Scorn is a challenging survival horror game with tricky combat situations, limited health and supplies, and a variety of clever and distinctive puzzles for you to discover in your playthrough. In order to progress and complete the game, you’ll need to finish them all, with very few having a clear-cut solution. In Act II-II of Scorn, you’ll encounter a series of combination puzzles in which you must put a cylindrical tool, each having 3 spinning rings, with a total of 4 you must solve. Each subsequent puzzle is trickier than the last, so it’s important to note what you’re supposed to do.
Scorn: How to Solve the Combination Puzzle
The first puzzle you encounter is directly above the corpse from which you get the cylinder key tool that you can’t miss. It’s across from a door locked with a panel featuring one light on the upper left. The solution to any of these puzzles is simple: align each ring with an outer notch and hit the ‘use’ button (‘Mouse 1’ or ‘A’,) starting from the outermost and working your way in. Once you’ve got all 3 rings lined up, rotate them to point straight up, and hit ‘use’ to have the contraption push a small white bead into your cylinder key, completing that puzzle.
Is There a Trick for the Spinning Rings on Later Puzzles?
For the later puzzles, you’ll notice that the notch you must align with won’t stop spinning and stopping at seemingly random spots, but watch closely and listen for a click. When the notch stops and makes that clicking noise, that’s when you can align the ring’s connection to hit ‘use.’ This makes each of these puzzles significantly easier, which brings us to the fourth puzzle, which can only be reached if you’ve regained your arm key tool, and used it at the console to melt the bodies blocking the third retractable path in this area.
Go past the freshly melted cadavers and you’ll see the fourth console with a twist: while the first 2 rings are as easy as the others, the third has its point obscured. Simply align the third ring to how it shows above and listen for that click, then hit ‘use.’ Don’t think too hard about the yonic imagery being used there, just pat yourself on the back if you knocked out this first one. You’ll complete the last of this type of combination puzzle in Scorn, and be able to tackle the next obstacle, down the elevator in the red-lit room with 4 plant-like bulbs. You’ll soon be able to progress past this area.
Scorn released on October 14, 2022, for PC and Xbox Series X|S. It is also a Day One Xbox Game Pass exclusive.
