Should you go the Community Center or Joja Mart route in Stardew Valley 1.6?

Stardew Valley offers players a critical choice early on, drastically altering the story. While you should experience both in separate playthroughs if possible, let me answer the question: Should you go the Community Center or Joja Mart route in Stardew Valley 1.6?

What path should I choose: Community Center or Joja Mart?

I will keep this guide as spoiler-free as possible, but I recommend rebuilding the Community Center if you’re a new player. The Community Center path is arguably canon, and restoring the building is a satisfying long-term goal.

If you’re an experienced or returning player, you may be surprised to learn that the Joja Mart route through the game is pretty fleshed out. Sure, you feel like a scum bag, but you won’t ruin the game by picking one or the other.

Regardless of what decisions you make here, you can still do most things as normal, including dating and getting married.

What’s the difference between the Community Center and Joja Mart routes?

The end game has some differences, but how you reach that point is more important. If you go the Community Center route, you must complete Bundles to restore the building. Bundle hunting is excellent for new players, as you’ll need to do everything from Mining to Farming to complete it. 

It took me a very long time to complete the Community Center for the first time, but it’s satisfying and taught me a lot about all of the mechanics in Stardew Valley.

On the other hand, Joja Mart’s progression is much more straightforward and requires cold, hard cash. Instead of working toward Bundles, you’re putting money toward various developments around Stardew Valley. The Joja Mart route gives you much more freedom as you can make the required cash however you please. 

To start the Joja route, speak to Morris at Joja Mart and pay 5,000G for a membership. You can work toward the Joja Community Development Form the following day.

What are the endgame differences between the Community Center and Joja Mart?

If you rebuild the Community Center, you will receive rewards for completing each Bundle. You get nothing for completing Development Projects for Joja, although the Bundle rewards aren’t very impactful overall. 

If you side with Joja, the Community Center will be replaced with a Warehouse with some applications much later. If you complete the Community Center, you drive the Joja corporation out of Stardew Valley.

The 1.6 Update has added some exclusive Joja route items, including one for late-game content. 

Developer ConcernedApe recommends starting a new save for the 1.6 update. Your existing files will still work, but you may miss some of the latest content.