starting out, HOLE is a difficult game. Trying to gather money for upgrades with nothing but your foot and a simple handgun when your opponents have dragon's breath shotguns? Not easy. Here are a few things that should hopefully make those first few runs a bit easier.

1. AIM FOR CENTER-OF-MASS
   something i found interesting about HOLE was the armour system. Apparently, according to the test dummies, an AP round to the heavily-armoured dummy's head had the same damage as a limb shot to any of the dummies but lost the extra stun damage. A body shot, on the other hand, would always yield the same damage, armoured or not. That knowledge combined with the difficulties of long-range headshots with pistol iron-sights led me to a simple realisation: body shots just make life easier.
   
   
2. KEEP AN EYE ON THE TIME
   In the bottom left of your screen youll notice a small circle with a number in the middle. This is your threat level. Over time, this number will rise steadily. As it does, more powerful enemies will begin to spawn. Early on, you should probably aim to keep this number at four (at most) to avoid the worst of the enemies. The last thing you want to do is lose all of your hard-earned money because you were way out of your depth.
   
   
3. RACK AND RELOAD
   Youll realise very early on that this game has rather interesting gun mechanics. Right off the mark, youll have to reload and then rack your pistol. however, as you have your first few fire-fights, youll notice something else; your guns will heat up and/or jam. Youll most likely struggle to begin with as you get used to this new system. Youll probably confuse a jam for an empty magazine, reload, realise that you still cant fire and wonder whats wrong. Any time you hear the 'click' of a misfire mid fire-fight, hit the rack button first. if you still cant shoot, then you hit the reload button.
   
   
4. CONFIRM YOUR KILLS
   Another interesting mechanic in the game is the stun/knock down system. When an enemy is stunned, they fall over and lay on the ground for a moment before getting up again. Leg shots deal extra stun damage and kicking an enemy is typically an instant knock down. The only problem is that the knock down duration isnt static. sometimes, enemies will stay down long enough to convince you that you killed them, only to get up and unload a full magazine into your back the moment you move on. The easiest way to check if you really did kill the enemy is to see if their mask is still attached. If it isnt, youre good to move on. If it isnt, keep unloading into the downed enemy until they drop their loot
   
   
5. FIND AND PRE-PREP THE EVAC HOLE ASAP
   Sitting out in the open whilst you struggle to dodge a storm of incindiary buckshot? Not exactly an ideal situation. Waiting for that microwave to ding can be an intense situation, especially as the threat level gets higher. So find and prepare it as early as you can - especially in the office where only one can spawn - so your escape is as easy as possible when the going gets too tough to handle
   
   
6. KEEP YOUR GUNS READY
   Despite the realistic gun mechanics and the bodycam-style POV, the game gives you infinite ammunition for your weapons. Use and abuse that fact, since for some reason the enemies will often group up and engage each other in large fire-fights. And trust me, the last thing you want to do is sprint full-pelt around a corner into an all-out war with a jammed AR and a total of three rounds left in your pistol. So always make sure you have your weapons locked and loaded

Enemies come in a plethora of different variants, each one with different properties such as behaviour, health, armour and weapons. Most enemies can be split into three factions: Blue (the most common and the variant on the cover image for the game), yellow (recognisable by their distintive blue hair) and red (the rarest of the three to spawn). Most of the enemies in the game can be placed into one of the three factions, and you can tell which one by the colour of their mask. There are also other coloured enemies, each one with different behaviour and more dangerous than the typical factions' enemies.

1. BASIC
   The first enemy youll encounter.
   
   • Armour: None
     
   • Weapon: HG
     
   • Threat lvl: 1+
     
   • Colour: Faction
   
   
2. ELITE
   A slightly more dangerous variant of the faction enemies, distinguished by their caps and vests
   
   • Armour: Basic
     
   • Weapon: HG, AR, SG, SR
     
   • Threat lvl: 3+
     
   • Colour: Faction
   
   
3. BOSS
   The most dangerous variant of the faction enemies, sporting a spetsnaz helm and heavily-armoured vest
   
   • Armour: Advanced
     
   • Weapon: AR, SG
     
   • Threat lvl: 4+
     
   • Colour: Faction
   
   
4. BLUEBERRY
   The most annoying and scariest enemy for new players. The blueberry is an enemy with a big, round head and a variety of melee weapon. Blueberry will always target the player if it can see you and will run full pelt towards you. The head is well-armoured and will simply absorb the default pistol's rounds. Dont bother going for headshots against the blueberries, as they arent effective. Instead, lead the blueberry away from other enemies, kick the it over and unload into it's legs or torso for the best results
   
   • Armour: Advanced (head), basic (torso)
     
   • Weapon: Melee
     
   • Threat: 2+
     
   • Colour: Ultramarine
   
   
5. BAGHEAD
   Killing bagheads is how you can get attachments for your guns. They have supressed pistols and white, ghost-like masks and will track the player with swift but silent footsteps. See the weapons section for a list of attachments and the order in which you they drop.
   
   • Armour: Basic (head)
     
   • Weapon: Silenced HG
     
   • Threat: 3+
     
   • Colour: White
   
   
6. ONI
   Easily the most intimidating enemy in the game, especially considering how many enemies are usually around when you finally ecounter them. These guys have dragon's breath shotguns (see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkxVhFg81fs if you dont know what that is) and horned demon masks. Alone, they arent that hard to deal with. But due to fire-tick damage, a few shots from these guys can lead to the end of a perfectly good run.
   
   • Armour: Addvanced (head), basic (torso)
     
   • Weapon: Dragon's breath SG
     
   • Threat: 5+
     
   • Colour: Orange

There are four weapons in HOLE (in order of unlock): the handgun (HG), the rifle (AR), the shotgun (SG) and the sniper (SR). To unlock the weapons, you need to complete the task for the level's key, find the locked room, get the disk from whatever terminal is in the room, complete the final task and extract without dying. Each one has a list of attachments to customise it to your liking and playstyle. Below is a complete list of each weapon, its base stats, its attachments and the stat changes for each attachment.

[1.] HG
• AMMUNITION
  
  Damage:

  Stun:

  Penetration:

  Heat:

  Default (FMJ)

  +0 (35)

  +0 (15)

  +0 (8)

  +0 (15)

  Hollow point (HP)

  +10 (45)

  +25 (40)

  -3 (5)

  +5 (20)

  Armour Piercing (AP)

  -5 (30)

  -10 (5)

  +17 (25)

  +5 (20)

  Subsonic (SUB)

  +10 (45)

  -7 (8)

  -4 (4)

  -7.5 (7.5)

  
  
• MAGAZINE
  
  Capacity:

  Reload Speed:

  Base

  10+1rnds

  +0s

  extended

  17+1rnds

  +0.25s

  
  
• MUZZLES
  
  Damage:

  Recoil(x/y):

  Noise:

  Heat:

  Jam rate:

  Suppressor

  -10

  -0.25/-0.15

  -240

  +50

  +2.5%

  Compensator

  -5

  -0.5/-0.1

  -0

  +25

  +0%

  
  
• SIGHTS
  
  View:

  Irons

  ____

  Red Dot

  ____

  
  

  [2.] AR

  
  

  [3.] SG

  
  

  [4.] SR