How to Not Be Zombie Chow

Overview

I’m still fairly new to this amazing game but, as I play, I’ve been learning things that make me say: “Man… I wish I knew that before.” So I decided to start compiling a list of tips that will hopefully help you understand the game a little better. With any luck, you’ll be up and running faster than I was with these. Bear in mind that you may prefer to play the game differently than I do. I’m just listing things that work well for me. Right now this guide is basically a mish-mash of useful thoughts I’ve had while playing, and I’m sure to add more over time. I’ll do my best to keep this mess organized!

A Crash Course

These tips should be useful for both Survival and Story mode, but I have only played Story mode so far. If you want a guide specifically geared towards Survival mode, check out KEN’s excellent guide “Survival Mode For Beginners”. Some of my tips here are obviously geared towards Story mode, such as how magazine unlocks work. I have played the game both solo and with others and the tips I give here apply in both situations. I would also ask that, if you have a lot of experience playing this game, please comment below for corrections and additions so I can improve the tips. Thank you!

Note: “Magazines” in this guide can refer to two very different things: Either the weapon magazines that hold the bullets for your guns, or the reading kind of magazines that unlock the use of new attachments of ammo types. Generally, I’ll be referring the former as “ammo mags” or just “mags”, and the later as the full “magazines”.

VERY IMPORTANT – MOVEMENT SPEED

For the longest time, I was getting more and more frustrated by the fact that I am always slower than everyone else on my team (in terms of walk/run speed in the game). I figured it had something to do with how much gear I was carrying. But that didn’t make sense, because everyone else was carrying as much as me. Then I had a suspicion: It always seemed like people that were faster than me were also taller than me. So I used SteamVR’s video settings to change the game world scale to 80% (making me 20% larger, technically). And, sure enough, I was now a giant and much faster than my teammates. It’s absurd that your movement speed is based on your height, but… here we are.

I have to assume it’s a bug that your speed is based on your player scale. But, until this is or isn’t fixed, I would use SteamVR’s world scale video settings (per-application setting) to set your world scale a little smaller if you aren’t at least 6 feet tall in real life. I’m 5′ 7″ tall and around 94% scale seems to work well for keeping pace with most other players.

A note for Oculus Quest 2 users using Virtual Desktop: The developers of this game have stated that the game doesn’t run well if you launch Surv1v3 through Steam when linked wirelessly to your PC through Virtual Desktop. This means that, if you run it through the game through VD’s menus, you will not be running SteamVR… which means that you cannot change your game world scale (as Oculus does not give you tools like this). I’ll have to do some testing to see if there’s any workaround for this.

Pack Rat Life

The backpack, ammo pouch, and holsters can be a little confusing at first. Here’s some tips on how it works:

