HOPE 01 Controls and Keybinds

HOPE 01’s keyboard map looks simple until a dark room, a dry magazine, and an extract timer hit at once. This page is the deep dive for keyboard play as shown in public Early Access and demo footage. Bindings can change in patches; if a prompt on screen disagrees with this table, trust the prompt. For the rest of the loop, return to Getting Started.

The game supports controllers and has Steam Deck reports from players, but the on-screen coaching in footage is keyboard-first. Learn the keyboard verbs even if you later play on a pad: dodge, light, drag-reload, and inventory are the four skills that wipe runs when they are slow.

Default movement and combat

Action	Default	Why it matters
Move	A / D	Side-scrolling Cluster. You are almost always in a 2D plane of corridors and shafts.
Sprint	Shift	Noise and stamina trade. Sprint to extracts, walk when you do not know the next room.
Jump	W	Gaps, crates, and some enemy tells.
Crouch	S	Low windows, cover, and not eating a shot that was aimed at standing height.
Dodge	Double-tap A or D	I-frames and reposition. A post-launch note even called out a single-button dodge bug, so expect this input to stay important.
Fire / knife (held tool)	Left mouse	Context: gun fires, knife stabs, flashlight lights while held.
Melee attack	Space	Dedicated melee even when a gun is equipped. Use it when a mag is empty or an enemy is already in your ribs.
Interact	E	Boxes, doors, fabricator, medical wall units, extracts.
Inventory / menus	B, Tab, or Escape	Opens and closes. Also the way many players first notice the extract timer.

If you take only one row from that table, take dodge. Souls-like tagging on the Steam page is not marketing fluff; crowded halls punish people who only strafe.

Flashlight is a gadget, not a key

Dark rooms are a core threat. Until you find a tactical flashlight that mounts to a gun, light lives in the utility slot:

1. Swap the utility slot to the flashlight.
2. Hold left click to throw a beam.
3. Aim the beam at the enemy so you know where they are.
4. Either fight in the light or memorise the position, swap back, and shoot — the Doom 3 tax.

Holding light means you are not shooting. That is why Gadgets ranks a gun-mounted light so highly, and why the Loadout Checklist asks whether your kit can see. Blind fire wastes ammo you cannot reprint until you extract.

Reloading is inventory work

HOPE 01 does not treat magazines as an abstract ammo number. You load them by dragging loose ammo onto the magazine in the inventory grid. Then you put that mag on the gun or into a reachable tile.

Practical habits:

• Pre-load mags in the hideout. Mid-fight dragging is how people die on stairs.
• Keep ammo types honest. A mag labelled for heavy rounds is dead weight on a light pistol.
• Scan unusual mags even if you will not equip them today. The Fabricator learns item types once; a Failance-style heavy mag is a future print.
• Do not let empty mags clog the grid. Empty metal still occupies tetris squares.

If the gun feels “broken,” you probably have an empty mag seated or the wrong ammo type. Check the grid before you check the wiki.

Inventory, stash, and world containers

Three different spaces get confused:

• World loot sits on floors, in wall boxes, and on corpses. E picks it up if there is grid space. If nothing happens, the grid is full or you are targeting the wrong pixel.
• Run inventory is the tetris bag you will lose on death. Fabrics, guns, food, mags.
• Hideout stash is the tab you sort after a successful extract. Move keepers here before you queue the next raid.

Footage shows players dropping guns on the fabricator floor because they dragged onto the wrong slot. Drag slowly. Blue dots mean “unscanned,” not “broken.” After scanning, the item still exists; put it in stash or back on your body.

Medical boxes on walls are world objects. The prompt in the demo is literally: close inventory (B / Tab / Escape), look at the wall, press E. If you are in the grid, you cannot see the box.

Extract HUD

The Manorial Extract timer lives at the top of the screen. B or Tab is the reminder the tutorial uses. Missing that train does not instantly kill you; it forces you to another extract. That is a navigation problem, which is why this page links How to Extract and Hab Cluster Map instead of repeating rail lore here.

Do not open a full inventory sort when the clock is under a minute unless you are already standing on the platform. Sort in hideout. In the Cluster, only rearrange if you need a mag or a light right now.

Combat flow that actually works

A clean room looks like this:

1. Listen and peek. Sprint is optional; information is not.
2. If the room is dark, light it. Identify the enemy silhouette.
3. Dodge the first lunge (double-tap away or through, depending on spacing).
4. Shoot bursts that respect muzzle velocity and RoF. Penetration matters against clustered or armoured targets; spraying a wall wastes the mag you just dragged.
5. If they close, Space melee or knife. Do not reload in their face unless you already dodged to a gap.
6. Loot only after the room is quiet. Fabrics first, unscanned items second, ammo third.

Boss versions of this flow are on Boss Fights. Weapon stat context is on the Weapons Tier List.

Controller and Steam Deck notes

Steam lists single-player, achievements, and family sharing as the headline features. Controller support is present in the product and players have reported clean Steam Deck sessions, including a launch-week review that called Deck play excellent. Official Steam Deck verification may still read as unknown. If you play on a pad:

• Rehearse dodge and inventory in the hideout until muscle memory exists.
• Map flashlight to a hold you will not confuse with fire.
• Accept that drag-reload is slower on a stick; pre-load more mags.

Settings hygiene

The install is tiny (about 70 MB on Windows, 400 MB listed for Linux storage). That does not mean you should ignore frame pacing. A Steam thread already described four-digit FPS making input feel delayed. If the character lags behind your tap:

• Cap FPS in the GPU driver or OS.
• Disable exotic overlays that fight a 70 MB pixel-art client.
• Re-test dodge. If double-tap registers as a walk, the problem is likely framerate or key repeat, not “the game has no dodge.”

Once the hands work, the remaining deaths are routing deaths. Take the Beginner Walkthrough and stop practising inputs on live loot.