Welcome to Dead Cells, a challenging roguelike Metroidvania where you play as a reanimated corpse trying to escape a cursed island. You'll dash, dodge, and hack your way through procedurally generated biomes, facing hordes of enemies and tough bosses. Each run is a fresh start, but you'll unlock permanent upgrades and new abilities like the Vine and Ram runes, allowing you to access new areas and discover deeper secrets on your quest.
This guide is your roadmap through the chaos. We'll cover everything from essential pickups like healing items and scrolls to permanent upgrades and runes that unlock new paths. Whether you're struggling with a specific boss, trying to find all the blueprints, or just want to optimize your build for survival, we've got the tips and strategies to help you master the island and uncover all its secrets.
General Tips and Tricks
Discover essential Dead Cells tips and tricks to survive and thrive. Learn about cell grinding, permanent upgrades, optimal stat distribution (8-7-13), and damage reduction for easier runs.
Dead Cells is a challenging roguelike where death means starting over. Due to its random nature, levels and enemy placements change each run, requiring adaptability. However, several general tips can improve your experience across all playthroughs.
Cells and Upgrades
Grind For Cells
Cells are the primary currency used to purchase permanent upgrades and better weapons from The Collector. Unlike other currencies, you retain purchased upgrades between runs. These include carrying more health potions, keeping some gold after death, and unlocking more powerful weapons in the random pool. Since you lose all held cells upon death, it's best to spend them immediately. Grind cells by killing every enemy encountered and invest them in upgrades whenever you find The Collector. Even if you can't afford a full upgrade, partially investing cells counts towards the final cost.
Break The Collector's Door
The Collector's door, which prevents you from leaving with cells, can be broken by attacking it a few times. This allows you to save cells for the Blacksmith's valuable upgrades, especially if you haven't died before reaching him.
Prioritize Permanent Upgrades
When spending cells, prioritize permanent upgrades over temporary weapon or skill pickups. The Collector offers upgrades that enhance future runs, such as increasing potion capacity or allowing item rerolls in shops. The Blacksmith permanently improves the drop rate of higher-quality items. These persistent benefits make your character stronger and simplify the game more than most found gear.
Optimizing Your Build
The 8 - 7 - 13 Setup
Scrolls found in-game increase your Brutality, Tactics, or Survival stats. While it seems beneficial to collect all scrolls, exceeding a certain point can be detrimental. Enemies scale in damage with each scroll collected. Beyond a threshold, the increased damage enemies deal outweighs the health and damage boosts you gain. A balanced approach is recommended, with a sweet spot around 8 Brutality, 7 Tactics, and 13 Survival. This spread, tested against the final boss, significantly reduces incoming damage, making the game more manageable, especially for new players.
Damage Reducing Items
Items provide attack and defense boosts, but damage-reducing items are high-stakes, especially on lower difficulties (0-3 Cells). Familiarize yourself with these items and prioritize acquiring them to increase your survivability. There is a cap of 75% damage reduction, allowing you to take approximately four times more hits. Achieving this cap significantly eases progression.
Items that offer damage reduction include:
- All level 3 or greater amulets
- Corrupted Power
- Fire Grenade
- Flashbang
- Force Shield
- Hokuto's Bow
- Ice Bow
- Ice Grenade
- KO Shield
- Shove Shield
- Tonic
- Toxic Cloud
- Vampirism
A good amulet combined with two strong damage reduction items can get you close to the 75% cap. Upgrading these items at the Blacksmith increases their effectiveness. Even if you don't plan to use a shield or bow, holding onto a damage-reducing item provides valuable defensive benefits.
Prisoner's Quarters
Master the Prisoner's Quarters in Dead Cells. Learn enemy strategies, find blueprints like the Quick Bow, and understand scroll mechanics for your first run.
The Prisoner's Quarters is the starting area in Dead Cells, serving as a tutorial level. You'll always begin here, and dying will return you to this room. Initially, you'll have a Rusty Sword I and a Prisoner's Collar I, both weak starting items. You can find a Beginner's Bow I and an Old Wooden Shield I nearby. Upgrades exist to randomize your starting melee and ranged weapons from your entire pool.
- 1Upon starting, turn around and climb the back wall of the initial room to find the Quick Bow blueprint. This is the first blueprint you can acquire and a significant upgrade. Blueprints can be turned in to the Collector after finishing the Prisoner's Quarters for the first time to unlock them for purchase with cells, expanding your available weapons and items.
- 2Explore the Prisoner's Quarters thoroughly to find two Scrolls of Power. These scrolls increase one of three stats: Brutality, Tactics, or Survival, providing health and weapon/skill boosts. Spreading scrolls offers balanced health and attack, while focusing on one stat grants higher damage but lower health.
- 3Defeat all enemies to collect cells, which are used for purchasing blueprints, and to find potential blueprint drops.
Enemy Types:
- Zombie: Slow-moving, melee swipes, leaping attacks. Roll through their leaps and slash. Easily stunned.
- Undead Archer: Fires slow-moving arrows. Duck or roll to avoid.
- Grenadier: Throws bombs that travel through walls and explode after a delay. Can be dangerous in groups. Avoid the slow-moving bombs.
- Shield Bearer: Immune to frontal attacks due to a shield. Charges forward. Dodge roll behind them and attack.
Higher Difficulty Enemy Types:
- 1 Cell: Inquisitors replace Undead Archers.
- 4 Cells: Bombadiers replace Grenadiers.
Level Details:
- Alternate Level Possibilities: None
- Exit Possibilities: The Promenade of the Condemned, The Toxic Sewers
- Scrolls: 2 Scrolls of Power, 0 Dual-Stat Scrolls
- Timed Doors: None
- Practice your dodge rolls and basic attacks in this area as enemies are relatively easy.