Amateur hoarding: To put a small item in the backpack, grab it, and hold it over your left or right shoulder for a moment. You should hear a zipper sound, which means it’s been stored in one of the 3 general slots. I have had issues on occasion with having items automatically go into the backpack when held over your back. Usually if you release the item it will go into the backpack, though.
Lead pants: To store some ammo, put it over your waist and let go. There are 3 slots for pistol ammo, 3 slots for rifle ammo, and one slot for shotgun shells which can store up to 30 shells. By default, the ammo you pull from your waist pouch will match the gun you are holding.
Jack of Blades: If the item you put over your shoulder is a melee weapon or bow, it will go into either the left or right large slot depending on which shoulder. Unlike small items, you have to release grip for it to be stored. You can then pull the stored weapon by reaching over the same side shoulder again and gripping, with either hand.
I call it “Vera”: You can store one primary (meaning: any semi/automatic rifle, shotgun, or sub machine gun) on your chest sling. This means that you can keep one primary weapon in your hands, and one on your chest. This will be useful as explained in a later section.
Making a withdrawal: You can see everything stored in your shoulder slots, backpack, and ammo pouch by moving either hand over either shoulder and pressing trigger. Anything in any slot can be pulled out of its slot from this interface.
Taking inventory: On the top left and top right are two long vertical slots. These are your stored melee weapons or bow. Other types of weapons cannot be stored in these. Between the two melee slots are your general storage slots. All small items (such as medical sprays) are stored here. Along the bottom of the interface are 3 slots on the left for primary (rifle) ammo mags, a small slot for shotgun shells in the middle, and 3 slots for secondary (pistol) mags.
Loot goblin: Later on, you will be able to increase the number of your general item slots (and only the general slots). I’ll go into detail on this in a later section. At first, you might think this is lackluster, because you just want to carry more ammo. But… Ammo mags and boxes of shotgun shells (but not loose shells) can be store in the backpack’s general slots!
Personal armory: Now that you know you can store ammo mags and boxes of shotgun shells in your general backpack slots, here’s a couple of tips related to that: Remember to move your mags from general slots by grabbing them from the backpack interface and dropping them on your waist pouch whenever you have pouch space. I do this because it’s quicker to pull from the pouch during combat (and easy to forget you have extra ammo in your backpack). At max backpack upgrades, you will have 6 slots to use. So, assuming you are carrying 3 crucial items (such as a med spray, quest item, and a drill), that means you’ve got 3 spare slots for more ammo. With your pouch and backpack loaded with ammo, it will be a long while before you have to switch from your primary weapon.

Weapon Handling for Dummies

Most of the weapons in this game are pretty self-explanatory if you have played any other VR shooters with semi-realistic weapon handling mechanics. I’ll add mostly non-obvious tips that are unique to Surv1v3 here, but maybe a few basic ones for those who aren’t super familiar with VR shooters.

