Directive 8020 Secrets: 65 Collectible Locations by Episode

Astronaut scanning the Cassiopeia exterior in Directive 8020

Do not treat Directive 8020‘s collectible hunt as one 65-item pass. The first route contains 50 regular Secrets and 10 Simms Recordings. A coin beside the final recording in Episode 8 then activates five O Death Secrets, four of which require earlier Turning Points. The efficient plan is 60 forward, then five backward.

Collection cutoff: locations and counts were reconciled on July 19, 2026. In the official announcement feed, the newest gameplay-fix post available to this research is the June 15 patch; it includes a PS5 correction for save corruption after touching Secrets through the DualSense pad. Install current updates before a long collection pass, and use the in-game per-node counter as the authority if a platform patch changes an interaction.

Official Directive 8020 screenshot of an astronaut using a Utility Strap on the Cassiopeia exterior
Most entries are ordinary objects until the Utility Strap highlights the interaction; scan a room before following its objective marker.

Spoiler warning: this route identifies the Episode 8 coin, the Curator material, crew duplicates, and late Cassiopeia areas. Dark Pictures dolls are not included in the 65: the official store describes those as separate Deluxe content, and they are not required for the standard Secret and Recording totals.

Track 50 + 10 + 5, not one unexplained total

The Secrets menu and Turning Points chart show how many interactions remain in each section. Clear a node until its counter is full before crossing a chase, elevator, or objective door. The route breaks down as follows:

Episode Regular Secrets Simms Recordings O Death on cleanup
1 – Little Star 10 2 1
2 – Best Laid Plans 14 2 0
3 – The Sample 6 2 1
4 – Dragnet 0 0 0
5 – Mr. Williams 5 1 2
6 – Hostile Takeover 6 1 0
7 – Revelation 4 0 0
8 – Come True 5 2 1
Total 50 10 5

Episode 4’s zero is intentional. If the menu still shows a missing item after that chapter, the gap belongs to another node or category; there is no reason to comb Dragnet for an invented collectible.

Episode 1: empty Crew Quarters before answering the breach

The opening rooms hold eight regular Secrets and one recording before Carter leaves for Medical. Start in the shared room and work outward:

  • Stalemate. Use the chessboard on the central table.
  • Count Down. Read the calendar fixed to the rear-right wall of that room.
  • Night Shift. Enter the sleeping room on the right and inspect the desk tablet.
  • Green Tea – Simms Recording. From that desk, face back toward the entrance; activate the monitor mounted just left of the frame.
  • Balance. Cross to the other sleeping room and scan the bonsai on the desk’s right side.
  • Daddy in Space. The tablet is farther into the same room, on the bed.
  • Mission Summary. Continue into the next room, take the stairs, turn left, and read the poster at the end.
  • Pioneers. Reverse from the poster, keep left, and play the wall-mounted video.
  • Myths Retold. Before using the objective, take the door on its right and check the book beside the bathroom sink.

Medical adds two Secrets and the second recording:

  • Brave New World. Follow Medical’s left boundary to the poster near the dark room’s far end.
  • The Goldilocks Planet. After lockdown is released, scan through the window beside the main door to open the small office, then take its desk tablet.
  • Patches – Simms Recording. Leave the office, cross the hall, and climb the opposite stairs to the monitor at the top.

The Oracle decision changes how Carter reaches this area, and one source incorrectly treated Medical as exclusive to a single answer. Detailed Episode 1 route evidence shows the destination on both branches. Use the local counter – 2 Secrets + 1 Recording for Medical – rather than restarting because the approach animation differs.

Episode 2: clear three zones before Eisele follows Simms

Simple Pleasures contains one entry. When Young leaves her pod, turn toward the back-right wall and play the display for Perfect Replica.

In Ship Shape, collect two Secrets and one recording before operating the reactor:

  • Print As Needed. On entering the Reactor Room as Young, turn around and read the poster behind the spawn point.
  • In Denial. Cross the catwalk beyond the center door; its poster is on the left.
  • Red Alert – Simms Recording. Approach the reactor controls, take the stairs on their right, and activate the wall monitor above.
Official Directive 8020 screenshot of Young seen through a sleep pod window
Pod and crew areas contain story-state media as well as loose objects; the scan highlight is more reliable than object size.

Sleuth is the largest single sweep: 11 regular Secrets and one recording. Begin when Eisele enters the Atrium and do not start the Simms pursuit until all 12 have registered.

