A Rundown in GTFO is a collection of levels all released at the same time. They're a bit like mini-campaigns. They contain multiple levels of varied difficulty, with difficulty increasing as you go deeper through the tiers.

Previously in GTFO's development, when a new Rundown was released, the old Rundown would be removed, so only one Rundown was accessible at a time. This was the case for the original releases of Rundowns 1-6, none of these original rundowns are accessible to play.

After the original Rundown 6, Rundown 7 was released, and is still available to play. After that, the developers began rereleasing the old rundowns as "alternate" versions. These rereleases have received minor changes, but are generally faithful to their original counterparts. Noticeably though, this means that new mechanics, new objectives and new enemies that were only introduced later in GTFO's development will not appear in the earlier alternate Rundowns. These rereleases, as well as Rundown 7 and the newly released Rundown 8, are all still available to play, which means there are a lot more levels to choose from when starting the game! Navigating this choice is what this guide is about.

Prior to the release of the original Rundown 6, GTFO didn't have very much of a linear story so much as it had environmental world-building. The 'story' was delivered through small lore drops, found on logs in the in-game terminals, however, these logs only gave tiny slivers of information, and it was up to the players to piece together what they thought had happened.

If you're interested in checking out the game's story as revealed in the logs, then you can read all of the logs online, and there are also numerous excellent videos explaining and exploring the lore. Or you can of course read the logs while playing through the game!

With the original release of Rundown 6, the game's delivery of the story became a bit more involved. Levels started adding narrative exposition in the form of a voice-over, and in general, the game started to feature more cinematic levels and moments. Rundown 7 continued this trend. With that said, there are no cut-scenes, and most of what is presented through exposition is happening adjacent to the player, and rarely impacts what you actually are doing. While the narration is linear, and favours experiencing it in order, the story is still unobtrusive enough that players won't be unduly affected by playing through levels out of order.

After Rundown 7, the releases of the alternate Rundowns didn't simply rehash the old story-line told before, but presented an alternate version of it. Rundown 8 leans even more heavily in to story elements, and could be considered to occur after Rundown 7 and ALT://Rundown 6.

Thus the 'story' when played fully linearly would be experienced by playing the original releases of Rundowns 1-6, then Rundown 7, the the alternate Rundowns 1-6, then finally Rundown 8. Unfortunately, the original releases of Rundowns 1-6 are not available to play, so the closest to the start we can get is Rundown 7.

Regardless of the experience you are looking for in this game, I can firmly recommend starting with Rundown 7 A1.

• Is the easiest level currently in the game.
  
• Contains checkpoints, which helps ease through tougher sections.
  
• Does a good job of introducing the terminal, which is an important mechanic for all levels.
  
• Exposes the player to the game's story.
  
• Tips:
  
  • With Settings > Audio > Dialogue Volume you can turn down the volume of the narration.
    
  • The terminal on which to input the RECYCLE_GROUP_7A42 command is in Zone 44, to the west.

After R7A1, I believe there are two good routes to consider:

• For player's that want to dive right in to everything the game has to offer, including all of the mechanics, objectives, enemy types, and meatier story elements. I can recommend continuing with Rundown 7 or jumping to and continuing with ALT://Rundown 6. New mechanics and enemies will be introduced quite quickly, ~1 per level, ensuring that the player is always facing a fresh challenge. However, the levels also ramp in duration and difficulty quite quickly, you may rapidly start looking at multi-hour commitments for your level attempts.
  
• For player's that are looking to play through every level roughly in the order that they were released, I can recommend playing through ALT://Rundown 1 next. This will mean meeting new enemies and mechanics very slowly. It may take you 30+ hours to meet the first mini-boss (which isn't introduced until Rundown 3). Earlier Rundowns also do not contain checkpoints (with the strange exception of ALT://R1A1), meaning if you wipe at the final hurdle, you will have to replay the entire level (which may be a 1hr+ time commitment - though in general, levels in earlier Rundowns tend to be shorter than those in later Rundowns).

Depending on which route you take, below there a couple further tips to hopefully ease you through the next few levels.

If you choose to continue with Rundown 7, then R7B1 will be the next level to complete.

• Contains the gentlest introduction to two new enemy types.
  
• Tips:
  
  • Some of the sections in this level have a lot of verticality, so the map, which is 2D, isn't particularly helpful - for this level, the exits to each of these zones is just on the opposite side of where you enter.
    
  • Typically enemies will spawn two rooms away from the players, which is a very useful rule to consider when preparing for alarms. However, the second alarm in this level breaks this rule and allows enemies to spawn to the east even though it is only one room away.

If you choose to continue with ALT://Rundown 6, then R6A1 will be the next level to complete. This level is fairly straightforward, especially if you've just beaten R7A1.

Rundown 7 and ALT://Rundown 6 also contains missions with Secondary and/or Overload objectives, in addition to the Main objective. For missions that contains both a Secondary and Overload, completing them both within a single run counts as a Prisoner Efficiency completion for that level. The Secondary/Overload often add a high amount of difficulty to the mission, but they are optional.

After Rundown 7, if players wanted to keep experiencing all of what the game has to offer, I would recommend either ALT://Rundown 6 or Rundown 8 next. Rundown 6 will add a bit more context to the story, and (as it was designed for the original 1.0 release) has a very good difficulty curve. Rundown 8 is the end of the game's story, and will introduce a lot of crazy new stuff, but it will also ramp in difficulty quite quickly.

If you did ALT://Rundown 6 first, then Rundown 7 is the clear place to go next.

If you choose to jump back to ALT://Rundown 1, then R1A1 will be the next level to complete.

• The latest patch added a checkpoint to this level, so it is a much gentler experience.
  
• Contains a new enemy type.
  
• Tips:
  
  • Zone 51 is a resource zone, you can hit up this zone before attempting the class IV alarm.

If you do jump back to Rundown 1, then a word of caution regarding some levels that a lot of players get stuff on. Namely R1C1 (and eventually R2D2/R2E1). These levels are a big spike in difficulty, and often require the players to make use of skills that previous levels have not done a good job of teaching yet. There are lots of great tips for these levels, but it is also often advisable to try out some other levels in the meantime, rather than bashing your head against the wall.

• It is perfectly acceptable to jump around between the different Rundowns, you don't need to commit to beating one before moving on to another. Getting stuck on on a high tier level? Jump to a lower tier level in a different Rundown! You'll continue to learn new skills and grow as a player.
  
• Difficulty increases both as you go down in the tiers (A, B, C, D, E) but also typically as you go across tiers (B1, B2, B3). If you're stuck on C3 you might find D1 approachable.
  
• You can still get completion credit even if you haven't unlocked a level yet. Don't be afraid to join in on a level you're not up to yet.
  
• Don't be afraid to restart a level, even if you have a checkpoint.
  
  • Instead of restarting many times from a compromised checkpoint, your newfound map knowledge may ensure that you get back to the checkpoint in an even better position.
    
  • It may be worthwhile to try out a different loadout. Perhaps there are better tool/weapon choices for this particular level.
• Try out all the different guns and melee weapons! The weapon balance is good enough that you're not going to significantly hamper your chances by taking "bad" guns, so experiment and find out which ones you enjoy.
  
• If you're playing with bots, you can tell them to use their tools with the Communication Menu. Generally sentries (or the bio tracker) are the best tools for bots, as they require the least amount of micromanagement from the player.