. “Feels kinda dumb posting this same thing over and over, but that’s the reality,” he said at the time.

In a new interview with GQ (thanks, Eurogamer), Barone touched on what to expect from Haunted Chocolatier when it eventually comes out, and it sounds more different from Stardew Valley than I had expected. It’s set in a more “metaphysical” locale, for a start, and in terms of gameplay it’s more of an action RPG.

“It is still what I call a town game,” Barone said, “But it’s more of an action RPG — the main focus is more about adventuring, finding equipment and getting more powerful. There are monsters, there are boss fights. It's for the people in Stardew Valley that go into the mines. That's what I do, honestly.”

In June, Barone admitted fussing over every last detail in a bid to make Haunted Chocolatier as close to perfect as humanly possible. “I am being very thoughtful about every aspect of the game,” he said at the time. “The things in the game which the player will be interacting with or using very often need to be ‘perfect.’ They need to be seamless, clear, intuitive, satisfying, aesthetic.”

He used the example of iterating on the recipe book for making chocolates, which sounded like a significant challenge.

“To me, it’s not a simple task, as I torture myself over every last detail,” he said. “This is a UI you will be using fairly often, so it has to be perfect. You need to be able to accomplish your goal with the minimal number of clicks. There needs to be just the right amount of data presented to the player: not so much as to be overwhelming, but not so little as to be trivial or mundane. And the way that this data is laid out on the page is crucial… If the data is all clustered together, it will be disgusting to look at. The data needs to be grouped into compelling, intuitive and easy to read/understand groupings. It needs to look appealing and intriguing. And this is just the bare minimum, that players will likely take for granted. If all of that is accomplished then the player is now comfortable while perusing the recipe book. But I want more than just comfort. I want to delight the player. All of this typically requires me to iterate on something several times before I’m satisfied with it.”

Barone also explained why he didn't want to show Haunted Chocolatier off too much at this stage of development. “Partly, it feels like I’m serving a half-baked bread. I would rather serve a fully baked bread,” he said. “Also, I know that many parts of the game will likely evolve and change before release, so if I reveal them early, I risk disappointing players if the final product does not match their expectation. Fortunately, I’m in a position where I don’t need to market the game, so I can take my preferred approach.”

Haunted Chocolatier is so far without a release date, as is Stardew Valley 1.7 update, which Barone isn’t working on directly. Earlier this year, he explained his current way of working in an interview with IGN.

“Well, part of the reason why I've expanded my team a little bit is so that hopefully I can spend more time working on Haunted Chocolatier," he told us in February. "And it's worked out pretty well so far, I would say. On 1.7, the approach we're taking is that I am like, you might say the creative director and I'm involved with like, 'Okay, here's what we're going to do. Here's some of the ideas.' Then I let the team work on that. And then meanwhile, I'm working on Haunted Chocolatier.

"At some point in 1.7's cycle, I will get heavily involved, because I feel like my hand needs to touch every part of the game, every aspect of the update. I need to go over it and adjust it or at least approve everything. So it will require a lot of my time anyway, but I think the balance has been a little bit more shifted, so that I can spend more time focused on Haunted Chocolatier. And I think it's been working out pretty good. That's been a big change from the 1.3 update or 1.1 or something where it's completely me. I had no time to work on a new game. So that has changed.

"It is difficult because it's hard to shift gears, I guess. If I'm thinking about Haunted Chocolatier, it's difficult to be like, 'Okay, I'm going to one day of the week or two days of the week work on Stardew Valley.' That's not how my brain works. I'm all in one thing or the other. So I've been trying to work on that. I feel like it requires a lot of discipline, which I'm always working to improve on."

We interviewed ConcernedApe and chatted about topics such as the addition of two new marriage candidates with 1.7, the one secret players still haven't found yet, and why there isn't a Stardew Valley TV show yet. We also chatted with the Stardew Valley community about what the game has meant to them over the years.