Shotgun!: Don’t overlook the shotgun just because you want to go with a rifle as your primary. There’s a special slot in your ammo pouch just for shotgun shells that can store 30 shells. A box of shotgun shells has 15 shells, so two will fill that slot. And, if you read the previous section, you will know you can store more boxes in your backpack. You can go with the shotgun as your only primary weapon, but I don’t recommend it due to its slow firing and reloading speeds. If you do go this route, I suggest taking Berettas as your sidearms for the higher magazine sizes.
Twice the pain: It’s not too difficult to keep one primary weapon in your hands, and one on your chest. When necessary, you can swap between them, or set down the current one to do something else with your hands. My suggestion is to choose one rifle, load up on mags for it, and then sling a shotgun on your chest (when one is available). Whenever you need to free one hand, continue holding your primary in one hand, and do what you need to do. If you need to free both hands, look for a waist-high object to set your rifle on, or prop it up against a wall. If all else fails, just drop it on the ground.
Load it up: The shotgun can have 7 shells in the tube and one in the chamber. So, load 7 shells, pump it, and load an eighth. Try to keep count as you fire it in combat, and load it up whenever you have a spare moment. Unlike a weapon that is magazine-fed, you can top up the shotgun whenever you like since it’s done one shell at a time. I will usually load a shell after every shot as long as I’m not surrounded.
Pump it up: You actually need to hold down your offhand trigger button and pull back to rack a shell. This prevents you from accidentally ejecting a live shell, but can be confusing at first. When you move the bolt forward again, make sure you move it far enough to hear a click to indicate the next shell is chambered. If you don’t, you won’t be able to fire.
Arrow science: Similar to the shotgun, loading an arrow is not self-explanatory. It’s covered prominently in the tutorial but I’ll explain it here, too. Again, hold down the trigger on your offhand (the one actually holding the bow), then reach your main hand over your shoulder and press that trigger. If you don’t do it this way, you’ll just open your backpack interface (where you could grab an arrow from anyway). If you want to get rid of your arrows, you unfortunately have to do it one at a time. You can do this quickly by opening your backpack, placing one hand over the slot with the arrows, and the other hand over your shoulder to open the backpack again. Keep rapidly alternating both trigger buttons to dump all the arrows (this works for shotgun shells, too).
Arrows are economical: As far as I am aware, arrows are indestructible (unless they are explosive). Which means, if you have the patience to run around and pull all your fired arrows out of dead zombie brains, you technically have infinite ammo. This is good, because you can only carry 15 arrows of one type. You cannot fill a second slot with arrows, or carry both types of arrows at the same time. It is a silent weapon, but once you have the suppressor unlocked, you might not care about that.
A tasting: I like the bow a lot, but it’s hard to justify bringing it if you are hauling both a shotgun and a rifle as I described above, because you will have to drop one of your primaries whenever you want to use the bow. I still think you should try it and see how you like it, though. In the end I think it’s best to choose two of the three options.
HEAT: Red ammo mags contain explosive rounds. So don’t bother picking them up if you haven’t unlocked the ability to use them. I made the mistake of filling up on red mags and found out the hard way in the middle of combat that I couldn’t use them!
Sidearm savant: To me, the purpose of a pistol is to act as a backup when: Forced into close combat, your primary runs dry at a bad time, or you are carrying something important in one hand… all situations where you want to use your secondary one-handed. It’s a good idea to attach a laser sight because of this. It can also be your backup if all your other weapons are dry. If using any pairing of the bow, rifles, and shotgun, this shouldn’t happen. If possible, I keep two pistols of the same type since you have two pistol holsters and it simplifies ammo management if they use the same mags. That second holster basically translates to a fourth pistol mag slot.
Beretta: The Beretta M9 is a pistol that fires 9mm rounds. The Beretta can still one-shot zombies (especially at closer ranges) despite its lower power and smaller caliber rounds. At longer ranges it may take two shots, and it doesn’t have the power to penetrate helmets like the Desert Eagle. It makes up for this with a large magazine, low recoil/high accuracy, and can fire about as fast as you can pull the trigger. Both the Beretta and Desert Eagle are great sidearms.
Deagle: The Beretta M9’s high caliber counterpart, and the only other sidearm choice in this game. The Desert Eagle is basically what you would call a “hand cannon”. It uses .50 caliber rounds that devastate just about anything. Headshots are are likely to end even helmeted zombies. It has three downsides compared to the Beretta: 1.) The recoil is high, making firing it one-handed less accurate than the Beretta, but still manageable (especially in close-range panic situations), 2.) The fire rate is slower, and 3.) It holds almost half as many rounds in its mag as the Beretta.
The giggle switch: The game does tell you how to switch your weapons to automatic fire, but here’s a recap: Move your dominant hand thumbstick all the way forward, then click and hold it while keeping it up. After holding like this for about a second, it will click over to automatic fire. But I did discover by accident that you can do the same thing by moving your offhand to your rifle and pressing the offhand trigger button roughly where the actual fire selector is on the gun (hint: AK47 selector is a lever on the right side).
Release the hounds: All this time, I’ve been working the slide/bolt of my current weapon manually after reloading from empty. The game tells you there is a command for releasing the slide or bolt, but I was confused about how to do it instead of using the fire selector. To use the release, move your dominant hand thumbstick all the way up, and then click the thumbstick while holding it up. Just click it quickly, don’t hold it, otherwise you will just change the fire mode of the weapon. The shotgun (obviously) and the AK47 do not have a bolt release, which makes sense, because I don’t believe AK’s in real life have a bolt release.
Bullet farm: You can refill a mag with the rounds stored in another mag by holding one in each hand, putting them close together, and pressing the top face button on the controller pertaining to which mag you want to empty. For example, to empty the mag in your left hand into the one in your right, press the top face button on your left controller (Y for Oculus). This is mainly useful to fill double mags with normal mags. But, as pointed out by naclasen in the comments, you can share round between magazines of different types if they share the same ammo type. The compatible mag types are: SCAR=Dragunov, M4=LMG=XM9, and Uzi=Deagle (yes, really).

