Terraria is a 2D sandbox, action-adventure, role-playing, and platformer game with gameplay that revolves around exploration, building, crafting, combat, survival, and mining; it is playable in both single-player and multiplayer. The game's graphical style is reminiscent of the 16-bit sprites found on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System game console.[11][12] Terraria is noted for its classic exploration-adventure style of gameplay, similar to games such as Super Metroid and Minecraft. The game starts in a procedurally generated world, with players starting out with basic tools and a non-player character (NPC) guide that teaches the player about aspects of the game and progression.
The world is divided into biomes that include a vast variety of resources, such as metal ores, which can be found while exploring caves. Some resources may only be found in specific areas of the world, stored in containers or dropped by enemies. Players also begin with low health and mana, which can be increased by finding and crafting specific equipment or items.[17][18] Players can use found resources to craft equipment and items, such as weapons, armor, and potions, at crafting stations. The game has several difficulty modes: the default "classic" mode, "expert", and "master" modes, which increase the difficulty in exchange for exclusive items, and "journey" mode, which allows the player to duplicate items, adjust the world's difficulty, and control weather and time while playing.
The game features a character class system, primarily divided into melee, ranged, magic, and summoner classes.[22] Throughout the game, players can also encounter a variety of enemies, the occurrence of which depends on several factors such as time, location, and special events.[10][12][23] A more difficult version of enemies, called bosses, use a number of different combat mechanics and can drop valuable items.[17] They can be summoned either by players using special items or when certain criteria are met.[10][17] The defeat of some bosses is directly tied to in-game progression, such as Wall of Flesh, who advances the game into "hardmode", a stage of the game that introduces tougher enemies, as well as new NPCs, resources, and items. Like bosses, players can also battle enemies and mini-bosses during special events, such as goblins,[10] pirates,[25] or aliens,[17] in which enemies appear constantly, and they must either be defeated or a certain amount of time must pass before the event ends.
By completing specific goals, such as defeating a boss or obtaining a certain item, players can attract NPCs, such as a merchant, nurse, or demolitionist, to occupy houses they have built.Some NPCs can also be acquired by finding them throughout the world.[28] After acquiring NPCs, players may buy or sell items from NPCs with coins or obtain services from them. The happiness status of NPCs is controlled by two factors: the biome they reside in, and the NPCs they are neighbors with. Depending on their happiness, NPCs will raise or lower their prices and sell special items.
Players also have the option to customize their character's appearance when creating a new character, and in-game through equipping various items. Along with this, players can obtain vanity items, armor pieces and accessories with only a cosmetic effect, and dyes, which change the color of equipped items. Throughout the game, players can obtain accessories that provide boosts to the player's statistics, such as wings that enable the player to fly or a shield that provides knockback immunity.
Terraria has support for modifications, which is facilitated by the third-party ModLoader. It received official support when it was released as a free downloadable content (DLC) on the Steam digital distribution service in 2020. Mods for Terraria vary widely in their scope, content, and purpose. Some, such as Thorium and Calamity, add new content to the game, including bosses, weapons, and biomes. Others, such as Overhaul, rework the mechanics of the game to provide players with a different experience. Additional ones, such as Recipe Browser, Veinminer, Magic Storage, and Fargo's Mutant Mod, aim to improve quality of life by streamlining parts of the game.
