Secret Neighbor Beta: Guide for Beginners

Secret Neighbour is a 6 player game of adventure and deception. 5 players are children and have to locate keys hidden around the house to open up the basement door and escape through it. The sixth player is the neighbour, disguised as a child but can transform at any time to try and kidnap the children and supernaturally turn them into missing posters.

The game’s open beta has come to a close and it will be releasing some time as a pay to play game. This guide will hopefully get you well prepared so you can survive inside the neighbours crazy house.

In the main menu, you can choose the class you want to play, the neighbour you’d like to become and adjust a bunch of options such as voice chat and clothing for your characters. For your first game, simply pick the character that appeals the most to you and read the later chapters of this guide to find out how they work.

Once you’re in a game, you’ll either be a child or the neighbour. As a child, you have to explore the house to try and find red, blue and yellow keys. These keys can be hidden anywhere, usually within drawers and cabinets. Once you find one, you have to bring it to the basement door, located near the main entrance, and put the key in the lock. After all six locks have been opened, you can escape into the basement and win the game.

As the neighbour, you want to stop this. You have several skills at your disposal and start off incognito. In your child form, you want to pretend to look for keys and hoard important items for yourself, then in your neighbour form, get close to children and press E to pick them up and kidnap them. If you hold on to them long enough, they are out of the game. You need to eliminate all children or run down the clock in order to be victorious.

There are several things you’ll need to know if you want to be good at the game as a child and as a neighbour.

The most important skill in this game is being able to throw items. As a child, throwing items can stun the neighbour to help you get away, save someone who is being captured and can knock down a neighbour disguised as a child. If you’re the neighbour, you can win the game without ever transforming if you simply throw items repeatedly at the same child until they’re down. As the neighbour, you can also throw items to slow down children for you to catch up to.

Throwing is the key! The best way to get better is to practice but make sure you don’t practice on other innocent players or you might end up losing the game. If you’re a child, work with the others to gang up on the neighbour to practice your throwing arm. If you want to practice as the neighbour, consider capturing some children first and then try throwing items at the rest until you land consecutive hits.

The second most important skill is map knowledge. Again, the best way to learn this is practice. Once you’re good at throwing and escaping the neighbour, you should take your time to explore the house. The house is randomised every time but each room stays in the same spot; for example, the kitchen is always in the same place. I’d recommend a new player to get to the roof as it’s relatively safe, giving you plenty of time to explore the house top to bottom.

The rest of what you need to know includes; what items to use, what characters are best and strategies for winning the game. Each of these topics has its own section within this guide.

Five out of six times, you’ll be a normal child. As stated above, your goal is to find six keys and escape to the basement. There’s two strategies you can follow. You can either choose to stay as a group or go solo.

If you decide to stay as a group, the neighbour will have a hard time capturing one of you. If someone in the group gets caught, you can throw items at the neighbour to set them free. If the group stays alert and keeps on the move, you can find all the keys within time and escape in to the basement together. Just make sure the neighbour isn’t hiding among you in the first place.

If you want to be a lone wolf, you’ll have to know what you’re doing or the risks will outweigh the rewards. The best thing about being alone is that you are free to loot your own items and gather your own keys without worry of someone else interrupting. If you ever see another player, throw an item at them and run far away as if they’re the neighbour, you’ll be an easy target for them.

Each class has its own playstyle and may fit one strategy more than the other but there isn’t one that is unable to do both. Just remember: never be alone with someone else!

One is six times, you’ll be playing as the Neighbour. You start off looking as a child and can drop your guise at any time by pressing T to transform! The neighbour is very powerful and therefore has several strategies they can use. We’ll be talking about two of them here.

The first strategy is to be quick and aggressive. As soon as the game starts, follow someone who wanders off and immediately transform and capture them. They won’t be able to escape and you’ve already made the game a lot easier for yourself. Transform back into a child if you weren’t spotted or stay as the neighbour if you want to use your abilities such as disguising.

The other strategy is the intended way to play: to be sneaky and secret. Just like the aggressive strategy, you want to try to catch someone who is on their own. Or you could decide not to capture someone, making them think that you’re an innocent child. If you find any keys, make sure to hide them either in the corners of the map or in your own room where no one else can get them.

The neighbour’s panic room is in the middle of the house and provides the neighbour with both a sonar system and secret entrances to the first three floors. If you don’t know where someone is, it’s a great idea to head to the secret room to activate the sonar as it will show you where they are (unless they’re not moving). However, children can hear the sonar and smart players will know that you’re after them.

