How to Find Food and Cryptobiotes in Death Stranding

Food is a vital component in Death Stranding to ensure Sam has plenty of health in his body. Here’s how to find it in the game.

Food is a vital component in Death Stranding because it’s used to fuel the main character, Sam. Sam needs it to recover his health, which he could quickly lose during his journey. There are plenty of dangerous encounters in being a Porter, such as suffering a bad fall, encountering MULEs, or even BTs. Here’s how players can find food and cryptobiotes in Death Stranding.

How to Find Food and Cryptobiotes in Death Stranding

The concept of food in the game is a little strange. Players will not be able to go out of their way to locate a vending machine or speak to another person to receive any. Instead, they’re going to need to rely on foraging on the land to find small ant hills full of what appear to be bug-like floating creatures. These are what Sam will feed on and use to keep his belly warm during his journey.

Luckily, you only need to worry about food whenever you’re losing health. While you don’t always need to keep it at 100 percent, it’s better to make sure Sam has plenty of blood because, if not, he could suffer from anemia. This effect happens to a person when they have too little blood in their system, causing them to sway and swerve around, and it makes their movement unreliable. For someone looking to make deliveries for other people, it’s wise to make sure they’re stable on their feet.

To locate the interesting creatures, cryptobiotes, players need to use their ordradek to scan the immediate area in front of them. The scanner goes out 100 meters, so there’s plenty of ground to cover, no matter what direction you point. When you locate a small cryptobiote den, you will see a small, larva-like icon in front of you. Go to the location, and you should find this red, almost coral-like structure resting somewhere. Approach it, and you should receive a quick prompt from eating the contents. Sam should grab it real quick, gobble it down with a small amount of protest, and recover part of his health.

It’s not an ideal system of eating, but Sam’s health goes up, and he doesn’t complain about being hungry. You can’t argue with the results.

Food’s not the only thing players need to worry about during their journey in Death Stranding. There’s also keeping cargo balanced, your stamina bar full, refilling your canteen, and recharging your batteries. We have guides for all of those topics, and much more.