History VideoGame / TheLongDark

* NonIndicativeName: Timberwolf Mountain does not contain any timberwolves. They are only present in Bleak Inlet and in the story, Pleasant Valley.

* AnAxeToGrind: The hatchet can be used as an emergency weapon against wolves. The knife is more effective for the same purpose though, at the cost of a bit more damage to your character.

* GhostTown: The entire map is abandoned, but the most traditional version is the Coastal Town on the Coastal Highway map. The only things there are crows and wolves.

* SuicidalOverconfidence: Averted. Wolves will always run away from bears, and occasionally from the player if they are brandishing a brand/torch/flare or are wearing a wolfskin/bearskin coat.

* TheDreaded: Just like in the Challenge Mode, the relentless Old Bear can be found in Episode 2. He's Jeremiah's nemesis, not Will's, but he'll go after Will in a pinch; after all it ''is'' a maneater.

* SerialKiller: [[spoiler:Molly has been murdering all of the escaped convicts scattered around the Pleasant Valley, [[DoesNotLikeMen apparently because they are men]].]]

** Timberwolves take this UpToEleven. Not only are they far more aggressive than regular wolves, but attack in packs and are not deterred by regular flares.

* CriticalExistenceFailure: Averted -- if the player's Condition is low, then the player character's ability to function will be affected.

* DrivenToSuicide: Implied; sometimes, a corpse will have a bottle of painkillers next to it. And of course, if things have gone badly, badly wrong, the player can always decide to put a stop to their character's suffering[[note]]and their own frustration[[/note]] by jumping off a cliff or marching towards a wolf and not fighting back...

* EndlessGame: Sandbox mode doesn't end, unless you die. There are achievements for surviving for certain lengths of time. That said, it's only theoretically endless, as resources don't respawn and force you to rely on RNG going your way once you hit around the 500 days mark.

* BreakableWeapons: Tools like the hunting knife, hatchet, and hunting rifle will wear down as they are used[[note]]originally it was worse, as the rifle would break after 20 shots, but since then weapon degrade rate has been decreased to more believable levels[[/note]]. You can repair them, but this uses up finite resources such as scrap metal or whetstones.

* LeapOfFaith: [[spoiler:When Mackenzie & Jace are cornered by an angry Mathis in the power plant (in Episode 4), Mackenzie ends up throwing himself and Jace off of the platform they're on into one of the streams flowing underneath, in order to escape.]]

* TheReveal: [[spoiler:The closing cutscene of Episode 4 shows that Astrid bundled up in a canoe to make it to Perseverance Mills and the hardcase Will's been struggling for contains a cure to some sort of infectious disease that has caused a quarantine in Perseverance Mills.]]

* UnexpectedlyRealisticGameplay: Frequently:
** Fighting a wolf in hand-to-hand combat without a weapon will almost always result in extreme injury, if not outright death, for the player character. It's impossible to fight back at all against a bear that has you pinned down.
** Falling from a great height will likely cause a sprained ankle at best, death at worst.
** Eating uncooked meat will likely get you food poisoning, and drinking non-potable water will result in dysentery.
** Leaving injuries untreated can cause an infection, which in turn may result in death.
** The cold is a constant threat and can kill extremely quickly. Hypothermia cannot be cured instantly, either -- it requires several hours of rest and keeping your body temperature above a certain level.
** Using a lantern won't light up a whole room or large area. At best, it will light a few feet in front of you.
** Stepping in fire will result in a burn that slightly cripples your character without treatment.
* RobbingTheDead: There are quite a few dead bodies that the player can loot and use for a small bit of storage.
* SavageWolves: This is either played straight, averted, or possibly defied depending on the difficulty setting:
** In general, the wolves will chase the player down if they see them. You can try to outrun them by consistently breaking line of sight, but you would need to do that fast.
** The wolves also seem to have lost their pack behavior from the disaster, but a lone wolf is still a wolf.
** In the Stalker difficulty setting, the wolves will hunt you down, and most of the time you wouldn't see them coming until they are in your face.
** The player can use flares and brandish torches to scare the wolves away, though they sometimes come back for a second round. Campfires will also ward the wolves off; though you'd better make sure they don't go out at the wrong moment...
** If the player is well equipped, they could just walk confidently towards a wolf, looking for a fight; it will still try to maul you of course, but the player could deal enough damage to send the wolf fleeing, possibly without being costly hurt themselves.
** On the Pilgrim setting, wolves will just run away from you when you get too close.
** Keeping this trope in place is possibly the reason for the omission of (despite being able to fashion an improvised knife, a bow or even a bearskin coat) making and using [[BladeOnAStick a spear]] which would probably allow players to keep wolves at bay a lot easier with a remotely realistic implementation.
** Timberwolves take this UpToEleven. Not only are they far more aggressive than regular wolves, but attack in packs and are not deterred by regular flares.

