I got Oxygen Not Included a couple of weeks ago, probably when there was that Steam ad when the Agricultural Update dropped, and I’ve really been enjoying the game, though there are aspects I’ve found confusing. Also, I don’t think I’ve seen terribly many resources out there when I’ve looked, so here’s my attempt to contribute back and provide a guide for newcomers to the community.

Please note that my longest-running game so far is my current one at Cycle 94. I keep learning new things and making improvements, so any super-end-game stuff will have to wait until later. And with that… let’s begin!

Sections:

Assembling your Crew
A New World
Setting Up Base
An Eye Toward Expansion

First off, don’t be afraid to just dive into the game and try things out for a couple of games first. There’s a lot to take in, and a lot of the game’s appeal is in exploration and discovery - both in terms of game mechanics and your dupes’ world. Oh, and “dupes”? “Dupe” is shorthand for “Duplicant,” the race of your adorable little crew members in this game.

Assembling Your Crew

So, you just got this game and are wondering how to begin, or perhaps, where to begin. What are your important decisions? What goals should you have? How should I approach the game? All are good questions, so let’s get to it with the first screen you’ll see as you start a game.

Let’s get the obvious things out of the way.

You get to start the game with three randomly-generated Duplicants. As the game progresses, you’ll get the opportunity to gain more of them, but at the start of the game you have a special opportunity - you can infinitely re-roll your generated Duplicants to custom-tailor your starting team. Once the game proper begins, this ability is lost to you, so feel free to take some time looking for the ideal crew - you’ll have to rely on favorable random-generation later!
You’ll note that each Dupe has a profession. While it may sound like a class or a job from an RPG, this “profession” title has no practical impact - it simply tells you what the Dupe’s current strongest specialty is. It can and will change as you proceed through the game.
Each Dupe has two traits. (This will not always be true once the game progresses significantly.)

Positives:

You’ll note that many of the traits simply boost a Dupe’s starting skill level. I believe that this also means they have an easier time attaining higher levels in that skill, acting as a bonus to the level’s number instead of the Dupe’s experience toward that skill.
However, some skills exist with special unique bonuses - one skill allows a Duplicant to use less oxygen, another lowers their Decor requirement, one reduces a Dupe’s susceptibility to disease, and another allows Dupes to move through water at standard speed.

Negatives:

Some negative skills simply disable jobs. Personally, a few of these will likely be your best option.
Yokel blocks research, but you can only ever use a maximum of two researchers, and I highly recommend restricting yourself to just one.
Cooking isn’t high demand, so Gastrophobia’s a perfectly fine negative.
Scaredy-cat is fine in small numbers as well - even a single Dupe can take on a Hatch just fine.
There are ones that block digging and construction, which I do not recommend for your initial crew.
One negative skill (Anemic) will make a Dupe start out very slow. It sounds bad, but the Dupes learn the Athletics skill very easily and it won’t be an issue at all after several cycles.
Some can be more problematic. If you select a Loud Sleeper, for example, you’ll want to give them a cot separate from where other dupes might sleep, as they’ll get a significant debuff for the next day if you don’t. Small Bladder seems innocuous, but that Dupe’s going to need a lot more breaks and will likely be less useful - and their waste will take increase your overall workload a bit.

Please note that these lists are not exhaustive.

An example initial crew I might take.

Reasons:

It is extremely beneficial to get a Dupe early with at least 4 Creativity. While you may think I lucked with this guy in that he also has Cooking, check his negative - he can’t cook. Devon there is still a keeper, though. And then he has 4 Strength…
At this time, there is no way to increase Dupe Strength, and strength is very helpful with all the material you’ll be needing to move around. Most other skills can be learned, but not Strength. An initial 9-strength Dupe? Amazing. Welcome Mi-Ma to the team.
I usually like to start with a Dupe of at least 5 Learning, to help research move quickly so that I can get into things more quickly. I spent a lot of time refreshing Bubbles’ slot for better options, and she’s the best one that came up for now. Learning is a learnable skill, so it’s not that critical, but still, I choose her. The 8 construction should help her be useful once there’s no more research to be learned.

