Ever since Stardew Valley’s new 1.6 patch dropped last week, tons of players have been grinding through the cosy farming sim to try and discover as much new content as possible. And as more is uncovered, I’m slowly realising that Eric Barone definitely didn’t explain all the creepy new additions in the patch notes. 

At face value, the arrival of mannequins in Stardew Valley doesn’t sound all that exciting. Once you unlock the Calico Desert you can purchase as many as you can afford for 12,000 Gold each. Then, when you’ve placed your mannequin in your home, you can plan outfits to hang on it, and that’s about it. They don’t really do much else—unless you stumble upon a cursed mannequin. 

Stories of strange encounters have been flooding Reddit threads and Discord discussions in the last couple of days, with many believing that these cursed mannequins have a life of their own and some sinister intentions. 

One Reddit user, Piper1336, had a particularly creepy interaction with a cursed mannequin: “I placed a haunted mannequin in my house, and it randomly moved around. Quite harmless, right?? This morning, the mannequin was wearing MY CLOTHES. The ones I went to bed with!!! It actually swapped the displayed outfit with the outfit my character wore.”

While this could have been an odd one-off it looks like the same sort of weird mishaps have been happening to other players as well. ClafoutisRouge described how the mannequin moves around their room and has even blinked at them, while others agreed that they’ve woken up to see that their mannequin is in a different spot from where it was the night before. 

According to what players have shared, cursed mannequins can only be dropped by haunted skulls that roam in the Dangerous Mines. But even still, I absolutely refuse to place even a single mannequin in my home, just on the off chance I get a bad egg. 

There’s no confirmation from Eric Barone about this change, so it could be an elaborate community creepypasta rumour, but it wouldn’t be the first spooky addition found in 1.6. Last week, some players stumbled across a particularly brutal cutscene involving Mr. Qi at the Summit, where he punishes cheaters after giving them a stern telling-off for being so selfish.