Controls & Keybinds Explained

W A S D moves your character. Mouse look controls the camera. There is no dedicated sprint button — movement speed is fixed, so "running" in prep phase means pathing efficiently, not holding Shift.

Seekers use the same movement scheme while scanning. Lower mouse sensitivity helps wall sweeps — you want smooth horizontal pans, not jerky flicks that miss edge tells.

Crouch (default Ctrl) lets seekers check low angles and helps hiders tuck under furniture during prep. There is no jump-spam meta; vertical spots use map geometry and pose locks instead.

F opens the paint menu: palette, brushes, eyedropper sampling, and surface sliders (metallic / roughness). R opens the pose menu: crouch, wall-flat, curl, and object-mimic options depending on map context.

Left mouse button applies paint strokes and confirms UI selections. Middle mouse button rotates the camera while painting so you can sample distant walls without walking to them.

Inside the paint menu, Spacebar often triggers quick eyedropper sampling (confirm in Settings after patches). Hiders live in third-person while painting; seekers typically hunt in first-person.

Aim at a hider and use left mouse button to tag/interact. Tags require line of sight — you cannot wall-tag through geometry.

Switch between third-person and first-person views using the view toggle shown on your HUD (label varies by patch). First-person helps inspect suspicious edges; third-person helps corner clears.

Experienced seekers crouch-sweep baseboards after chest-height passes fail. Audio cues from footsteps and pose animations matter as much as visual tags.

Wall-flat and stick poses display a HUD prompt for the release key — often Shift or the key shown on screen at lock time. Read the prompt before prep ends; panicking after hunt phase starts costs seconds you do not have.

After releasing, you can re-open pose (R) and paint (F) menus if hunt rules allow movement. Breaking pose during seeker line-of-sight creates motion tells — release only when they look away or rotate rooms.

Height fine-tuning on stick poses sometimes uses up/down arrow keys while attached — test in a private lobby because patch notes occasionally remap these helpers.

Yes. Esc → Settings → Controls exposes the full bind list. Rebind one key at a time and test in a private room before ranked chaos.

After major patches, hit Reset to Defaults, then remap only the keys you customize. Updates sometimes shuffle rarely-used binds while leaving WASD and mouse untouched.

Confirm paint (F) and pose (R) before inviting friends — these two keys decide whether you finish prep in time.

Steam General Discussions thread "Needs Invert Y Axis option Please" (June 2026) reports no native invert-Y setting at community report time — multiple players say the game is difficult or unplayable without it after decades of inverted-mouse muscle memory.

A parallel "Invert Mouse?" thread includes players requesting a simple flip on raw Y input; replies note third-party mouse tools did not reliably fix in-game camera for everyone.

Check Esc → Settings → Controls after each patch for a newly added invert toggle — community pressure is high but verify in your build before assuming it exists. Until then, KB+M players who require invert Y may need to wait for a settings update or use private lobbies with patient friends while testing workarounds.

SlashSkill and NeonLightsMedia confirm no native gamepad support — Steam does not list controller compatibility and menus offer no gamepad toggle at community report time.

Workaround: Steam Input layouts map pad buttons to keyboard/mouse; Steam Deck is Playable (not Verified) when right trackpad emulates mouse for painting.

Competitive prep still favors KB+M or Deck trackpad — thumbstick painting struggles with eyedropper precision and brush resize. See our Controller Support guide for layout tips.

Text chat uses T in many lobbies (confirm on your HUD). Proximity voice chat is supported in-game for party banter — test mic levels before public rooms.

Many groups run Discord alongside Steam voice. Mute one source to avoid echo. Streamers should use push-to-talk so paint-phase whispers do not leak strats.

GameRant's control notes cite the 1 key for manual whistling when hosts enable taunt-related settings. Confirm your bind in Esc → Settings → Controls after patches — community guides warn keybinds can shift between updates.

Forced Taunt is a host lobby option: when enabled, players auto-whistle on an interval (allthings.how reports ~45 seconds by default) to give seekers audio hints in large groups. Manual whistles reset that countdown so you pick a safer moment to make noise.

DualShockers notes the whistle is louder or softer by distance but does not pinpoint your exact position — some hiders use it to misdirect seekers toward the wrong room.

GameRant: once hidden and the hunt phase starts, press 5 to target and follow hunters, or press 4 for full free-roam camera — you can watch the map without moving your body.

After elimination, free-fly spectator camera unlocks fully; whistle becomes cosmetic taunt only (meccha-chameleon.wiki mechanics page) with no effect on hide timers.

Use free camera to learn seeker sweep patterns between rounds — do not confuse spectator vision with fair competitive rules in public lobbies where late joiners reportedly see live positions (see Public Lobby Guide).