This War of Mine is about keeping your small group of survivors alive until the war ends. So it is has a dark, brooding feeling to it. The graphics and music are perfect for creating and establishing this mood throughout your game play – this was part of my attraction to the game and still is. And while the mood is never happy (the best your characters can do is become content), this is because your characters are trying to survive in a city ravaged by civil war – so it makes sense, and fits the game well.

The game has a lot more depth than what it appears to at first. Unfortunately, you also must understand the game’s depth in order to reach the ending without killing off or losing a few characters. There is no tutorial, and while you only use the mouse to guide your characters, it would have been helpful to know that you can select them either by clicking them, or clicking the character’s image icon in the lower right.

And finally, making the game even more difficult, it defaults to a medium difficulty setting, which is quite unforgiving and really unhelpful for those just trying to learn the mechanics of the game. This is coming from someone that NEVER starts a game on easy, and waffles between challenging and hard for my first play through.

I suggest you start your first round on easy, and consider it a tutorial/training round.

Go to Write Your Own Story, and set the following parameters:
Length = 40 days is fine
Intensity of Conflict = LOW (vs Moderate or High)
Winter Comes = NEVER or 1/2 WAY THROUGH (vs Early or Late) ... practicing winter does help
Winter Harshness = MILD (vs Moderate or Severe)
Winter Length = SHORT (vs Moderate or Long).

The game gives you a day divided into two parts: day (crafting at home base) and night (scavenging abroad). On its default setting, you must live through 40 days before the war ends. It takes quite a time commitment to get to the end of the 40 days. This is why I suggest EASY for the first play through.

During the 40 days, you will experience a crime wave (bandits attacking almost every night) and winter (freezing temperatures that you must deal with, or your characters will get sick). Use your radio to clue you into when these are happening.

During the day, the game features characters that must be fed, kept healthy, and in good spirits (more on this in a minute); also, these characters can get wounded and come down with illnesses. During the day, multiple characters can be working on different things at the same time.

Sometimes an additional character will appear on your doorstep – you can accept them or send them away. You can have a maximum of five at the same time, although four is typically the most I see. I try to keep all four.

Your starting home is your home base, and your first day is running around the home cleaning it up and scavenging the few items you can, and building some basic items.

Also during the day time, random characters may arrive with either requests for items, gifts of certain items, or requests for assistance. Rejecting or accepting these offers have an effect on your mood. Not all requests have a positive impact on your mood, some will have a negative impact.

A trader also appears about every three days. You do not have to trade, it does not affect your mood.

During the night, this is when one (and only one) of your characters will need to head out to locations in the city and scavenge items for your continued survival. The rest stay back and either sleep, or guard. Sleeping in beds is much preferable to the floor.

This is another area where the game could have been easier if I had known more about these locations. There are currently 23 locations. They come in three flavors:

• easy (scavenge everything you want!)
  
• regular people inhabit the location, and looting it can negatively affect some of your character’s mood (the game clearly marks piles you can loot, and piles that if you loot, will be considered stealing), also, in some locations, even walking in certain areas cause neutral characters to become hostile,
  
• dangerous, armed people occupy the location.

A few of the sites can come with one of two alternate scenarios for them: an easy and one with armed individuals.

The best trick I have found is to simply look up (online) the sites that you can reach.

To start with, obviously go for the easy ones with no one on the map. The description of the site sometimes gives you clues as to what items are there and whether you'll need a shovel/crowbar/etc. – but why not just look it up online?

If the site has multiple scenarios, the description also clues you into which one it is. However, while you are looking it up, also look up what you will need to bring with you (a shovel, crowbar, hatchet, and/or hacksaw(s)).

Only one of your characters can scavenge each night. I typically shoot for the one with the most inventory space, regardless of running speed. I only worry about running speed if I know I am in a dangerous situation and I need the speed.

I leave the first storage location I come across alone -- I do not loot it -- because once emptied out, the storage container disappears. I then proceed to clear out the map and bring it all back to this storage bin. That way, the next time I visit, all of the items are present right at the entry point to that location. Some locations have a second exit point on the other side of the map.

The game does a couple of things to make your site selection a little more challenging. First, to start off, you can only see a small selection of locations. As the days pass, more and more locations are added to your map, until they are all present.

However, another challenge you will face is that snow or fighting can cause some locations to be temporarily unavailable – making it a little more challenging to get the supplies you need from safe only locations.