Some general guidelines:

I’d generally say not to take a Dupe with max attribute level over 9. Higher level attributes have higher level demands, and you want to have some time before you have to start seriously managing your Dupes’ stress levels.
Athletics, Construction, and Digging sound great for getting the game going early on, but these are highly learnable attributes that nearly all of your Dupes will become extremely proficient at later on unless you block them from doing relevant jobs. As a result, I advise ignoring these attributes when selecting Dupes, though if two or more appear on the same Dupe at moderate to high levels, they’re probably a fine pick.
If you don’t take a Creative or Cooking Dupe, know that there’s no guarantee you’ll get one within your first few random selection opportunities. You probably will, but a lot of people advise ensuring you get one now. I’d say that Creative is more important than Cooking starting out.

A New World

http://imgur.com/6PMK8zC

First reaction: They lied to us! Oxygen is right there! There are even some free oxygen sources just to the top-left of our base!

While that may be true, your Dupes have this nasty little habit. They breathe, and when they breathe, it uses that oxygen up! Gasp! That being stated, the Oxylite blocks you see to start you out will last you probably 5 or so cycles, so let’s not panic too quickly. So, what do we have to start?

Three Dupes
20,000 kcal of food (probably around ~7 days of food for three dupes)
Starting oxygen (probably good for around 5 - 7 days with three dupes)
A gate with a pretty light show.
- More seriously, this gate is your base’s initial center, and every three days it will offer you the selection of 1 of 3 new dupes that you may add to your growing colony. Note, “may.” You have the option of denying all of them entry, and I highly advise you make use of that from time to time… probably more often than not. Learning to manage your colony’s size is a very important part of the game.
Not much initial free space. The good news is, you can dig through right about anything!
The ability to build the following as soon as you mine your first blocks:
- Ladders
- Basic Tiles
- Storage Compactors
- Outhouses
- Cots

You can also build a few other things - just check out your build menu in the bottom left! You have to have the required resources first, of course.

Rather than give an absolute step-by-step breakdown, I’ll assume you’re a competent gamer and can do some basic mining and exploration. I mean, this game is in alpha and you’ve taken the time to purchase it and play, right? I’m sure you can figure out the basic controls and a few other things.

Setting Up Base

What I want to talk about: priorities. And maybe a little bit about that “Prioritize” button, but more about general priorities. Here’s my usual list:

Establish a bathroom
Eliminate the initial mobs - the Hatch
Establish a research center
Finish foraging
Start production
Beautify your base

Establish a bathroom

You see, there are some things your Dupes can handle just fine, and others that they… can’t. Or maybe it’s more of a “won’t,” really, but let’s not be too particular - it’s up to you to ensure some things are kept at bay. The first of these: like people, your Dupes need themselves a good ol’ fashioned bio break every once in a while.

You’ve got a little over one cycle (in-game day) to prepare for this before they leave wonderful little polluted-water messes all over the floor. Much like you, I imagine, they’re also not fond of mopping… though they will actually bother if directly instructed to do so. That polluted water does have some unwanted side effects, so I recommend ensuring it’s not a problem by building a loo. That’ll delay the next stage of the problem by around 4 cycles, which is plenty of time to handle some other things.

Eliminating a Hatch or few

Hatches can actually be useful later into the game, but at the beginning they can be a nuisance. Your food stores are limited, and these guys will eat resources. They also seem to like attacking Dupes when you’re first getting set up. To prevent these problems, I simply go ahead and address this early. Please turn your eyes to the top-right of our “new world’s” image from before.

That little dirt mound you see says there’s a Hatch buried here that will turn active at night, and it’ll start nomming up a few things it sees every night. If you’re not careful with your building plan, it could decide to wander throughout your base, even if you don’t go dig it up to kill it. At least it won’t hurt your dupes at night, but you don’t want it eating up valuable resources when you’re short on supply. Even a single dupe can take one on, so just go get kill the ones in rooms with harvestable food.

I advise also setting up a Medical Cot early and rotating your Dupes through it after combat, since they do get a significant debuff from their combat wounds.

Establish a research center

First off, to accomplish this: you’ll need to mine significant quantities of copper. Look for an area like this and mine it. Once that’s done, find an area near the center of your base and setup the following:

1 Manual Generator
1 Tiny Battery (with space for an extra, if not two)
1 Research Station
The wires necessary to connect them.

Make sure that the area you select has plenty of room to grow without breaking into a pool of water or a new biome, because you’ll want to expand this over time.

