This War of Mine

Most war games put you on the front lines with a rifle in your hands and adrenaline in your veins. This War of Mine does the opposite — it drops you behind the lines, in the rubble of a city under siege, where survival isn't about glory, but about desperation, morality, and hard choices. This is war through the eyes of the civilians. Inspired by the Siege of Sarajevo, This War of Mine tasks you with managing a group of ordinary people trying to survive in a war-torn city. These are not soldiers — they're teachers, chefs, musicians, and mechanics. They're cold, hungry, injured, and scared. And it’s your job to help them make it through another day. The gameplay mixes resource management, crafting, stealth, and emotional storytelling. By day, you fortify your shelter, cook food, care for the wounded, and try to stave off depression. By night, you send someone out to scavenge for supplies — often facing brutal moral dilemmas in the process. Do you steal from an elderly couple to feed your starving group? Do you risk injury to save a stranger calling for help? Do you ignore a knock at the door because you're low on meds? Every decision has a cost, and survival often means sacrificing your humanity. The game’s art style is hand-drawn, bleak, and hauntingly beautiful. The grayscale palette is punctuated by muted colors, adding to the sense of despair. The ambient soundtrack is minimal and melancholic — never overpowering, always appropriate. And yet, the most powerful element is silence. The game gives you space to feel. To stare at your characters as they sit in sorrow. To reflect after a gut-wrenching choice. It doesn’t yell at you. It lets the weight of war speak for itself. While the mechanics are relatively simple — crafting, managing hunger, sleep, and morale — the emotional complexity runs deep. Each playthrough is procedurally generated, offering different characters, stories, and events. No two runs feel the same, especially with the growing burden of your decisions over time. The game isn’t without its rough edges. The AI during scavenging can be a bit rigid, and the pacing in late-game scenarios can feel slow once your base is fortified. But those are minor blemishes on an otherwise unforgettable experience. This War of Mine isn’t just a game — it’s a statement. It has been used in classrooms, praised by humanitarian organizations, and even added to the Polish educational curriculum. It forces players to think not just tactically, but ethically. It reminds us that war is not just fought with bullets, but with hunger, trauma, and loss. The developers further supported this message with the “Stories” DLCs and the Final Cut, which refined visuals and added new content while maintaining the game’s somber tone. This War of Mine is a raw, emotional, and humanizing portrayal of war that lingers long after the screen goes dark. It’s not “fun” in the traditional sense — and that’s exactly the point. It’s a powerful piece of interactive storytelling that deserves a place among the most important games of its generation. If you’re looking for a game that challenges not just your skills but your conscience, This War of Mine will leave a lasting impression — and maybe a heavy heart. Rating: 8/10

There are so many ways to die and so little resources to keep your suriviors alive. Hunger, fatigue and cold are far away from the only things that will make your playthough a truly hellish exprience. Every day you must make decisions that often lead to unexpected outcomes. War isn't fun or easy, this game does a good job at showing all the hardship people have to go through just to live another day.

BASE GAME: 2/5 For what it’s worth, I do like the concept behind this war of mine. Playing as a survivor or group of survivors desperately trying to outlast the war around them by any means necessary was a unique concept when this game came out, and it still is one of the only games I know of that tries to show this perspective. where TWoM falls apart for me is in the gameplay; it feels like Balkan Fallout Shelter with its focus on base building, upgrades, and resource management. I was less concerned with the effect the war would leave on my three survivors than I was with collecting three cargo ships worth of lumber to upgrade my workshops. Likewise, most of the challenges in my run weren’t due to the consequences of trying to survive at the cost of other people in the city, but rather due to mechanics I didn’t understand, bugs/glitches, and strange occurrences like my survivors inexplicably becoming severely wounded after a calm night in a fully boarded up base. As of right now I don’t think This War of Mine is a bad game, but I don’t think I got it or it wasn’t meant for me. Maybe in the future I’ll try it again :p

★★★★★ This is the kind of game that is timeless, no matter if you played it when it originally came out or going into it now with no idea what the game has to offer it is phenomenal. I originally found this game watching youtubers I loved like Kubz Scouts back when he played it in 2016 and never really had the chance to play it myself. I bought this game recently for an amazing deal and thought its time to play it myself. Not only is it emotionally dark from the themes of war but the gameplay is so original and nothing like anything I have ever played, even with the additions of the story DLC's they all have amazing depth and cool dynamics for each of them. This game is challenging but in the way it makes you want to really try complete it and survive, the different choices you make will impact your run and it makes me appreciate the mechanics way more. I cannot recommend this game enough, I urge you to buy this if its ever crazy cheap in a sale, its the kind of game you can come back to and feel pulled in by all over again.

