Don’t Starve. This seems like a simple concept…easy some might say. I mean somehow I manage to do it every day, and I’m lazy and incompetent at the best of times.  However, surviving is not so straightforward in the case of Klei Entertainment’s action adventure title. Don’t Starve puts you at the heart of a fantasy world with no one to help. With only a mere sarcastic remark from the man who brought you there for company, you’re left to fend for yourself. In a climactic battle between you, the elements and hunger: everything is out to get you and it will get you, unless you arm yourself.

I want to start by talking about the look of the game. Klei Entertainment are a Canadian Indie company and like most indie titles it relies on a more quirky aesthetic rather than cutting edge graphics. This, again like most indie games, makes it feel all the more loved by the developers. It looks like a Tim Burton film and plays like you’re in a story of your own making. The game is split into two halves and each has its own style: day and night. Day is wonderfully colourful and full of cheery music it will make you feel at ease and as though you have nothing to worry about. You will have time to gather resources and build the tools that will get you through the night. The night is dark and full of terrors…no seriously, it is. During the night you will have to make your own light source or a mysterious monster you never actually see eats you. I assume it eats you; you don’t see that bit either…

One aspect of the game that I really liked was the sanity-meter. It’s been done in other games but I’ve never seen it done so well. When it drops below a certain level you start seeing shadow creatures and your vision starts to shake. The creepiest example of this is when I was sat next to roaring fire and a shadowy hand crept along the floor with some kind of twisted lullaby music playing in the background. It scuttles away if you chase if off but leave it to grab you and you’re doomed. Another big feature of the game, and one that it neglects to tell you about, is winter. After approximately 24 days, you will start to notice changes in the landscape and a short while after you will be in the bleak midwinter. This, my friends, makes the game even harder. Nothing will grow and there will be vast shortages of animals to hunt. This then sets you up for a month long fight to survive in hostile and freezing conditions – walk too far away from your fire and you will freeze to death. The screen begins to turn to ice, and your once youthful hopes of surviving chip away like Winston’s health. By the way, Winston is your starter character, not a British caricature. 

The mysterious land in which the game is set is full of secrets that you will become determined to get to the bottom of. The human features like hunger and temperature mixed with the cartoon graphics is an odd combination but it makes for a fantastic game, and an interesting challenge. It has so much content, you’ll want to come back for more.

Most importantly, I got extremely attached to my character. Huddled next to the fire, I found myself rooting for Winston, wanting him to not only stay alive but to live. Waiting out the night with nothing but the wind and the shadows for company I really felt for my lonely protagonist. When a game makes you care, it makes you want to play. My one piece of advice would be…Don’t Starve.