How to Brain Zombies

So it’s time for some practical combat tips! Some might seem obvious… but you might be surprised. The game’s combat is not too difficult. The danger comes in when you start fumbling your weapons or reloads, get surrounded or surprised, or run into a lot of fast zombies. I’ll offer some tips on how to deal with all of that.

The golden rule of zombie slaying: Anyone who’s heard of zombies knows that you should aim for the head. Body shots don’t count for much, and this holds true in this game in a big way. It’ll stagger them and that’s about it. The limbs are good secondary targets though, and I’ll explain why later.
We got a runner!: Any zombie (even the “boss” varieties) can decide to start running, which makes them a much higher threat. Sometimes they will stop running, usually after running in a random direction away from you, but I have no idea what causes it. I know for sure that just hitting or shooting them will stagger them for a second but not stop them running, which is why they are such a high threat. You are fast enough to stay ahead of running zombies (as long as you followed the advice in the “VERY IMPORTANT” section), but they will always be on your tail, so you need to deal with them before they become a problem.
We got a sprinter!: Once you get to the later parts of the game, you will start running into sprinting zombies. They always sprint, are MUCH faster than running zombies, and they look different than normal zombies (there’s only a couple of models as far as I know). Obviously they are more dangerous than running zombies, but you can use the same tactics to deal with them. They are no more sturdy than a regular zombie.
Plan B: If a running zombie is making a bee-line for you, and you don’t think you can hit them in the head before they close the distance, aim for a bigger target: The legs. If you manage to blow off a leg, they will fall down and become a crawling zombie. Which is almost zero threat unless you stand still all day. Later in the game, you may run into hordes of zombies that are ALL runners. Don’t underestimate what a medium or high caliber gun can do to these hordes if you go kneecap-happy.
It’s so ugly!: If a zombie manages to get close to you, it will be extremely difficult to get a headshot with a rifle or even a shotgun. This is especially true with running zombies, because they can keep pace with you as you backpedal, meaning you never gain any distance on them. Guns have a physical presence in this game, so you can actually beat the zombie with your gun to stun them for a moment (even though it doesn’t do any damage). This also means that a zombie can nudge your gun around and prevent you from lining up a headshot. The biggest problem, though, is that the distance between you and the zombie will be shorter than the length of any rifle or shotgun.
Get outta my face!: So, what I like to do in the above situation is: Let go of the rifle with my main hand, while keeping the forward grip held in my offhand so I don’t drop the gun. Then, with my free main hand, grab a pistol and aim it point-blank at the zombie’s face which is significantly easier to do with a pistol (rather than a long gun) in close quarters. You can also go for a melee weapon in the same way, as long as it’s usable one-handed. You should avoid dropping your primary weapon entirely to do this, because you are likely being surrounded in this scenario.
The beatings will continue until morale improves: Aside from the awkward two-hand-exclusive weapons, most melee weapons are actually very useful as backups, ways to preserve ammo, or a way to take out zombies (relatively) quietly. Zombies stagger when hit, so if you go berserker on them, they tend to be pretty defenseless. Be mindful of getting surrounded if you do this. The better melee weapons (such as spiked bats) will take most zombies out in a hit or two, one-handed or not, if you can hit the head. The only melee weapon that feels super weak (that I’ve tried so far) is the machete.
Shell shocked: The two main ways you’ll end up taking damage if using a melee weapon are: Getting surrounded while trying to take down one zombie, or, your weapon bouncing off a helmet. In the later case, the zombie you are fighting is not getting stunned and can attack you back. The game doesn’t give any feedback that your weapon is doing damage to the helmet, so it can seem like your weapon just isn’t working. But a couple hits will usually remove a helmet. The better way to deal with helmeted zombies in melee is to use a side-swing at their head. With good aim, this will go under their helmet get you an instant kill.
Threading the needle: Same as melee weapons, ranged weapons can one-shot zombies if your aim is good. The hitboxes on helmeted zombies seem pretty accurate. So if your aim is good and you hit an exposed part of the head, it’ll be an instant kill. It seems more powerful weapons (Desert Eagle, FN SCAR, Dragunov) will sometimes one-shot zombies right through the helmet, and others always will (explosive ammo, shotgun). Unfortunately, hats made out of fabric or plastic seem to have a kevlar lining in this game, and will also block at least one medium or lower caliber shot.
This is my BOOMSTICK!: Shotguns are second to none when it comes to taking out boss zombies. If you see one of these big boys, get up close and personal, line up that barrel on their dome, and let one loose. Usually one shot is all you need. I’ve gotten into the habit of using one rifle as my primary, and keeping just the 30 shotgun shells the dedicated pouch can hold. And it usually only comes out when there’s a boss zombie. I wouldn’t rely on only the shotgun as your only primary weapon, due to the slow firing and reloading speed.
Free fireworks!: Gas zombies are dangerous because of the gas cloud that surrounds them, their high health, and the big delayed explosion if you accidentally shoot the packs on their backs. That said, those explosions can be used tactically if a gas zombie is in the middle of a crowd of other zombies. Just make sure you’re in a situation where you can be clear of the blast by the time it finally goes off.
Handle with care: Explosive ammunition is very powerful. Similar to using a shotgun, your aim doesn’t have to be very good to take out a zombie with explosive rounds. They will also make pretty quick work of boss zombies, especially if you can keep hitting the head. The downside (other than being much more rare than standard ammo) is that the explosions can damage you if you are close to them, meaning fast zombies can make you a danger to yourself. It’s a good idea to keep a pistol handy with standard ammo for this situation.
Tactics, woman!: Obviously, your most vulnerable spot is the 180 degrees behind you. A good team will reduce this vulnerability by covering each others’ backs. But when things get real crazy, solo or in a group, sometimes it’s a good idea to make a tactical retreat to the nearest doorway or other chokepoint. If you can get yourself into a situation where your back is protected and the zombies in front have to funnel through a doorway, you’ve got plenty of time to calmly deal with even a massive horde.
Poor man’s bunker: Related to the previous tip, there are many situations where you can put walls and a door between you and the zombies. In some of those situations, the door(s) and/or wall(s) will have windows. Smash those windows by bashing/poking your gun through them, and start firing on the zombies outside until it’s safe to exit that door. I used this extensively on the last few missions of the game (which I couldn’t find any teams for, so had to solo). It may be a cheesy tactic, but this is survival of the fittest (and cheese is delicious)!