Here’s my initial base at this point:

Note that I have the “Jobs” tab open in the first image. I highly suggest that you do settings similar to mine above and lock out all Dupes but one from the Research job - the Dupe with your highest Learning trait. The top-most row of boxes allows you to determine each new Dupe’s default setting, and note that I’ve also blocked new Dupes from Research. I suggest you do something likewise for Art, only allowing your creative Dupes to do Art, but that comes into play later.

What researches should you go for now? My priority:

Farming - get the planter box early, along with the ability to do Compost. The former allows you to grow seeds quickly, while the latter allows you to handle the Outhouse’s waste and process it into something safely left alone. The terrarium’s also super useful for cleaning up any Carbon Dioxide pools that develop in your base.
Power Regulation - you’ll note as you go that Dupes may have to stop fairly often to recharge your batteries. This holds especially true after the next section of building once you have automatic power consumers. This tech gives you the larger Battery, which holds 4x as much power for just 2x the space and resource cost. This will help free up your Dupes from a bit of their constant running about.
Interior Decor - by the time you get here, your Dupes will start to actually feel a bit of stress from time to time, and you’ll be getting close to the “Beautify your base” section. A bit of time invested into Art will greatly free up your time down the line.

Finish foraging

You may have noticed that there was some initial food for you, out the gate, on some wild plants. Especially if it’s already dropped to the floor, have your Dupes beeline it to that food. Waste not, want not - it’ll take a bit before your food production kicks into gear, and this will help you not to use your starting reserves too much - Field Rations (and Muckroot, also ungrowable) are the only nonperishable food in the game. Don’t harvest Meal Lice yet if you can help it - it’ll be addressed in the next section.

Start production

Now that you’ve got some basics in place, let’s start addressing some of our actual long-term needs. Remember how your oxygen and good are limited, and you’ve got that initial pool to get you started? You don’t want to waste that pool, as each makes a good buffer for when your production dips down the line. It’s time to start producing food and oxygen.

Machines

It’s time for our first research center expansion - since you’ve got some power established for your research center, place an Algae Deoxydizer somewhere easy to power and out in the open. Do note that you’ll need to mine Algae to use it - since those Dupes mining for the green stuff and you’ll be set. This will be one of your main mining priorities for a little while.

At the same time, go ahead and invest in a Microbe Musher. For it to be useful, you’ll also want to open a path to the top of a water pool, so get that in place as well. Once you’ve done this and the above, your base might look something like this.

Why a Microbe Musher?

In the case your food stores become dire, you can make Mush Bars.
It lets you convert Meal Lice into Liceloaf, doubling their usefulness as food, reduces their mass significantly, and refreshes the freshness timer.

Meal Lice Farming

In a new, separate area of base, set up 6 - 8 Planter Boxes once the Farming research is complete. Try to choose somewhere that you do not otherwise foresee building toward - you’ll want to avoid having to move them later. (Don’t worry about choosing too poorly if you’re just starting out, as it’s all part of the learning process.) If you can help it, do not uproot existing Mealwood plants - there are special benefits that the wild versions have that can be quite beneficial, even if their growth rate is slow. If you don’t have enough seeds, you should probably be clearing out more terrain - those seeds drop very often in your starting biome.

Extra note - do not uproot Mealwood when it nears completion. You have more seeds available to you than you think - you just haven’t dug them up yet. Yes, they don’t renew unless you make an advanced farming setup, but that’s okay. Also, remember those wild ones I told you to leave? Some of those will produce extra seeds if you left them in place. It’s also free food, so hey!

Other Housekeeping

Around this time, your Outhouse will start to fill. It takes a while to clean, so think about placing a second one (so no one’s left in want of toilet) and also building a Compost.

Beautify your base

At this point, you should have the most basic elements of a sustainable base up and running - congratulations! It’s now time to address the next pressing need - preemptively managing stress. Remember how I advised you work on Interior Decor? It’s time to make use of that… and give our Dupes a sleeping area. But first, we also need to establish a stash.

Check out this image. The most displeasing thing to our working Dupe there isn’t the ugly battery or the drab attire of her coworker - it’s all that trash lying around. But the Dupes don’t have any plans for the stuff. So, you’ll want to set up a few Storage Compactors somewhere in your base. Perhaps, a utility tunnel you can expand later on? (We’ll allude more to that in an advanced section.) Anyway, pick somewhere out of the way, and set them to accept literally everything, but also set “Sweep Only.” Then, use the sweep command over our current research base and new sleeping quarters to take out the trash. (Note that there’s a “Copy Settings” button at the bottom right of the structure’s display window when selected - it’s quite useful!) This is where having high-strength Dupes really helps - it’s a pretty time-consuming task!

