Day Cycle
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The day cycle is a period of 18 hours in game (or 13.5 minutes real time; one in-game hour is 45 seconds) from 6:00AM to 12:00AM (Midnight). Past midnight, the player's character becomes tired and in need of sleep. However, The Player can stay awake until 2:00AM, after which their character will pass out.
If the character passes out they will wake up in bed, having been dragged there by either the town's doctor, Harvey, Linus, a JojaMart member or JojaMart doctor. In each case some of the player's money will be lost (the details of this transaction will appear as a letter in the player's letter box). An exception is if the player was lucky enough to pass out inside the house.
The game saves only after the player has gone to bed and the daily profit breakdown has been accepted, commencing the end of day.
Sleep will restore the player's Energy and Health to full if they go to bed before 12:00AM and are not exhausted, and to half if they pass out or are exhausted. The longer past midnight the player stays awake, the less energy they wake up with (regardless of amount before sleep), with about 50% if they sleep right before 2:00AM.
Animal Routines
It is considered nighttime after 6:00PM, which makes it possible to catch night time fish. However, it does not become dark until 8:00PM.
Cows, sheep, goats, pigs, chickens, ducks and rabbits will automatically go inside their coop or barn at 6:00PM and will start going to sleep at 7:00PM. They will stop moving around at 8:00PM. After 8:00PM, animals can no longer be moved around by nudging.
The heart level of cows and goats is increased through successful milking, which can be done any time, including while they are sleeping.
On the face of it, you cannot to talk to animals while they are asleep, making it impossible raise the heart level of pigs, sheep, rabbits, chickens or ducks at this time. However, you can still talk to animals when they are sleeping if you talk to them while walking into them. This may be a glitch.
- Tip: The advantage of milking after 8:00PM is that animals never walk away from you. Animals walking away mid-action frequently causes milking and shearing to fail.
Because animals cannot be moved after 8:00PM, this causes a problem if they are in an awkward position. For example, if two cows are end-to-end, the game may keep trying to milk the same one, and they cannot be separated by nudging after 8:00PM.
- Tip: To address this, the player should stand a full pace behind or in front of the intended target, so there is a sizeable gap between the player and the animal.
You can also exit the barn and re enter; the animals will change position randomly, but this makes it hard to keep track of who has been milked.
Never Pass Out Glitches
There is a glitch where, sometimes, if the player is on their horse at 2:00AM, they will not pass out. Instead, the game will freeze momentarily before giving back control. The player can then get on and off their horse again, and continue beyond 2:00AM. The same thing will happen every 10 in-game minutes.
There is also a glitch in version 1.1 where if the player selects the journal of quests while beginning to pass out, they will be able to avoid the penalty and continue beyond 2:00AM. To exploit this glitch, the player must select the journal manually, i.e., by clicking, rather than pressing F. Again, the player will attempt to pass out every 10 minutes.
The player will not pass out while fishing but will attempt to pass out as soon as the line is reeled in. This allows the player to pass large amounts of time without having to click the journal repeatedly. Staying up past 2am is useful for processing materials (in a furnace, recycling machine, etc.) or collecting from sources that create items over time (crystalarium, tapper, and bee house).
Normally, going to bed late consistently reduces the player's energy for the next morning. If the player uses these glitches to go to sleep after 2:00AM, the energy reduction rate varies.
Mods
There are game modifications (mods) that allow you to manipulate the clock speed, (i.e., to slow down or speed up the time) to, for example, 10 minutes every second or every 14 seconds, or even to freeze the clock.
Infested levels do not occur in The Mines if the time is frozen, and fish bubbles never disappear.