PREHISTORIC Survival Tips: How to Survive Every Night Until Sunrise

Quick answer

Prioritize the curfew rules over combat: keep lights away from your windows, close the curtains, lock the doors, keep the generator fueled and keep the house quiet until the HUD clock reaches 6:00 AM. When a dinosaur gets close or breaks in, the job changes from managing the house to managing yourself — freeze when one looks through the glass, stay silent when one is above the ceiling, and hide the moment a break-in is announced.

• Nights run from 12:00 AM to 6:00 AM. Surviving to sunrise shows 'SUNRISE - YOU MADE IT THROUGH NIGHT 1'.
• Close doors with [E], lock them with [Q], and board broken windows with planks to raise the SECURE meter.
• Refuel the yellow garage generator before FUEL hits 0%, or MAINS switches off mid-night.
• Running makes noise: watch the SOUND meter (SOFT / NOISY / BREAKING) and move slowly inside.
• A lit flare may draw away sound-hunting animals — but it attracted the tall Night 2 animal in one recorded run, so identify the threat before you use one.

Every night in PREHISTORIC is the same contest: you and your house against a clock. The curfew starts at 12:00 AM, the HUD clock counts toward 6:00 AM, and if you are still alive when it gets there, the night ends with 'SUNRISE - YOU MADE IT THROUGH NIGHT 1'. The game never asks you to defeat the dinosaurs — every broadcast rule exists to keep you from being found. That framing decides your priorities: the house systems (lights, locks, generator, noise) come first, and close dinosaur encounters are about reacting correctly, not winning fights.

The EMERGENCY BROADCAST SYSTEM messages that open each night hand you the priority list directly. Night 1: stay inside your home, keep all lights away from your windows, close your curtains and lock your doors — 'If you can see them through the glass, they can see you.' Night 2 keeps the same three ideas: lights away from windows, doors locked, home quiet.

Your start-of-night routine

Run the house in this order while the streets are still calm:

Checklist

• Draw the curtains and move lights away from the windows

  Rule 2 on Night 1 and Rule 1 on Night 2 — if you can see them through the glass, they can see you.

• Close and lock every exterior door

  Doors show [E] OPEN/CLOSE DOOR and [Q] LOCK prompts; objectives like 'Something's outside. Lock the doors' track your progress as you go.

• Board up any broken windows

  Planks are picked up with 'E TAKE PLANK' and go onto objectives like 'Board up the broken upstairs hall window'.

• Check FUEL on the HUD

  MAINS, FUEL and SECURE sit at the top of the screen; plan a refuel before FUEL reaches 0%.

• Silence the smoke alarm when its alert appears

  The red 'Shut off the smoke alarm upstairs' alert marks a live noise source; [E] PULL THE BATTERY removes it.

• Stop running inside

  Running raises the SOUND meter; the broadcast says to move slowly and not run inside your home.

Locking and boarding raise the SECURE meter, your at-a-glance read of how sealed the house is. Keep expectations for locks realistic: when the game reports two large animals breaking in on your street, the broadcast says outright that a locked door will not stop them — it slows them down. That makes locks time-buyers for the hide drill below, not a wall. For the first-night lock-up and boarding drill, see the beginner guide.

Keep the generator running

Power is the chore that repeats all night. Watch FUEL on the top HUD; when it drops to 0%, MAINS switches OFF with the red flashing warning 'POWER LOST - the generator ran out of fuel', and the fix is always the same loop:

1. Grab a GAS CAN.
2. Reach the yellow generator in the garage and use [E] REFUEL GENERATOR.
3. Use [E] PULL THE CORD — 'The generator is running.' confirms power is back.

Fuel drains repeatedly in a single night, so treat FUEL checks as part of your patrol rather than a one-time setup. The official game description lists 'Keep the generator running' as a core task, and the FOSSIL CREEK SECURITY shop backs you up with a FUEL TANK (listed at R$29) alongside LOCK DOWN (R$64), CAR ALARM (R$40) and TEAM REVIVE (R$29). The generator guide covers the power system in more depth.

