Swen Vincke stamps seal of approval on Stardew Valley mod that yoinks the Baldur's Gate 3 cast out of D&D and into a cosy pastoral life

Typically, in an Isekai anime, the main thrust of the plot involves a poor unsuspecting person dying (usually via unfortunate truck placement) and waking up in a fantasy world of magic and adventure. In the case of Stardew Valley's latest hit mod, it's sort of the inverse—while they don't have trucks in the Forgotten Realms, the entire cast of Baldur's Gate 3 has been transported to Stardew Valley.

It's a downright impressive bit of kit—featuring over 20 new NPCs, a bunch of new locations, items, and the like. More of an expansion than a gag, really, and a clear labour of love. Which is why it's nice that Swen Vincke, co-founder of Larian Studios, has given it his official stamp of approval (thanks, GamesRadar+) on X: "So much love went into this—amazing work!"

A post on X that reads: "So much love went into this - amazing work!" quoting a Stardew Valley mod. — (Image credit: @LarAtLarian on X.)

Xun, the mod's creator, replies in a separate post: "You have always been an inspiration, and your words mean a lot to us. We sincerely thank you for your encouragement."

The mod itself, dubbed Baldur's Village, is already pretty dang popular—accruing over 11,000 downloads on Nexus Mods, alongside 80,000 eyeballs set on the thing. I'm not particularly surprised, mind—the companion cast of Baldur's Gate 3 is extremely popular, so much so that Wizards of the Coast has leapt to franchise the heck out of them. Why wouldn't you want to rizz up Astarion in some cottagecore environs?

Honestly, it's just nice to see Stardew Valley's modding community is alive and well—our own best Stardew Valley mods list has been updated as recently as February of this year. That shouldn't be much of a surprise, though, since it's still incredibly popular—for instance, it managed to pull in 150,000 players last year for its 1.6 update. Those are good numbers for a freshly-released blockbuster game, let alone a cozy indie that's been kicking around for almost a full decade at this point. Here's to 10 more years of the Stardew multiverse.

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Harvey's history with games started when he first begged his parents for a World of Warcraft subscription aged 12, though he's since been cursed with Final Fantasy 14-brain and a huge crush on G'raha Tia. He made his start as a freelancer, writing for websites like Techradar, The Escapist, Dicebreaker, The Gamer, Into the Spine—and of course, PC Gamer. He'll sink his teeth into anything that looks interesting, though he has a soft spot for RPGs, soulslikes, roguelikes, deckbuilders, MMOs, and weird indie titles. He also plays a shelf load of TTRPGs in his offline time. Don't ask him what his favourite system is, he has too many.

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