What Does Sanity Do in Phasmophobia?

Do you think being a ghost hunter is an easy task? Sure, the TV shows make it look pretty simple. You hole up in an abandoned location for a night, yell at the slightest noise, and sit alone in the occasional pitch-black room. Some may note the mental drain the experience can have, but what they leave out is what that pull on one’s sanity does for the supernatural entity lurking about. Phasmophobia, however, does depict how a hunter’s sanity can make them fodder for angry spirits.

In Phasmophobia, sanity serves as a sort of life bar. The lower it gets, the more in danger you are of succumbing to the very specter you’re hunting. As you’re exploring the haunted halls of this online survival horror game, it’s important to understand how sanity works, what causes it to drop, and how you can recover some of it.

What Effects Sanity?

Hunting murderous spirits is stressful enough, but you can slow down the mental drain it has on you. To prevent drastic sanity loss:

• Stay in lit areas or carry a Candle
• Don’t travel alone
• Move away from any ghost activity
• Hide out in the Van

Unfortunately, there are plenty of factors working against you. The biggest of them is the

unpredictability of the spirit. While standing in the dark by yourself will slowly chip away at your sanity,

witnessing ghost activity like flickering lights or even a full-on manifestation will quickly drive you mad.

Making matters worse, some ghost types have a passive ability that drains your sanity faster. Yurei, for example, drive hunters mad at a much quicker rate. Even using a Ouija board will negatively affect your sanity.

Can I Restore Sanity?

Thankfully, Kinetic Games was sure to give one surefire way of replenishing part of your sanity. Sanity Pills help restore your sanity by 40%, but they come at a cost. Each bottle of pills, which is good for one use, costs $45. That means you’ll need to make some money during your haunted escapades.

You absolutely want Sanity Pills on hand in larger locations like the Brownstone High School, Asylum, and Prison. On higher difficulties, they’re even more important. You can carry four bottles of Sanity Pills on you at all times, and we recommend you have at least one per person waiting in the van.

What Happens if I Have Low Sanity?

Now, sanity isn’t the same as a life bar. When it’s fully depleted, you won’t instantly die. However, it does make you a primary target for the spirit – which increases the likelihood that you won’t leave the location alive. Players will diminished sanity will attract more ghost activity. Sometimes, this can be a good thing if you’re still hunting for Evidence or trying to complete an Optional Objective. In some instances, you may want one player to have lower sanity to draw the ghost out.

But, you do also have to be careful of the ghost’s Hunt Phase. When things start to go wonky, lights flicker, and the ghost manifests, the spirit may start to hunt down players and kill them, starting with the one with the lowest sanity level. While having higher sanity won’t keep you off the ghost’s kill list or prevent the Hunt Phase from starting, it makes it a little easier to escape alive.

Knowing what sanity in Phasmophobia does and how you can manage it is vitally important to surviving a ghost hunt. Keep this information in the back of your mind, and you could become quite the prolific paranormal investigator.