Terraria is a 2D action-adventure sandbox video game developed by Re-Logic. The game was initially released for Microsoft Windows in May 2011, and has since been released for various consoles, handhelds, and mobile devices. Gameplay of Terraria features exploration, crafting, building, and combat with a variety of creatures in a procedurally generated 2D world. Terraria received generally positive critical reception upon release, with direct comparisons to Minecraft and praise given to its sandbox elements. By December 2018, the game had sold over 26 million copies across all platforms.
An in-game screenshot of Terraria, circa 2011
Terraria is a sandbox 2D game with gameplay that revolves around exploration, building, combat, and mining.[1][2] The game has a 2D sprite tile-based graphical style reminiscent of the 16-bit sprites found on the Super NES.[2] The game is noted for its classic exploration-adventure style of gameplay, similar to titles such as the Metroid series and Minecraft.
The game starts in a procedurally generated world. The player starts out with three basic tools: a pickaxe for digging, a shortsword for combat, and an axe for woodcutting.[1] Many resources, notably ores, can be found while exploring underground caves. The player begins with a limited amount of health and magic points, which can both be increased by finding certain items by exploring.[1] Some resources, and most items, may only be found in certain areas of the map, stored in common and rare containers, or dropped by certain enemies.[1] The player uses resources to craft new items and equipment at an appropriate crafting station for that recipe. For example, tables or other items can be crafted at a work bench, bars can be smelted from ore at a furnace, and armor crafted at an anvil. Several advanced items in Terraria require multiple crafting operations where the product of one recipe is used as an ingredient for another.
The player can encounter many different enemies in Terraria, such as simple slimes, zombies, skeletons, demon eyes, and various biome-specific enemies. The occurrence of certain enemies depends on several factors including time, location, random events, and player interactions.[1] The player can fight against enemies with swords, bows, guns, magic spells, and summoned attackers. The player may also battle boss monsters during the game with a number of different combat mechanics that can drop rare items and large amounts of in-game currency. All bosses can be summoned by using certain items or randomly when certain criteria are met. Most Bosses can only be summoned at night. Four of the bosses can spawn naturally in certain places and times. The defeat of these bosses is often tied to in-game progression. Defeat of bosses are met with several rewards which equips the player for future gameplay.