Honestly, it does not matter what class you play, as long as you enjoy playing them. If you’re really not sure who to pick though, you can follow this advice.

Bagger – Good for new players. Good for team players. Good at burying the neighbour under many, many boxes. Bad at defending himself.
Brave – Good for aggressive players. Good for lone wolves. Counter-strike is such a great ability that gives you an extra life essentially. Bad when ability is unavailable.
Detective – Good for all skill levels. Good with teams and alone. Can even find keys down the back of the sofa. Bad at defending himself and others.
Inventor – Good for skilled players. 5 gears he’s okay, 6 gears he’s good. 0 gears he’s just a nerd.
Leader – Good for people who want to lead. Good for team players. Good for people who need to escape. Bad on cooldown. Very hard quest.
Scout – Good for trolls. Good for lone wolves. Best when secretly the neighbour. Play Brave instead.

Neighbour – Good for people who don’t know how to switch character. Good for if you want to steal someone’s identity. Not as good as Clown.
Clown – If you play Clown, you’re automatically a tryhard. Good for people who want to become a box.

If you want to learn more about the characters, read their individual sections down below!

The bagger is an easy class with a backpack and two passive abilities.

Bagger’s backpack is large and gives him an extra inventory slot, meaning he can carry 3 items instead of 2. Bagger also has a quest: if all of his inventory slots are full for two minutes straight, he’ll gain an extra inventory slot, boosting him to 4. The extra inventory slots are useful for carrying important items and keys and are good for all players.

His first passive, Heavy Bones, is a defensive ability. Whenever he is caught, he slows down the neighbour, making it slightly easier for allies to rescue him. This is a good ability for new players and people who use group/team strategy.

His second passive, Strong Knees, reduces his fall damage by 20%. The damage reduction can mean the difference between life and death but it is a very situational ability. It’s good for people who fall off the roof a lot, either by accident or on purpose.

Overall, Bagger is a great character. If you are new to the game, he’s a great pick. He is best when in a group as when he is caught by himself, he has absolutely no defensive capabilities. However, a lone wolf bagger can hoard 3 or more keys to the basement fairly easily, as long as the other players keep the neighbour occupied.

The brave character only has counter-strike.

Counter-strike is a quest; if the brave hits the neighbour three times, they will get the counter-strike ability. If they get caught by the neighbour, they can use this ability to break free and will need to complete the quest again to regain the ability. Keep in mind, you have to hit the revealed neighbour. Hitting the neighbour when he is disguised as a child will not count.

Overall, Brave fits the lone wolf playstyle better but is great in a group too. If you can hit the neighbour three times, you’re free to explore the house with little worry. If you get caught, you can break out once for free, even if you’re alone! Therefore, the brave is very strong, especially in public lobbies, but only if you’re skilled enough to hit the neighbour three times.

The Detective has his trusty camera and his own intuition to help him find keys in the neighbour’s house.

The camera will have a photograph of a random key in the house. In the photo is enough information to work out what room the key is in, meaning if you know the map well enough, you can find the key easily. However, if you don’t know the map, it will be tricky to find the room you need. Even if you find it, it may be locked off and you’ll have to find an alternate route inside.

The Detective’s intuition is a quest. If he can find two keys from the photographs, he can use the ability to have a third key highlighted for him. Again, just like with the photographs, you may know where the key is but now how to get to it. This is why map knowledge is so important!

Overall, the detective is best when you have knowledge of the map. However, this doesn’t mean the detective is bad in the hands of a new player. A rookie detective can tell other players what room the key is in and have them retrieve it for him – although he won’t get his ability if this happens. The detective can also help teach new players key locations and could be a good starter class.

The detective has two downsides. Firstly, he has no defensive capabilities and therefore needs to stay in a group or be alert. Secondly, skilled players do not need help with finding keys and would be at a much better advantage playing a different character instead. In the end, the Detective is in an odd position where new players use him sub-optimally and skilled players don’t need him.

The inventor has his tinkering ability and a quest to find gears located all around the house.

Tinkering allows the inventor to transform the gears he finds in to useful objects. 1 gear gives him a saucepan, 2 gears a flashlight and 5 gives a toy gun. When you have enough gears, press Q to craft and then pick up the item. The saucepan and flashlight are next to useless and should only ever be crafted when you’re being chased outside and need an item to defend yourself with. The toy gun on the other hand is very powerful and should always be crafted when you plan on escaping.

If the inventor collects six gears, he will complete his reverse engineering quest, allowing him to open the gates around the house. To do so, simply press E on the clock/lever next to the gate to toggle it open and closed. This quest is hard to complete but once you do it, it can speed up your search for the last couple of keys and also give you more routes for escaping.