Treat noise as a resource

The SOUND meter on the right side of the HUD shows how much noise you are making — SOFT, NOISY or BREAKING. Running generates noise, which is why the broadcast for the sound-hunting animal says to move slowly and never run inside your home. Two habits keep the meter low: walk everywhere inside, and pull the battery from the smoke alarm ([E] PULL THE BATTERY) the moment its red alert appears, because an alarm nobody silences is a noise source working against you. The stealth guide goes deeper on staying unheard.

When a dinosaur gets close: match the response to the animal

Close encounters are where nights are lost, because the animals do not share one behavior. Each broadcast names the threat and the sense it hunts with, so read the announcement first and identify which animal you are dealing with — the responses below are keyed to each one:

• The large animal reported on the main road hunts by sound.
• The fast predator patrolling the yards can hunt anyone it finds outside.
• The tall animal from Night 2's 'DON'T LOOK UP' broadcasts is drawn to light and movement. It is tall enough to look into upstairs windows, and later it lands on rooftops listening through the ceiling. Do not reach for the flare against this one: in one Night 2 playthrough, a thrown flare attracted it rather than driving it off.

Decision guide

Choose for your situation

A large sound-hunting animal is reported on the main road

Move slowly and never run inside the home; keep quiet — a lit flare may draw it away.

The fast predator is patrolling the yards

Stay inside until it moves on — it hunts anyone it finds outside. A lit flare may draw it away, and a strong light shone in its eyes is said to drive it back.

The tall animal is looking through your window

Stay away from the glass and do not move until it loses interest.

You hear the tall animal above you on the roof

Make no sound — it listens through the ceiling.

A break-in is reported at your address

Hide immediately in the pantry, a closet or under the stairs and stay silent until it has left.

When a dinosaur breaks into the house

A break-in flips the night from defense to hiding. The urgent broadcast spells out the whole drill: 'URGENT: A BREAK-IN HAS BEEN REPORTED AT YOUR ADDRESS. HIDE IMMEDIATELY. DO NOT MAKE A SOUND. REMAIN HIDDEN UNTIL IT HAS LEFT. DO NOT STAY HIDDEN LONGER THAN YOU MUST. THEY FIND PEOPLE BY SMELL.' The objective banner points you to the spots — the pantry, a closet or under the stairs — while the dinosaur patrols through the house.

When it is over, the follow-up broadcast tells you: once the animals have left your residence, 'Secure all broken windows at once' — so come out promptly and get the SECURE meter restored before the next alert.

The Shotgun is the contingency for the worst case. It holds 6 shells ('Press H to take it out'), and in one Night 2 run a T-Rex that broke into the living room was driven back with it. Six shells is not much, so treat the shotgun as a contingency rather than the plan — the weapons guide covers the shop side, and the hide guide covers the quiet option in detail.

Other night events to expect

A fire can break out in the kitchen or back yard with the objective 'Put out the fire'. Get the fire extinguisher in hand and hold LMB to spray until the objective reads COMPLETE.

The pressure escalates night over night. Night 3's broadcast says it directly: 'EVERY ANIMAL SIGHTED THIS WEEK IS ACTIVE TONIGHT' — lights away from windows, doors locked, homes silent, but with every animal from the week out at once. The lobby host sets NIGHT, DIFFICULTY and WEATHER before starting, so how brutal a night gets is decided before the curfew begins; the lobby settings guide explains those choices.

The final night adds an escape. A helicopter drops a supply crate in the back yard — open it with [E] for TAKE FLARE / TAKE PLANK — and at 6:00 AM survivors must run out the front door and board the yellow school bus on the street. The HUD counts the crew ('0/2 PLAYERS ON THE BUS' in a two-player session) until everyone is aboard, so plan the run to the bus as part of surviving the night, not an afterthought.

If you are still finding your bearings in Fossil Creek, the beginner guide covers the basics; from your first night onward, the loop above — dark, locked, fueled, quiet, and hidden when it counts — is what carries you to sunrise.