Being set in a post-apocalyptic environment, Endzone: A World Apart is a survival city builder where the player is tasked to ensure a colony’s survival. Placed into the position of chief, the player is expected to provide for a settler’s needs, prepare for the future and advance the colony on a technological level.
Like other civilization-type games, Endzone has features like assigning settlers jobs, weather variation, farming, etc. But between the fact it’s in early access and how it only has a minimalist tutorial, actually learning the ins and outs of this game can be a bit of a challenge. So here is a guide that goes over the colony’s basic stats, what the player needs to focus on, and potential hazards that may strike the settlement. All to create a sustainable colony.
Keep an Eye Colony Stats in Endzone: A World Apart
Understand that one of the most important mechanics of the game resource management. This applies both in terms of material and labor, with the player having to almost constantly keep an eye on the colony’s status and resources over the course of a single playthrough. But to keep things simple, a sustainable colony needs a healthy balance of:
- Health: It is self-explanatory. It is the overall health of the settlement and at lower levels, the colony’s productiveness will take a hit since several settlers will be wounded. If it reaches zero the colony is—well—not a colony. They are all dead. It’s a ghost town now.
- Confidence: Is basically Endzone’s happiness rating. The higher the confidence, the higher the rate of production. But it can also be used as a general indicator for if the settler’s basic needs are being met.
- Radiation: The lower the better for this stat. Radiation is a hazard to anyone, and at high enough levels it will start ticking away at the health of settlers and actually render some of them infertile.
All of these stats are displayed near the top of the screen with various symbols, and these stats allow the player to gauge the general status of the settlement.
Establish Food and Water Sources in Endzone: A World Apart
Without fail the first thing the player wants to do is establish water and food sources. Most of these are easy enough. For water just build a jetty over the water, connect it to a cistern and assign a few settlers to collect water.
Food is a bit more complicated, but not by much. Depending on how the player’s preference, the settlement can gain food through a variety of sources. The settlement can build crops, orchards, hunter’s lodge, etc.—each with their own corresponding profession that is capable of bringing in food. But some are more convenient or effective than others.
- Crops/Orchards: Take time to cultivate, and part of their effectiveness (or ineffectiveness) is affected by the weather and soil quality. The player only starts with two random crop types, and each specific crop comes with its own grow times and food yield. But farming crops of any kind can still contribute to a steady supply of food if they are tended to.
- Fishing Hut: Capable of producing fish, this building requires a body of water to function and can be put out of commission when a drought hits.
- Hunting Lodge: When hunters are assigned to it, the lodge is capable of producing meat for the settlement. The only downside is that it is tedious to keep it effective. Players will have to constantly reassign the “field of work” to wherever the largest animal population is, which constantly fluctuates.
- Gatherer’s Cabin: Allowing assigned settlers to gather fruits, berries, and other natural bounties. So long as the player occasionally reassigns the gathering area, this building enables a decent collection of food.
It is recommended that players utilize several methods to get the colony’s food supply. Settlers need food variety in order to keep their confidence up and it will prevent the colony from becoming overly reliant on a single food source.
But before building any of these structures, take note of the amount of radiation in the area with the tab button. If food or water is produced on an overly irritated area the resources collected from that area will be contaminated with radiation. These irradiated resources will, in turn, increase the radiation level of the colony when consumed. Since this is the beginning of the game it is best to just avoid irritated areas altogether.
Provide Housing and Population Growth in Endzone: A World Apart
The shelter is also something of a basic need for settlers. Any settler who doesn’t have a place to place to call home will almost instantly lose confidence and may even become unhappy. But also know that if the player provides them with the most basic house, a cabin, it will also provide room for them to start a family (i.e. population growth).
While that population growth may be beneficial to a colony, the player should always ensure that the settlement has enough food and water to provide for any children the settlers may produce. At the beginning of the game, population growth is likely exactly what the player wants.
But if the player wants to provide housing while not encouraging population growth, then building shelters are the way to go. Shelters, unlike most other forms of housing, do not enable settler reproduction. But it more than makes up for it with how many settlers it can house. But building this structure is a bit difficult in the early game since it requires metal to be built, which can only be produced when scrap goes through a recycler (more on that later).
Build Resource Collection Buildings in Endzone: A World Apart
With the colony’s basic needs set up and ready to go, now it is time to build structures that collect raw resources from the environment. These include the forester’s lodge, scrapyard, and the herbal hut which produce wood, scrap, and herbs respectively.
While the player can technically collect resources by giving settlers collection tasks, these buildings enable resources to be collected as a more efficient rate when settlers are assigned to them. In particular, wood and scrap are a must for the construction of most buildings so it is a good idea to start gathering those materials for future expansion.
