The Survivalists presents a sandbox adventure on a deserted island that you need to explore. Here’s our beginner’s guide to help you get started.
Note: For more information, visit our guides and features hub for The Survivalists.
The Survivalists: Beginner’s guide and general tips
Take note of your health, hunger, and stamina
On the right-hand side of The Survivalists‘ UI, you’ll find the stamina meter (green/lightning bolt). Stamina gets used up whenever you attack or sprint. On the left-hand side, meanwhile, you’ll see the health and hunger meters. Hunger is denoted by the heart icon, and the red circle outside that symbolizes your health.
Take note that food does replenish both hunger and health, and better recipes tend to restore more. You should try to bring some extra food in case you’re doing some dungeon delving since this will be your primary way of restoring HP (if not hunger as well).
If you still have enough health and you keep going on an empty stomach (depleted heart icon), your HP will slowly drain and your character will die. Assuming that you do end up dead in The Survivalists, fear not because you’ll respawn at the last save point/bed that you used.
Save often
Once you’ve found a cozy spot to settle in, go craft a comfy padding and a makeshift bedsheet. Here are the requirements:
- Comfy padding – 1x straw bundle, 2x palm leaf, and 1x rope.
- Makeshift bedsheet – 3x palm leaf.
Beds are used as save points and, well places for you to sleep on. Obviously, your character in The Survivalists would get hungry as time passes by. So, if your health is fine, you might just want to click on “save” instead of “save and sleep.”
Note: Later, you can create more advanced/comfier beds that give more health.
Get the campfire, crafting bench, and forge ready
These objects will be used regularly as you craft items in The Survivalists. Here are the requirements:
- Campfire – 6x pebbles; you need 1x timber to start a fire. Once some time has elapsed, the fire will go out and you’ll have charcoal.
- Crafting bench – 2x stone chunk, 3x timber, and 2x rope. Although you can craft basic items (default “C” key), the crafting bench provides more options and recipes to unlock.
- Forge – 6x stone chunk and 2x mud; you need 1x charcoal to stoke the fires. The forge is for higher-tier crafting items. These include metals, glass, and rare ores.
Note 1: Later you might want to start digging for mud and sand. You can also sail to other islands and search for metal ingots, gold ingots, and gems. These are materials required for Crafting Bench and Forge items.
Note 2: You can learn more about The Survivalists‘ main mechanics in our crafting mega guide.
Craft those animal traps
Animal traps (2x wooden slat, 2x rope, 1x berry) are a reliable means of getting food. These can be created as soon as you’ve unlocked the recipe from the crafting bench.
Place animal traps in areas where lots of rabbits frolic around. Check back after a day and you’ll notice that there’s some meat and bone left inside. Grab these and start cooking.
Note: To learn more about recipes and food, head over to our cooking guide.
Bring your own food as well as monkey food
You should bring several units of food as you’re roaming around in The Survivalists. Apart from your own food, you’ll want to bring something for any monkeys you encounter — the Monkey Meal (1x petals, 1x berries, and 1x makeshift bowl). You can quickly befriend these creatures while on the go.
Note: We’ve added more tips in our Monkey Mimic Mode guide.
Combat can be a little clunky
Combat in The Survivalists can be a little clunky. This is due to your character either lunging or swiping only to hit empty air (this happens even when a hostile mob is right next to you). Ideally, you should rely on your monkey companions to eliminate your foes.
If you want, you can also time your counterattack properly. Once the enemy has a red exclamation point over their head, go attack them. This should lead to a combo that damages them severely.
Note: What you definitely don’t want to happen is for raids to occur while you’re away from your base. We’ve got a mini-guide to help you defend against raiders.
The Mysterious Chest and monkey mules
In RPGs, characters that you dump items on for them to carry are called “mules.” The same concept is present in The Survivalists. The idea is to craft something like a small chest (4x timber, 2x rope). While chests can be placed in your chosen camp, you can also carry these (hold spacebar) and pass them onto your monkey companions. They’ll bring these wherever you go if they’re assigned to follow you. You may also open the chests (press spacebar) to transfer materials while they’re being carried.
What I tend to do is bring a couple of monkeys as chest mules and the rest have weapons (i.e., hand axes) equipped. This ensures that I’ve got an army that can beat down foes while a couple of others lug around all my loot.
From time to time, you might also encounter the Mysterious Stranger. This NPC sells the Mysterious Chest. It’s got lots of storage space and, if you’re joining multiplayer runs, it even follows you around.
Note: Our Mysterious Stranger guide has more info about the vendor’s wares and mission rewards.
The world is replenished
Every now and then, you’ll see the game slightly zoom in followed by a chime. That’s followed by a notification that the world has been replenished. That simply means creatures, plants, trees, and other objects have respawned. You can happily farm, gather, and take them out once more.
The Survivalists is available via Steam. For more information, check out our guides and features hub.