The game is very good and shows something that isn´t a big mistery but yet it has happened an will keep happening. WAR FRICKING SUCKS!

This War of Mine is a war survival video game developed and published by the Polish game development company 11 Bit Studios. This War of Mine is a survival-themed strategy game where the player controls a group of civilian survivors in a makeshift-damaged house in the besieged fictional city of Pogoren, Graznavia. The main goal of the game is to stay alive during the war with the tools and materials that the player can gather. Most of the characters under the player's control have no military background nor any kind of survival experience and will require constant intervention by the player in order to stay alive. The player must maintain their characters' health, hunger, and mood levels until the declaration of a ceasefire, which occurs after a randomized duration.

This is quite the thematic game to play nowadays...

+ very challenging resource management due to unexpected occurances + a few moral dilemmas + harsh environment + progress feels rewarding - can be really depressing - sometimes I get attacked for no reason :(

The beauty of this game is - despite the realistic depiction of how people struggle during war, it encourages you to work together and create a safe haven where you can feel at home. More people should play this.

Very fun game with looting mechanics similar to State of Decay 2, little hard to start but after a bit it gets easier. 8/10

This game has the gameplay of a fun survival game where you scavenge buildings, looking for loot while managing inventory and deciding what should be dropped in exchange for something else. Graphics are great as well. It also has a very depressing yet hopeful story and theme of survivors trying to stay alive in a warzone, cut off from the outside world. There can be anger, grief, suicide, and hope, all packed into one. Again, depressing but hopeful. I highly recommend to anyone who enjoys the survival genre, as well as a handful of difficult moral choices. Thumbs up.

I like this game for its uniqueness. The devs made it really interesting to survive and make hard moral choices. There's a ground for replay-ability, because there are different scenarios. I wouldn't say I could play in for thousand hours, but if you get to like this game -- you can definitely play a couple dozens of hours. Of course not everything is impeccable, especially combat system, tho the game isn't about combat. I'd like to see bags and backpacks that can help while scavenging. DLCs did bring some new content, happy to see that. I'd love to see This War of Mine 2 tbh! Also worth mentioning that devs use some money for charity, big respect

This game is genuinely good like playing As as an survivor of the war hits different + the sound effect when ur on scavanging was mind blowing A 7/10 FOR THIS GAME

Got it on sale, 8.5/10 worth it. But man gyaat damn give some tutorials and let us key bind some shortcuts what the hell.

in the rubble of a city under siege, where living isn't about glory, it desperation, survival, and hard choices

---{ Graphics }--- ☐ You forget what reality is ☑ Beautiful ☐ Good ☐ Decent ☐ Bad ☐ Don‘t look too long at it ☐ MS-DOS ---{ Gameplay }--- ☐ Very good ☑ Good ☐ It's just gameplay ☐ Mehh ☐ Watch paint dry instead ☐ Just don't ---{ Audio }--- ☐ Eargasm ☑ Very good ☐ Good ☐ Not too bad ☐ Bad ☐ I'm now deaf ---{ Audience }--- ☐ Kids ☑ Teens ☑ Adults ☐ Grandma ---{ PC Requirements }--- ☐ Check if you can run paint ☐ Potato ☑ Decent ☐ Fast ☐ Rich boi ☐ Ask NASA if they have a spare computer ---{ Game Size }--- ☐ Floppy Disk ☐ Old Fashioned ☑ Workable ☐ Big ☐ Will eat 15% of your 1TB hard drive ☐ You will want an entire hard drive to hold it ☐ You will need to invest in a black hole to hold all the data ---{ Difficulty }--- ☐ Just press 'W' ☐ Easy ☐ Easy to learn / Hard to master ☑ Significant brain usage ☐ Difficult ☐ Dark Souls ---{ Grind }--- ☐ Nothing to grind ☐ Only if u care about leaderboards/ranks ☐ Isn't necessary to progress ☑ Average grind level ☐ Too much grind ☐ You'll need a second life for grinding ---{ Story }--- ☐ No Story ☐ Some lore ☐ Average ☑ Good ☐ Lovely ☐ It'll replace your life ---{ Game Time }--- ☐ Long enough for a cup of coffee ☐ Short ☐ Average ☑ Long ☐ To infinity and beyond ---{ Price }--- ☐ It's free! ☑ Worth the price ☐ If it's on sale ☐ If u have some spare money left ☐ Not recommended ☐ You could also just burn your money ---{ Bugs }--- ☑ Never heard of ☐ Minor bugs ☐ Can get annoying ☐ ARK: Survival Evolved ☐ The game itself is a big terrarium for bugs ---{ ? / 10 }--- ☐ 1 ☐ 2 ☐ 3 ☐ 4 ☐ 5 ☐ 6 ☐ 7 ☑ 8 ☐ 9 ☐ 10

Civilians at war simulator, this game breaks me while playing it

Purchased on android and now steam. Great game in my opinion.

