Valheim Midsummer 2023: Seasonal Items, Save File Fixes, and Patch Highlights

Valheim may still wear its Early Access badge, but Iron Gate Studio keeps pushing updates as the game inches toward a full release. The latest is the Midsummer 2023 patch, a smaller seasonal drop that lines up with the summer solstice and quietly fixes a long list of save file issues at the same time.

What the Midsummer Update Includes

This is not one of Valheim's headline expansions. It is a focused seasonal patch, lighter in scope but heavier on quality-of-life fixes than most players would expect from a holiday event.

Returning Seasonal Items

Last year's Midsummer items are back without changes to their recipes.

Maypole

The Maypole is a decorative structure that you can sometimes find sitting in abandoned villages around the Meadows biome. Standing near one grants a nearby player a Comfort bonus of 1. The crafting recipe asks for:

• 10x Wood
• 4x Dandelion
• 4x Thistle

One thing worth flagging: once a Maypole is destroyed, it does not respawn. If you accidentally chop it down, console commands are your only way back. Craft it carefully, place it somewhere safe, then admire from a respectful distance.

Midsummer Crown

The Midsummer Crown gives the wearer a single point of armor and nothing else. It is purely a seasonal cosmetic with a token stat attached. Craft it at the Workbench using 10x Dandelion.

New Banner Colors

Alongside the items, the update introduces four new banner shades to dress up your hall: orange, purple, white, and yellow. Useful for picking out your base from a distance, or simply for marking the solstice in colors that do not scream "Viking funeral."

Save File Improvements

The technical side of the patch is where most players will feel the difference long after the seasonal items go quiet.

• Save file sizes have been reduced significantly, which means faster load times when entering worlds.
• Several save-related bugs were patched, including a nasty one that could erase a save when the GUI hit a glitch while deleting a backup.
• The game now generates an automatic backup whenever a world is loaded under a new version.
• Worlds saved on a newer build can no longer be opened in older clients, which prevents a class of corruption that used to surface after rollbacks.

When Does Midsummer Run?

The Midsummer update went live on June 12. Iron Gate did not publish a hard end date, so it is reasonable to assume Maypoles and Crowns can be crafted past the solstice. For reference, the 2021 event began on June 23 and the 2022 event on June 22, with the previous year's seasonal crafting only disabled at the end of August. A similar window is the safest bet here.

Full Patch Notes for 0.216.9

The complete changelog for update 0.216.9 covers more than the seasonal content:

• Midsummer items enabled (Maypole and Midsummer Crown).
• Performance, memory, and networking improvements for both fresh and long-running worlds.
• World save file size greatly reduced.
• Fixed endless loading of the save manager when switching tabs too fast.
• Corrupt saves, saves with load errors, or saves with missing meta files can now be restored from the most recent backup via the "Start" button in the Select World menu.
• General save file stability fixes.
• Faster loading inside the Manage Saves menu.
• Fixed a GUI update failure that occurred when deleting the bottommost backup in Manage Saves.
• Automatic backup created when starting a world in a new version, plus a permanent backup when loading into a new world version.
• Fixed a world load issue between versions: worlds from a newer game version can no longer be opened in an older one.
• Fixed hitbox issues for close combat and a related spear-throwing bug.
• Added a UI scaling option in settings on Xbox.
• Fixed minimap pin input on Steam Deck and Big Picture mode.
• Fixed minimap text input for certain Asian languages.

Final Thoughts

As seasonal patches go, Midsummer 2023 is modest on content and surprisingly generous on backend fixes. Pick up your Maypole and Crown while the event runs, hang a yellow banner over the longhouse, and enjoy the quieter load screens that came along for the ride.