You can play this game without ever attacking anyone or stealing from any one.

In fact, that is my default play through mode. However, sometimes it is simply impossible to continue without visiting a location that has hostiles. You can sneak around and hide, or you can equip your characters with weapons (shovels, hatchet, knife, etc.) or guns.

You can also attack non-hostiles, if that is how you want to play. This will affect the mood of quite a few characters. If you are going to need to fight, I suggest you look up a quick video discussing the techniques.

Finally, in the “create your own story” mode, you can select every site you want in your play through, as well as the default story for that site (i.e. easy or dangerous).

People that have played this game and read this might wonder why I am talking about this before talking about crafting. Mood can get out of control quickly. It is the hidden depth that you must control, but how to control it wasn't obvious to me during my first few play throughs.

I have had characters crying and useless on the floor for days at a time. Sometimes, they just get depressed and leave the house for good (although the game will likely send a replacement in a few days). I had one hang himself. And I’m sure there are other ways they deal with their grief that I have not encountered yet.

Therefore, controlling mood becomes a necessary aspect of the game.

Playing through the game on the default medium setting the first few times through, I found it was hard enough to find supplies and keep my people fed and healthy, let alone realize that my actions (and lack of coffee and cigarettes) were affecting their mood.

Once I realized mood was integral to the game, I was able to achieve things much more easily. Hopefully this early warning will allow you to advance to more difficult settings quicker, should you desire.

Mood is best controlled in two ways:

• supplying character’s addictions (coffee and cigarettes),
  
• and avoiding actions that can negatively impact mood (killing innocents, stealing, etc.).

The characters all have a background story (click the BIO link on the image icon for each character), and you can determine their addiction needs there.

However, at the top of the screen is an “Our Things” tab – your basic inventory. To the right of that is a “Some thoughts” section which details exactly what your current group of characters need, as a whole, in terms of coffee and cigarettes.

My first few play throughs I thought this was all just a bunch of writing and I ignored it -- which which is a mistake. This section procudurally updated based on where you are in the game – so it contains a form of current status. In addition to listing your addiction needs, it discusses your home and events and gives you clues about what you might consider worrying about next.

The day time is about crafting items and random people events showing up at your door.

It starts with a summary of the previous night. Throughout the game, random attacks will have occurred against your house at night, and the result of this is what is summarized here. The game will show what was looted (if anything) and who was hurt (if anyone) and what ammunition you might have consumed protecting the house.

Until I have boarded up the house (3 construction items) and I have built the reinforced door, I always leave someone on guard at night.

First day: as soon as you have a few materials, you will need to craft a workshop. At the workshop, you can craft a metal working workshop. You want these day 1. Then make a shovel at the metal workshop to assist clearing the inevitable piles of rubble out of your way (as you cannot walk around them, you must clear them out). It takes forever to clear a pile of trash without the shovel.

If you only have 1 shovel (and you will) then only one person can use it at a time. Wait until they are done, and then someone else, even if they are on a different floor, can start using it immediately. Same with the crowbar. You can clean the entire house in the first day.

I also craft a crowbar day 1, and use that instead of lockpicks to open locked doors and locked loot containers. I keep the lock picks for trading. A bed the first day is a great, if possible. If not, then by the second day.

If you can build and upgrade the metal working table, and you have the parts, you can create a hatchet, and reclaim wood from items in the house. I try to create a hatchet before the end of day 2 or 3.

Your hunger won’t be an issue the first 2 or 3 days, but eventually you will need a cooking stove.

I rarely feed my characters until they hit VERY HUNGRY. And then I only bring them back to HUNGRY status.

Cooking your food heals much more than eating it raw, but it requires water. A rain trap during warm weather (and a filter). Melting snow on the stove during winter (also requires a filter and fuel). I like the melting solution because it is quicker, if I have the fuel.

While you can scavenge for food, I tend to create the two rat traps that you are allowed (you cannot create more). These require fertilizer or food, so I try to find fertilizer early on. You also need an upgraded workshop to create the rat traps. You want the upgraded workshop anyway for the “board up” items that will help you keep out the bandits.

When it starts getting cold, your characters are more likely to become sick. You counter this by placing a heater in the home to keep it warm. I like the upgraded heater because it is much more effecient with fuel. You can place the heater anywhere in the home, it doesn’t matter, it heats the whole house. You will need a second heater in the dead of winter.

