•Patrik Mršnik• 6 min read
Games
Hell Is Us Exploration Guide for Playing Without a Map
Hell Is Us exploration throws out the area map, the quest marker, and the objective arrow. You get a compass, a datapad full of what people told you, and a war-torn country called Hadea that expects you to remember things. For anyone raised on waypoints, the first hour feels like being dropped in the woods with a riddle.
We flagged this in our Hell Is Us review, where the exploration section argues that the game rewards whoever pays attention. Below, you'll find how the Hell Is Us datapad, the compass, codes, and dial puzzles fit together, plus the habits that cut backtracking. Ready to trade the minimap for a notebook?
Hell Is Us Exploration Guide Summary
No area maps, no markers: directions come from NPC dialogue, documents, and landmarks, read against a cardinal-direction compass. The APC's world map only handles fast travel.
The datapad logs people and leads, but passwords and wall inscriptions often stay off the menus, so screenshot or write them down.
Compass on keyboard is Q once it sits in a quick slot. On controller, select it on the D-pad and press down.
Dial puzzles answer themselves through nearby inscriptions your drone can scan, and Vaults of Forbidden Knowledge take four runic symbols from Tania's research.
Follow one wall through dungeons and keep one note page per area.
How Hell Is Us Exploration Works Without a Map
There is no map of the areas you walk through in Hell Is Us, and the game never puts a marker on your screen. Executive creative director Jonathan Jacques-Belletête wrote on the PlayStation Blog that Rogue Factor dropped maps, quest markers and quest journals, along with any compass that reveals points of interest. The only map is a world map in the APC, and it just handles fast travel between regions.
Guidance still exists, delivered as information. An NPC tells you to head west toward the marshes, a letter names a farmhouse by the river, a mural shows a symbol you'll need hours later. Hell Is Us exploration asks you to connect those pieces yourself.
Jacques-Belletête told Game Informer that the 1997 Blade Runner game was the model, with its web of clues and leads simplified for this game. Treat each region as a case and every conversation as a witness statement.
Rémi can't jump, so even waist-high obstacles force you onto set routes, and dead ends cost real time. Know where you're going before you leave the APC.
Reading the Hell Is Us Datapad Like a Case File
The Hell Is Us datapad is your casebook. Investigations appear as flowcharts that update as you gather clues from people, items and events. Each NPC entry lists a location, a description, known facts and linked investigations, filling in as you talk.
Its investigation tab starts small and grows into a web of leads, with side content split into Mysteries, Good Deeds and Timeloops. Open it after every conversation to see which leads moved.
What you need | Where the game keeps it | Your job |
|---|---|---|
Who to talk to next | NPC entries and flowcharts | Reread them before leaving the APC |
Which way to walk | Dialogue and documents | Note the direction word |
Safe and terminal passwords | Often only in the world | Screenshot it on the spot |
Some things never get logged. GamesRadar's reviewer noted that passwords and environmental clues can stay out of the menus and kept screenshots for them. A paper notebook does the same job.
Using the Hell Is Us Compass With NPC Directions
The Hell Is Us compass only shows cardinal directions. Put it in a quick slot, then press Q on keyboard (F and G cycle items) or pick it with left and right on the D-pad and press down. It shows overhead briefly, and you can toggle it on and off.
Whenever an NPC mentions north, the swamp, a forge or wind chimes, open the compass right there and pick a landmark in that direction. A distinctive tree, a tower or a broken arch gives you a target once the overlay disappears.
When a path is blocked, walk around the obstacle and take a fresh reading on the far side. Small corrections every minute beat a long walk the wrong way.
In dungeons, a common guide tip is to follow only the right wall (or only the left) for the whole run. You miss fewer rooms that way and walk the same corridor less often.
Hell Is Us Codes and Dial Puzzles
Every Hell Is Us dial puzzle hides its answer close by. The first big one in Act 1 has three rotating dials guarding a stone door, and the surrounding wall inscriptions describe a symbol sequence. Scan them with the drone, read the order, then turn the dials to match.
Puzzle type | Where the answer lives | Tip |
|---|---|---|
Rotating dials and rings | Inscriptions in the same dungeon | Log symbols top to bottom |
Safe and computer locks | Documents and files in the world | Capture the code on sight |
Vaults of Forbidden Knowledge | Tania's research results | Hand in every research item |
Vault codes come from the APC. Give research items to Tania, and when her progress bar fills she points you to a Vault and shows its four-symbol runic solution, drawn from eight symbols in total.
Difficulty swings a lot. Jacques-Belletête told Game Informer that the team ranked puzzles internally from very easy to very hard, plus a top tier named after Reddit for puzzles meant for community teamwork. He described main story puzzles as manageable, with two late-game ones as the hard exceptions.
FAQs About Hell Is Us
Final Words
Write the direction word down the moment someone says it. It's a dull habit, and nothing pays off more. Most confusion in Hadea comes from remembering that an NPC mentioned a place without remembering where it was.
A mural you walked past in one region can answer a door somewhere else, so reading documents counts as progress.
The first act runs slow. Once your notes and the datapad start pointing at the same places, Hell Is Us plays like a detective game with swords.
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“ A former sports journalist and editor, Patrik joined Gameboost SEO team in 2026. He has spent most of his life playing Football Manager, but his sphere of interests spreads through whole gaming universe.”
