Oxygen Not Included Wiki: Critters, Food, Plants and Elements

Critters are the animals of Oxygen Not Included, living alongside Duplicants on land, in the air and in water. Most can be caught, tamed and raised on a ranch for eggs, meat, materials, light and power. A few, such as Beetas and Gnits, are hostile, and Pokeshells turn aggressive around their eggs, so it's worth learning each critter's behavior before you build around it.

Food keeps Duplicants alive and sets their morale, with each dish rated on a quality scale from Grisly to Ambrosial. Most food spoils over time unless it's kept cold or stored in a sterile gas, and a few foods never spoil at all. Cooking raw ingredients at the Electric Grill and Gas Range raises their quality and calories, while the Microbe Musher covers the early game.

Plants are the living parts of your base in Oxygen Not Included, and they come in four main kinds. Food plants feed your Duplicants, industrial plants supply raw materials, decorative plants improve rooms, and utility plants change the air or temperature. Most need the right temperature, gas, light or liquid to grow, and growing them on a farm makes them mature about four times faster than wild plants.

Elements are the basic substances that make up the world of Oxygen Not Included, from solids like rock and metal to liquids like water and oil, gases like oxygen and steam, and empty vacuum. Each one changes form at set temperatures, and weight, pressure and heat decide how it moves and mixes. Players gather them by digging, through geysers and vents, with machines that convert one element into another, or by sending rockets into space.

Biomes are the regions that make up each asteroid and planetoid in Oxygen Not Included. Each one has its own temperature, air, materials, plants, and creatures, and those contents decide what it offers your colony and what it can do to your Duplicants. Space forms the surface of every asteroid, while some biomes, such as Aquatic and Niobium, appear only on specific worlds.