Search For The Needle: How to Solve All 3 Puzzles in the Chapter 2 Basement

The Basement map that arrived with the Chapter 2 update is the first part of Search For The Needle that cannot be brute-forced with upgrades. Three puzzles sit between you and the trapdoor, and two of them are randomized per run, so memorizing someone else’s numbers will not work. What stays the same is the structure, and once you know it, the whole room takes a few minutes.

Quick answer: Pull the green, red, and purple levers, click the “DO NOT ENTER” sign to open the hidden room, then count the colored crystals on the walls and ceiling and enter those totals on the matching pedestals, rotate the 16 picture tiles until they match the small reference image, and pick up the papers on the floor until one shows a four-digit code for the keypad. All three solved frees the alien and switches off the lasers over the exit.

Before the puzzles: find the key in the haystack

The Basement objective list opens with three entries: find the key in the haystack, pull all the levers, and solve 3 puzzles. The key is the same job you already know from the farmhouse, just underground. Clear hay, sell it, and keep going until the key turns up in the pile.

The key glowing inside the basement haystack as the player moves in to collect it — The key appears in the hay pile and is picked up like any other collectible. Image: Garage Games

You do not need the key to start the puzzles, and you cannot leave without it. Grab it whenever it appears, then move on to the levers.

All three lever locations in the Basement

Three levers are hidden around the main basement room, and each one is wired to the secret door with a colored cable running along the floor. If you lose track of a lever, follow its wire instead of sweeping the room at random.

Lever	Where it is
Green	In the corner behind the haystack, next to a group of boxes
Red	Behind the signboard beside the Sell Hay cart
Purple	On the ground in the corner near the Upgrade Bag and Drone stands

Click each lever to pull it. With all three flipped, the objective ticks over and a short cutscene plays showing the door opening. The last interaction is the “DO NOT ENTER” sign on the wall, which you click to actually get inside.

Objectives panel showing Pull all the levers ticked off as the player walks toward the hidden door — The objective tracker confirms the lever step before the secret room opens. Image: Garage Games

Puzzle 1: count the crystals and set the pedestals

On the left side of the hidden room there are three pedestals, each topped with a colored crystal and showing a 0 underneath. Clicking a number raises it by one. The answer is simply how many crystals of that color are hanging in the room.

Stand back and look up. The crystals are attached to the walls and the ceiling, so a count taken from eye level will miss several of them.

Count one color at a time. Do a full lap of the room for red, then repeat for pink and green rather than trying to tally all three at once.

Click each pedestal’s counter until it matches your total for that color. In one run the answer was 4 red, 1 pink, and 2 green, but the layout is generated per run, so treat those numbers as an example and not a solution.

Puzzle 2: rebuild the alien emblem picture

To the right of the entrance is a large scrambled picture made of 16 tiles, with a small version of the finished image mounted beside it. Clicking a tile rotates it one step, so every piece is already in the correct position and only the orientation is wrong.

Player standing in front of the 16-tile symbol board in the hidden basement room — The tile board rebuilds the alien emblem shown on the smaller reference image. Image: Garage Games

Work across one row at a time and compare each tile against the reference before moving on. The reference print is small on screen, so it helps to walk right up to it first and fix the emblem’s outline in your head. The puzzle registers as solved the moment the last tile lines up.

Puzzle 3: find the keypad code on the floor papers

Directly across from the picture puzzle is a four-digit keypad lock. The code is not displayed anywhere on the keypad itself. Instead it is written on one of the loose papers scattered around the floor of the hidden room.

Pick up the papers one at a time and read each one. Most are decoys, including sketches and maps marked with an X, so do not stop at the first interesting-looking page.

A hand-drawn map page from the basement floor showing a large X marking a spot — Several floor papers are decoys, including map pages marked with an X. Image: Garage Games

Keep flipping until a page shows four digits. In one run the code read 7974, and like the crystal counts it is not fixed, so the number you find is the only one your keypad will accept.

Enter the digits on the keypad. The cage in the room opens and the alien is freed, which is the visual confirmation that the third puzzle is done.

The basement keypad lock with a four-digit code being entered to open the alien's cage — The keypad accepts the four digits printed on one of the floor papers. Image: Garage Games

How to confirm all 3 puzzles are solved

The objective tracker is the reliable check. It counts up from “Solve Puzzles 0/3” to “Solve Puzzles 3/3” as each one registers, and the entry gets a green tick when the set is complete.

Two things happen in the room at the same time. The alien’s cage opens, and the laser lines blocking the basement escape door switch off. If the lasers are still on, one puzzle has not registered, and the tracker will tell you which count you are missing.

Why a puzzle refuses to complete

Crystals mounted high on the ceiling were left out of the count, so a pedestal number is one or two short.
Numbers copied from someone else’s run were used. Crystal totals and the keypad code are generated per run and will not carry over.
A picture tile is in the right spot but the wrong rotation, which is easy to miss on the emblem’s plainer sections.
Not every paper on the floor was read. The code page can sit under other pages near the edges of the room.

Escaping the Basement for 100% completion

With the lasers down, equip the key you pulled out of the haystack, climb the ladder, and use it on the trapdoor. That completes the map.

Above ground, the farmer is gone. The alien you released is waiting instead, and it points upward. Look up and a UFO collects you, which is where Chapter 2 ends. The following update is dated September 12, 2026, and the alien thread is set to continue there, so banking gems rather than spending them now is the safer call.