Embarking on paranormal investigations in Kinetic Games' Phasmophobia forces you to face some of your greatest fears in the pursuit of becoming the best supernatural investigator on the block. To do that, however, you'll need to take on the game's biggest challenges.
The weekly challenge mode in Phasmophobia is one of the best ways to do just that, and the Lights Out challenge is one of the trickier ones of the bunch. Here's what it entails and the best strategies for completing it.
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How to Start the Lights Out Challenge in Phasmophobia
To start the Lights Out challenge in Phasmophobia, you first need to open your Difficulty settings in the main lobby menu. From there, scroll through until you find the Challenge Mode setting, which provides the challenge name, description, progress gauge, and the reset timer (as seen above).
Select 'Apply' to set the Lights Out challenge as your next investigation contract. Before you can hit 'Start,' however, you still need to select the correct map for the challenge, as it doesn't automatically set it for you. Go over to the map selection board menu, look for 6 Tanglewood Drive in the top left corner, and select it to apply it to the challenge's specification.
All weekly challenges have a map requirement, meaning that you must complete the challenge on the map indicated in the description. If you don't, your progress won't be counted toward completion. Also, each challenge comes with a preset equipment loadout, which you cannot change or add to in any way. The prescribed loadout serves as part of the challenge itself, pushing you to complete the investigation with special conditions and technological hurdles to overcome.
Finally, completing a weekly challenge guarantees a hefty base reward of $5,000 for your efforts. However, to receive that reward, you must complete the challenge itself a total of three times, each on the same required map. For your investigations to qualify as "complete" for this challenge, you only need to correctly guess the ghost's identity. No other objectives are required but can still help bolster your rewards.
Lights Out Challenge Rules
As previously mentioned, this challenge takes place at 6 Tanglewood Drive, one of Phasmophobia's most classic (and coziest) maps. As an advantage, it gives you less ground to cover in terms of finding the ghost and completing the investigation as a whole.
Unfortunately, you'll soon find that's about where the true advantages end with this challenge. Despite the small locale, Lights Out is still arguably one of the most difficult weekly challenges in the entire game. The investigation starts you with full sanity with the ability to replenish it. However, that sanity will be in constant jeopardy, as the map's fuse box starts broken with no way to repair or use it. This means you'll have no source of light to use inside the house (unless you count turning on the TV in the living room).
You also need to be on your guard immediately, as there is no setup time for this challenge. This means that the ghost will become an active threat from the moment you step inside the house.
A large number of doors will start open in the house, in an attempt to throw you off the ghost's supernatural scent. This means you'll need to quickly find other early indicators of ghost activity in order to uncover its favorite room/area and, subsequently, its identity. This can include thrown objects or other special interactions, such as the phone ringing in the kitchen or the car alarm going off in the garage.
All in all, time is against you more than ever in this challenge, so you need to prioritize finding and identifying the ghost as soon as humanly possible. If you're feeling ambitious, you can shoot for completing the optional objectives and filling the Media section of the journal, but that wouldn't necessarily be recommended in this situation. After all, you'll be wading through darkness the entire time, and the loadout you're given is extremely limited.
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Lights Out Challenge Loadout & Cursed Objects
The loadout you receive for the Lights Out challenge is, for lack of a better word, lacking.
Several types of equipment are missing entirely, including the following:
- Flashlights
- Tripods
- Sound Recorders
- Sound Sensors
- 1 Photo Camera (you can still bring at least one)
- Motion Sensors
- Parabolic Microphone
What you are given is an underwhelming assortment of Tier 1 and Tier 2 equipment, which you'll need to do your best to get creative with. Thankfully, there is a lineup of defensive items, including two Crucifixes (Tier 1), Incense (Tier 1), and Sanity Medication (Tier 1). While they're not as powerful as their upgraded counterparts, they can still provide substantial protection from and during hunts. Just remember that each Tier 1 Crucifix can only burn once, meaning that you can fend off up to two hunt attempts.
Also, you can replenish your sanity via the provided medication, which you'll find yourself needing to frequently. The Firelights (Tier 1) can help temporarily safeguard your sanity as well when lit, but given that they also serve as your main source of light for this challenge, you'll need to use them very wisely.
You'll need to rely on the EMF Readers (Tier 2) and Thermometers (Tier 2) to help pinpoint the ghost's location, as you're deprived of all sound-based equipment as well as Motion Sensors. One other unique source of light you can try to use here is your Video Cameras (Tier 1). While their video quality isn't the best, their night vision feature helps illuminate dark spaces and spot evidence such as Ghost Orbs.
Make sure to ferry in evidence-gathering equipment, such as the Ghost Writing Books (Tier 1), DOTS projectors (Tier 2), Spirit Boxes (Tier 2), and Ultraviolet Lights (Tier 2) as soon as possible after finding the ghost room. The faster you narrow down your ghost choices, the better your odds of survival are.
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OpenCritic Reviews
- Top Critic Avg: 76 /100 Critics Rec: 62%
- Released
- October 29, 2024
- ESRB
- T For Teen // Blood, Use of Drugs, Violence
- Developer(s)
- Kinetic Games
- Publisher(s)
- Kinetic Games
WHERE TO PLAY
- Engine
- Unity
- Genre(s)
- Survival Horror, Puzzle