Prepare for Droughts in Endzone: A World Apart
It may be a bit early in the guide, but it still worth mentioning. Droughts exist and they spell trouble for any colony. Bodies of water evaporate, the land dries up and radiation storms become more frequent. So even though there will be more advanced means of protecting the settlement from a drought’s effects later in the game, it is best to begin building safeguards now with what the colony already has.
Firstly, build additional cisterns. One or two should be enough for a colony that just started out. But it is imperative that the colony has space to stockpile water before a drought hits. Alongside the additional cisterns, the player should build a few wells. These may not collect water as frequently but they are viable in any weather condition when maintained by a settler. Just be sure not to place wells too close to each other otherwise their effectiveness will be reduced.
Similar to water collection, droughts will also have an effect on food production. Fisheries will basically become unusable, crops will have a reduced growth rate and gatherers will have a harder time finding edible plants. So just like water, the colony should stock up on food before a drought hits.
But arguably the worst part of the drought is the storms. Sometimes the player gets lucky and avoids one, but oftentimes a drought is coupled with a radiation storm. As its name implies, it suffuses the land in radiation which, in high enough amounts, can make settlers infertile and start affecting their health. Or irradiate the water. Or damage buildings. Or irradiate the land to where harvested food is instantly hazardous. It’s just a bad time. Especially if the colony has not been able to produce protective clothing yet.
There is a silver lining though. Sort of. Because a drought basically shuts down most of the colony’s water systems, that means the player can reassign a good amount of the workforce to other tasks like hunting, charcoal burning, recycling, etc. It’s not like they can collect water anyway so might as well put them to better use.
Create Advanced Materials and Charcoal in Endzone: A World Apart
Out of all of the resource buildings, the scrapyard is arguably the most important for progressing the colony. Why? Because not only is scrap used as a component for several structures and tools, but the scrap itself can be used to make materials that are necessary for more advanced structures.
To create these advanced materials, the player will have to assign a settler to a recycler—a structure that is dedicated to converting scrap into either cloth, metal, plastic, or circuitry. Because each recycler can be made to produce only one type of material, it is recommended that the player builds several recyclers. But out of all of the materials, cloth stands out as a necessary component for protective wear.
Similarly, charcoal from buildable charcoal kilns can also be useful. Not only can charcoal be used to create more advanced protective wear, but it can also potentially be used to purify water reserves from radiation. Because of this, it is recommended that the colony always produces a steady supply of charcoal.
Radioactive Protection, and Medication in Endzone: A World Apart
Remember radiation? That thing that can decrease a settler’s health and make them infertile? Well, odds are it's going to be a problem. Especially during and after radiation storms. With radiation being a constant threat, it is important to get exposure level under control.
To do so, build the colony a tailor or two near the colony’s main hub. With cloth likely already being in production thanks to the recyclers, the colony should have enough material to begin producing protective scarfs at the tailor for basic protection. The tailor can also produce a more-effective gas mask if the colony has enough cloth and charcoal in reserve. But at the end of the day, what is produced isn’t too important. What matters is that something is being produced. Even just having scarfs can really help reduce radiation exposure.
But sometimes it is not enough. Sometimes settlers get radiation sickness or begin succumbing to the disease. For these instances, it is best to set up a medical facility. They use herbs collected from herbal huts to produce medication, which can, in turn, be used to increase a settler’s health and offset disease. It is a must-have for any sustainable colony.
Tools and Upgrading Structures in Endzone: A World Apart
So at this point, the player should have a relatively stable colony that is producing all of the materials and radioactive protection it may need. So now is the time to begin really optimize what the colony can accomplish.
Build a workshop and assign a few settlers to begin making tools out of scrap or metal. These tools increase the settler’s ability to work effectively and the most basic tools are really cheap to make. Build a few warehouses if the player has not already done so. These structures store additional resources and material thereby increasing how many resources a colony can stockpile.
Then start clicking on structures that have already been built and see if any of them have an option to be upgraded. Cisterns, the bus player started in, and houses can all be upgraded into more advanced versions of themselves. Increasing settler confidence is also something the player should focus on. Build a few campfires and a cemetery. Or even a pub. Settlers like having a place to hang out and mourn their dead, and their increased confidence will make them even more productive.
The aim of this stage is to improve the colony to an ideal state and strengthen any weaknesses the colony may have, be it in the form of radioactive protection, resources, space, quality of life, etc. When all of these things are brought to a stable state, the player will have a sturdy foundation to begin rapid expansion.
Other Miscellaneous Tips
- Hoard cloth, charcoal, and herbs early in order to effectively produce protective gear and medicine without stalls in production
- Structures like wells, cisterns, cemeteries, and campfires can all be made without advanced materials and can, therefore, be built very early in a playthrough
- Building dirt roads between structures increase a settler’s movement speed
- Building an exploration station will enable assigned settlers to explore ruins and potentially come back with new discoveries and rations
- Children are not officially part of the workforce but still help their parents store food and water sometimes
Endzone- A World Apart is currently only available on PC.