Little Nightmares – The Lair

The second area in Little Nightmares is The Lair. In The Lair you encounter the long-armed enemy that cannot see, but will smell your presence and find you. Use the enemy’s lack of sight to run around it to avoid capture while you move through The Lair in Little Nightmares.

There are very few 100 percent safe areas, but you can stay on the move anytime the long-armed enemy is close and it will have difficulty catching you, so you can make it through The Lair with ease.

Little Nightmares – The Lair

The Lair

• Nomes: 3
• Statues: 2

Head up the stairs in the background and through the first door on the right (instead of continuing up the third flight of stairs. In the room to the right there’s a Nome hiding under the desk, but you can’t catch it just yet. Walk toward it so that it moves to the next hiding place, then climb up to the top of the desk using the draws on either side.

Light the lamp on the right side of the desk and grab it or the chair in the room and move either to the fourth tile to the left of the wardrobe on the far right where the Nome ran to. When you stand on this tile a doorway opens in the wardrobe.

Place something on the tile and continue through the wardrobe to find a room with a large metal eye in the background. Don’t worry about the Nome hiding behind the control panel so long as you make it run out of the room so you can catch him later.

Climb on top of the control panel in the middle of the room and push the button in the middle to cycle through several different rooms in the facility to make note of some dangers and some Nomes.

Head back to the left and up the next flight of stairs to find an air locked door. To the far left is the Nome you’ve been tracking. Give it a hug then continue up the next flight of stairs. When you reach the next level, climb on top of the box and into the small opening to the right.

Take the suitcase in the middle of the floor and move it to the far right so you can reach the switch on the wall. Pull the switch to lower the bed in the background, then use the bed to climb up the draws to the top.

Your objective is to drop down to the table in the middle of the room, but first jump across to the adjacent set of draws, then jump over to the shelf just above and to the left. Grab the statue on the shelf and break it, then drop back down to the drawers, then down to the table so the fall doesn’t kill you.

Pick up the key on the table and drop down to the floor with it. Push open the doorway to the right that looks like the wall, then use the key to open the door to the far right.

Pick up the monkey on the floor of the next room and throw it (hold and release X or A) at the button on the wall to the right to raise the elevator.

Take the monkey into the elevator with you so you can hit the button again once you’re inside. Make your way out of the elevator to the left and light the lantern just after you have to duck under the pipe. As you walk your stomach will start to hurt again. Move into the next room to the left and eat the meat in the cage, which gets you temporarily trapped.

When you wake up, knock the cage to the left and right until it falls off and breaks. Head through the small opening in the doorway to the left and light the lantern outside, then go back into the previous room. Move the cage to the right (with the child in it) and push it under the pulley hanging from the ceiling on the right to open the door.

Don’t let go of the pulley once the door opens, instead swing left and right to build momentum so you can jump over to the door and make it through before it closes.

Once the door closes behind you, climb up the door and jump over to the right once you reach the level above. Light the candle on the shelf to the left of the bathtub, then head through the small opening to the far right.

In the next room is an enemy with long arms, but it can’t see. It relies on smell and sound to determine where you’re at. You have time to sneak up to it while staying near the foreground, then run to the small hole on the far right when it eventually smells you.

In the next room, pick up the lever on the floor and move it to the post near the left side of the room where there’s a hole to insert the lever. Once the lever is in place you can turn it to open the hatch on the floor to the right. When the hatch is almost completely open, the enemy from the previous room will rush in.

Quickly run over to the hatch and drop down the hole.

Crawl to the right and drop down into the next open area. You can climb up the crates to the right, but before you do that climb up the ladder slightly in the background on the right.

When you reach the top of the ladder, move across the boxes toward the foreground, then climb up into the small passage as you see another Nome run off to the right.

Drop down into the room to the right and hug the Nome, then drop down into the hatch on the right. This places you in the same area you’d be if you had climbed the boxes instead of taking the ladder. Continue to the right and drop down into the next room.

This room is filled with shoes and difficult to move through. There are several suitcases on top of the shoes that you need to use as safe havens because an enemy burrows through the shoes to catch you.

As long as you jump off of each suitcase and make a beeline for the next suitcase, climbing up as soon as possible, you won’t get caught. Remember to pan the camera to the right so you can see where the next suitcase is located.

Move into the next room and up the stairs on the right. As you move through the next hallway the long-armed enemy will start chasing after you.

The elevator you came down is just ahead so keep running until you reach the elevator, then crouch and hide in the box in the background on the right.

