How to get Essence in Infinity Nikki

Looking for a way to get Essence in Infinity Nikki? A large portion of your time in Infinity Nikki will be spent collecting crafting materials and items across Miraland using your special Ability Outfits. But after a time, you'll encounter tasks that require Essence variants of certain items. How do you get Essence? The game leaves this question irritatingly unanswered, so we've decided to step in.

In this quick guide, you'll learn everything you need to know to start gathering Essence in Infinity Nikki. We'll also go over what Essence is generally used for, including its uses in the creation of the all-important Miracle Outfit.

How to get Essence in Infinity Nikki

To get Essence variants of crafting materials in Infinity Nikki, you must first upgrade your Ability Outfit's abilities in the Heart Of Infinity. In the lower-left region of the Heart Of Infinity there are four branches of upgrades related to different types of resource-gathering activities: plant picking, animal grooming, bug catching, and fishing. Unlocking each of the larger diamond-shaped nodes on these branches will give you a chance to gain Essence of an item when you collect it in certain regions of Miraland.

The screenshot below highlights the skills you must unlock in the Heart Of Infinity in order to start obtaining Essence:

For example, if you unlocked the enhanced version of the Bug Catching ability, then you'll have a small chance to gain Pin Hopper Essence whenever you use your Bug Catching Outfit to catch Pin Hoppers as normal. Be aware though that the first diamond-shaped node in each branch only allows you to gain Essence from items collected in Florawish and the Memorial Mountains. If you want to collect Essence of items only found in Breezy Meadow, then you'll need to progress to the second diamond-shaped node in that branch of the Heart Of Infinity.

How to get more Insight

Each of the Essence skill unlocks in the Heart Of Infinity require a large amount of Insight. The type of Insight depends on the type of gathering ability you're trying to upgrade. Here are the total costs in Insight for each Essence upgrade:

• Collection (Florawish and Memorial Mountains): 1,000 Collection Insight
• Collection (Breezy Meadow): 3,000 Collection Insight
• Animal Grooming (Florawish and Memorial Mountains): 1,000 Animal Grooming Insight
• Animal Grooming (Breezy Meadow): 3,000 Animal Grooming Insight
• Bug Catching (Florawish and Memorial Mountains): 1,000 Bug Catching Insight
• Bug Catching (Breezy Meadow): 3,000 Bug Catching Insight
• Fishing (Florawish and Memorial Mountains): 1,000 Fishing Insight
• Fishing (Breezy Meadow): 3,000 Fishing Insight

You obtain Insight each time you collect an item, but it's a slow process, and there's also a daily limit to how much Insight of a particular type you can obtain in this way. You can speed up Insight collection in the Realm Of Nourishment, accessible from any Warp Spire once you've finished the "Unexplained Coma Incidents" quest in Chapter 1 of the main story.

In the Realm Of Nourishment you can exchange excess crafting materials for large amounts of Insight. The crafting material has to match the type of Insight - for example, if you want Bug Catching Insight you need to trade in excess bugs you've caught. But by spending Vital Energy, you can turn a single item into 125 Insight - and that's just common items. Rarer items can be exchanged for 250 Insight or more. It's a great way to quickly gain lots of Insight, provided you have the Energy to spare!

What is Essence used for?

Essence items in Infinity Nikki are generally used in crafting high-quality dresses and other outfits. One of its most important uses is crafting the Miracle Outfit, which is Nikki's main goal in the Wishfield Chapters of the story (Chapters 1-8). The Miracle Outfit of Wishfield requires, among other things:

• 3x Bunny Fluff Essence
• 3x Sizzpollen Essence
• 3x Starlit Plum Essence

So it's a good idea to prioritise these Essence-unlocking skills in the Heart Of Infinity early on!

That's all there is to obtaining Essence in Infinity Nikki. Be sure also to check out our guides on how to find all 366 Whimstars, and all the Kindled Inspiration solutions and answers to Professor Aventura's Observation questions!