Now that the area’s clear, make a cot for each of your Dupes and start working on some art - both in the sleeping quarters and in the research area, since they’ll be there pretty often. (It may be wise to place the Algae Deoxydizer somewhere else, as its location is a fantastic place for a sculpture!) Note that completed paintings provide a Decor buff in a 6 tile range, while sculptures provide a buff in an 8 tile range.

Once you’ve done this, you might have a base that looks like this.

Note that despite the debuffs, the research station is still clocking in at +20 decor, which is pretty good for a work area, especially near the game’s start! Add a new painting or a sculpture and that will really shine! The sleeping area is also very strong and will help your Dupes immensely with any stress issues. Piece of advise - have a nearby bathroom so that they don’t have to run too far in the night should nature call.

Other Housekeeping

Now’s a pretty good time to keep researching - don’t be afraid to build the Super Computer and another hamster wheel / Manual Generator!

An Eye Toward Expansion

Now that you have the basic elements of establishing a base in order, it’s time to really start advance planning. A few topics you’ll want to tackle, in my personally-suggested order:

Establishing utility tunnels
Building a reservoir
Long-term oxygen
Breaking into new biomes
Advanced plumbing

Note that images in this and later sections will be taken from my current Cycle 94 game.

Establishing utility tunnels

A significant problem you’ll run into down the road is figuring out how to manage your eventual utility infrastructure. You’ll eventually have lots of plumbing and air vents all over the place, and Heavi-Watt wire isn’t the kindest thing to work with, either. You need a plan to handle these things and stay organized.

Toward that end, I highly advise identifying a utility tunnel route as early as possible - even while setting up your initial starter base, as you gain more experience in the game. I use a structure like this. You can roughly see how I ‘split the main bus’ in this image as well.

If you’ve ever played Factorio, you may be aware of the classic 4-width main bus technique. You’ll note that my tunnels here… are four tiles (of space) wide. No coincidence, though it turns out to be a pretty sweet design for in-game reasons!

Note how I have a ladder on the left-hand side at all times. This is the route that Heavi-Watt wire will take, as it can have no tile obstructions. A Power Transformer is three tiles wide and requires floor… 1 + 3 = 4.
You’ll need space to route a few different types of pipe - an in-bound water & polluted water and an out-bound water & polluted water, at minimum. If you apply any sort of liquid cooling solution, you’ll want a little more width to work with.
Gas-wise, we’ve got at least Oxygen, Natural Gas, and Carbon Dioxide to worry about. I’m strongly considering a Hydrogen refrigerant line as I proceed - both inbound and outbound. That’s a needed width of at least 5 once I get there.
You’ll also want space for valves and possibly filters.

Since the utility tunnel is already going to be full of all sorts of negative-decor stuff, throw in your long-term trash storage here as well, since it’s also a minor decor debuff but needs to be quite accessible.

Building a reservoir

You’ve probably noticed that water (and liquids in general) are tricky to work with. They flood your base if you’re not careful, but you need good stores of water long-term if you want your base to survive, and you need it somewhat out of the way.

If reasonable, you may want to convert an existing pool of water into a reservoir. If so, do be aware that you must leave a wall two-thick at all times on a pool of significant density or the water will erode that wall within a cycle or two, flooding your base. If the wall has any points made of sand, make that three-thick or replace the sand ASAP.

In general, try to build from underneath the existing pool, create the tile under-layer, then work on the walls surrounding it. Make sure to leave it sufficiently thick walls as you work, and don’t be afraid to build a few ladders into the pool for your Dupes to finish the job, even if it raises their stress significantly. That’s why you made them a pretty home, so that they can get over it in their sleep.

Otherwise, just build a nice, large area, put in the general pump infrastructure, and when complete pair up a hamster wheel, battery, and pump at an existing pool to route the water to its nice new home. You can see my primary reservoir in the last image. I was pretty lucky with its original placement, as I never moved that pool. Fill it up as you’re able, and convert polluted water from as necessary.

After your clean water reservoir, try to build a polluted water reservoir as well - you’ll want it for Natural Gas, irrigation, or at the least Fertliizer. It’s also good for buffering input Polluted and having a secondary water storage solution.