- Grinding for cells and blueprints early on is high-stakes for improving your item pool.
- Pay attention to the color-coding of scrolls to understand which stat they boost.
Walkthrough
Navigate Dead Cells' procedurally generated worlds! Learn enemy patterns, find guaranteed objectives like timed doors, and understand biome progression to survive.
Hey there! So, Dead Cells is a roguelike, which means things change every time you play. Because of that, I can't give you a super detailed, room-by-room guide like I usually do. The levels and enemies shuffle around, but don't worry! I can still give you the lowdown on what to expect, the general strategies that work, and point out the things that *always* show up, no matter how random the run gets.
You'll always face a specific set of enemies in each biome, even if their exact placement is different each time. Think of it like this: the game pulls from a specific enemy 'menu' for each area. So, even if the room layout is totally new, you can use the same tactics to deal with the baddies. Most enemies have predictable attack patterns, and once you learn 'em, you'll be able to handle them no matter where they pop up.
There are also some things that are guaranteed to be in a level, even if their location shifts. For example, in the Promenade of the Condemned, there's always a timed door that holds a specific blueprint. And in the very first biome, Prisoner's Quarters, there's always an alternate exit leading to the Toxic Sewers. These constants are super helpful, even if you have to hunt around for them a bit each run. This guide will cover those consistent objectives, any tricky obstacles, and general combat tips for each biome.
The order of the biomes themselves is also fixed. After Prisoner's Quarters, you'll always head to one of two second-level biomes, and you can't explore the other one in that same run. The same applies to the third and fourth levels. Below's a table showing all the biomes, where they fit into a run, and how to get to them. It's super important to know this progression!
| Biome | Entrances | Exits | Rune |
| First Level | |||
| Prisoners' Quarters | None | Promenade of the Condemned (No Requirement), Toxic Sewers (Vine Rune Required) | None |
| Second Levels | |||
| Promenade of the Condemned | Prisoners' Quarters | The Ramparts (Vine Rune), The Ossuary (Teleportation Rune), Prison Depths (Spider Rune) | Vine |
| Toxic Sewers | Prisoners' Quarters | The Ramparts (No Requirement), Ancient Sewers (Ram Rune) | Teleportation |
| Third Levels | |||
| Ramparts | Promenade of the Condemned, Toxic Sewers | Black Bridge (No Requirement), Insufferable Crypt (Three Boss Stem Cell door) | None |
| Prison Depths | Promenade of the Condemned | The Ossuary (No Requirement) | None |
| Ossuary | Promenade of the Condemned, Prison Depths | Black Bridge (No Requirement) | Ram |
| Ancient Sewers | Toxic Sewers | Insufferable Crypt (No Requirement) | None |
| Fourth Levels | |||
| Black Bridge | The Ramparts, The Ossuary | Stilt Village (No Requirement), Slumbering Sanctuary (Spider Rune) | Challenger |
| Insufferable Crypt | Ancient Sewers, The Ramparts | Slumbering Sanctuary (No Requirement), Graveyard (Spider Rune) | None |
| Fifth Levels | |||
| Stilt Village | Black Bridge | Clock Tower (No Requirement), Forgotten Sepulcher (Teleportation Rune) | None |
| Slumbering Sanctuary | Black Bridge, Insufferable Crypt | Clock Tower (No Requirement), Forgotten Sepulcher (No Requirement) | Spider |
| Graveyard | Insufferable Crypt | Forgotten Sepulcher (No Requirement) | None |
| Sixth Levels | |||
| Clock Tower | Stilt Village, Slumbering Sanctuary | Clock Room (No Requirement) | None |
| Forgotten Sepulcher | Stile Village, Slumbering Sanctuary, Graveyard | Clock Room (No Requirement) | None |
| Seventh Level | |||
| Clock Room | Clock Tower, Forgotten Sepulcher | High Peak Castle (No Requirement) | None |
| Eighth Level | |||
| High Peak Castle | Clock Room | Throne Room (No Requirement) | None |
| Ninth Level | |||
| Throne Room | High Peak Castle | None | Homunculus |
Promenade of the Condemned
Learn how to navigate the Promenade of the Condemned in Dead Cells, including enemy types, item locations, and the timed door reward.
- 1At the start of the level, jump onto the building to your right, then jump back to the roof of the starting building to reach a higher area.
- 2Climb onto the ledge on the left side of the starting building's roof and ascend to a room containing the Assassin's Dagger blueprint.
- 3Explore both the above-ground and underground sections of the level, as underground areas often contain chests, items, shops, power-ups, and enemies.
- 4Prioritize defeating Protectors first, as they create force fields that make other nearby enemies invulnerable.
- 5Dodge the attacks of Bats and defeat them with a single hit.
- 6To defeat Runners, dodge their slash attacks, attack from behind, or use weapons that slow them down. Lure them away from other enemies if possible.
- 7Be prepared for elite enemies, which are larger, more powerful versions of normal enemies that can summon minions and teleport after taking half damage. They drop cells and items that are two levels higher than standard drops.
- The Promenade of the Condemned has two timed doors: one at 2 minutes offering 12 cells and the Assault Shield Blueprint, and another at 2 minutes offering a Scroll of Power.
- Cell doors in this level include a Weapon Shop (1 Cell), a chest (3 Cells), and another chest (4 Cells). There is also a cell door requiring 2 Cells.
- Enemy types include Zombie, Grenadier, Bat, Protector, and Runner. On higher difficulties, Bombardiers and Kamikaze enemies appear (1 Cell), and Dark Trackers replace Zombies (4 Cells).
- This level contains 1 Scroll of Power and 2 Dual-Stat Scrolls.
- The level exits to The Ramparts, The Prison Depths, or The Ossuary.
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