First Appeared on The Legend of Lorie
Sandbox games are becoming quite popular these days. Animal Crossing, one of my favorite games, is what made me so interested in sandbox games. If you are not familiar with what a “sandbox” game it, it basically is an entire world in the game that you can modify yourself. Minecraft and Terraria are two examples of sandbox games. Don’t Starve is a game developed and published by Klei Entertainment that takes a new and unique twist on the “sandbox” theme.
Don’t Starve is an open world survival game. Unlike Minecraft or Terraria, you do not have unlimited lives. The objective of the game is to see how long you will survive in the world. In the beginning of the game, you will only have one unlocked character but there are eight characters that you eventually get to play who all have different abilities to help survive in the game. When you start a game, the world is generated randomly. The world map is different every time you start a game with randomly placed items and monsters. To survive, you have to keep your character’s sanity, hunger, and health from reaching zero.
With Tim Burton style artwork, the game has an eerie and spine-chilling feel to it. The world itself is very dark and the creatures are very twisted. This all adds to the effect that your sanity (something that you must maintain to survive) is constantly draining. Whether you are running around in the dark, entering strange wormholes to get around the world quicker, or eating raw meat; your sanity will drain. Once your sanity gets to about 60%, you character will start seeing hallucinations. Eventually when your sanity gets low enough, these hallucinations will start physically harming you. Sustaining your health is important in Don’t Starve as it is in most survival games. Once your health reaches zero, your world is destroyed and you must start over in another randomly generated world. Starving, being attacked by creatures or hallucinations, and eating dangerous or spoiled foods will start depleting your health. Last but not least, don’t starve. Forage and hunt for food so your hunger level does not reach zero or you will die.
Death is inevitable in Don’t Starve and each time you die, you gain experience to unlock more characters. There are so many different ways to die in Don’t Starve and it’s one of the reasons why the game is so enjoyable. The Don’t Starve universe is dark, treacherous, and dangerous but don’t let that steer you away from exploring the map. Exploration is very important in game play as you will have to find more food and more creatures to obtain supplies for crafting. Like most sandbox games, crafting is an essential aspect of Don’t Starve. Build shelters, campfires, a crock pot to make better food, and various machines to unlock more recipes. Building, poking, and learning are important in your survival in Don’t Starve.
Don’t Starve also features an adventure mode if you have survived for awhile and want to challenge yourself, however, adventure mode must be found in sandbox mode. Adventure mode consists of several grueling stages varying from never-ending darkness, year long winter, and other very difficult scenarios. If you die in adventure mode, you will be ported right back to sandbox mode.
If you are looking for a new and challenging open world game then Don’t Starve is worth the $14.99 on Steam. The game is constantly being updated and lets players know when the next update will take place right on the title screen. The game is engaging, fun and a refreshing change from the typical Minecraft-esque sandbox game.