Resident Evil 7: Not A Hero – Professional Difficulty Guide | Tips & Tricks

The free add-on to Resident Evil 7 follows the main game’s tradition of remixing Professional difficulty. Instead of harder enemies and less ammo, you’ll have to contend with huge changes to Chris Redfield’s reintroduction to the horror franchise. You begin with no guns, no ammo, and no hope.

Professional difficulty is possible to beat, but doing it is going to take a whole lot of practice, or a whole lot of tips. We’ve survived the experience, and we’re bringing all our expertise to help you make it to the end alive. Scroll down to find general tips, gun locations, boss strategies, and where to find all the coins you’ll need to unlock bonuses in the central hub.

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Professional Difficulty Guide | Tips & Tricks

Professional isn’t your standard difficulty change. It’s more than tougher monster and less ammo. Before diving into the tips you’ll need to survive, we’ll start with a list of ways Professional changes the game.

• How Professional Mode Is Different:
  • Start with no guns — you’ll only have a knife.
    • You’ll find more weapons later.
  • Item placement has been remixed.
  • Enemies (including White Molded) will now appear in places they didn’t previously.
  • Lock picks and lock boxes have been remixed.
  • More traps. Watch out for explosive trip-wires.

Let’s  get into the tips. We’ll break the tips up into different problem areas, starting with general tips you’ll want to keep in mind to survive. The basic steps are exactly the same — you’ll still need to enter the three areas from the Central Cavern in the same order — go in this order, as before: Red, Green, Blue.

General Tips

• Blocking is incredibly important, but parrying is even more powerful. Master the art of parrying — block just as an attack is about to land to parry and stun a Molded.
  • When a Molded is stunned, Chris can insta-kill with a melee punch.
  • This will only work on regular Molded or regular Fumers. Molded with claw-arms should be avoided.
• The knife is your only weapon, but punching is a much better solution. Practice parrying and try to avoid knife fights.
• Grenades are the only weapon that will stun Fumers (White Molded). 
  • Find two grenades in the second office, on the desk, after encountering Lucas. Use one to stun the Fumer blocking your path.
  • Save Neuro-Grenades for Fat Molded, Fat Fumers, or Fast Molded. Don’t waste these valuable grenades on regular Molded or regular Fumers.
    • While Fast Molded are stunned, kill them with knife stabs to the head.
• Grenades are rare and will save your life. Save them for Fumers or especially difficult encounters you can’t skip.
• Grenades will disable auto-turrets. 
  • When you reach the hallway with three turrets in the Green door catacombs
• Can you run from a fight? Do it. If there’s a clear path to the exit, don’t bother killing every enemy.
  • You can block even with your back facing an enemy.
  • Parry regular Fumers to temporarily stun them and run by.
• To cause enemies to despawn, open a door and enter. Then you can double-back into the previous room without worrying about enemies.

Healing items are incredibly important, and if you want to survive, you’ll need to save them. You’ll also need to collect Coins to unlock Steroids. Steroids will increase your maximum HP and fully heal you when used.

• Where to Get a Free Steroid: Unlock the clown door through the green door to find extra items and a steroid.

Gun Tips

• Shotgun Location: You will reacquire the Thor’s Hammer Shotgun in the Blue door trap area, on the shelves after saving the third soldier.
  • Equip Sight B (or unlock Sight C) to increase damage. You’ll be less accurate, so get very close to save ammo and do as much damage per shot as possible.
• Pistol Location: Found through the blue door, on the barrel to the left of the first cart on the tracks you’ll push. Once you have the pistol, the Ramrod shells from the catacomb will finally be useful.
  • Use the pistol only in extreme situations. Use it when Fat Suicide Molded spawn, or when the tiny crawlers spawn in Lucas’ trap room.

Difficulty Spikes 

Some areas are harder than the rest and require specific recommendations.

• Central Cavern: Don’t bother killing the enemies that respawn here. To save your game, enter the red door to make the enemies despawn for a few moments long enough.
• Red Door, Large Cavern: Through the red door, you’ll have to solve a puzzle. Get the Neuro-Grenade from the Central Cavern and use it on the Fat Fumer while you turn the crank.
• Green Door, Elevator Puzzle: Solve the puzzle (Up, Down, Up) then wait at the elevator shaft. Use fire grenades to keep the tiny critters at bay.
• Blue Door, Clown Key Room: After getting the clown key, weave behind the explosive trip-wires and lead the Fast Molded into the bombs to kill them. The bombs will also stun the Fumer.
• Blue Door, Trap Room: In the room with the last soldier, equip the pistol and use it to shoot the crawlers before they set off the explosive tripwires.
• First Boss: Use Ramrods to stun the fat boss, then swap to the shotgun and fire into the exposed head instead of punching it. You’ll do a lot more damage that way. Use regular grenades when it recovers. Three stuns should be enough.
• Shield Door Gauntlet: This is the most challenging part of Professional mode. If you don’t start with enough grenades and ammo, this area is impossible to complete.
  • Enemies spawn too quickly. Don’t use your knife. Use the pistol — get headshots and then insta-kill them with punches, one at a time. Swap to the shotgun if you’re overwhelmed.
  • Use one ramrod per Fumer. When the two Fat Molded spawn, use one ramrod per enemy to quickly end the gauntlet.
• Mutant Lucas Boss: Scavenge the room when you first enter for supplies. At this point, you should have plenty items to complete this fight. Make sure to save in the lab.
  • To safely fight Lucas, throw a fire grenade at him. While he’s stunned, use the shotgun on his head until a weak point appears on his chest. Shoot the exposed weak point with ramrod pistol bullets.
  • In his second form, Lucas will recover much faster. Throw a fire grenade, shoot him twice in the head with the shotgun, then throw another fire grenade. Repeat until the weak point is exposed, then use ramrod shells again.
  • Continue to follow this pattern and you should be able to kill Lucas without having to refill your air tank once.

Coin Locations

Coins have been remixed in Professional difficulty. You’ll still want to find enough to unlock the Steroids. Steroids cost 4 Coins, and the Thor’s Hammer Sight C costs 6 coins.

• Coin #1: In the Central Cavern, on the left side of the white vehicle off the tracks.
• Coin #2: Through the blue door, on the right, on a white bucket.
• Coin #3: To the right just after opening the first clown door.
• Coin #4: Opposite the switch that disables the laser trip-wires in Lucas’ trap room, where the last soldier is located.
• Coin #5: To the left, on a barrel after unlocking the clown door through the red door.
• Coin #6: Through the clown door in the red area, turn right at the tracks and duck under the low gate.
• Coin #7: In the rumble, down the hall and to the right after removing the bomb attached to Chris’ wrist.
• Coin #8: Through the clown door right before the door down to the catacombs area.
• Coin #9+#10: In the catacombs. One coin is found on a bunch of barrels through a door. The other coin is on a stretcher with a dead body.

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