In CHKN your creatures become tools as much as your generic hatchet or axe would. In fact, hatchets don't work as well in breaking down trees or rocks as much as a creatures mouth would. You are then encouraged to utilize your creatures with the whistle in order to help you survive and thrive.
So where do you start? You need to understand the creatures and their emotions first because without a tamed creature, you can't use them in the first place. Here we outline a few things in order to understand your creatures emotions.
1. Creatures have five emotions (currently).
- NEUTRAL: When you make a creature, they start out as neutral. They require food and attention in order to move on to feeling happy.
- HAPPY: Creatures actively pursue play. They follow you closely, eyes wide and mouth smiling, staying sometimes annoyingly close to you (like a puppy who is excited you are home.)
- ANGRY: Wild creatures can be angry depending on the makeup of their blocks. They may attack if you come too close to them. Tamed creatures can also turn angry as well.
- SCARED: Once scared, creatures run away from the threat and won't slow down until they become calm on their own, then (if you made the effort to chase them down) you can pet or feed them to make them happy again.
- SAD: Sad creatures look at the ground, walk slowly and clearly look sad with a grown and down-turned eyebrows. This emotion usually takes time to happen.
2. Each emotion has certain triggers.
- Creatures require attention: That includes petting, eating, playing and generally spending time together. If you don't do these things, after a while creatures may become sad.
- Losing a friend: Creatures are aware of other creatures around them and if one dies or becomes scared, they know and will feel sad or scared because of it.
- Starvation: If creatures aren't fed they will become sad and lethargic. If you neglect them enough they may die of starvation.
- Damage and Aggression: In any form, whether you attack them or another creature does, damage will cause a creature to become angry and attack back, and then eventually scared (if you don't kill them first).
3. Tame creatures can be used to your advantage.
- Creatures become tame after they have been given enough food and attention. You can tame wild or freshly made creatures, but you can only edit creatures that you have made in the first place. They are a little bit more accepting of you than wild creatures.
- Only tame creatures can be used to break down resources, be ridden and protect your homestead.
- You can use your whistle to command your tamed companion to break down stones and tress as well as attack other threatening creatures.
- You can ride tamed creatures in order to get around the large environment faster.
- Tame creatures who lay eggs will let you harvest them for life blocks, like when you make a farm of creatures.
4. You can tell how creatures feel by their facial expressions, sounds and body language.
- Just like the picture of the dragon above, creatures show their emotion through their facial expressions, especially their eyebrows.
- Happy creatures have excited facial expressions and move quickly and excitedly. They also coo.
- Sad creatures move slow and look down at the ground, not at you.
- Scared creatures have surprised, wide eyes and high-arched eyebrows. They may scream.
- Angry creatures snarl and bare their teeth, as well as furrow their eyebrows.
5. These emotions effect the way you play the game.
- Not all creatures are alike. Some creatures might take more time and energy to tame them, some are more aggressive and some may become more easily scared than others. It all depends on their lifeblock combination.
- You must work with your creature and learn how they are feeling in order to use them to your advantage. If your creature becomes scared or angry, you must solve this problem in order to complete whatever goal you had in mind.