How to Put Things on Other Things

It’s kind of weird that your have to find a magazine with instructions on how to attach a scope to a rifle, but I don’t mind the system. It is nice in the sense that it adds a small progression mechanic to the game and more reason to explore specific locations and redo certain missions.

It’s a circle!: White circles on your map will lead you to houses with unlocks of various kinds. When you arrive at one, you are looking for either magazines (the reading kind) or backpack satchels. Magazines unlock the ability to use new weapon attachments or ammo types. Backpack satchels will increase your backpack storage slots. Typically, if a white circle contains a magazine unlock, there will be no icons within the white circle. If it has an orange icon of a satchel, it’s for a backpack upgrade. Occasionally, there will also be a pink icon shown, which is for little statuettes that unlock new outfits for the five playable characters.
Circles within circles: It seems that there is always two white circles on each mission. One for the magazine unlock, and one for the backpack unlock. The backpack upgrade can be picked up on any mission that occurs on that map (only once per map). The other circle contains a magazine that can only be acquired on that particular mission. Like the backpack upgrade, the pink outfit icons are available on any mission for that map, and there are 5 for each map (one for each playable character). So far, I think that the best practice is to make the magazine your top priority for each mission, and grab the backpack and outfit upgrades whenever they are on the way to your next destination.
Trophy hunter: On your tablet, under “Extras” is a section for Story mode unlockables, and a section for Survival mode unlockables. In the case of Story the story mode list, some text will actually tell you what chapter and episode they can be found on. Be aware that the white circles and other icons will remain on your map even if you have collected them already. There are three maps in Story mode, and each one has a unique backpack upgrade. With all 3 upgrades, you will have 6 general slots.
That’s Deep…: So, there is a mission called “Deep” in the Sewers. You will know it because your tablet map will be malfunctioning. I’ve been on a few teams who were trying to get the unlockables on that mission, and could not find one of them. At the very start of the mission, you go to a much deeper level of the Sewers. This means that, while the magazine unlock is down there, the backpack upgrade (one of the two white circles) is not. And since your map doesn’t work on this mission, I suggest getting the backpack on another Sewer mission instead. Any mission in the Sewers will do, since there is only one backpack upgrade per map.

