Welcome to the colorful and charming world of Slime Rancher! If you’re just stepping onto the ranch for the first time, this beginner’s guide will walk you through all the essential mechanics and systems, helping you settle into your new slime-filled life. We’ll go over everything from currency and corrals to plorts and perilous tar slimes. Let’s dive in.

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Understanding Your HUD: Nubucks, Health, and Stamina

First things first: take a look at the bottom left of your screen. The gold coin icon accompanied by a number is your Nubucks—the in-game currency you’ll use to buy upgrades, expand your ranch, and invest in infrastructure. Right underneath are two key indicators: your health and stamina bars. These will regenerate over time. Your stamina is consumed while sprinting (hold Shift), so be mindful when exploring or escaping danger.

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Getting to Know Your Ranch: Plots, Corrals, and Upgrades

When you first start, you’ll notice you have a basic corral and several empty plots. Walk over to an empty plot and press ‘E’ to interact with it. You’ll be given several options: Corral, Garden, Coop, Silo, Incinerator, and Pond. In your early days, focus on building a Corral and a Garden. These are foundational to your slime-ranching success.

Each structure can be upgraded. For Corrals, you’ll eventually want to add High Walls (a must-have to keep your increasingly bouncy slimes contained), Music Boxes, Air Nets, Plort Collectors, and Auto-Feeders. Prioritize High Walls as soon as you start adding more slimes—overcrowding can lead to jailbreaks.

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Your Own Upgrades: Tools for Exploration

Behind you on the ranch, there’s another terminal that provides personal upgrades. These include the Water Tank, Jetpack, Heart Module, Power Core, and Tank Booster. Your first investment should be the Jetpack—it greatly improves your mobility and exploration, allowing access to hard-to-reach areas.

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Meet the Slimes: Pink Slimes and the Slimopedia

You’ll find Pink Slimes bouncing around the ranch early on. Use your Vacpack to suck them up and deposit them into your corral. When you collect a new type of slime, a new entry will appear in your Slimopedia. You can access it via the pause menu. The Slimopedia is your go-to guide, containing tutorials, slime info, food types, resources, and ranch expansions.

Pay special attention to the Favorite Foods section of each slime entry—feeding a slime its favorite food results in double plort output. For example, Pink Slimes eat everything but have no favorites, while Rock Slimes favor Heart Beets.

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Generating Nubucks: Feeding and Selling Plorts

Slimes produce Plorts when you feed them. Drop carrots into your corral, and watch Pink Slimes gobble them up and produce plorts. Take these plorts to the Plort Market terminal on your ranch. Each plort type has a fluctuating value, and supply affects demand. If you sell too many of one kind, its price drops. You can invest in a Silo later to store plorts and wait for a price rise.

Early in the game, just sell all your plorts—you’ll need Nubucks to afford your initial upgrades. Over time, you can start strategizing by stockpiling for market highs.

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Reading Your Mail and Exploring the Dry Reef

Inside your house, the mail terminal lets you access Star Mail. These story messages add background and sometimes gameplay hints. Once you’ve read your mail, venture into the Dry Reef—the first explorable area.

Throughout the world, you’ll find messages left by Hobson, the previous ranch owner. These lore-rich notes offer guidance and insight. Also, keep an eye out for Map Nodes. Activating these nodes reveals the area on your map, making exploration much easier.

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Advanced Slimes: Largos, Gold, and Lucky Slimes

Soon you’ll encounter larger slimes called Largos. These are formed when one slime eats another’s plort. For example, a Pink Slime eating a Rock Plort becomes a Pink Rock Largo. Largos yield two plorts when fed. And if fed a favorite food of one of the slime types? You’ll get four plorts. Farming Largos efficiently is one of the best ways to earn Nubucks.

Occasionally, you’ll find rare slimes like Gold Slimes and Lucky Slimes. Gold Slimes cannot be captured, but if you shoot food at them, they’ll drop a highly valuable Gold Plort. Lucky Slimes need to be fed meat quickly—they drop straight Nubucks.

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Building a Garden and Heartbeat Farming

To boost efficiency, build a Garden and plant Heart Beets—the Rock Slime’s favorite food. Simply shoot a Heart Beet into the garden plot to begin growing. In time, you’ll have a renewable food source to maximize your Largo production and plort yield.

Be careful near water—falling in causes you to lose all held resources. Move carefully, especially when exploring new terrain or navigating cliffs.

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Avoiding Disaster: Tar Slimes and Crossbreeding

Mixing two slime types is encouraged, but introducing a third plort to a Largo creates a Tar Slime. Tar Slimes are destructive and will devour slimes and resources alike. They spread quickly and can ruin your ranch. To eliminate them, either use a Water Tank or suck them up and launch them into water. Always separate incompatible slimes, and never let Largos near other plorts unsupervised.

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Gordo Slimes and Slime Keys

While exploring, you’ll discover giant stationary slimes called Gordos. Feed them their preferred diet until they burst, releasing goodies and often a Slime Key. These keys unlock new regions of the map. For instance, the Indigo Quarry becomes accessible after using your first key. In this area, you’ll encounter new slimes and another Gordo to feed. Use their favorite food to speed up the process—feeding a Gordo its favorite counts as double.

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Final Thoughts

As you can see, the first few in-game days are packed with mechanics to learn and systems to optimize. From managing your corrals to exploring new biomes and avoiding tar outbreaks, Slime Rancher rewards both careful planning and playful experimentation. Stick with the basics, invest wisely, and use your Slimopedia as a constant guide. Before long, you’ll be rolling in Nubucks and managing a thriving, well-balanced slime empire.