Unique concept, and interesting gameplay.

Great story. Very captivating. Good replayability. Mix of resource, base and human management

DO NOT BUY, this game crashes constantly regardless of specs. It crashes on xbox it crashes on low tier gaming pcs and crashes on high tier gaming pcs. This game was really fun until they released the little ones update at which point it has consistently crashed over and over again. It had crash problems before The Little Ones update and they only got worse. I occasionally forget why i uninstalled this game and re-download only to get a good game going and it crashes so much I re-uninstall it. Save your money for any other game. The devs know that this crashes and refuse to actually fix it. the crashes got worse the more the update the game. During the crashes of The Little Ones update I could tolerate the occasional crash but after the Final cut update it crashes almost every day or every other day in game. NOT WORTH WASTING YOUR MONEY ON A BROKEN GAME THAT WILL NOT BE FIXED.

Most expensive game in my Steam library because it comes with the cost of a weekly therapist. 10/10, 11bit studios can do no wrong.

In my This War of Mine edition that I have, I have completed all of them. This game is a perfect balance. I want more of it! Something if not extremely similar, then make add-on's to this game lol PLEASE! It is really hard to find games that I like so between this and Sims, it has all of my attention. DOWNLOAD IT NOW!

I like this game a lot. I find it very strategic and fulfilling to finally be able to accomplish things in a planned out manner

One of the best survival games I have ever played, if not the best. Everything is excellent, from the music to the game atmosphere to the emotions to the difficult choices that come your way. There are many challenges and the game is considered average to somewhat difficult. I highly recommend it.

Awesome game with sad story and gameplay. This game is telling a story from the perspective of a survivor, an oridnary human being who is constantly struggling to survive at the times of war. I really like that you are constantly under some pressure to make hard and moral decisions for survival. ---{ Graphics }--- ☐ You forget what reality is ☑ Beautiful ☐ Good ☐ Decent ☐ Bad ☐ Don‘t look too long at it ☐ MS-DOS ---{ Gameplay }--- ☐ Very good ☑ Good ☐ It's just gameplay ☐ Mehh ☐ Watch paint dry instead ☐ Just don't ---{ Audio }--- ☐ Eargasm ☑ Very good ☐ Good ☐ Not too bad ☐ Bad ☐ I'm now deaf ---{ Audience }--- ☐ Kids ☑ Teens ☑ Adults ☑ Grandma ---{ PC Requirements }--- ☐ Check if you can run paint ☑ Potato ☐ Decent ☐ Fast ☐ Rich boi ☐ Ask NASA if they have a spare computer ---{ Game Size }--- ☐ Floppy Disk ☑ Old Fashioned ☐ Workable ☐ Big ☐ Will eat 15% of your 1TB hard drive ☐ You will want an entire hard drive to hold it ☐ You will need to invest in a black hole to hold all the data ---{ Difficulty }--- ☐ Just press 'W' ☐ Easy ☐ Easy to learn / Hard to master ☑ Significant brain usage ☐ Difficult ☐ Dark Souls ---{ Grind }--- ☐ Nothing to grind ☐ Only if u care about leaderboards/ranks ☐ Isn't necessary to progress ☑ Average grind level ☐ Too much grind ☐ You'll need a second life for grinding ---{ Story }--- ☐ No Story ☐ Some lore ☐ Average ☑ Good ☐ Lovely ☐ It'll replace your life ---{ Game Time }--- ☐ Long enough for a cup of coffee ☐ Short ☐ Average ☐ Long ☑ To infinity and beyond ---{ Price }--- ☐ It's free! ☑ Worth the price ☐ If it's on sale ☐ If u have some spare money left ☐ Not recommended ☐ You could also just burn your money ---{ Bugs }--- ☐ Never heard of ☑ Minor bugs ☐ Can get annoying ☐ ARK: Survival Evolved ☐ The game itself is a big terrarium for bugs ---{ ? / 10 }--- ☐ 1 ☐ 2 ☐ 3 ☐ 4 ☐ 5 ☐ 6 ☐ 7 ☑ 8 ☐ 9 ☐ 10

