Selaco: Beginner's Guide & Best Tips

This Game Made Me Angry, Then Obsessed

I bought Selaco on a whim after watching one gif of a security guard getting vaporized by a particle beam. That gif sold me. The first fifteen minutes sold me harder. The first time I hit the Pulse Rifle alt-fire and watched a wall of white-hot plasma erase three attackers through a piece of furniture? I was hooked. But let me be real with you: the game does not care that you're new. It will stomp you, laugh at your corpse, and then respawn you just so it can do it again.

I'm writing this because I spent my first four hours dying to things I *could* have survived if someone had just told me how the healing system works. Or how the cover actually breaks in this game. Or why every single Steam guide telling you to "save your ammo" is lying to your face. This is the guide I needed on day one. Not a list of basic controls. Not a lore dump. Real, raw, "stop dying you idiot" advice.

For context, I've got about 80 hours in Selaco now. I've beaten it on Veteran, I've speedrun the first three levels on Hardcore, and I've deleted my save file twice because I hated my build choices so much. So yeah. Trust me, I've made every mistake you're about to make.

The Real Reason You Keep Dying

Selaco looks like a classic shooter. It moves like one too — fast strafing, bunny hopping, shotguns that feel like they're powered by hate. But here's the lie: it is not an arena shooter. It is not Doom. It's closer to F.E.A.R. with a sci-fi skin and less hand-holding. The enemies flank you. They use suppression fire. They will crawl through vents and drop from ceilings to surround you. That's the first thing nobody tells you: treat every room like a tactical breach, not a murder box.

The second pain point is resource starvation. You will run out of bullets. Not because the game is stingy, but because you're wasting ammo on the wrong targets. That Plasma Rifle feels amazing against everything until you realize the Scavengers (those little bug things that skitter on walls) take 4 shots to kill with it, but 1 shot from the basic pistol. I spent ten runs trying to "save the good guns for later" and ended every fight meleeing enemies with the stock of my rifle because I'd run dry.

The third thing that made me rage-quit twice? The healing system is not generous. Health pickups are rare. Med-bays are on cooldowns. And if you get hit by a Grenadier's plasma grenade? That's not a scratch — that's 60% of your health gone in an instant with a burn DoT that ticks for 8 damage every second for 4 full seconds. You will die to that burn damage five seconds after you thought you were safe. It's bullshit. And then you learn to respect it.

If you came from something like ULTRAKILL where health is everywhere and the answer is "go faster," Selaco punishes that instinct. Go slow. Check your corners. Use the Peek mechanic (hold Q by default) to lean around doorframes. I ignored it for the first five hours. I was a moron.

Stop Dying: The Real Day-One Checklist

Here's what you need to know before you even touch the controller or mouse. These five things will save you more deaths than any armor upgrade.

1. Your pistol is your best friend, not your backup.
The M9 Sidearm does 18 damage per shot to unarmored targets. That's not impressive. But here's the secret: headshots do 3x damage on humanoid enemies, and the pistol has zero recoil bloom when fired slowly. I clear entire early-game encounters using nothing but the pistol and the occasional melee finisher. Save your rifle ammo for the armored Enforcers and the Shield Drones. The pistol kills the basic security droids in two headshots. Two. That's insane value.

2. The cover system is not cosmetic.
You can press E to snap to cover. Most players ignore this because it feels slow. But here's the thing: when you're behind metal cover, explosive damage is reduced by 70%. That Grenadier I mentioned? His grenade does 90 damage direct hit. Behind a metal crate? That same grenade does 27. You can survive that. You can heal through that. You can't dodge grenades in this game — they have proximity detonation — so learn to hug metal objects when you hear the "beep-beep-beep" of a launched grenade.

3. Upgrade your armor first.
I know the big guns are tempting. I spent my first 5,000 credits on a Laser Carbine upgrade that gave me +10% fire rate. It did nothing to help me survive the next fight. The Armor Integrator upgrade (costs 2,500 credits in the first shop) gives you +40 base armor. Armor in Selaco works like health, but it regenerates slowly out of combat if you have at least 1 point. That 40 armor is effectively an extra health bar that refills itself. Rush it. I cannot stress this enough.