Overall, the inventor is okay. Both the toy gun and the quest have their uses. As a lone wolf, the toy gun can help you kill a camping neighbour. As a team player, the quest can help your team get to hard to access areas and can also help you escape when you walk into a locked gate. However, if you can’t find 5-6 gears, the inventor is completely useless and should be avoided.

The leader has the ability to inspire others and a quest. As the name implies, they’re good for people who want to lead a group.

The inspire ability gives a speed boost to all children within a small radius. This includes a disguised neighbour so be careful! This ability is great as a tool for searching rooms quicker and as a way to escape the neighbour. The downside is that its cooldown of 30 seconds can sometimes be too long.

The leader’s quest is to inspire others 25 times, including the leader themself. Therefore, you’ll have to use your inspire ability a minimum of 5 times but more likely, you’ll be using it well over a dozen times. This quest is very hard to complete and when you finally complete it, it upgrades your inspire ability to also dazzle a revealed neighbour, essentially making them blind for a few seconds. Is it worth it?

Overall, the Leader is a good character. Inspire can help yourself and others escape the neighbours grasp and if you ever manage to pull the quest off, dazzling the neighbour makes it even easier to escape from him. Obviously, the leader is best in a group as that allows them to inspire more people and complete the quest faster, yet they’re also good on their own with a nice escape tool.

“Ey, is somebody keepin’ track of my heads batted in? Boink!”

The scout comes equipped with a slingshot, 15 pellets and a quest.

The slingshot is an item that doesn’t take up an inventory slot and can’t be dropped. When holding it, you can fire pellets at whatever you aim at. It’s a very useful defensive tool for when you don’t want to throw your items (because they’re keys.)

The quest, evasive maneuvers, requires you to hit the neighbour three times in a row (presumably with pellets but items might work too.) Once you complete this somewhat easy quest, you’ll get a 15% movement speed boost. Being able to move faster is very useful for both searching for keys and escaping, but 15% is very small that you may not even realise you’re going faster.

Overall, the Scout is similar to the Brave but instead of a powerful ability, has a very limited slingshot. If you’re terrible at throwing items, the Scout might be good for you but the quest reward has no impact on the game. Finally, the Scout is a great child for the Neighbour to be as their sling pellets refill whenever the Neighbour transforms, giving the Neighbour an infinite ammo weapon to slow down children.

The neighbour is the default…neighbour. He starts off as a child and can transform to give him bear traps, disguises and rage!

The neighbour can place down an infinite number of bear traps that damage and stun children. They are great when hidden in doorways and near the basement door but are very situational and can easily be broken. They’re only good for people who are sneaky and struggle to capture children without their use.

The neighbour’s disguise is his most valuable tool when being sneaky and secret! When the neighbour uses his disguise, he will transform in to the nearest child. This ability is perfect for when your cover is blown and you want to continue being incognito. However, if someone sees their doppelganger, they’ll start attacking you immediately.

Rage allows the neighbour to become unstoppable whenever he blocks 5 hits. Sounds great, right? However, as of time writing this, I have no idea how to block attacks and have never used this ability. Either it hasn’t been implemented yet or I’m doing it wrong.

Overall, default Neighbour is great. Yet, you don’t even need to use his abilities to win as him! If you go round throwing items at children, you can knock them down and they’ll die if no one rescues them. Furthermore, the Neighbour’s greatest weapon is his long arms. If you can get close enough to someone, there’s nothing they can do once you’ve grabbed them.

The clown is the alternate neighbour with extremely powerful abilities!

The clown’s smoke bomb is a grenade that surrounds an area in poisonous smoke. Children can’t see through the smoke easily and will be damaged by it. The smoke bomb is perfect for splitting up big groups, getting some damage in, basic area denial and obscuring an area to capture someone more easily. It’s a very powerful tool in the hands of a skilled clown.

The clown’s passive ability allows him to dazzle anyone who escapes his grasp. Again, this is a very strong ability as anyone who escapes from you can’t get far, meaning you can just grab them again a few seconds later. Even a skilled player can’t do much when they’re dazzled.

Finally, the clown’s camouflage ability transforms him into a random object. As this object, the clown can walk around, interact with objects and even capture children. Do I even need to say how powerful this is for someone who plays covertly?

Overall, the Clown is very powerful and can catch both new and skilled players off guard with his brutal abilities. Despite this, the clown isn’t over-powered. All of their skills can be somewhat countered and once the default Neighbour’s rage is working properly, there will be a reason to play him instead of the Clown.