How to Get Started in Curse of Resthaven's Six-Day Time Loop

Curse of Resthaven, the follow-up to Hilltop Studios' acclaimed Lil' Guardsman, launched today on PC, Mac, PS5 and Xbox Series X|S, published by Digital Bandidos, with Switch, Switch 2 and PS4 versions still to come. It drops you into the boots of Governor Ambrose, a newcomer tasked with running a cursed island colony while hunting for his missing niece, Amalia, before an ancient catastrophe wipes the place out. The catch is that it does wipe the place out, six days in, every single time, and you wake back up at the start with your memories intact. The five-person team at Hilltop built the whole thing around that time loop, layering investigation, trading, town management and deckbuilding on top of it, so a first run can feel like a lot to track at once. Here is what to know before you set foot on the island.

Know Your Six Days

Every run of Curse of Resthaven is a six-day countdown, tracked by the moon-phase dial in the top-left corner of the screen. When the cataclysm hits on day six, the island's guardian resets you to the moment of your arrival, and you carry your memories, and some of your progress, into the next loop. Treat the first loop or two as reconnaissance rather than a race: you cannot see every thread, trade route or expedition path on a single pass, and dying to a bad decision costs you days, not the whole run. If you played the free Steam demo before launch, your save carries straight into the full game, so there is no need to replay the opening chapter from scratch.

Talk to Everyone, Then Talk to Them Again

Resthaven is split into four explorable zones, and more than 25 fully voiced residents are hiding pieces of the mystery behind what is happening to the island. Interrogation is not a one-and-done menu: characters reveal new information as your standing with them changes and as you turn up evidence elsewhere in town, so it pays to revisit the same people across different days rather than assuming you have exhausted what they know. Keep track of contradictions between what different townsfolk tell you. Your choices in these conversations steer which of the game's three main narrative paths you start to uncover, and the game is built to be replayed with different allegiances in later loops.

• Prioritize residents tied to Amalia's disappearance early; their leads open up new interrogation topics with everyone else.
• Revisit people you have already questioned after a major event, since their dialogue options update.
• Note which characters contradict each other. Those contradictions are usually the fastest route to new evidence.

Trade Smart at the Docks

Resthaven's prosperity, and your ability to fund expeditions, hinges on the Ships at Port trading screen. Visiting merchants post what goods they are expecting, from jewellery to perfume, and matching their request nets a better price than dumping whatever you are carrying. Factions such as Ellyria carry their own haggle bonus that improves the longer you trade with them, so it is worth sticking with a merchant relationship instead of chasing the single best-looking offer every time a new ship docks. Spend your early profits on upgrading the town's businesses rather than hoarding coin; a stronger economy keeps expeditions funded and gives you more to haggle with later in the loop, and a well-stocked town is also what keeps residents willing to talk to you in the first place.

Keep an eye on which faction each ship represents before you commit to a trade. Haggle bonuses are tracked per relationship rather than globally, so jumping between factions to chase a marginally better price on a single trade can cost you more in the long run than it earns. Early on, it is worth running a small deficit on a trade or two just to build goodwill with a faction you expect to see again later in the loop.

Build a Deck Before You Expedition

Once interrogation and investigation stall, the only way forward is out through Resthaven's walls. Expeditions are card-based: you assemble a deck of resource and companion cards before setting out, and that deck determines how well you handle the encounters and eldritch horrors waiting in the wilds. Bring a mix rather than stacking a single type of card. Resource cards keep you supplied through a long excursion, while companion cards bring townsfolk whose skills matter in specific encounters, so swap your lineup based on which part of the map you are pushing into. Establishing outposts along an expedition route banks skill points you can spend on permanent upgrades between loops, so treat early expeditions as much about securing those outposts as about reaching the end of the path.

Scott Christian, studio director at Hilltop Studios, described the tone the team was chasing with the game's blend of systems:

“It's evocative, story-rich gothic horror, like if Twin Peaks and Lost had an eldritch baby raised by Edgar Allen Poe.”Scott Christian, studio director at Hilltop Studios

Make the Loop Work for You

What separates Curse of Resthaven from a straightforward roguelite is how deliberately it rewards failure. Permanent skill upgrades earned from expeditions and outposts stay with Ambrose across every reset, so a loop that ends badly in the town can still be a net gain if you banked skill points out in the wilds first. The island's goddess also offers temporary boons between loops, each a real power spike paired with a genuine drawback, so read what you are accepting before you take it; a blessing that wins you day three can make day six considerably harder. Because the town, the trading routes and the expedition map all persist in memory even after a reset, your most valuable resource across the whole game is information, not gold. Write down, mentally or otherwise, what each loop teaches you about Resthaven's secrets, and treat every run as one step closer to breaking the curse rather than a fresh start from zero.

Which Edition to Start With

The base game is a single purchase on Steam, but Hilltop and Digital Bandidos launched it alongside two crossover bundles worth knowing about before you buy. The Secrets, Spirits and Suspects bundle pairs Curse of Resthaven with Spooky Doorway's The Séance of Blake Manor, and The Case of the Curse bundle pairs it with Color Grey Games' The Case of the Golden Idol, so either is worth a look if you already own, or want, the other title. There is also a Gilded Edition carrying two soundtracks, an art booklet and sheet music for the in-game bard's ballads, aimed squarely at players who already know from the demo that the hand-drawn presentation and voice cast are going to stick with them. If you are still undecided, the free Steam demo spans the entire first loop plus the opening day of a second, and any progress you make there carries straight into whichever edition you buy. The game ships with full controller support on PC as well as console, so there is no real penalty to trying it on a gamepad from the opening menu rather than committing to mouse and keyboard.