4. Use the scanner on EVERYTHING.
Your Multitool (default F) has a scanning mode. It highlights interactable objects, hidden stashes, and — most importantly — enemy weak points. The Scavenger Nest that spawns infinite bugs? Scan it. You'll see a glowing orange node. Shoot that node, and the nest dies in one hit. I spent an embarrassingly long time trying to kill nests by shooting the bugs coming out. Nobody tells you about the node. Scan. Always scan.

5. The first boss is a DPS check, not a skill check.
The Mk. II Prototype Walker in the Thermal Generators level feels impossible until you know its weak point. It's the glowing coolant pipe on its back left leg. That's not a hint you piece together from lore — you can see it if you just use the scanner. Deal 200 damage to that pipe and the boss enters a stagger state for 8 seconds. During that stagger, all damage is 2x. I beat it on my first try after someone told me this. Before that? I died five times trying to shoot its face.

The Tricks That Turned Me from Victim to Menace

Once you stop dying every two minutes, you can start optimizing. Here's the advanced stuff that the game never explains.

Slide-cancelling into cover is faster than walking. Sprint (Shift), slide (Ctrl), then immediately press E for cover. Your character slides into the cover piece and snaps into position. The total time is about half a second faster than walking to cover and pressing E. In a game where the difference between eating a grenade and surviving is 0.3 seconds, this matters. Practice it in the first hub area until it's muscle memory.

The Flamethrower is not a weapon. It's a control tool. Damage-wise, the Flamethrower does 45 base DPS but ramps to 120 DPS after 3 seconds of continuous fire. That sounds great until you realize enemies just walk out of the fire and shoot you. The real use is area denial. Fire spreads along floors and climbs walls. If you spray a doorway, any enemy that walks through it takes that 45 DPS base damage immediately AND a panic animation where they stop shooting for 1.5 seconds. Use it to lock down a flank while you clear the other side. Don't use it as your primary DPS source unless you're fighting something slow like the Heavy Crawler.

Ammo conservation is a lie. ECONOMY is real. Every weapon has a "cost per kill" that changes based on the target. The Shotgun (pump-action, not the auto) does 160 damage per shell at close range. That kills a basic Security Mech in one shot. That's 4 credits worth of ammo per kill (one shell costs 4 credits from the vending machine). The Plasma Rifle kills the same mech in 3 shots, costing 12 credits. Learn the credit economy per weapon per enemy type. The shotgun is your economy weapon for the first half of the game. The Railgun (once you find it) is your "delete one nightmare enemy" panic button.

Explosive barrels are not traps. They are tools. I treated blue barrels as "don't shoot these" for my first three hours. Then I realized that enemies also take damage from exploding barrels, and they stand near them constantly. There's a specific patrol route in the Hydroponics section where two Enforcers walk side by side past a cluster of three barrels. One pistol shot into the middle barrel kills both instantly. That's a 30-second encounter reduced to 2 seconds. Memorize barrel locations. They're free kills.

Melee finishers grant temporary invincibility frames. When an enemy is below 25% health and you melee them (default V), you get a finisher animation that lasts about 1.2 seconds. During that animation, you are fully invincible. I use this to tank boss attacks. Time a finisher on a small enemy just as the boss fires its big laser. You take zero damage. The finisher doesn't need to connect with the boss — just any killable enemy nearby. This is a glitch the devs haven't patched. Abuse it.

For more on advanced movement and positioning, check out our Hades guide — the dash-cancelling and positioning principles translate surprisingly well to Selaco's combat flow.

The Dumb Shit I Did for 10 Hours Before I Got Good

I'm going to list the exact mistakes I made so you don't have to. Some of these are embarrassing. All of them cost me runs.

