I think DL: The Beast has the perfect atmosphere for a true survival horror playthrough, so I created this ruleset for myself after finishing the main story and thought I’d share it in case anyone else wants to try. Here it is:


Objective: Reach level 15 without dying

Core rules

1. Difficulty: Brutal, never changed.
2. Death: Permadeath — if you die, you must restart the game. No exceptions.
3. Story quest: Play the main story only until you unlock the Town Hall vendor, then stop all main story missions permanently.
4. Side content: Side quests, random encounters, and events are allowed and encouraged.
5. Healing: Only food and beverages may be used to heal outside of combat. During combat, only bandages (up to rare quality) may be used. No other healing is allowed, except core gameplay skills (e.g. Beast Mode).
6. Safe zones: You may unlock safe zones, but for this challenge you may not remain in one during night hours. You must be outdoors or in an improvised shelter without UV light (houses, basements, makeshift camps, etc). If you exit the game during nighttime and continue later, you must leave the safe zone immediately upon logging back in.
7. Sleeping / skipping time: You may not use a bed to cycle night and day. Sleeping to change time is banned. (Loading/quitting can also change your spawn point — see rule above).
8. Vendors: Selling valuables and other items at vendors is allowed. Purchases are limited to what the vendor has available at the time.
9. Vehicle use: Allowed.

Bonus Objectives

A. Wealth Hunter: Hold at least 50,000 Old World Money in your inventory at once. This may be achieved before or after reaching level 15, but you must still remain alive after level 15 for the bonus to count.
B. Collector: Find all Castor Woods beaver statues and recipes.
C. Minimalist: Never buy a weapon; only craft or loot your arms.
D. Light Load: Carry no more than two weapons at once.
E. True Survivor: Only exit the game when necessary for real life reasons. Do not use quitting and reloading to reset your position or teleport to a safe zone.
F. Into the Dark: Play only at night or in a completely dark room (irl).

Here's an infograph I put together for quick reference:

https://imgur.com/a/N0DLulD

It’s up to you to make sure you’re not breaking any rules, but I thought this could help extend gameplay after beating the game. Plus, it might be fun, especially with Halloween coming up, since surviving out in the open at night is pretty spooky.