Long-term oxygen

Once you’ve gotten a water reservoir in place, it’s time to think long-term about oxygen. You’ve probably already noticed just how finite Algae is, and the solution is to use an Electrolyzer setup. Here’s my current one:

If I wanted perfect Oxygen throughput, I could add an extra filter in there for the secondary pump, but this version works surprisingly well as is. It does need periodic Dupe help, but usually only via one wheel. One’s set to trigger at 25%, the other at 75%. This plus one Algae Deoxydizer have been sustaining this base through Cycle 94.

You’ll also note the Wheezewort plant in there that helps to offset the heat. It’s not perfect though, as the cell has been slowly experiencing global warming; the cell walls have increased about 15 degrees C in around 80 cycles. That being said, the neighboring biomes are warm ones, which probably didn’t help. There’s also a steam geyser not too far directly above that I haven’t bothered tapping into yet because of its heat.

Breaking into new biomes

After you’re ready to break out of your home base biome, you’ll find up to three different types of neighboring biomes:

The ice biome - home to lots of ice, sleet wheat, and Wheezeworts
The bio biome - home to slime, lots of pollution, gold, and Thimble Reeds
The hot biome - home to hydrogen, chlorine, Pincha Pepper, and significant free algae

The Ice Biome

I highly recommend breaking into this one at first for three reasons:

A Wheezewort to offset your Electrolyzer’s heat
Sleet Wheat farming. Sleet wheat is a better long-term solution than Meal Lice, but it’s quite a long-term solution - get started soon if you can! (The Cooking Station also requires far less power than the Microbe Musher, and lacks the decor hit!)
They’re always bounded by Abyssalite, which is utterly fantastic for preventing the spread of heat. Leave a good barrier to the ice zone, but mine what you can of the stuff, as it’ll be very helpful for building cross-biome corridors and for establishing an eventual refrigeration system.

A fourth reason, if you’re lucky:

It’s also home to the Wolframite metal, when it chooses to appear. It’s by far the most conductive metal, which will be useful for refrigeration systems.

The Bio Biome

If you check the gas levels in the Polluted Water pockets, they’re often quite dense. Make sure to prepare well with Air Deodorizers and you’ve got a lot of free Oxygen incoming!
Those pockets are also great candidates for converting into a Polluted Water reservoir.
Thimble Reeds will help as you look to dive deeper into the new biomes, even to cross them!
I could be wrong, but I’ve only ever seen geysers spawn within Bio zones. (Their heat would ruin Ice biomes, but I see little reason for them to not spawn in Hot biomes.)

The Hot Biome

Pincha Pepper is useful for the highest-grade foods.
That algae is nothing to sneeze at, as gaining new sources will help you to establish secondary bases. I’m in the midst of establishing a new base carved out of a hot zone below my original, as it’ll provide a great vantage point to break into a Natural Gas Geyser.

Advanced Plumbing

If you’re like me, the whole setup with valves is pretty confusing and not well explained. Here are some very useful notes I’ve taken on how plumbing works in this game:

Except with a valve, only one source of gas or liquid can cross into a pipe per tick. If there are two sources that can lead into a pipe section, regardless of the mass and element/molecule in the pipes, they will never merge. The single way around this is via use of a valve.

Check this image again: Electrolyzer setup (Gas) - there’s a valve that combines the output of the two pumps into a single pipe. Otherwise, their outputs can’t merge.

Speaking of which, note that Gas Pumps output at 500 g/s, but Gas Valves allow 1000 g/s output rate. You can combine two pumps on a valve!
- Be careful if there are two or more kinds of gas that might get pumped, though - if the contents don’t match, the valve won’t combine the outputs!
- If the contents do match but would combine for over 1000 g in that tick, the valve will let through as much as it can but will still block. It’s still progress, though.

Want to run a shower and lavatory on the same line? Better use a valve, or one will block the other’s output, even if it’s only using 1/10th of the pipe’s capacity!

As a result, do not underestimate valves - they’re pretty much your best friend. Place the ‘source’ on the line to be merged with the other gas line. It is the ‘source’ that will be blocked if the valve cannot let enough content through that tick.

A Farewell

This is as far as I’ve gotten on this run, though I do have a save with a basic Natural Gas setup on a less-well-designed run’s file. I’ll try to update this guide as I continue my game if there’s interest and I progress through new content. I hope this helps some of you out there!

Enjoy the game!