Prehistoric Farm Progression Guide: Complete Walkthrough

Prehistoric Farm is an island-hopping Roblox simulation game developed by Project Mirvy. Progressing through the game revolves around a single, interconnected loop: digging up prehistoric fossil sets, turning those fossils into dinosaur eggs with Dr. Ivy, incubating the eggs, and feeding your hatchlings on your ranch until they reach rideable maturity.

Advancing past the starting island requires strategic coin management to purchase higher-tier shovels and faster boats. This progression guide covers the entire gameplay loop, confirmed gear milestones, creature care mechanics, and the requirements needed to unlock each new phase of your prehistoric ranch.

The Core Progression Loop

According to the official in-game tutorial and verified gameplay demonstrations, progression follows a strict six-step sequence:

1. Travel to an Island: Board your boat at the home docks and navigate to an excavation island.
2. Excavate Fossils: Locate dig mounds, hold down the dig action, and release when the timing meter hits the green zone to dig up fossils.
3. Assemble a Period Set: Continue digging until you acquire all necessary fossils required for a specific prehistoric creature.
4. Trade with Dr. Ivy: Take the completed set to Dr. Ivy at the DNA Lab on the home island to turn the samples into a dinosaur egg.
5. Incubate and Hatch: Place your egg in an unlocked incubator slot, wait out the timer, and claim the hatchling at the hatchery.
6. Raise and Ride: Place the baby on your ranch, keep its belly over half full so it matures into an Elder, and mount it to ride across the islands.

Every system in the game feeds back into this structure. Digging yields the fossils and coins needed for upgrades, while mature dinosaurs unlock high-speed traversal across land and sea.

Shovel Progression and Island Gates

Where you can dig is gated directly by the shovel you equip. Using a starter shovel on advanced islands results in an on-screen prompt stating that a better shovel is required.

During excavation, holding down the dig button starts an oscillating bar. Releasing in the green zone yields a "Perfect" excavation, increasing your chances of finding a fossil rather than coming up empty. "No fossil" outcomes are frequent, meaning patience and timing are necessary to complete sets.

In verified launch gameplay, the Bronze Shovel is the first mandatory purchase, costing 2,500 coins at the home island tool shop. The shovel tier directly following Bronze was observed at a price of 12,000 coins.

At night, glowing dig sites spawn across islands. Hitting these glowing spots with accurate green-meter releases provides bonus coin payouts and rare finds, helping you fund your tool upgrades faster.

Boat Upgrades and Sea Travel

While shovel tiers dictate what you can dig, boat tiers dictate how easily and quickly you can navigate the open ocean.

• Starter Dinghy: Available at the spawn docks for free. It reaches the nearby Cambrian Island in under a minute, though players note its speed is slow. Fan wiki data lists its top speed at 12 knots with 88% handling and a 2-seat capacity.
• Banks Dory: Available at the home island dock for 4,000 coins. In observed gameplay, saving up 4,000 coins is the primary early travel goal. Fan records show a top speed of 14 knots and a 3-seat capacity.
• Console Skiff: A high-end motorboat documented on independent wikis costing 60,000 coins, featuring a 29-knot top speed and 4 seats.
• Lobster Boat: The largest motorboat documented on fan databases, priced at 300,000 coins with 6 seats and a 37-knot speed.

Aquatic Mount Alternative

If saving 4,000 coins for a boat upgrade is taking too long, raising an aquatic creature offers an alternative route. Mature sea creatures can be ridden directly on the water, serving as player-controlled ferries between excavation sites without requiring an immediate boat purchase.

Turning Fossils into Dinosaurs

Digging up a fossil adds it to your collection menu. In the Cambrian period, six distinct creatures are documented, including Hallucigenia, Pikaia, and Opabinia. Each creature requires a specific number of fossils (such as five or six individual pieces) before the UI shows "Ready to extract DNA."

• Trading at the Lab: Once a creature's set is complete, return to Dr. Ivy at the DNA Lab. Handing over the full set immediately converts the fossils into that creature's egg.
• Incubation Times: Place the egg into one of the two free starter incubator slots. Timers vary based on rarity: gameplay tests showed a Hallucigenia egg taking roughly five minutes, while a Devonian Tiktaalik egg took two minutes and 30 seconds. Fan guides list general timers ranging from one minute for Commons up to 20 minutes for Legendaries.
• Hatchery Collection: When the incubator timer hits zero, step over to the adjacent Hatchery building. Interacting with the station triggers the hatching sequence and places the newborn into your inventory, ready to be deployed onto your ranch pens.

Dinosaur Care: Feeding, Growth, and Riding

Placing a newborn creature on your ranch begins the raising phase. Growth in Prehistoric Farm is governed by one rule specified by the developer:

A dinosaur only grows while its Belly is over half full.

If a creature's Belly drops to 50% or below, growth freezes completely. To resume development, purchase compatible feed from the ranch food stand and interact directly with the stalled dinosaur.

• Life Stages: Dinosaurs progress through distinct life stages: Newborn, Juvenile, Subadult, Adult, and Elder.
• Diet Compatibility: Carnivores can be fed standard meat or player-caught fish, while herbivores require plant feed.
• Upkeep Costs: Upkeep increases as your ranch expands. Raising multiple Elders simultaneously causes overall food consumption and costs to rise, requiring steady coin income from fossil digs to maintain growth.
• Unlocking Riding: Once a dinosaur completes its growth cycle into an Adult or Elder, an interaction prompt appears allowing you to mount it. Larger species provide fast ground traversal across island terrain.

Sea Activities: Fishing, Diving, and Bosses

Beyond the core digging loop, open-sea exploration offers alternate sources of income, animal feed, and rare items:

• Fishing: Requires purchasing bait at five coins for five casts. Players cast a line off docks or boats and reel in species like mackerel, sardines, puffer fish, and swordfish. While small fish sell for modest amounts (around 5 to 10 coins), keeping them provides a free supply of carnivore feed. Additionally, six rare Cretaceous Seas eggs are documented as fishing drops rather than island dig sets.
• Diving: Listed under the game's official exploration activities as a way to find rare underwater catches, though specific dive gear requirements remain undocumented.
• Sunken Grotto: An advanced exploration objective where players must sneak past hazards to steal rare sea reptile eggs.
• Giant Mosasaurus World Boss: An endgame multiplayer encounter where groups of players band together to fight a giant Mosasaurus using spears.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why has my dinosaur stopped growing?

Under official game mechanics, a dinosaur only grows if its Belly meter is more than 50% full. If growth halts, purchase compatible meat or plant feed from the ranch shop and feed the dinosaur until its hunger rises comfortably above the halfway mark.

Where do I buy the Bronze Shovel?

The Bronze Shovel is sold at the tool shop on the home island for 2,500 coins. Equipping it allows you to dig up fossils on Devonian Island.

Can I hatch more than two eggs at a time?

All players start with two unlocked incubator slots. Expanding beyond two slots requires purchasing additional incubator game passes from the in-game shop using Robux.

How do I ride a dinosaur?

Dinosaurs cannot be mounted as Newborns or Juveniles. You must consistently keep their Belly over half full until they mature into large Adults or Elders, at which point a mount prompt becomes available.