• I ignored the flashlight upgrade. The first Tool Station offers a Flashlight Mod for 500 credits. I thought "I don't need light, the game is already bright." Then I got to the Maintenance Tunnels which are pitch black with invisible tripwire mines. The flashlight reveals the wires. I died to those mines seven times before I bought it. Buy it immediately.
• I hoarded healing items. The game gives you a Stim Pack that heals 50 HP. I kept thinking "what if I need it more later?" Then I died with it in my inventory. The Stim Pack has no other use. If you're below 50% health, use it. There's one in every other room. You're not saving it for a wedding.
• I tried to kill every enemy. Selaco has a surprising number of unskippable fights, but it also has rooms where you can just... run past. The Server Farm level spawns infinite Mite Drones if you linger. I spent 15 minutes killing them thinking there was a timer. There isn't. The door unlocks after you flip three switches. Kill the bare minimum to survive and move on.
• I upgraded the wrong weapons. The first upgrade station lets you put a Damage Mod on one weapon. I chose the Assault Rifle. The Assault Rifle is fine, but the Pulse Rifle's secondary fire gets a hidden +30% explosion radius from the same mod. That radius bump makes the orb hit multiple targets consistently. I didn't learn this until hour 30. Don't be me.
• I never used the map. Press M. The map shows you locked doors, keycard locations, and — critically — ventilation shafts. Enemies use them to flank you. The map also shows which vents are big enough for you to crawl through. I missed an entire optional area in the Docking Bay because I didn't check the map for a vent that led to a secret weapon stash. The Gauss Pistol is in that stash. It's the best anti-armor sidearm in the game. I found it on run 8 by accident.

A word on the difficulty curve: the game gets harder around the 3-hour mark when enemy types start mixing. You'll fight Shield Drones (which require breaking the shield with 3 pistol shots before you can damage them), Snipers (one-shot kill if you're not behind cover), and Berserker Units (melee-only, fast, and they explode on death). The Berserkers are the reason you should never corner yourself. They rush you, you kill them, they explode, and that explosion deals 80 damage in a 5-meter radius. Kill them from range. Always.

This is similar to the crowd-control challenges in Nova Drift guide — managing explosive enemies that punish close engagement is a skill that transfers directly.

Questions You're Too Ashamed to Ask

Q: How do I save my game?
A: The game has manual save points at specific terminals. You can't save anywhere. Autosaves exist but are sparse. If you quit mid-mission, you restart at the last terminal. Learn where the terminals are. They're usually right before a boss or a big ambush.

Q: Is there a New Game Plus?
A: Yes. Beat the game once and you unlock New Game+ where enemies have +40% health and +25% damage. You keep your upgrades and weapons. I'd say skip it your first time. Play on Standard difficulty and just learn the levels.

Q: What's the best weapon to beat the final boss?
A: The Railgun is king. It does 250 damage per shot fully charged and ignores armor. The final boss has three armor phases. The Railgun bypasses two of them. I also recommend the Shotgun with the Auto-Loader mod (reloads one shell per second automatically) for the adds he spawns.

Q: How do I get more credits?
A: Credits come from lootable containers (blue crates, lockers), selling weapon mods you don't use at the Shop Terminal, and optional objectives. There's a side mission in the Habitation Block that gives 3,000 credits for finding five missing data chips. Do it. Check every desk.

Q: I died to the tutorial boss. Am I bad?
A: The tutorial boss (the Drone Carrier) is genuinely overtuned for a tutorial. It does 35 damage per laser burst and summons 4 repair drones that heal it for 10 HP per second each. Kill the drones first with the pistol. Then shoot the Carrier's exposed core on its underside. You have to jump or stand on a crate to hit it. Took me three tries. You're fine.

Q: Can I respec my upgrades?
A: No. There is no respec. Every upgrade is permanent. That's why I told you to rush the Armor Integrator. If you waste credits on the Grapple Hook upgrade (which sounds cool but only works on specific yellow surfaces and is useless in 80% of fights), you're stuck with it forever. Think before you buy.

Q: Stealth? Is that a thing?
A: Sort of. You can crouch (C) to reduce footstep noise. Some enemies have vision cones shown on the minimap. You can sneak past patrols in the early levels. It's never required. But if you want to feel like a ghost, crouch-walk behind the Security Troopers and you can get a backstab melee kill that's silent. Useful for thinning a room before the shooting starts.

I also recommend reading our Titanfall 2 guide for movement fundamentals — the slide-hopping and air strafing in Selaco share DNA with that game's movement system.