Once Human is a brand new multiplayer survival game with PVE and potential PVP gameplay, and since it’s free to play, people are flocking towards it trying to see what it’s all about.
In this guide, we will be helping you get started with your journey with a few tips and tricks that should hopefully ease you into the game’s mechanics. We’ll mainly be covering the absolute essentials, as it can be a bit overwhelming if we give you a massive info dump.
Complete Beginner’s Guide + Tips & Tricks
First of all, when selecting your server, you can choose between either PVE or PVP. This is all down to personal preference, and if you want my take on it, let’s just say that some of you out there might run into me in a PVE server.
Basically, PVE is going to be more chill because you don’t have to worry about competing with others, especially if the server is several days old. If you’re looking to fight other players, obviously choose a PVP server, but pick one that is new so that you’ll be on even ground.
Finally, on that note, these servers work on a seasonal format. This means that your characters will be wiped after a certain period, but with specific things being carried over to the next season.
It’s a fairly complex system, and if you want to learn more about it, we recommend taking your own time to read through the dev blogs covering the game’s seasonal format and the concept of Eternaland.
Which Starting Weapon to Use
Early on, one of your first weapons will be the crossbow, which will actually be one of the best tools in your arsenal for the entire early game.
Not only does it deal a lot of damage, but you can also retrieve your bolts after killing a target, making it very ammo efficient. This is especially true once you upgrade it even further.
Basic Needs and Sanity
As with any other survival game, food and water are going to be a necessity if you want to, well, survive. However, it goes a little deeper than that, as there is also a sanity system to keep in mind.
Basically, doing certain activities or entering polluted zones will cause you to lose sanity, which will decrease your maximum HP. This also happens when you eat raw food or other filthy consumables.
One way that you can recover sanity is by sleeping on a bed. As you are resting, your sanity will gradually increase, which will slowly but surely remove the dark grey bar on your health bar.
You can also consume sanity gummies to restore it, though sleeping at your base should be more than enough unless you are in a tight spot out in the field.
Finding and Gathering Loot
As you progress through the game, you will be looking to activate rift anchors scattered around the map, typically near or in points of interest. These can be spotted from a distance as they are marked with a beam of light extending up into the sky.
In addition to that, certain areas will require you to do other objectives on top of the rift anchors themselves. Upon finishing these, you’ll be rewarded with all sorts of resources.
There will also be various loot crates scattered around points of interest that are typically highlighted with different colors. There are even hidden crates that you’ll have to unveil by interacting with glowing objects.
Blueprints & Upgrading
On the topic of loot, you will eventually be finding various blueprints for equipment that you can use to craft them back at base. These come in different rarities and tiers, which will require a variety of resources depending on how high they are.
These bits of gear can also be calibrated later on, which will allow you to increase their stats at the cost of certain resources. Mods can also be added to your weapons, giving them even more bonus stats.
What Are Deviations?
Deviations are little creatures or objects that you can capture throughout the map, and they have their own distinct uses. Think of them as pals in Palworld, if you’ve played that game before.
They all have varying classifications. Some are placed in your base to gather resources, while others might be used specifically for crafting.
There are also combat deviations that you can sync to your cradle. These types of deviants can typically be manually commanded by holding E out in the field.
Take your time to read up on what each deviation does whenever you capture one out in the wild. These will make your life a whole lot easier when it comes to both combat and productivity.
The Memetics-Cradle Menu
The Memetics tab is basically a passive skill tree where you can unlock the ability to craft or build certain tools/facilities, among various other perks. Feel free to prioritize whichever you’ll think you may need in your run.
Under the same category, you have Memetic Specializations, which are other passives that you unlock as you progress further into the game. You can reset these later on, so try not to stress out about your choices.
The Cradle tab give you different sets of passives that you can mix and match whenever you unlock them. There are different unlock conditions written underneath each row, but basically, you just need to keep leveling up to make them usable.
There isn’t necessarily a set of “best” choices for either of these, so you will just have to check and see which ones suit your needs and playstyle the best.
Check Your “Journey” Tab & More
While you’re still figuring out how things work in the game, the Journey tab in the map menu will help you out with some suggestions on what tasks to do. These will give you a handful of rewards as well.
This can be great for new players as you will be taught to do things such as unlock certain memetics and build essential structures. Basically, it’s like a tutorial that you can do at your own pace and in almost any order.
Survival Manual
Beside that tab is the Survival Manual, which will teach you most of the basics, including the controls, what certain enemies do, and more.
If you are confused by anything in the game, try to use certain keywords at the search function in the Survival Manual to find some advice, whether it involves the UI itself or mechanics that are still unclear to you.
Those are all of the essentials that should help you get started in this admittedly daunting game, and you’ll undoubtedly be diving deeper into its many other systems later on. For now, check out our guide on how to play with friends in Once Human too, in case you have a group coming in with you!