The upgraded heater requires a thermometer which requires the second, and final upgrade to your workshop For your second heater, you do not necessarily need to upgrade this one.

In the winter, your rain collectors will not work, and you will need to dig snow. But during the warm days, even though the snow still shows in your inventory, you cannot use it. If it gets cold enough again (rare, but it has happened to me), you can then melt more snow.

You can create hand weapons and guns after the first metal workshop upgrade. A final upgrade will allow you to create bullets and military vests. I don’t always get to the second upgrade, so I have to keep an eye on my bullet count in my inventory so that my non-scavengers can use the guns to protect the house.

Within the first week, you should have upgraded your workshop at least once, and your metal table at least once. You should have food and water under control. And now you can begin to think about the alternative crafting tables you may want. You do not need them, but they do make things easier and/or give you more valuable items to trade.

Herbal Workshop
This allows you to make cigarettes, bandages, “herbal” meds, and tobacco. I always make one. I use it to keep the supply of cigarettes going. The upgrade to this allows you to make pain pills (more effective at healing) and quality roll ups, but I’ve never bothered with the upgrade.

Herbal Garden
The similar names between these two confused me at first. The icons helped more. But this one allows you to make fertilizer, herbs, and when upgraded, vegetables; the vegetables when combined with meat, make two food items per meat. They are also quite valuable for trade, and in the winter, they increase in value. It takes 20 water and 2 fertilizer to make 8 vegetables; it also requires 3 days to make these. So it is quite an investment in materials and time.

Moonshine Still (Alcohol Distiller)
The moonshine still uses water and sugar to make moonshine. You can trade this, or you can also build the alcohol distiller to further refine it into alcohol. The alcohol distiller is a separate workshop, but is really your “upgrade” for the moonshine still. These are both optional workshops, but are quite useful for trade. You can also drink the alcohol (to improve a character’s mood) or make bandages out of it. I make these on some play throughs, but if you are going to do the vegetable garden (which also consumes water), then you are going to find yourself challenged to keep up with your water demands; its not impossible, just an additional challenge you should be aware of.

The characters have some intrensic skills that you can leverage, but some really stand out. There are good reference guides out there, so I suggest you get to know the characters as they show up.

But in summary, these few stand out:

• Bruno is a good cook and moonshine/distiller (needs less consumables). *
  
• Marin is a great crafter (uses less resources). *
  
• Katia a good trader (better prices).
  
• They say Anton catches mice quicker, but there's still an element of randomness to it.
  
• Boris is the slowest, but has a 17 slot inventory; I absolutely use Boris every night for scavenging even though he is the slowest character.

* With these two, you can have them start something and someone else finish it -- if you need. And while this is true of any project started by any character, it is especially helpful with these two "resource saving" characters, especially if time is a factor in what you want to accomplish that day.

Depending on the scenario, you will likely start with an injured or ill player, and will need to deal with that as quickly as possible. With illnesses, pills always heal, while the herbal medication seems to increase your odds of healing. I had to look this one up. There are levels of sickness, and there is nothing wrong with trying the herbal medicines and bed rest for the early levels, then relying on the pills if that doesn't work.

I always make an armchair or two so people can relax and read (I also keep as many books as possible, and don’t burn them).

I make a radio pretty early on, as it provides you with weather and other status warnings (like when the crime wave will start and when it has ended); it has three stations that provide updates, and two that provide music, and you have to manually tune them each day; it is a pain, but I do it any way.

You can make a guitar, as it is supposed to improve the mood, and I do like the song Katia plays, but I have honestly never seen it improve any moods. But the game says it helps, so it must. Other characters can play also, but not all.

Plan what you are building next before heading out scavenging. Look up the recipe for items needed, if you need. Make a list if you have to, and bring those supplies home with you. Don't forget you need components for filters and wood for fuel. I hate getting home with just what I need to complete a project, then forget I also need to make food.

I like to leave my shovel/crowbar/etc. at the site and bring it home on the last day. The challenge with this is if there is a snow or fighting block that takes away that site, you are now without those tools until that site frees up again, so keep that in mind.

Once you've found the City Hospital, you can take a sick or damaged character there and have the nurses heal them. It wastes a night scavenging, but it can save the character.

FInally, I accomplished most of the achievements without planning for it. So if you like to achievement hunt, give it a few play throughs before actually spending any time planning them.

I hope you enjoy this game as much as I have!