Tutorial

First, the player appears in a tutorial chunk in some basement-like area. They learn the basics like moving and looking around and start moving through a corridor into the next room. The next room has a journal and a flashlight. A prompt appears "Press J to start journalling". Pressing J opens up the journal and highlights multiple things in the room that the player hasn’t paid attention to (the lamp, a mold patch in the corner, a hole in the wall. This incentivises curiosity - why is this highlighted? I should take a look at it

As they look at these they interact with the journal - they take notes on the hole in the wall, unlocking the structure of the walls in the YellowSpace biome. As they journal a bit they see a counter below their crosshair that shows how many pages are left in the journal (127/128), which tells that there will be resource gathering in place

If they look around they may find some goodies like 1 morsel and a bottle of water (the bottle itself being more useful), but being optional. This teaches items, scavenging and looking around.

After that they move to the next room which has three break in case of emergency boxes. In each is an item of a corresponding faction, visible through the glass (Map, Carving knife with a totem base and a stack of blueprint paper). On the floor is a one-time-use hammer - they can only open one of these boxes. The player may choose to ignore these items and move forward. When they break a box the hammer also breaks, locking out the player from the other items. [In the late game with enough research they can unlock the other mechanics]

As they open the fire-exit door and move up the stairs they open to the YellowSpace. The door has handles only on one side, preventing entrance back to the tutorial area - this is the tutorial

First phase

Now that the player has the tools they have to learn to use them properly. First things first is to find a source of water, which there are multiple:

• The easiest one is finding a Restroom. They are obvious, having a WC sign above the door. Inside is a large but limited amount of water from the sinks. The player gets a callout "Restroom Discovered: Secure it to unlock a safe zone". They notice that the room is some disrepair - requiring some maintenance like fixing a pipe or screwing down a fuse that is left on the sink. After they secure it another callout appears "Restroom Secured", changing the atmosphere and sound design to become more soothing and relaxing. This is the introduction to the Restroom mechanic.
• The player can notice that some tiles are broken down and drip water. As they look at it they see a [<Journal icon>???] UI element, prompting them to enter Journaling mode and interact. They discover that this is dripping water, and the player needs something to collect it with. They have the bottle, which after journaling the tile shows up as an option to fill with water (works with any BaseFluidContainer).
  • But if they do a Close Examination they unlock a paragraph that says "If I don't have a water bottle I could use the wallpaper around as a fluid container", as well as unlocking a crafting recipe for a "Wallpaper bowl". The player must figure out how to get wallpaper pieces, either from areas with fallen wallpaper or with an improvised knife, with which they cut out pieces of wallpaper anywhere. Then they place the bowl under the dripping water and collect Murky Water
• An easy source of water in the early game is moist rooms with condensation. The player learns that not all rooms are equal. When they get close they get a prompt [<Journal icon>???] (Hold E to collect condensate with [Clothing item Eg: T-Shirt]. When they collect it they get a wet cloth. The Journal tag-on incentivises the player to enter journaling mode and find out what the hell is this. The wet cloth can be wringled out into a bottle or any BaseFluidContainer with crafting

To get food the player must work a bit harder:

• Easiest source of food is the occasional brownish mushrooms which mutated from Enokitake (Flammulina velutipes) ****mushrooms. They grow in damp corners and like the fluorescent lights. They are rather dry but edible. Careful, as they can be misidentified with a poisonous more yellowish-green variant with inverted caps
• In some rooms there are small holes near the floor. These are Rat nests, which often host a handful of rats. They only leave in darkness and can be lured out with anything that's edible, including the mushrooms above. They have to be cooked to be rid of any parasites in it, as raw meat is a good way to catch Salmonella or Dysentery
• In YellowSpace there are occasional Kitchen Rooms. They have a fridge and a few counters and rarely some sort of food appears there, like a granola bar or cereal.
• When desperate, the old and massive structure of the Backrooms, specifically YellowSpace has had its share of parasites. In some places there are walls with wooden scraps on the floor along them - this is a telltale sign of a Termite infestation. Breaking the wall with your fists here creates a hole, in which you can find termites to eat and collect with a Termite trap

The player needs basic tools to survive the Backrooms. These are the easiest ones to get and the goals for this first phase

• Instead of ripping wallpaper where its loose, the player should invest into making a knife-like tool. It could be done from the metal frame from an internal wall. Most walls in YellowSpace are considered internal, with a wooden frame that is connected with diagonally placed metal framing. After finding one you should use a blunt force object or your fists to break off the plaster layer from the internal wall, revealing the frame and the gypsum plate. In YellowSpace there is no insulation in the walls, so there is no danger of hurting yourself. Rip off the metal frame and you have a sharp piece of metal ready for use! Wrapping it in wallpaper creates a more comfortable handle, increasing durability significantly. This tool can be used to scrape off mold from a wall as well as cut off wallpaper
• A wooden chair can be broken down for a chance of a good breakage, leaving not just scrap wood, but a chair leg. A chair leg is a good blunt weapon that could serve as a hammer or club and is useful for breaking stuff like furniture or walls. Scrap wood is a good fuel for Campfires
• Not an urgent tool but tool nonetheless is a piece of cardboard. It is used to move air around in a badly ventilated room manually, which gets rid of dust and has other great benefits (See World Interactions) It can be made from breaking cardboard boxes occasionally found