Got this game on a whim. I heard it challenges you with moral problems and it does. The game is pretty glum and the subject material dark. But it makes you think.

it´s best on the first run, when you can´t manage resources properly cause you don´t know recipes and survival techniques, as a result your characters fall ill, get wounded or outright die. hopeless and depressing, unique experience. these are the feelings and experiences that a game on war should give. on further runs you gain some skills and it gets repetitive and boring as the quests are all the same as are the locations. there is also stories mode with plot from which the last broadcast is the best. fading embers is middling with some schematic plot twists, but art during the wartime is an interesting topic.

I personally bought this game because it's about a war in Bosnia and I live next door so it interested me. Never was a huge fan of this type of games but playing this game for as little as I did it really was fun. It has a really cool atmosphere, aesthetics and characters. Definitely gotta try it if you're a fan of this game genre.

The grind is real! You are constantly under some pressure to scavenge for materials, food, fuel, medicine to survive. If it gets too cold, your people get sick. If you can't find food for the day, they get hungry. Bandits try to steal your stuff and people get injured. There are outposts you can search that are under military control, or near a military patrol and the soldiers sometimes randomly get angry and decide to start shooting at you. Unless your scavenger is fast, they'll most like end up dead. Unfortunately, this game is all too real for the world we exist in, so the game is great at trying to build empathy for the majority of regular people caught in the middle of a war. People who get murdered trying to find food at a sanctioned aid station.

Its alright for $1 game, basic survival game like keeping your survivors and supplies in check. Scavenge for more supplies each night. It gets boring real quick after a while as there is no incentive that motivates the player (at least imo). The story mode itself is okay-ish. There are some questionable plot holes but i assume that's just on my end. There's no tutorial involved but playing and fiddling with the game for a couple of minute is enough to learn what you need to do.

The best game I played in 2025, it reminds me of current world events :) "Refusing to fight for what one believes is right is not an act of cowardice. It is the realization that war is futile."

This War of Mine – A Game That Left a Scar, Not Just an Impression I’ve played countless war games, but none have ever made me stop, sit in silence, and just feel the weight of survival like This War of Mine. This isn’t about soldiers, medals, or glory. This is about civilians—trapped in the crossfire, starving, freezing, breaking, enduring. You don’t win This War of Mine. You outlast it. Maybe. What makes this game so hauntingly powerful is its brutal honesty. Every choice feels heavy: Do I rob an elderly couple to feed my group? Do I risk venturing out under sniper fire for medicine? Can I bear to leave a wounded stranger begging at my door while I protect the last of our supplies? This game doesn’t offer “fun” in the traditional sense—it offers perspective. The kind that lingers with you after you close the game. The kind that makes you look at news headlines differently. It's art, in the most raw and human way possible. Every character has a name, a past, a breaking point. And by the time the war ends—if it ends—you’re not celebrating victory. You’re just wondering what kind of person you became to survive. If you’ve never played a game that truly challenges your morality, your empathy, and your humanity, this is the one. This War of Mine doesn’t want to entertain you. It wants to make you understand.

The best thing about the game is the art style and the morality mechanics that truly reflect the horror of war. Addictive and fun game play.

Such a successfull video game that acccomplishes to make people able to look at the war from dramatic and realistic angle I think it can be thought one of the classics of video games that bring survival and strategy genre together after the time longer than 10 years since it is initial release

Great game, only thing is once you figure out the key to keep them happy, it's no longer that challenging, however, still great game tho. Worth every penny.

Good little indie game but very flawed. There is a fundamental problem: lack of ability to speed up time. This means that you'll spend large amounts of time doing nothing but watching your characters literally do nothing. This is bad game design. Also, every single location on the map you can loot and visit is the same for every single story, so there is extremely little replay value as the only thing that changes is the flavor text and role play of slightly different characters. Was expecting much more in the ways of showing the brutality of war and meaningful choices, events etc. It's fun enough for a single playthrough on the normal mode, and maybe some of the "stories" mode, which have even more problems because the stories often make no sense or are incredibly dull. Get on sale. 5.5/10

Really enjoy this game, after all these years it still holds up. Only negative thing I have to say is that it doesn't play well with controller. Maybe it's just me, but I find it hard to build/upgrade etc. But that's a none issue.