* RealityEnsues: Frequently:
** Fighting a wolf in hand-to-hand combat without a weapon will almost always result in extreme injury, if not outright death, for the player character. It's impossible to fight back at all against a bear that has you pinned down.
** Falling from a great height will likely cause a sprained ankle at best, death at worst.
** Eating uncooked meat will likely get you food poisoning, and drinking non-potable water will result in dysentery.
** Leaving injuries untreated can cause an infection, which in turn may result in death.
** The cold is a constant threat and can kill extremely quickly. Hypothermia cannot be cured instantly, either -- it requires several hours of rest and keeping your body temperature above a certain level.
** Using a lantern won't light up a whole room or large area. At best, it will light a few feet in front of you.
** Stepping in fire will result in a burn that slightly cripples your character without treatment.
* RobbingTheDead: There are quite a few dead bodies that the player can loot and use for a small bit of storage.
* SavageWolves: This is either played straight, averted, or possibly defied depending on the difficulty setting:
** In general, the wolves will chase the player down if they see them. You can try to outrun them by consistently breaking line of sight, but you would need to do that fast.
** The wolves also seem to have lost their pack behavior from the disaster, but a lone wolf is still a wolf.
** In the Stalker difficulty setting, the wolves will hunt you down, and most of the time you wouldn't see them coming until they are in your face.
** The player can use flares and brandish torches to scare the wolves away, though they sometimes come back for a second round. Campfires will also ward the wolves off; though you'd better make sure they don't go out at the wrong moment...
** If the player is well equipped, they could just walk confidently towards a wolf, looking for a fight; it will still try to maul you of course, but the player could deal enough damage to send the wolf fleeing, possibly without being costly hurt themselves.
** On the Pilgrim setting, wolves will just run away from you when you get too close.
** Keeping this trope in place is possibly the reason for the omission of (despite being able to fashion an improvised knife, a bow or even a bearskin coat) making and using [[BladeOnAStick a spear]] which would probably allow players to keep wolves at bay a lot easier with a remotely realistic implementation.
** Timberwolves take this UpToEleven. Not only are they far more aggressive than regular wolves, but attack in packs and are not deterred by regular flares.

* FinalDeath: Similarly to Roguelike games, once the character dies, that's it. The save file may no longer be accessed.

** Methuselah. Is he some supernatural entity, a figment of Mackenzie's addled imagination, or just a strange {{Cloudcuckoolander}} with strange insights into things? It's never explained how he knew [[spoiler:of the fate of Hoggs, the murderous convict and he refuses to answer Mackenzie when confronted about it.]]

* DogFoodDiet: Dog food is one of the available food items you can find. Chocolate bars are more common and more weight efficient though, and in the long term you'll have to rely on food you hunt or fish anyway.

** Warmth is simplified as below 0°C means you're getting too cold, while above it means you'll be heating up - despite how having an actual person's body temperature falling below 35°C means hypothermia will start setting in. As well, you never have to worry about getting too warm and having to bother to take off clothing, and any "indoor" area with a loading screen will always have a constant temperature despite how you can never get if the heating's running in a place (not to mention the necessity of it is why indoor heating exists).

** You can't make a [[BladeOnAStick spear]] to deter predators, forcing you to expend some resource to avoid a confrontation (flares and torches, time and energy) or win a fight (bullets, health, weapon and clothing condition).

* CrateExpectations: There are small crates in most houses that can be broken apart to get one piece of reclaimed wood. They sometimes hide small items such as cans of soda or chocolate bars.