The Library of Death

Well, now that I’ve finished Story mode, I have a complete list of unlockables in my tablet computer. Under the “Extras” section, you will be able to see what levels you haven’t gotten the magazine unlock on yet, but it doesn’t tell you what you unlock on that level. Each entry below will start with something like “C2M10” which means “Chapter 2, Mission 10”, followed by the title of that mission. Keep in mind this is only a list of magazines, there are also outfits and backpack slots to unlock:

C0M2 “How to Survive”: Flashlight Attachment – An underbarrel flashlight that is really useful when you need it. The second you get it, never look at full size flashlights again.
C1M3 “Bad Santa”: Sight Small – A red dot sight which you should get ASAP. Some guns are extremely hard to aim without a sight attachment of some kind, because they don’t have iron sights. Note that none of the sights can be attached to either pistol (but the laser and flashlight can).
C1M4 “Monster Joe”: Beretta M9 Explosive Ammo – See the “How to Brain Zombies” section for more info on explosive ammo. Each explosive ammo magazine only unlocks explosive ammo for a particular gun.
C1M5 “Hope”: Laser Sight – You can’t equip both a laser sight and a flashlight attachment on the same gun. If you want a suggestion: I like to equip pistols with laser sights, and rifles and shotguns with flashlights, since they can take red dot or holo sights.
C1M6 “V1V3”: XM8 Explosive Ammo
C1M7 “Fight Together”: Holosight – This, and the Holosight with Magnifier are my favorite sights to use. They don’t fit on an XM8, though.
C2M8 “Sewers”: MP7A1 Explosive Ammo
C2M9 “Dark Water”: Suppressor – Taking your favorite powerful rifle and making it less likely to attract zombies by sound is a nice perk. But it doesn’t sound as badass. A tough decision, indeed.
C2M10 “Deep”: M416 Explosive Ammo – This magazine is a bit of a nightmare to get, because you don’t have access to the map on this level. It’s at the deeper level of the sewers, not at the same level where the mission begins.
C2M11 “Hungry”: Docter Sight – This sight is larger than the red dot sight, which is good, but it also has an integrated circular iron sight on the back of it. This is meant to help you center the red dot. But in my experience, it just hides the red dot from view if you’re not lined up, making it harder to draw a bead than the other sights. Give it a try, see if you like it.
C2M12 “Survive”: Desert Eagle Explosive Ammo
C3M13 “Nowhere”: M233 Sight – Your classic sniper scope. I have never found this useful in normal gameplay (it’s useful for about one minute of a very specific mission). Might be useful against other players in Survival?
C3M14 “Jailhouse Dead”: Holosight With Magnifier – Exactly the same as the normal holosight, but with a 2x magnifier scope. You can flip the scope out of the way and use the holosight normally by moving your finger over it and tapping the trigger button on your controller. I think this scope is more useful than the M233 scope, but both scopes seem to darken the picture even more than it already is, making it hard to see your target.
C3M15 “To Protect and Kill”: Shotgun Explosive Ammo
C3M16 “Black Friday”: SCAR-H Explosive Ammo
C3M17 “The Wall”: AK47 Explosive Ammo
C3M18 “Ticket, Please”: Micro Uzi Explosive Ammo

Dumpster Diving Like a Pro

Moving around the map and scavenging is a big topic all on its own. It’s the main thing you are doing when not actively fighting zombies. So… here’s how to do it a little better!