The game is peak except when you're scavaging and your character decided to just open the fucking door infront of 2 soilders because you used right click by mistake

Awesome game. Got it on sale for 99c and didn't expect much. Thoroughly impressed.

I really like the game but if often crashes. I don't know if this is new with the dlc or not. I really love 11 bit studios games. I am saving up for alters.

Dont waste your time, this game is bland. The game loop has been done better in every way by sheltered. daytime is just your slow ready up for night time which is the actual game. During night only 1 of 3 people can leave the shelter to scavenge, the other 2 stay back and just get robbed/killed/fend off robbery which you have no actual part in. The scavenging is pretty poor, here are lots of items you need and no way to carry them, here are lots of locations but you can only visit one per night (even if you enter and leave with the entire night time left, your night of scavenging is over). Trade is a joke, a guy comes to your base to sell you things, you cant buy more than 6 slots or 8 slots at a time even though its going in to base inventory, which then means you need to play a juggling act between the value of what you are selling and buying which is entirely unnecessary. Combat is a poorly implemented joke. The radio gives you the same message for 2 days which is normally some trivial crap like 'some guy died' and somehow this helps the mood of your characters? what?. Nah this game sucks donkey balls. Bland, badly implemented good ideas.

It's a pretty cool game with a cool concept, but it's a bummer that there's no fast-forward option (waiting for NPCs to do stuff can be annoying sometimes, and loot stacking are pretty bad, so you might need to run a ton of times to clear one location, but the mod fixes that. I also encountered a bug in the game; I almost reached the end of the main storyline, but got a black screen with sounds... Overall, the game is playable, but not worth buying.

2/10，一周目存活通关，差评。 一间网红工作室，一部被过誉的作品，一个我不会推荐给任何人玩的游戏。 卖的是“战争反思”和“反战氛围”，实际给玩家带来的体验只有刻意的营造苦难，强行制造反思，在此同时又缺乏鲜活合理的NPC以及世界观框架和平衡优秀的数值塑造，最终给玩家的体验只有一地鸡毛和强行吃shi的不适感。 不知道游戏里的小人到底是想活还是想死。如果是不想活的话，一开始捡到枪的时候就可以自我了断不和别人抢空气抢水抢食物吃，完美了事；如果是不想死的话，又会因为诸如杀了几个强盗或是偷了一点建材之类的一点小事就坐在地上不断重复悲伤失落崩溃失落崩溃的荒谬循环。如此自相矛盾的人物设计无不令这款游戏距离令人感到好玩与沉浸的境界相去甚远。 最关键的则是剧情上的矛盾点。游戏后期明明手握突击步枪和数十发子弹，却总打不过强盗的突袭，一晚上打出去三颗子弹，被抢走八颗，或是拿着枪却被持刀歹徒打伤都是屡见不鲜的事情。此外温度与冻死，吃药和病愈的机制更是滑稽至极——草药是不能治高等级病症，但你抓一把塞嘴里会死不是？ 最后的最后，所有的评价，归结为两个字，过誉。

just trash and they have background sound effect u cant turn off it is not worth it for $20 after u pay $20 u have to buy another modes for play youre not allow to any modes lol

I honestly don't know why this game is "critically acclaimed" I just don't see it. The game play is a point and click game on the level of a mobile game. and I don't mean that in a positive way. The gameplay loop is lame, there's almost nothing to do in this game. There is no tutorial, and the game is trying too hard to be this dark "hardcore" type of game when the core mechanics of the game doesn't support it. The "gameplay" if you could call it that is too slow even for someone like me who enjoys slow paced rts like games. I don't know why the devs didn't add a simple fast forward button. Combat is....terrible, to put it bluntly. Combat is basically RNG where you're always set to lose. I still couldn't believe my guy, who had a crowbar, lost to a dude with nothing. Characters would often ignore commands and just rush the enemy then stand there like an idiot. I get that the devs are trying to make the player feel underpowered and hopeless, as well as trying to get the message that "violence is bad" but this isn't the way to do it. everything is so tedious in this game, from the crafting to the limited "slots" in your backpack when scavenging. Technical wise, I've had this game crash on me for the 15th time today. I don't know what's causing it, now It won't even start at all. Always unresponding the moment you start it up, a reinstall fixed it thank fully. Honeslty, I got more to complain about but I got this game for less than a buck, so... Yeah. Overall, I just don't see the "Critically acllaimed, indie best seller" on this game. It's basically a mobile game on pc. TLDR: Game is so slow, with very limited gameplay. Saying this game has "gameplay" is generous as it is, and it doens't even compensate by having a good story.

