Content Warning stopped being a PC-only game on April 1, 2026, when Landfall shipped it to PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, Switch, and Switch 2 at $9.99 with full cross-play against the existing PC version [9]. That’s the reason this guide exists in its current form: a huge wave of players are diving into the Old World for the first time on a controller, and most of the beginner advice still floating around online was written in 2024 for a keyboard-and-mouse crowd that already knew the quota system by heart. This guide is verified against patch 1.23.0, the update that shipped alongside and just after the console launch [10].
What Is Content Warning?
Content Warning is a 1-4 player co-op horror game where the objective isn’t survival for its own sake — it’s footage. You and up to three others dive into a cursed zone called the Old World, film whatever tries to kill you, and upload the recording to SpöökTube for views and ad revenue [12][11]. Every run is capped at three in-game days; miss the view quota by day three and the run ends [12]. It’s frequently compared to Lethal Company and R.E.P.O. for its physics-driven monster AI and proximity voice chat, though the camera-first objective — record danger instead of just surviving it — is what actually separates it from both. If you’ve played either of R.E.P.O. or Lethal Company, the core loop of gear up, dive, extract will feel familiar even if the win condition doesn’t.
The console versions require the platform’s online subscription (PlayStation Plus, Xbox Game Pass, Nintendo Switch Online) to play with others, and the game only matches you with players running an identical mod setup — vanilla players never get paired with modded lobbies [1]. On Steam, Content Warning sits at 93% positive across more than 35,000 reviews [11], which is unusually high for a game this chaotic — a sign the difficulty spikes below are intentional, not bugs.
Quick Start Checklist
Do these in order on your first dive:
- Customize your ASCII face and confirm your mic works — proximity voice chat and one specific monster counter (see Ear, below) both depend on it.
- Buy a flashlight before anything else if your starting cash allows it. You cannot see monsters coming without one.
- Assign one player as camera holder for the whole dive — don’t pass it around mid-run.
- Film everything you see for at least a few seconds, even things that don’t look scary. Content Value rewards duration, not just danger (see the mechanism below).
- Watch your oxygen and camera battery. Oxygen drains at a fixed 0.2% per second in the Old World — about 8 minutes 20 seconds per dive — and neither it nor your camera battery refills until you resurface [2].
- Extract before you panic-run. A dead player with the camera in hand loses that footage; a camera dropped and recovered on the next dive does not [1].
- Upload your footage at the Quota Viewing Station before ending the day — it shows your current day, accumulated Content Value, and money [3].
How the Camera and Content Value System Actually Work
Content Value — the number that becomes views and ad revenue — is calculated from two variables: how much of the screen your subject occupies, and how long you keep filming it [3]. This is the single most misunderstood mechanic in the game. New players assume any footage of a monster is good footage; in practice, a monster that fills the frame at close range for several seconds scores dramatically higher than the same monster glimpsed for half a second from across a room. The duration curve has diminishing returns rather than scaling forever — roughly 9 seconds of continuous, well-framed footage already reaches about 95% of its maximum scoring modifier [3], so there’s little point holding a shot on the same subject much past that once you’ve got a clean take.
One rule catches almost every new player at least once: Artifacts (in-world collectibles like Old Paintings, Radios, and Animal Statues) are worth four times less Content Value if you film them without holding them in your hand [4]. If you’re filming loose loot lying on the ground instead of picking it up first, you’re leaving most of that footage’s value on the table.
The starting quota is 300 points of Content Value [3] — low enough that one well-framed close encounter with almost anything can clear it, which is why panicking and fleeing every monster on sight is actually the wrong instinct for your first dive.
The Old World’s Monsters: What’s Actually Dangerous
31 named enemies currently populate the Old World [5], and the beginner mistake is treating all of them as equally lethal. They aren’t. The table below covers three you’ll meet early and often — one is nearly harmless, one has a specific counter most players never learn, and one you should never try to outrun directly.
| Monster | Actual threat | What works |
|---|---|---|
| Mouthe | Low — jumpscare rating 1/lowest, its scream has zero mechanical effect despite what you’ll hear in chat [6] | Turn and look at it. It dislikes eye contact and backs off — don’t waste Shock Stick battery on it [6] |
| Ear | Moderate — 20 damage per pounce, hunts by eyesight, not sound, despite the community myth that staying quiet keeps you safe [8] | Get loud. Shout or blow into your mic (or use a Shock Stick if you’re on a controller without voice chat) — muting your mic does nothing, you need to make noise [8] |
| Big Slap | High — 51 damage per hit, a grab attack that totals 110 damage, and it’s faster than you [7] | Never flee in a straight line. Lure it toward an unreachable ledge and jump the instant it leaps — it overshoots and lands behind you [7] |
The pattern across all three: read the wiki entry before you improvise a counter. Community folklore about this game is often wrong in specific, confident ways — the “stay silent around Ear” advice is the clearest example, and it’s the opposite of what actually works [8].
Gear Priorities for Day One
You start with limited cash, so day-one purchases matter more than day-three ones, when footage revenue has caught you up. Here’s what to prioritize:
| Item | Priority | Skip if |
|---|---|---|
| Flashlight | Buy first, always | Never skip — you cannot safely film in the dark |
| Boom Mic / Reporter Mic | Buy once you’ve cleared your first quota | Your team already has a designated camera holder getting clean audio incidentally |
| Shock Stick | Buy before your second dive | Your squad has reliable mic access — it’s a backup counter to Ear, not a primary one [8] |
| Defibrillator | Buy once you can afford it without skipping the flashlight or mic | You’re not planning aggressive, close-range filming that risks downs |
Every item above is bought with ad revenue from footage you’ve already extracted [1][12] — so day one is about surviving to extract at least one usable clip, not about buying everything at once.
