Tips for newcomers

[Jorri]

Wow, this game is pretty punishing if you don't know the mechanics. And it doesn't do a lot to explain them, either. Here's some stuff to keep in mind as a new player, that will really help you get through the game, with minimal spoilers:

- Every time you make a trip, your watch counts the time until the bells ring and the horde comes. You'll want to get out before that time. Any NPC's will also dissapear, and any business you have with them will be unavailable/forfeit. Later in the game, you can use this to your advantage to access heavuily guarded places. But until then, focus on completing the mission in time.

- There are two parallel storylines. Sometimes you need to advance one, for the other to continue.

- When you grab a zombie, you will keep them at bay, and you'll be safe from them. Use this to deal with two zombies: grab one, and stab the other.

- Weapons you craft are far more durable than weapons you find. Always bring a fresh crafted weapon (and preferably a spare) on a trip. The shiv is great: you'll unlock more and cooler melee weapons, but it will always stay useful.

- You get an audio cue when a zombie notices you, and another one when they go after you. Use this to go into sneak mode as soon as they notice you.

- It gets a little bit harder every day: more enemies and less loot. Keep this in mind and keep focused on your objectives, but don't worry too much, things won't really get out of hand.

- Don't eat the food that you find, and only use the weapons you find when you need to (or to spare the ones you brought): bring them back to the bus and recycle them.

- After a few days, there will be zombies that can make you sick. this will happen when they hit you, or when you kill them while they're very close to you. You can recognise them by the sound they make, their pale skin, and green mouths. Kill them from a distance with your gun, or by throwing your knife. Use the trigger to turn the knife in your hand so you can throw it.

- Try to save your medicine for when you're sick. Work towards unlocking herbal medicine as a priority.

- Loot food or stuff that contains nuts and bolts, wood scraps and workable metal. When your backpack is full, prioritise junk boxes first, and food second. After that are things that yield a lot of stuff: clocks, broken weapons, egg timers, etc. If you lack space in your backpack, throw out cigarettes and razor blades and matches and such.

- You'll run into NPC's and the game gives you a lot of freedom on how to respond. Enjoy the freedom: there's no karma system.

- You'll find yourself in some tough situations with enemy NPC's pretty soon. Be creative. Sneak around, create distractions, think outside of the box.

- Later on, there will be less loot, and you wil get clues on the radio about special events and loot stashes in the levels. If you need stuff (medicine, weapons, food) and want to go on a looting trip, pay attention to this. When you're after a stash, look for a wooden crate with loads of stuff in it. Don't make too many loot trips, the game gets just a little bit harder every day and you can only make one trip per day. But don't worry too much, the difficulty won't get out of hand: it's perfectly fine to take a few trips to upgrade your crafting stations.

Hopefully some of this helps! Feel free post more tips as well.

[Skaut69]

Well done mate. Very good tips. Radio station 47 is very helpful as well. They inform about No Horde for example - you can run around without time restriction.

[[RX-7] Rotary-Raptor]

How does channel 47 work? Do I have to unlock it during the story? I never get anything when I try 47, but I'm only on day 5.

[Jonna]

Great tips!
Definitely some I didn’t know about but I’m glad I read this!

One question I have and some others might benefit from; how do I save the game?

If it only saves when you sleep that kinda sucks since I’m only able to play for so long until I feel sick and I’m forced to waste each day away just to keep my progress.

[Muse Snooze]

Originally posted by RX-7 Rotary-Raptor:

How does channel 47 work? Do I have to unlock it during the story? I never get anything when I try 47, but I'm only on day 5.

You absolutely do. Casey on the radio will tell you after you get his inital trust. Just play through his plot pretty quick to unlock that station, then spend until about day 15 just taking advantage of no herd days and caches. Also good, when both factions are in the same spot. It's risky, but as they kill each other, they all drop extremely good ♥♥♥♥.

[***Aluc@rd***]

@jon When you sleep and when you start to visit a place

[Jorri]

Originally posted by J_o_n:

Great tips!
One question I have and some others might benefit from; how do I save the game?

It saves when you sleep, but also after each travel. There's only autosave. Usually when I die, I just reload the save from the start of that level and re-play it.

[zskunzl]

Great tips！Thank you very much!

[Jonna]

Originally posted by Jorri:

Originally posted by J_o_n:

Great tips!
One question I have and some others might benefit from; how do I save the game?

It saves when you sleep, but also after each travel. There's only autosave. Usually when I die, I just reload the save from the start of that level and re-play it.

Thank you! That’s good that it saves when you travel between places.

[Jonna]

Originally posted by ***Aluc@rd***:

@jon When you sleep and when you start to visit a place

Thank you! I appreciate the answers!

[Zerfyx]

Good tips, but i'd add a few more.

Use weapons you find as much as possible, untill they start flashing red, then stash them for salvaging later, since you get the same amount of material no matter the condition of the weapon.

Guns that use clips (Bolt action, 9 mil,) can be unloaded before scrapping, saving you some bullets. As a followup, if you use those guns, unload it, stash the mag and take a new one to refill it.

Humans that die by anything else than a headshot comes back as a zombie. Useful to create chaos in "camps". You can avoid this by braining humans you kill before they rise.

If a sick zombie gets too close to you, grab them and shove them away, since killing them in melee range still gets you sick, even shooting them when they're about a meter away from you will get you sick. A shove and one or two steps back is enough distance to shoot them safely.

Decapitating zombies take less stamina and durability than braining.

Might add more later~

[zskunzl]

Thank a lot!

[crazyfellow1]

Thank you!

[Jorri]

Great stuff, Zerfyx!

[World Cup]

Originally posted by Jorri:

- After a few days, there will be zombies that can make you sick. this will happen when they hit you, or when you kill them while they're very close to you. You can recognise them by the sound they make, their pale skin, and green mouths. Kill them from a distance with your gun, or by throwing your knife. Use the trigger to turn the knife in your hand so you can throw it.

- Later on, there will be less loot, and you wil get clues on the radio about special events and loot stashes in the levels.

Thanks, this is awesome. Two questions:

1) I didn't know you can throw the knife/shiv to kill zombies. How does it work? Do you have to throw so it sticks in their brain only? If you throw and hit their chest for example, I assume they don't die?

2) The loot clues on the radio you refer to: is that channel 47 only you're talking about or is it loot clues that will be given on other radio channels?

Best single-player VR game out there. Damn, it's so good. I hope Half-Life: Alyx will be this fun.

Cheers

[Jorri]

Originally posted by Worldcup Academy:

Thanks, this is awesome. Two questions:

1) I didn't know you can throw the knife/shiv to kill zombies. How does it work?
2) The loot clues on the radio you refer to: is that channel 47 only you're talking about or is it loot clues that will be given on other radio channels?

Cheers! With the radio indeed I meant channel 47. You don't need to listen to the whole thing for it to update the map at your skiff.

As for throwing knives, press the trigger to switch the orientation of the knife in your hand so the blade is up. Then throw it at their heads to kill them. It will fall out so you can pick it up easily again. If you hit anything else they won't die, but to be honest, hitting the head isn't that difficult, there's a bit of auto-aim there.