You can now play "Stardew Valley" for free on your iPhone

Stardew Valley+ is now available on Apple Arcade. If you have a subscription to Apple's gaming service or pay for Apple One, you can play the hugely popular farming simulator for free. So maybe say goodbye to your free time (and maybe your loved ones?) right now.

If you've played it before, there's never a bad time to start another game on the Apple Arcade version. If you haven't played it, Stardew Valley is a farming simulator entirely designed by one person, Eric Barone, under the name ConcernedApe. Blending the retro appeal of an old-school pixel art RPG with a surprisingly deep (and still evolving) gameplay system, it goes well beyond nurturing your virtual crops to include bonding with your neighbors (who all have their own quirks), fishing, mining for ore, and even battling monsters in the surrounding forest. While you can certainly accomplish a lot, there's no real ending, which means you can play it forever if you're so inclined (and a lot of people are).

The Apple Arcade version of Stardew Valley includes all content from the most recent story, but does not support multiplayer or offer any in-app purchases. The game is expected to remain on Apple Arcade for the foreseeable future, so you have plenty of time to play it, but it's worth remembering that games leave the service from time to time. (If you can imagine going so far that you wouldn't mind losing your save data, you might want to go for a console version, it's available on just about every platform.

If you don't...