There are games that I dig up at the same time every year. In addition to Skyrim, this is mainly Don’t Starve in autumn. Because hardly any title is as much Halloween for me as the survival game in the eerily beautiful Tim Burton style.
I can’t stand horror games. It doesn’t matter whether it’s jumpscares or well-done subtle creeps: no thanks. That doesn’t mean, however, that I don’t feel like playing spooky games with a Halloween atmosphere. My favorite this time of year has long been Don’t Starve .
The game goal? Sure, survive and don’t starve. Besides, you should not succumb to madness, freeze to death or fall victim to one of the countless monsters. Well that can really become something.
Simple and mean
Many survival games are not particularly friendly to beginners: Complicated crafting systems and hostile worlds usually make the first steps in this genre a feat of strength. It’s different with Don’t Starve : You don’t have to do much more than collect a few grasses, make a fire and put together an ax at the beginning. It gets treacherous the first night. I just want to tell you this much: don’t forget this fire…
First of all, you have to explore the area – you always end up in a random place in the randomly generated world. You will find a wide variety of resources and dangers in the various environments such as meadows, swamps or forests. Once you have found a good place, you should build a base and survive a strategy on how to provide yourself with food and protect yourself from enemies. In addition, it is important to defy the sometimes more, sometimes less challenging seasons. If you die, you have to start all over again. Small consolation: the more often you die, the faster additional characters can be unlocked.
In short: With a simple introduction and an easy-to-learn crafting system, Don’t Starve is fun from the first minute. In any case, you will die all the time – but then it is usually clear why. It’s just not such a good idea to try hitting the tentacles in the swamp.
50 hours later…
With its numerous challenges and the admittedly pretty nasty adventure mode, Don’t Starve will definitely not only keep you busy until Halloween. If you are not too frustrated when you freeze to death on the third day of winter, you should have dozens of hours of fun. And as soon as the survival part gets boring, the three different expansions are waiting.
If you’re into the classic Stranded adventure, check out the Shipwrecked DLC . You don’t end up in the usual world, but on a tropical archipelago and have to navigate from island to island on a poor raft. Reign of Giants, on the other hand, has set itself the task of making the existing world a lot meaner with new creatures and seasons. The third expansion, called Hamlet, takes you back to civilization – instead of crafting, it’s about trading. Incidentally, you should take a look at the different platforms here: The base game for PC does not include any of the expansions, but for the switch you only have to purchase Hamlet separately , for example .
On the other hand, if you want to play the game with friends, you should take a look at the multiplayer counterpart Don’t Starve Together . The game principle is the same, but additional features, environments and characters await you. With regular updates and events, you won’t get bored that quickly, even with friends.