New Console Player or Returning PC Veteran? What Crossplay Actually Changes
Crossplay means your lobby might mix a Switch 2 player, a PS5 player on their first-ever dive, and a PC veteran who’s been farming Ear since 2024. Advice that works for one of those doesn’t automatically work for the others.
| Player type | Priority |
|---|---|
| New player (any platform) | Skip the Shock Stick your first two dives. Learn the flashlight-and-camera loop and the eye-contact/noise counters above before adding a third tool to manage |
| Casual player | Set a hard extraction timer with your group — “we leave when the camera hits 40% battery” not “we leave when we feel scared.” Removes the panic-decision that usually loses footage |
| Hardcore / optimizer | Chase the 9-second duration-curve plateau on high-Content-Value subjects instead of longer takes — past that point you’re risking oxygen and battery for near-zero extra score [3] |
| Completionist | Hold every found Artifact in-hand while filming it rather than leaving it on the ground — it’s worth 4x more that way and you’ll want the full Artifact catalog eventually [4] |
Console-specific note: patch 1.23.0 changed what happens after a failed quota — the lobby no longer automatically reopens the way it used to [10]. If your group hits an odd lobby behavior after a failed run, confirm you’re on 1.23.0 or later before assuming it’s a crossplay-specific bug.
Common Mistakes That Cost You a Run
Most failed first runs trace back to one of these, not to the monsters themselves:
- Filming from too far away. A distant, small-in-frame monster scores a fraction of what the same monster scores up close [3] — closing distance is scary but it’s also the entire point of the game’s scoring.
- Losing the camera with the carrier. If the whole team dies holding the camera, that footage is gone; if it’s dropped and the team survives, you can recover it on the next dive [1]. Prioritize retrieving the camera over retrieving a downed teammate’s body if you have to choose.
- Treating every monster the same. Fleeing from a Mouthe wastes a dive; standing your ground against a Big Slap wastes a player. Match your response to the specific threat, not a generic “run from everything” instinct.
- Burning flashlight battery on empty corridors. It only recharges on the surface — leave it off until you actually need to see something [1].
- Zero footage after Day 1. If your first dive goes badly and you surface with nothing, don’t panic-buy gear you can’t afford on day two. One clean, close-range clip of even a low-tier monster like Mouthe clears the 300-point starting quota [3][6] — you don’t need a dramatic Big Slap encounter to stay in the run.
- Ignoring the cost of dying. Getting revived on Sky Island isn’t free — it charges a Hospital Bill equal to your money times 0.1 times the number of players killed that dive [2]. A wipe with a full team doesn’t just cost the footage, it taxes whatever cash you’d already banked.
FAQ
Is Content Warning worth buying on console if I’ve never played it on PC?
Yes — the console versions launched with full crossplay against PC day one [9], so you’re not joining a smaller, separate player pool. The $9.99 console price is a flat rate, while PC pricing on Steam moves around with sales, but you’re getting the same build and the same monster roster either way, not a stripped-down port.
Why does my footage score low views even when I filmed a scary monster?
Almost always distance and duration, not monster choice. Content Value scales with how much screen space the subject fills and how long you hold a clean shot, up to a diminishing-returns point around 9 seconds [3] — a huge monster glimpsed for one second scores worse than a small one filmed close-up for five.
Should I mute my mic to avoid attracting monsters?
It depends which monster you mean, and this is where most players get it backwards. Ear reacts to sight, not sound, and is actually deterred by you getting loud, not staying quiet [8] — muting does nothing for it. Of the monsters this guide checked directly against the wiki, none are confirmed to be drawn in by voice volume — treat a blanket “stay silent” rule as folklore rather than a verified strategy for every monster you’ll meet.
What happens if I fail the quota by day three?
The run ends [12]. The exact post-failure consequences beyond that aren’t detailed in Landfall’s own FAQ [1], so treat quota failure as a hard stop rather than assuming a soft penalty — play day three like it’s your last chance to extract usable footage.
Sources
- Landfall. Content Warning FAQ. Landfall Games
- Content Warning Wiki. Player (Oxygen, Health, Hospital Bill). wiki.gg
- Content Warning Wiki. Quota and Content Value. wiki.gg
- Content Warning Wiki. Items and Artifacts. wiki.gg
- Content Warning Wiki. Enemies. wiki.gg
- Content Warning Wiki. Mouthe. wiki.gg
- Content Warning Wiki. Big Slap. wiki.gg
- Content Warning Wiki. Ear. wiki.gg
- Gematsu. Content Warning for PS5, Xbox Series, Switch 2, Xbox One, and Switch Now Available. Gematsu
- Nintendo Everything. Content Warning 1.23.0 Update Announced, Patch Notes. Nintendo Everything
- Valve. Content Warning. Steam
- Content Warning Wiki. Main Page (Core Loop, Run Structure). wiki.gg
I've been playing video games for over 20 years, spanning everything from early PC titles to modern open-world games. I started Switchblade Gaming to publish the kind of accurate, well-researched guides I always wanted to find — built on primary sources, tested in-game, and kept up to date after patches. I currently focus on Minecraft and Pokémon GO.