Who Is The Villain Of Stardew Valley? (2024)

There’s a quiet, idyllic life to be found in Pelican Town when you first begin playing Stardew Valley, but is there a villain before you can consider the game “beaten?” There are two major parties fans nominate as the villains of the game – the obvious Joja Corporation, but also, oddly enough, Mayor Lewis.

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Joja is the mega-rich corporation run by smug transplant to the Valley, Morris, and works its employees to the bone through long hours for little pay. On the other hand, Mayor Lewis hands responsibility of improving a decaying Pelican Town over to your farmer with little hesitation.

Is There A Villain In Stardew Valley?

With quaint farming and breezy social life at the forefront of Stardew Valley, you may not have considered the aspect of villainy in the game.

Developer ConcernedApe, whose real name is Eric Barone, is rumored to have omitted a clear-cut villain character to keep the peaceful aspect of the gameplay intact.

The point of Stardew Valley, though player choices decide the game's pace and tone, is to unwind from the bustle of city life, and ne'er-do-wells need not move to this verdant valley full of friendly folk.

That said, fans have named two villain characters since the game's launch in 2016: both Joja Cola and its manager, Morris, or, less commonly, Mayor Lewis.

Morris And Joja Corp.

Who Is Joja Corp.?

It's pretty easy to peg Joja Corp. and its manager, Morris, as the central villains of Stardew Valley, especially when considering the game's small-town aspect.

It's far from uncommon in real life for a multimillion-dollar corporation to move to a small town and disrupt the local economy, which seems to be Joja's move in Pelican Town.

When you first begin playing Stardew Valley, you'll decide between pursuing a traditional Community Center route or purchasing a Joja Membership from the store on the far east side of town.

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There's no right or wrong way to play the game, but while the Community Center route sees players growing assorted seasonal crops, collecting foraged items, and crafting artisan goods, the Joja route is fully centered on money without much focus on anything else.

As you go the traditional Community Center route, you'll upgrade the town with your contributions to the collections, but with the Joja route, you simply pay in gold to improve the town.

But just because the company is still technically improving the town, there are still some major issues with their ethics - polluting the local waterways with trash and overworking their employees to cut costs, to name a few.

And when it comes to leadership at Joja, though he's only the manager of the local branch of the store, Morris is presented as a traditional villain type, typically sniveling and scheming for ways to improve Joja's reach.

Do The Townsfolk Support Joja Corp.?

However, despite their overall improvements being made, the townsfolk aren't always keen on Joja's presence in Pelican Town.

Pierre, the owner of the local general store, was specifically averse to them building a store, as he'd previously been the town's only supplier of regular goods.

Now, Joja has arrived with lower prices (once you have a membership), presumably to undercut Pierre enough to convince the locals to buy from the corporation instead of their neighbor, which would ultimately force Pierre's store into obscurity.

Though Pierre's store won't close if you pursue the Joja Corp route in Stardew Valley, the tone shift is clear should you choose this path.

To bring home the idea that the corporate overlords are evil, finishing the Joja Corp route opens a Joja warehouse instead of a Community Center in the dilapidated building north of town.

Instead of a homey public spot for the locals of the Valley to gather for fun and friendship, Joja uses the building to expand its corporate reach and enhance its distribution across the region.

Eventually, it will go onto become the movie theater in time.

Mayor Lewis

While a markedly less popular choice for the villain of Stardew Valley, longtime fans have been pointing their fingers at Mayor Lewis as perhaps not outright villainous, but at the very least lazily complicit in the town's decline.

When you first move to Pelican Town, it's in something of a state of disrepair, as is somewhat common with games in the genre - the bus stop, mine carts, Community Center, and bridges are broken, and Lewis didn't seem to mind Joja moving to town.

Some fans argue that the mayor of this rural town is doing the best he can with what he's got, but others feel the mayor has allowed Pelican Town to decay out of personal neglect and failure to initiate for his town.

His inclusion is more of a fan theory consensus than the overall villain archetype, which more neatly falls to Morris and Joja, but players are always keen to save their favorite townsfolk, even if that's just from the arms of a man who won't commit.

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