The Unfinish’d
The guide
Everything the game does not stop to tell you: the controls, how land and building work, the places in the world and the systems under them.
Starting
What this is
The Unfinish’d is a world shared by everyone playing it. There is one of it, it keeps running when you leave, and what you build stays where you built it.
Your first hour
You arrive with a letter in your pack. Read it — open the menu with M, go to Inventory, and click it. It tells you where you are and what the first…
Controls
Every key, mouse button and controller input in The Unfinish’d, plus the chat and its slash commands.
On a phone
On anything with a touchscreen the controls appear on their own. The left of the screen walks — put a thumb down anywhere and the stick appears under it —…
Staying alive
You have a hundred points of health. It mends on its own, slowly. Eating something mends it about three times faster for a while, so food is worth…
Land & building
Land
The world is divided into parcels, thirty-two metres square. Press G to see the grid. Standing on one and pressing B buys it; the price depends on what…
Build mode
Press Tab. The tools appear on the left, the mouse comes free, and you can still walk around whatever you are making.
Shaping prims
A prim is a plain shape with no art of its own. Everything players build is made of them. New prim puts a one-metre square on the ground a couple of paces…
Facing & texture
Every side of a prim can be faced separately. Choose Paint and the kit appears in the palette: six surfaces, six colours, and a size.
Moving pieces
Make any piece you build move: choose a motion in the palette and set how it behaves.
Foundations
The ground here is rarely flat, and a house on a slope is a miserable thing to build. A foundation is a terrace you place like any other piece: its top…
The workshop
A flat green mat ruled in metres, a mile and a half from anywhere anyone lives, where prims and stone cost nothing and nobody owns the ground. It is…
Blueprints
A blueprint is a building remembered as instructions rather than as a building. Stand on a parcel, name it, and save — everything standing there becomes a…
The world
Getting about
Walking is slow on purpose. Horses are the answer: find a wild one, stand near it and press E to tame it, again to ride. A tamed horse is yours and stays…
The Three Roads
Out west, where three roads meet at the foot of Thunderhead, the biggest of the mine mountains, stands the Three Roads: a coaching inn you can walk right…
Lastwater
Take the south road from the Three Roads, past the Anvil and up over the heights. Where it forks, keep on south, down onto the sand, and follow it west:…
Haywick
Take the north road from the Three Roads, under Thunderhead and on across the grassland until it stops. Over the rise beyond its end is Haywick, a farming…
Stonecrown Gorge
South of the chapel, past the Stonecrown mine, the ground splits open: Stonecrown Gorge runs half a kilometre from the hills down to the bay, its walls…
Frosthearth
Take the road north-west out of the village. It climbs off the plain into the snowfields and stops at a fingerpost; up the slope from there is…
Gullhaven
Take the road south from the Three Roads and go east at the fork in the heights, past the foot of the Chain Bridge (or cross the bridge from Saltmarch),…
Fenmere
From Lastwater, take the road on south over the grass. It runs out at a fingerpost on the edge of a fen: shallow water and reeds, pines round it, and a…
Pinewater
Take the road north-west out of the village towards Frosthearth. Just before it reaches the fingerpost below the hamlet, another stands on the left of the…
Mines & forging
Six mountains in this world are hollow, and they are the only ones that will ever be: everywhere else is a heightmap and stays that way. Inside, you dig…
Quests
Nobody here gives you a task list. Someone has a problem, they tell you about it, and what you do next is yours to work out. A grieving woman mentions her…
Memories
Some knowledge in this world is an object. A Memory is a thing you carry, and while you carry it you know something — a rite, a truth about what happened…
Unfinished places
The Hollow Hills are land that stopped completing itself, and it is not the only thing that never got finished. Here and there the world holds a place…
Buildings that work
A sawmill saws the woodland it stands in whether or not you are there, and goes on doing it while you are logged out. Walk up and press E to empty its…
Farming
A crop plot costs six wood and a measure of seed. Stand on it with seed in your pack and press E to sow; press it again when the crop is ready and you cut…
Berries
There are berry bushes scattered through the open country. Walk up to one and press E to pick a handful. No tool, no coin, no land — berries are what…
Livestock
The Merchant sells a cow (220 coins), a ewe (160) and a hen coop (120). Put one down on your own land and it works the way a sawmill does: it yields on…
Fishing
The fish rack on the village square sells a rod for 40 coins as well as suppers. Hold the rod, stand at the water’s edge and press E to cast — the line…
Cooking
Lay a campfire (three wood), stand at it and press E to open its book — the same page the forge uses, with recipes instead of tools. Anybody’s fire will…
Two ways to build
Raise the plans and you are building on your feet — over the shoulder, the cursor aiming, about fourteen metres of reach. That is the right tool for…
Other players
You see what everyone else is carrying and doing: the weapon or tool in their hand, their shield going up, a bow being drawn, every swing, and their…
Standings
Menu → Standings. Six boards, ten names each, built from the account records the world already keeps — so somebody who has not logged in for a month is…
Posters
Menu → Posters → Add a picture. Bring a PNG, JPEG or WebP of any size; the game scales it to 512 across, saves it small, and keeps up to eight for you. A…
Help
When it goes wrong
Fixes for the usual problems: a piece you have lost, being stuck in the scenery, falling under the world, a handle that will not move.
Also
Plots for sale
The land that is still for sale on the east shore below the village, with a picture of each plot.