  1. Carter. Activate the wall display immediately to Eisele’s left.
  2. Bad Press. At the large head sculpture, inspect the tablet on the bench facing it.
  3. Frosted. Go upstairs, open the party room by scanning through its window, and examine the cake on the nearer coffee table.
  4. No Object. The second table in that room holds a tablet.
  5. Weak Spots. Return downstairs toward the Crew Complex; the item is on the upper bench just beyond the first stair set.
  6. Wish You Were Here. Climb the adjacent stairs again, stop outside the Crew Lounge, and check the seats.
  7. Professional Chemistry. Inside the Lounge, pass the Simms-and-Carter video and inspect the long wall counter.
  8. Father’s Footsteps. Leave by the far door, turn left, descend, and find the picture frame on the floor near a drifting crate.
  9. Paving the Way. Continue a short distance toward the Locker Room; a book lies among crates opposite its entrance.
  10. Sweet Dreams – Simms Recording. Enter the Locker Room and use the monitor immediately on the left.
  11. At Any Cost. Enter 13576 at the locker keypad, then open the released right bank and take the book.
  12. Promises. Stand behind the keypad screen, look high and left for a second security control, and use it to release the opposite lockers; the tablet is inside.

Episode 3: use the Tool Storage recording as the start marker

During Gear Up, enter Tool Storage and turn left before taking objective equipment. The wall monitor there is the episode’s first Simms Recording. Some early guides do not display a reliable recording title, so verify the category counter instead of assigning it a guessed name.

Search contains six Secrets and the other recording:

  • Words of Affirmation. As Cooper gains control, look right for a book on the table.
  • Simms. Vault through the window, turn left, and circle behind the storage racks to the monitor in the rear-left corner.
  • Nutrimito. Pass the fallen shelf and press the red wall control. Use 0402 on food storage and take the leaflet.
  • Game Changer. Power the next door with the battery; the tablet is on the first counter to the left after entering.
  • Fit to Fly. Turn right from Game Changer, open the side door with the Utility Strap, and search the back of the washroom.
  • A Friend Indeed. At the far end, operate the window controls, then look through the right-hand window toward the tablet on the table beyond it.
  • Special Permissions – Simms Recording. In the following room, descend and turn left; the monitor is tucked behind the stairs.

The 0402 code belongs to the food-storage Secret, not the later chemical cabinet. Keeping those nodes separate prevents the two four- and three-digit puzzles from being mixed during cleanup.

Episode 5: finish Radio Silence before following Cooper

Episode 4 has no entries in this route, so the next collectibles appear in Episode 5. Drugs has two:

  • Charybdis. When Cooper becomes playable, take the door opposite the objective and use the monitor on the right wall.
  • Terraformation. Enter Anders’s room, let the scene finish, then walk behind her to the display at the back.

Radio Silence has three Secrets and one recording while you control Cernan:

  • Orbital Oddities. Turn around at the start and go upstairs. Unlock the terminal with 3196, then advance through every screen until it registers. CAIF supplies the third, first, ninth, and sixth letters’ positions in that order.
  • To Do List. Follow the long passage to the cockpit and inspect the tablet on its right side.
  • Hostile Fire – Simms Recording. Backtrack into the next area, take the left branch at the split, vault the box, and reroute power to storage. The recording is at the rear of the opened room.
  • Love Lost. After the elevator, stop when Cooper passes through her objective door. Take the nearby stairs down instead, turn left, and flip the photo frame on the seating beside the large field image.

The Episode 5 chemical-cabinet code 168 is a story puzzle and is not one of these four collectible gates.

Episode 6: Detour is a chain of rooms opened from behind

All six regular Secrets and the single recording are in Detour. Use Stafford’s entry position as the anchor:

  1. Field Agent – Simms Recording. Turn back immediately, enter the Executive Office, and play the monitor at its rear.
  2. Cernan. Return, go left through the following door, and enter the vent on the right. Take the first left inside and exit to the room with a monitor in its back-left corner.
  3. McNamara’s Secret. Continue into the storage-like room and scan the right wall before entering the next vent.
  4. Making the Call. At the broken crossing, drop from the stairs, squeeze through, climb over the obstruction, and look left for a power panel. Feed the door behind the obstacle, enter its rear office, vault the broken window, and take the tablet from the crate.
  5. Meet the Tardigrades. After acquiring the Power Cell, continue to the corridor where Cernan is visible. Open Astroscience on the right with the Utility Strap; its monitor is on the left wall.
  6. Stafford. Rejoin Cernan, install the cell, enter the next room, and turn left toward the display on the right-hand wall ahead.
  7. Faster Than Fiction. In the same room, move to the solar-system hologram and inspect the desk tablet.

