My Homo Sapiens Snowball Earth World (Year 1)

[Kolyenka]

I'm playing lightly modded and with 3 day months; it's currently February 2, Year 1 (about 17 hours in). I settled very close to spawn as travel is extremely dangerous due to the weather and short days except for in the mid summer. It got to -41C in the worst part of winter, although it's been too dry to snow. I'm also playing with no map, no coordinates, and drop inventory on death, so getting lost is a very big problem and I have not explored yet because of it. Roads to everywhere are underway, but progress is very slow, I think my slowest game I've ever played. Very fun though !

Right now when it's daytime it's always with the sun low and a red sky. It's very beautiful here.

I have a small hut, a large storage shed, and am partway through a new, much larger building...not sure what I'll use it for, honestly. Maybe more storage. My buildings are an attempt at prehistoric stone roundhouse (found in many parts of the real world over a pretty large span of time). It's difficult and I haven't done any chiseling to it but I like how it looks; it's basically just a dome that is about 3 blocks thick at the base and 1 block (stairs) at the top of the curve, with thatch roof. I'm very happy with them even though they don't look very polished. 

I'm in the middle of switching my doors to all face where the winter sun traverses the sky--previously they were all facing east toward the rising sun (now they will be facing south). That's why the door to the small roundhouse is in a different spot in the first picture.

I want to rebuild the shed as it doesn't fit with my huts very well, but for now it does the job.

Here's my hut. I have a ton of oiled pelts because I did not think I would ever get to leather, so I was planning on making lots of hunters backpacks and fur clothes. But I found an oak tree thanks to the Arctic Survival mod (I owe a lot of my progress to that). They make a nice floor; I'm going to have to keep making the pelts I guess.

The storage area. I am well into the copper age although I'm not sure I'll go further (and haven't found the necessary ores yet anyway despite a lot of looking), but I do want to build a bit of a village here with lots of roundhouses and perhaps a wheelhouse if I get enough decorative/furniture stuff. It's a lot harder in homo sapiens, as there are no ruins and no traders, so most items cannot be gotten.

I lived in this cave before I made the roundhouse. It was a lot colder, and eventually extremely cramped. Caves are nice and safe due to the lack of drifters and other subterranean denizens, but living above ground is much nicer.

There are however a lot of bears and moose. I've died and lost all my stuff at least a dozen times now, but it's probably my favorite playthrough yet !

Edited October 12, 2025 by Kolyenka
wording

[Echo Weaver]

Nice! I really see the appeal of arctic starts. 

In my current stone age game, I also was trying to mimic a roundhouse -- a challenge in a block game. I like yours better than mine. 

[Kolyenka]

6 minutes ago, Echo Weaver said:

Nice! I really see the appeal of arctic starts. 

In my current stone age game, I also was trying to mimic a roundhouse -- a challenge in a block game. I like yours better than mine. 

Thank you ! I love arctic worlds, and it's nice that you can actually progress in them now with some mods. Resources are extremely sparse though, so it's slow going.

Nice to hear you also tried roundhouses ! They are challenging indeed. This is like attempt 3 or 4 with them, I've been trying every few worlds for while now

[EnbyKaiju]

I love a good snowball earth run and it looks like you're having a lot of fun with it!
I haven't done one in quite a few versions and I think with the current update they are far more viable, especially long term, than they used to be. Especially for first homosapian run.

Good luck with the rest of your run!

[Teagan Williams]

I love the inside of the hut! I just got the game and this just gave me a lot of inspiration for my own cave lol. I will now move out of it. I did a reverse start from yours in a warm climate. My mods are heavier as I took most of the paleo animals and fauna (attack by water buffalo frequent), I live in the wetlands but not a homosapian run. How long are your days? For that many hours its strange you are only in Feburary, I guess you might also have started in January. Please keep updating! Oh and maybe share your modlist :P!

[Kolyenka]

On 11/5/2025 at 8:10 AM, Teagan Williams said:

I love the inside of the hut! I just got the game and this just gave me a lot of inspiration for my own cave lol. I will now move out of it. I did a reverse start from yours in a warm climate. My mods are heavier as I took most of the paleo animals and fauna (attack by water buffalo frequent), I live in the wetlands but not a homosapian run. How long are your days? For that many hours its strange you are only in Feburary, I guess you might also have started in January. Please keep updating! Oh and maybe share your modlist :P!

Thank you ! 

Vintage story worlds start on year 0 (i think march, specifically), so year 1 February means ive played almost 1 full in game year. 

Im now at 29 hours although since I have very little to show for it (tore down the old rectolinear storage shed, moved some materials, built a tiny round greenhouse and am partway through another small roundhouse) i dont want to update just yet. I also have another world im playing concurrently so I switched off whenever I feel stuck.

Mods are: hanging oil lamps, arctic survival, food shelves, butchering table, and one sky mod that I cannot for the life of me remember the name of. Its what gives me the round sun and moon as well as beautiful night time skies.