* EverythingFades: Once interacted with, carcasses despawn without a trace after a few days. Ruined items kept in containers also despawn.

** Warmth is simplified as below 0°C means you're getting too cold, while above it means you'll be heating up - despite how having an actual person's body temperature falling below 35°C means hypothermia will start setting in. As well, you never have to worry about getting too warm and having to bother to take off clothing, and any "indoor" area will always warm you up despite how you can never get if the heating's running in a place (not to mention the necessity of it is why indoor heating exists).

* AcceptableBreaksFromReality: Warmth is simplified as below 0°C means you're getting too cold, while above it means you'll be heating up - despite how having an actual person's body temperature falling below 35°C means hypothermia will start setting in. As well, you never have to worry about getting too warm and having to bother to take off clothing, and any "indoor" area will always warm you up despite how you can never get if the heating's running in a place (not to mention the necessity of it is why indoor heating exists).

** You can just leave food out. Actually, outright leaving it outside will have the lowest rate of condition reduction. Have no worries about some creature messing with it or the ickiness of snow pouring on your rabbit meat for days, what you're doing is literally the best thing you can be doing!

* AWizardDidIt: In reality, wolves are not as hostile as they are in the game, but their antagonism [[RuleOfFun makes the game more interesting]]. The loading screen notes this, and blames their behavior on the geomagnetic disaster.

* FlareGun: A rare weapon found only at the top of Timberwolf Mountain or sometimes in The Ravine and the Carter Hydro Dam. Ammunition is very rare, but its the only way to scare away a charging bear.

* IdiosyncraticDifficultyLevels: The sandbox mode has four available difficulty settings, the easiest being 'Pilgrim' (more resources, wolves are scared of the player), the regular one is called 'Voyager' and hard is 'Stalker' (much more and also more aggressive wolves, resources are more scarce). The [[HarderThanHard hardest difficulty]] is 'Interloper' (No rifle spawns, less starting supplies, no knife/hatchet spawns, extremely small amount of loot, extremely aggressive wolves). There is also Custom mode where the player can adjust difficulty parameters to their liking, though these game will not record progress towards Feats.

* LateToTheParty: Will starts the game trapped in a ravine and is stuck there for several days while he recovers from his injuries. By the time he gets out, the "quiet apocalypse" caused by the worldwide power outage has had some time to get rolling. In fact, there are clues that the region was already in bad straits due to economic stagnation and other factors, even before the geomagnetic pulse, which is why the area is so abandoned and run down even though it's been less than a week since the end of the world.

[[caption-width-right:350:''How far will you go to survive?'']]

%%[[caption-width-right:350:Caption]]

* IdiosyncraticDifficultyLevels: The sandbox mode has four available difficulty settings, the easiest being 'Pilgrim' (more resources, wolves are scared of the player), the regular one is called 'Voyager' and hard is 'Stalker' (much more and also more aggressive wolves, resources are more scarce). The [[HarderThanHard hardest difficulty]] is 'Interloper' (No rifle spawns, less starting supplies, no knife/hatchet spawns, extremely small amount of loot, extremely aggressive wolves).

* InventoryManagementPuzzle: You can carry up to 30 kg without slowing down. If you get tired, this amount decreases, but can be increased by going 3 days without starving, or by creating a Moose Hide Satchel (both of those gives 5 kg each). However, it is generally a good idea to travel light as you burn more calories if you carry more even if it is below the limit. On the other hand, if you leave something behind you have to come back for it once you need it, so it's another one of the tradeoffs you have to consider in this game.

* MaximumHPReduction: Having exposed skin or wearing frozen clothes while outside leads to a risk of contracting frostbite, which permenantly reduces your character's maximum condition by 10% each time.

* LevelMapDisplay: There's an optional[[note]]the player has to "draw" it with charcoal[[/note]] in-game map of the area you're in. It keeps track of the points of interest you have already visited, but it doesn't show your current position so you'll have to rely on landmarks to orient yourself. The game also doesn't provide a compass, but considering that there's a geomagnetical disaster going on, [[JustifiedTrope it wouldn't do too much good anyway]].