In the next room there’s a toy box in the middle, and to the right of the toy box is a loose plank on the floor near the toy monkey. Push the toy box away from the loose plank, then stand on the right side of the plank to drop down into the crawl space beneath the floor boards.

Continue to the right, moving past the makeshift ladder that leads back to the floor above. When you can move into the background (which is blurry at first), look in the far left corner to find a statue you can break.

Break the statue, then head back to the makeshift ladder and climb up to the floor above. Keep in mind, the long-armed enemy is still patrolling the floor.

You need to run through the small hole to the right, then quickly climb up the drawers on the far right of the adjacent room. Once you’re at the top of the drawers, climb up on top of the shelves in the immediate background to make sure you’re out of the reach of the enemy.

Move the box out of the way so you can squeeze into the hole on the right, then continue into the next room. There are several clocks in the room, but all you need to do is head to the far right and push open the door so you can squeeze through.

The long-armed enemy will appear, but if you move between the this room and the clock room you should have no difficulty avoiding him.

Head to the far right and into the next room, and crawl under the desk here to see a Nome run off. Head back to the far left to find the Nome next to the stack of books in the middle of the room near the left wall (not the stack all the way to the left in the foreground).

You may have to move some books to see the Nome. Hug the Nome, then head back to the far right side of the room and climb up the stack of books. Jump over to the furniture on the right, climb up to the top, light the candle and jump over to the swinging piano when it’s close. Jump over to the bookshelf on the left and climb to the top, but be careful because the long-armed enemy appears when you get near the top.

Wait for the enemy to move before you follow behind it, and notice the opening in the pillar for another lever arm (you’ll find that soon). In the library room to the left you can climb many of the book stacks and crawl through the bottom shelf of the book shelves to avoid the long-armed enemy.

There are also two candles, one on the lowest shelf in the middle of the room and one on a high shelf on the right side of the room. Be sure to light both before you move on.

The best way to handle this room is to climb the stack of books in the foreground when you first enter the room, crawl along the upper level of the bookshelves, then knock over the toy monkey and quickly move to the far left when the enemy comes to investigate the sound.

Climb up the stack of books on the far left side of the room to crawl through the small opening and drop into the room to the left.

In the next room is where you’ll find the lever arm in the middle of the floor, but you need a way to get it all the way back to the area where the piano is hanging. There’s a TV on the left side of the room. If you turn it on the long-armed enemy will move into the room, opening the door.

However, it will also stay in the room until you run past, at which point it will be chasing you if you’re not hiding in the right place. Position the lever arm closer to the door on the right so you can pick it up on your way out.

There are several places in the room you can climb, including the suitcases on the far left and the stack of drawers near the right side of the room, in the background. Turn on the TV, then climb the stack of drawers and hide at the top until the enemy enters.

Once it’s distracted by the TV, climb down and stay crouched while you collect the lever arm and head through the door. As long as you’re crouched, the enemy will be too distracted by the TV to sense you and you should have no issues making it back to the pillar where the lever can be placed.

Rotate the lever to raise the piano to the right, which will also alert the enemy. Quickly jump over to the piano and wait for it to swing to the right side of the room. Jump over to the ledge on the right and climb through the small opening to reach the next room.

In the next room move the mine cart to the right so it covers the break in the pipe where steam is coming out. Climb up the cart and move over the steam, then continue to move the cart to the far right so you can use it to reach the handle of the door.

Continue into the narrow tunnels to the right and light the lantern in the middle before you reach the area with the grated floor. Be careful when you hit the grated flooring because there are two holes here where the long-armed enemy can reach its arms through.

You need to stand between the two holes and wait for the arm on the right to move up before you quickly crawl to the right.

When you reach the next room, the long-armed enemy continues to chase you. Run to the right and slide into the small room as the door closes. A small cage keeps the door partially open and the long-armed man will reach both arms through the opening.

In this room there’s a cart with laundry and two cages stacked on the right side, in the foreground and background respectively. The long-armed enemy will reach an arm to each object one at a time. Move from one object to the other until you can jump between the arms and reach the cage holding the door open.

Pull on the cage to remove one of the two supports, then return to two objects in the room. When you get another opening to jump between the arms, remove the second support from the cage to cut off the arms and lower the hatch on the wall. Climb up the cage and jump over to the newly lowered hatch to complete the area.

Find all of the Nomes and Statues in The Lair, move on to The Kitchen or head back to our Little Nightmares game hub for more strategy and advice!