It turns out you can sneak into Stardew Valley’s Secret Woods early using a chair

Another neat little Stardew discovery

I love when people stumble on tips, tricks, and skips in games I’ve spent hundreds of hours playing, even if the discovery is more for entertainment value than anything else. I think you’ll be able to appreciate this one even if you don’t care about Stardew Valley.

As it turns out, in the latest version of the game, it’s possible to sneak into the Secret Woods early using nothing more than a well-placed chair and the ability to sit.

Ordinarily, you’d need a sufficiently upgraded Steel Axe to break through the log that blocks the entrance, but funnily enough, if you plop down a chair diagonally on the other side of the log, your farmer can jump on and hop off to bypass the progression blocker.

If you don’t have a chair to borrow from your house, you can buy one from Robin.

Learnt a new trick today
byu/Accurate-Ad-1191 inStardewValley

I found out about the Secret Woods chair skip from a clip that made the rounds in the Stardew Valley subreddit this week, but its roots can be traced to another clip from four months ago, and the method goes even further back to an earlier Quarry discovery that also used the chair hop. Sure enough, I pulled up a throwaway save file on PC to test this and I quickly broke into the Secret Woods. It’s been possible since the 1.5 update.

As outlined by YouTube user BigHerni, there aren’t many reasons to go into the Secret Woods prior to having a Steel Axe, but the zone does offer a nice supply of Hardwood and mushrooms — and you could knock out the Woodskip for bundle purposes.

Anyway, this was new to me (and seemingly a bunch of other Stardew players), and I got a kick out of it. Another one for the silly old Things Gamers Do tag that keeps me sane.