Your first steps

The game guides you through the opening: the sidebar always shows your next step, and a trail of light leads to it. This page is the overview, for when you want to know what comes next or why something isn't open yet.

The road to Ember

1. Create your island and place the Meadow habitat for Bumbrel, your starter.
2. Hatch the opening egg, a Veylark, and collect your first Bloomthread.
3. Wait until Bumbrel and Veylark are both adults: about 6 hours, or 3 with training. They keep growing while you are offline.
4. Breed them, for 40 Islemarks and 60 Bloomthread. Your first breeding opens most of the game.
5. Buy the first island border for 100 Islemarks.
6. Unlock Ember in /families for 200 Islemarks and 120 Bloomthread. It also needs all three Meadow species in your Archive: the third, Myralume, can hatch from your Bumbrel and Veylark eggs, and 5 Meadow breedings guarantee one.

The opening quests pay about 100 Islemarks by your first harvest, and training pays 5 a round. After Ember, every family follows the same chapter; see What an unlock gives.

While they grow

• Train them. Each round takes 2 minutes 40 seconds off and pays 5 Islemarks; see Training.
• Care for them. A care round makes the habitat produce 5% more for half an hour.
• Fish at the Wellspring Lakes and sell what you catch; see Fishing.
• Try a trial. Tiers I and II of the Lantern Glade need no adult beast; see Trials.
• Build with blocks from the block shop.

What opens when

Menus only show what you have reached, and a command you can't use yet names the quest that opens it.