Gameplay Mechanics: 8/10 Narrative: 10/10 Graphics: 7/10 Sound and Music: 8/10 Replayability: 7/10 Innovation: 9/10 This War of Mine flips the war game formula on its head by putting you in control of civilians trying to survive a brutal siege rather than soldiers fighting on the front lines. It’s haunting, emotional, and brutally honest—an experience that stays with you long after the game ends. Gameplay mechanics are a mix of base management and stealth exploration. During the day, you manage your shelter—building tools, treating wounds, cooking, and keeping morale up. At night, you scavenge for supplies, often forced to make gut-wrenching moral decisions. The systems are simple, but they carry heavy emotional weight. Score: 8/10. Narrative is the soul of the game. There’s no traditional plot, but each playthrough tells its own heartbreaking story of survival. The characters’ thoughts, background stories, and the situations you encounter create a powerful sense of realism and human vulnerability. Score: 10/10. Graphics use a bleak, hand-drawn style that perfectly captures the tone. The black-and-white aesthetic, accented with harsh lighting and rough edges, adds to the atmosphere. Score: 7/10. Sound and music are subtle but impactful. Sparse ambient music, haunting melodies, and environmental sounds (like distant gunfire or creaking floors) enhance the feeling of dread and tension. Score: 8/10. Replayability is solid. Each playthrough features different characters, random events, and difficult choices that lead to various outcomes. While the core gameplay loop stays the same, the emotional arcs can vary dramatically. Score: 7/10. Innovation is high. Few games dare to explore the civilian side of war with such unflinching honesty. Its emotional storytelling through gameplay set a new bar for how games can tackle mature themes. Score: 9/10. Bottom line: This War of Mine is a rare and powerful experience—part survival sim, part moral test. It’s not fun in the traditional sense, but it’s unforgettable, and it proves just how impactful games can be when they aim for the heart.

I can't stop relying so much on trading for parts in the mid to lategame, help

This War of Mine hits different. One minute you're feeling hopeless and scared, the next you're proud of yourself for finding a can of food. It's an emotional rollercoaster that never stops. The game looks amazing, all sketchy and gray, like a sad painting. But when you find something good (like a working heater), it feels like Christmas morning. The art really makes you feel the despair and those tiny moments of hope. You'll get attached to your characters, even the useless ones. Every choice hurts, steal food and feel guilty, or don't steal and watch your people suffer. It's heavy stuff. You'll feel anxious, sad, relieved, and guilty all at once. Sometimes you'll even laugh at how absurd it all is. What gets me is how it makes you care so much. When someone in your group is sad or sick, you actually feel bad. When they're happy, you feel happy. It's weird how a game can mess with your emotions like that. Playing this is exhausting but in the best way. You'll stress over every decision, celebrate tiny victories. It's not fun in the normal way—it's more like watching a really good but sad movie that you can't stop thinking about.

If you are into survival base management games then this is something that is right up your alley. I played and came back to this game quite a few times because I found it very engaging. You start out with 2-4 civilian characters with unique qualities, and have to manage a base in a war torn country until you either buy your escape from the city you are trapped in or last until a ceasefire is declared. The weather can get freezing cold, supplies can be difficult to come across, and gangs can raid your base at night, and you have to defend your base, acquire resources, and manage things as best you can. I found out fairly quickly that mass producing cigarettes is probably the best way to get through a playthrough since there is a trading aspect to the game where you can trade goods for other goods. Cigarettes are the easiest thing to make, you can make lots of them, and then you can trade them for things you need to get through really difficult parts of your playthrough. Each game can last from 30 to 80 days where during the day you manage your base and look after your characters, and then there is a night phase where you can choose one character to go scavenge a certain location that may have food, building materials, weapon materials, scrap parts, medicine, etc... Certain characters may be able to carry more stuff than other characters, some may be able to sneak around quietly, some have combat experience and can kill hostile enemies with greater ease. The one major downside to this game is THERE IS NO SAVE GAME OPTION. If something goes wrong in your playthrough like a character dying or a particularly bad raid on your base at night, you're not going to be able to just quickly reload an earlier autosave and try again. That burned me a few times in different playthroughs of this game, especially when I was trying to get all of the steam achievements in order to 100% complete the game. Overall though this is fun game to pick up if youre into survival base-building management games, on sale or not.