The goal is to survive as long as possible, and a count of the number of days the player has survived is shown onscreen. The game keeps few records of player progress besides the total number of experience points and the playable characters unlocked. Wilson is the default playable character, unlocked upon purchase of the game, but the next character, Willow, can be unlocked with 160 experience points. Woodie, the last character unlockable with experience, requires the game's limit of 1,600. The player earns 20 experience points each in-game day and receives them after dying. As is common among roguelikes, death is permanent, barring the use of several rare or expensive items like the Meat Effigy, TouchStone, and Life-Giving Amulet.
The game relies on a day/night cycle that causes meaningful fluctuations in gameplay style. During the day, the player spends most of their time exploring the world: gathering food, firewood, and other resources, discovering crafting recipes to combine available items, and avoiding enemies. With nightfall comes dangerous monsters and an invisible menace, Charlie, who attacks the player when the screen is dark. A player must have a light source or night vision to prevent Charlie from attacking. Crafting from recipes allows the player to build shelter, weapons, and tools like axes. Players can forage and farm plants as well as hunt animals for sustenance, with several characters having dietary perks or restrictions. Food can spoil, however, so the player cannot keep it for too long. Eating spoiled food results in a loss of health, sanity, and an increase in hunger. Each in-game day takes 8 minutes of real time.
Death can occur in a variety of ways. The player has three gauges displayed on the game's head-up display, which respectively track hunger, health, and sanity. Hunger worsens by default, being replenished with food. Sanity decreases during the dusk and night or as a result of specific unpleasant actions, such as robbing graves or fighting monsters; it can be replenished through mentally stimulating activities, such as sleeping, picking flowers, and wearing fashionable clothing. When hunger gets too low, it begins to chip away at health, which will eventually result in the player's death. A large variety of creatures can attack the player, including giant one-eyed birds, tree monsters, tentacles whose owners are not shown, and even small, weak frogs that will nonetheless try to accost the player and steal from them. Additionally, at low enough sanity, figments of the character's imagination become corporeal and able to attack the player. Some creatures, such as pig-like creatures often found in tribes, begin as neutral to the player (Excluding the Reign of Giants character Webber), but the player's actions may lead them to be allies or hostile foes.
The bulk of the game is played in Sandbox Mode, but there is a second mode, Adventure, which the player can access by finding a landmark called Maxwell's Door. Adventure serves as the game's campaign, consisting of five levels that pit the player against Maxwell, the antagonist of Don't Starve. The player loses all items and recipes upon entering, and can only pick four to keep upon completion of each chapter. Death or the end of the five sections returns the player intact to Sandbox Mode.
Plot
Characters
Wilson, a gentleman scientist, is the protagonist of Don't Starve. While Wilson has no special abilities beyond growth of "a magnificent beard", which slows the speed of freezing in winter and accelerates overheating in summer, other playable characters do: Willow, a firestarter, has a unique lighterclarification needed and is immune to fire damage, but will start spreadable fires on the ground when she has low sanity. A girl named Wendy receives visits from her deceased twin sister Abigail when summoned. The strongman, Wolfgang, has high health and significant offensive capabilities that grow better the more his hunger meter is full, but he starves faster and loses more sanity when near danger. WX-78 is an android who nonetheless needs to eat, sleep, and stay mentally stimulated, but does not become ill from spoiled food, can increase its maximum health, hunger, and sanity with gears (reset to the original maximum after dying and respawning; the corpse leaves behind a portion of the used ones), and takes damage from rain (which causes sparks bright enough to ward off Charlie). Being made of conductible material, WX-78 also attracts lightning that surrounds it by a glow that gradually dies down as time passes and refills its health, but also lowers its sanity. Wes is a mime with fast depleting hunger and low damage. His maximum health and hunger are lower than most characters and he cannot talk. These characteristic give the players huge disadvantages for a more difficult play experience.. Wes has the unique ability to make balloons (which can act as diversions). Other characters include Wickerbottom, an insomniac witch writer with a higher intellect and refined tastes;clarification needed and Woodie, a Canadian lumberjack with a dark secret and a unique axe.clarification needed
The game's antagonist is Maxwell. Maxwell is described as a puppet master who is dapper and frail in stature. He is part-demon and transforms incrementally as his anger at the player increases over the five chapters of Adventure. He is the final unlockable character, obtained after completion of the story rather than with experience points. The character version of Maxwell starts with a Dark Sword, Night Armor, Purple Gem, 4 Nightmare Fuel and the Codex Umbra, a book that when activated uses 2 nightmare fuel, depletes 15 health, lowers maximum sanity by 55, and spawns a shadow clone of himself that aids him in battle, mining and wood chopping. Shadow Puppets have 75 health and deal 40 damage with each attack. When they die, they disappear and return Maxwell's lost maximum of sanity. A maximum of 3 puppets can be spawned at once, and each will disappear 2.5 days after it is spawned if it doesn't die earlier. The secondary antagonist in all games, and the primary antagonist of the multiplayer sequel § Don't Starve Together (DST), is Maxwell's old magic assistant Charlie, the Night Monster. Charlie's sister, Winona, is unique to DST; so far, she is the only other character to know the true identity of the Night Monster (and the only one theoretically able to survive two hits from her, at base health).