Discretion is the better part of valor: You don’t have to engage every zombie you see. In fact, if you fire on a zombie that isn’t a threat, the loud gunshot will attract other zombies who will all become threats. So if a zombie hasn’t spotted you, or is moving too slow to be a threat to your safe travel, it’s better to just save the ammo. That said, I won’t judge you for wanting to gun down every zombie you see. I mean… it’s fun.
Keep your head on a swivel: When traveling from place to place, it can be easy to get ambushed, especially when solo. In certain situations, it can be hard to tell when a zombie is chasing you. So check your rear every so often to make sure you don’t get swatted by a zombie the moment you stand still to line up a shot. This is especially important in the wooded area of the Nowhere map, because the soft ground seems to muffle zombie footsteps (I might have been imagining this).
Target acquired: Usually you can tell when a zombie is after you, even if you haven’t seen them. Their footsteps will suddenly be much louder and they’ll make different vocalizations. So keep your ears peeled and hopefully you won’t get surprised.
Anybody home?: If you see a house with lights on inside, generally that means you can break and enter. If you are running low on supplies, it’s a good idea to do so. They usually have a good amount of consumables and weapons/ammo to keep you going. I am fairly certain the door will always be locked, so always keep a drill with you (or at least one person in your group should, if co-op).
What is this I don’t even: I am not 100% sure on this, but I don’t believe containers with multiple vertical drawers ever have any loot in them. That’s good news, because this game is awful at determining which drawer you are trying to open. I’m sure I’ll keep opening them forever anyway. That said, cabinets and other containers often do have loot in them.
Auto acquisition: it seems very rare for civilian cars to have loot in them. Police cars often have firearms in them, and army vehicles very often do. Ambulances usually have medical spray. If you don’t have a flashlight with you, it can be hard to tell if there’s loot in a car. One workaround is to simply stick an empty hand in there and fish around. Any objects you can pick up will be outlined in white.
Shedding some light: Flashlights are usually not required… until you get to the sewers or subway. It is useful to have at least one gun with a flashlight attachment for rooting around in cars and other dark areas, though. I would definitely avoid filling one of your valuable backpack slots with a regular flashlight if you can help it.
Be a good house guest: Always close the door behind you whenever you go into a house, shelter, or room to pick up some loot. Zombies in this game have not figured out how to break down wooden doors, so you’ll be safe to dig through cabinets as long as the house/room you have entered is clear of zombies. You can take your time to loot if you just remember your manners!
DOOR STUCK!!!: Be careful when opening doors if you don’t know what’s on the other side (obviously). Often if there’s a zombie directly on the other side of the door, the door will push them back and to the side, so that they are hiding between the door and the wall. This means that you have a zombie hiding behind the door when you enter the room. So be sure to check behind doors after you open them so you don’t get a nasty surprise.

Playing Well With Others

The best way to play this game, in my opinion, is cooperatively. Solo is very enjoyable, but co-op really amplifies that. Lucky for you, the number of zombie spawns scales based on the number of players on the map. So running solo isn’t much harder than running in a group, though I’d argue that being in a group is easier despite the greater numbers of zombies. Here are some tips to help you and your fellow survivors work better together:

Three’s a crowd: By default, two other players can drop into your game on Story mode at any time (for a total of 3 players). It is possible to go out to the main menu and up that to 4, but it is listed as “experimental” so there may be performance issues there. It is also possible to set the game to solo mode, if you want to.
Medic!: Medical sprays have three uses before they are empty. Most importantly, they can be used either on yourself or another player by aiming at them when you pull the trigger. Share the heals! Note that the nozzle points away from you like a gun, so you’ll have to twist your wrist back to use the spray on yourself.
Communication is everything: If you have an active microphone, by default everyone that is within earshot of you in the game will be able to hear you speak. If you want to communicate at long range, put your hand over your left (by default) chest area and hold down the trigger button. I find the sweet spot for activating the radio is almost at my left armpit. If you did it right you will hear the walkie chime at you, and everyone will be able to hear you speak until you release the trigger. It makes a different sound when you let go of it, so be aware of when you accidentally de-key your radio by moving your hand the wrong way or something, as it will cut your transmission short. If you did it wrong, you probably opened your backpack interface instead. You can move the radio to different spots on your character in the main menu.
Friendly fire is not so friendly: In this game, you can damage your teammates with anything you can damage zombies with. So be careful where you shoot, and err on the side of caution if you are not sure if your teammate is about to cross into your line of fire. Likewise, stay aware of where your teammates are and don’t wander in front of their guns during combat. To reiterate the previous tip, keep in communication with your team so you can warn them of things like explosives, flanking zombies, and low health.
No kill like overkill: Try not to concentrate your fire on zombies you’re pretty sure your teammates are aiming at, unless it’s a boss zombie, or it looks like they’re struggling/in the middle of a reload. It’s better to find a different target, or just hold your fire to conserve the team’s ammo.
Down in front!: If you are in front of your group when you go through a door, and do not immediately go all the way into the room, press the crouch key (or duck for real) so your buddies can shoot over your head. You’ll be glad for the extra fire support if you can just learn to get out of the way!
Handyman: It is possible to get attachments on your guns that you don’t have unlocked with a little help from you friends. Basically, if you or a teammate wants to attach, say, a silencer when it hasn’t been unlocked yet: Hand your weapon and the silencer to a teammate who has unlocked the use of silencers and they can attach it for you, and hand it back. Yes, this is a trust exercise.
This is my gun: The optimal way to handle rifles in co-op is to make sure each player has a different kind. If one player has an M4, another has an AK, and the third has an XM8, it’s pretty clear which player should loot what ammo. This does require communication and cooperation, but it will make your lives easier and ensure you always have plenty of firepower as a group.
Ultra tactical: There’s a good chance you do this already, but if you don’t: Cover your teammate when they are drilling a door. They will get the door open faster if they don’t have to keep looking over their shoulder while they are trying to focus on drilling. Post up behind them and let them know you got their back.

Stuff I Was Too Lazy to Categorize

I have a bunch of other useful tips for you, but they are pretty random and don’t fit a particular category. So consider this the “miscellaneous” section.

Realistic gun volume is better: ‘Nuff said (but you do you).
Better gripping: Go back to the main menu and change the grip mode to “realistic” to make it so that holding a weapon requires you to hold down the grip button. When you release the grip button, you will drop it or holster it. The default mode is awkward if you have played any other VR shooter games for the most part. I also recommend changing grab for ammo to “trigger only” so that you use trigger to pick up magazines and shells and grip for everything else. Makes it much easier to grab your sidearms. Just keep in mind that you will also have to use trigger to grab ammo from your backpack. It also doesn’t seem to work properly with boxes of shotgun shells. Even so, I think the ease of use this options brings in most situations is worth it.
Ghost radio: I’m not sure what happened, exactly, but one of my backpack slots got glitched out by an invisible radio. You see, it’s possible to put radios (the ones playing music) in your backpack so you can pop them out for some tunes while you’re looting a house or you want to be the group’s bard. I did this in the sewers map, and eventually the radio disappeared in my backpack. However, the slot it occupied became unusable. Later on it reappeared and I was able to take it out again. I think what was happening was it was disappearing whenever there was another radio nearby in the game world… I’m not really sure, but keep it in mind if you want to pack a radio.
Too redundant: If you have more than one of the same item in your backpack (such as two healing sprays), you may find that you cannot grab one of them out of your backpack. Obviously, this is a bug, but it’s easy to work around: Grab the other one first, remove it, then you should be able to grab the one you couldn’t grab before.

SURV1V3 Guide