Episode 7: take the collectible detour, then return to the survival route

Official Directive 8020 screenshot of crew searching the wet surface of Tau Ceti f
The surface chapter uses terrain as its filing system: waterfall fork, pod catwalk, reactor elevator, then Geoscience.

There are four regular Secrets and no Simms Recordings:

  • Cracks Appear – Search Party. Follow the trail beyond the waterfall. After Anders’s second message, inspect the left branch and the broken helmet on the ground, but turn back before the rockfall area. This is not the later right-hand route to the real Anders.
  • McNamara’s Confession – Pod Room. Enter the fan-and-pod chamber and use its left passage. Take the next left to the short stairs, turn once more toward the lowering ladder, and climb to the catwalk monitor.
  • Mitchell – Pod Room. Continue toward the Reactor Elevator, pass it without activating it, and play the wall audio log just beyond.
  • Duplication Analysis – Geoscience. As Cernan, turn around and reroute the rear power source to the door. Enter the right-side room, scan through its window to release the far door, return to the hall, and climb through the newly accessible window. The tablet is to the right inside.

Episode 8: collect seven forward, then use the coin to unlock five backward

Official Directive 8020 screenshot of an infested Cassiopeia corridor
The final chapter hides its last entries inside the escape route; a missed side room can be more expensive than the object itself.

Redirect begins with one Secret and one recording:

  • See Attachment. When Stafford gains control, look right before moving and take the corner tablet.
  • Rabbit Hole – Simms Recording. During the stealth route, go downstairs and assign power to the Locker Room. Enter and use its wall monitor before restoring the exit path.

In Atrium, survive the first stealth room, climb the stairs, and turn left at the top. The bench tablet is Worth Fighting For.

Mess Hall holds three:

  • Keeping Tabs. At the choice between Mess Hall and the straight route, enter Colony Control. Follow its corridor to the final room on the right and activate the wall monitor.
  • Williams 2.0. After the next stealth crossing, enter Maintenance and inspect the small box behind the second server row.
  • Classified Orders. Continue to Maintenance’s back wall and use the monitor there.

During The Way Back, locate the empty battery socket in the hall. Fetch the cell from the adjacent room, return it to the socket, and crawl through the powered vent into the server maze. At the end, play At Peace, the tenth Simms Recording. Then pick up the coin beside that monitor. It registers This Doesn’t Belong Here and makes the other O Death objects exist in earlier episodes.

O Death cleanup: four earlier nodes appear only after the coin

Do not search for these before The Way Back. The objects are absent until the coin activates their category.

  1. This Doesn’t Belong Here. Episode 8 registers this first O Death entry when the trigger coin beside At Peace is collected during The Way Back.
  2. The Man in the Bowler Hat – Episode 1, Medical. Rewind near the end of Medical and inspect the circular console in the center of the breach room.
  3. Paranoia – Episode 3, Search. In the large Mess Hall, face the digital food and drink boards and continue along the far-right side to the wall monitor just beyond them.
  4. 0_DTH – Episode 5, Radio Silence. Climb toward the cockpit; the monitor is on the left wall roughly three quarters of the way down the long corridor.
  5. Bloodlines – Episode 5, Radio Silence. After the elevators, ignore the objective door, descend the nearby stairs, turn left at the bottom, then climb the stairs at the far end. The tablet rests on the upper bench. Its collection leads into the Curator material and closes the five-item set.

Audit the counters before replaying a whole episode

  • If the regular total is below 50, check the section counter in Turning Points. Episode 2 Sleuth is the likeliest large gap; Episode 4 is not.
  • If recordings stop at nine, replay Episode 8 The Way Back and power the server-maze vent. The coin and final recording sit together.
  • If O Death remains empty, the coin was not collected or its state did not save. Re-enter the node, collect it, finish the scene boundary, then reopen Turning Points.
  • For Orbital Oddities, entering 3196 is not enough; advance through the terminal pages until the Secret notification appears.
  • For Love Lost, turn the photo frame over. Seeing it on the seat does not register the interaction.
  • When a correct object does nothing on PS5, verify the June 15-or-later update before repeating the route; the official notes specifically addressed Secret interaction save corruption.

Evidence ledger and image provenance

Steam’s first-party product record for Directive 8020 identifies AppID 2255370, credits Supermassive Games as both developer and publisher, dates the release to May 12, 2026, and exposes the four untouched 1920×1080 JPGs selected for this page. Crew names, Utility Strap context, Turning Points, and the separate bonus collectible set were checked on the official game page. The episode ledger was built by comparing several readable location guides, full episode references, and the in-game category descriptions reported by those sources. Warning banners on the Steam Community captures kept those pages secondary; nothing visual or verbal was copied from them.