When you play contracts at the higher difficulties in Phasmophobia, the ghosts will start to hide some evidence. This forces you to rely upon your knowledge of the ghosts’ special abilities to determine the ghost type, rather than just finding all three evidences. This guide explains what “forced evidence” is in Nightmare and Insanity difficulties, and which ghosts have forced evidences.
Hiding Evidences on Nightmare and Insanity Difficulty
On nightmare difficulty, ghosts will hide 1 of their evidence types, meaning that you’ll only be able to find a total of 2 evidences during the contract. This means that if the ghost’s evidence is EMF-5, Ghost Writing, and Freezing Temperatures, one of these will never appear during the contract, no matter how hard you look.
This forces you to depend upon your knowledge of the ghosts’ special abilities to determine the ghost type, because you’ll have to choose between a few different choices.
Typically, the evidence which the ghost hides will be random. So for example, a demon has ghost writing, ultraviolet and freezing temperatures evidence. Any of these three evidences can be hidden, meaning you’ll only be able to uncover two of them. Let’s say you’ve found Ghost Writing and Ultraviolet; you’ll now have to choose between a demon, myling, poltergeist. This is where your knowledge of the special abilities comes into play:
- If you notice the ghost hunting when you have a high/full sanity, it’s likely a demon.
- If the ghost throws multiple objects with great force at once, then it’s likely a poltergeist.
- If you hear the ghost talking a lot on the parabolic microphone but is silent during a hunt, then it’s likely a myling.
Without this knowledge of the ghost’s special abilities, you’ll likely have no clue which ghost it is, which is why Nightmare difficulty is typically played by more experienced players.
Insanity difficulty takes this one level further, hiding 2 different evidences! This leaves you with a much wider range of ghosts that it can be, since you’ll only ever find a single evidence during a contract.
What are Forced Evidences in Phasmophobia?
Because some ghost’s special abilities are tied to certain evidences, the developers added a sort of failsafe for these difficulties. This means that a select few ghosts will always have a particular evidence appear (i.e. the evidence cannot be hidden from the player at Nightmare or Insanity Difficulty).
For example, the tell-tale way to find a Goryo is by noticing that you can’t see its D.O.T.S projection from the same room, only through a video camera from a different room. However, if D.O.T.S evidence was hidden, it would be near impossible to identify a Goryo.
Below is a list of the ghosts with forced evidences, and which evidence will always appear for them:
Deogen: Spirit Box
The Deogen has a 33% of answering a spirit box question with a heavy breathing (rather than a regular response).
Goryo: D.O.T.S Projector
The Goryo’s special ability is that it will only show on D.O.T.S. through a video camera (you can’t see the D.O.T.S. projection of the Goryo with the naked eye) and if there are no players in the same room as the ghost.
Hantu: Freezing Temperatures
The Hantu’s speed during a hunt is tied to the temperature of the room, with the ghost moving faster in colder temperatures during hunts.
Moroi: Spirit Box
The Moroi’s special ability is cursing a player once the player receives a response on the Spirit Box (or alternatively, after they hear whispers through the parabolic microphone).
Obake: Ultraviolet
The Obake has a 1 in 6 chance of leaving a unique fingerprint pattern that gives away the fact that it’s an Obake. This includes:
- A six-fingered handprint (rather than the usual five)
- Two fingerprints on light switches, lamps and TV remotes
Mimic: Ghost Orbs
The Mimic is the only ghost which has 4 evidences by default (Spirit Box, Ultraviolet, Freezing Temperatures and Ghost Orbs). These ghost orbs are always shown for Mimics in addition to the other evidences. This means that if you find three evidences on Nightmare mode, it’s a Mimic, and if you find two evidences on Insanity difficulty, it’s a Mimic. Even in custom difficulties with 0 evidences, Mimics will still show ghost orbs!
The other three evidence types can all be randomly hidden, so you might find any combination of evidence that appears alongside ghost orbs.
How to Use Forced Evidences to Help Determine the Ghost Type
When you find evidence, it rules out a particular group of ghosts. Knowing that particular ghosts have forced evidences can then help you rule out further ghosts in certain scenarios.
For example, if you find that the evidence is ghost writing on Insanity difficulty, your journal will display the following list of potential ghosts:
- Demon
- Deogen
- Mare
- Moroi
- Myling
- Poltergeist
- Revenant
- Shade
- Spirit
- Thaye
That’s a whole 10 choices to choose between! However, since the Deogen and Moroi both have forced evidences for Spirit Box, you can rule these two ghosts out (they can’t show more than one evidence on Insanity difficulty). This takes your number of potential ghosts from 10 to 8. That’s still a lot, but it’s progress.
The same works for Nightmare difficulty. Let’s say you’ve found EMF-5 and Ghost Orbs. Your choices are only:
- Obake
- Raiju
Since the ghost will only show two evidence types on Nightmare difficulty, the ghost cannot be an Obake because there are no fingerprints, meaning that the ghost is automatically a Raiju!
As such, knowing which ghosts have forced evidences can be extremely useful at these difficulties.
We hope you’ve found this guide useful. Make sure to check out our other Phasmophobia guides, including our handy Photo Rewards guide to maximise your XP and money from contracts.
