How to revive Kelvin and Virginia in Sons of the Forest

Well this is unfortunate. You just got out of a huge fight with some cannibals who were bold enough to approach your well-built fortifications. Everything seems fine, until you notice poor Kelvin sprawled all over the ground covered in blood. Your worst fear has been realized. Kelvin is not resurrectable via the ‘E’ button and you are now left without a buddy and an easy source of building material collection. Fear not, as savvy players have discovered a way to manipulate the save files to bring your fallen comrades back from the dead. Here’s what you need to know to do it yourself.

Resurrecting Kelvin and Virginia in Sons of the Forest

Kelvin is not the only companion in Sons of the Forest. You will also eventually run into a three-legged mutant named Virginia who grows to trust you over a few days. She is excellent with firearms, and is also capable of dying by your hand or enemy damage. Thankfully, she is resurrectable in the same manner as Kelvin.

Here are the steps to take in order to bring these two companions back from the dead.

• Save your game and exit Sons of the Forest.
• Locate your save file under AppData\LocalLow\Endnight\SonsoftheForest\Saves
• Create a backup of this folder if you don’t want any surprises.
• Navigate to the save file you wish to edit. The folders are separated by Single Player and Multiplayer, and each one is given a numerical value. The most current one is the latest save.
• Look for the GameStateSaveData.json file and open it via Notepad.
• Look for the value (preferably through the Find command as the values are listed on a single line) “IsRobbyDead\”:true or “IsVirginiaDead\”:true
• Change these from true to false depending on who you want to revive (or both)
• Save and quit this file.

The next step is the most complicated:

• Open the SaveData.json file in Notepad from the same folder.
• Locate where it says “TypeId\”:9 for Kelvin or “TypeId”\:10 for Virginia.
• The value listed just after both of these should be \”State\”:6. Change this to \”State\”:2.
• Just after this value for both characters should be one that says “Health\”:0.0. Change this to “Health\”:100.0.
• Save and close this file.

Related: All companions in Sons of the Forest, and how to recruit them

If everything is done correctly, you should now be able to open the save in the game and have your companions magically be alive again as if nothing ever happened. For those wondering why Kelvin is listed as Robby, this is likely because his last name is actually Kelvin and Robby is his first name. Now all we need to do is figure out a way to hug the two out of happiness when they return to life.