Key

SS2
SS3
SSBD
SS:T
SS4
SS:SM

Keycard

General information

Type

Item

Affiliation

Usage

Used by

Sam Stone
NETRICSA
Bomb
Bad Bulb
Ugh-Zan Jr.
Octanians
Orc Captains
Security guards
Any playable character (Co-op mode)

Used for

Unlocking locked doors, chests or cases

"Why can't these things ever been under the doormat?"

―Sam^[src]

A Key, or Keycard, is an important item required for unlocking things like doors.

Overview[]

Orc keycard — An Orc using a red keycard.

Keys are needed for unlocking locked doors, cases, or other objects which grant access to the next part of a level, or to find secrets. For instance, in Serious Sam 3: BFE, the Vista secret can only be found if the player finds a secret key in "The Power of the Underworld".

In Serious Sam's Bogus Detour, keycards serve an important purpose, and are usually held by Orc Captains. Killing a Captain will make him drop the Keycard. There are four types of Keycards: red, blue, yellow, and green. the yellow keycard only appears in "Biological Illogical".

In Serious Sam: Tormental, keys are needed for unlocking Mental Chests or rescuing playable characters, such as Bomb or NETRICSA.

In Serious Sam: Siberian Mayhem, keycards are used by Octanian units to keep items secured and locked and to prevent the enemy from using them. Keycards are usually kept within Octanian bases or secured inside Octanian Sentry Towers.

Appearances[]

Serious Sam 3: BFE[]

Keycards first appear in "The Silent Riddler'", where the first one is located in a small building. Later in the campaign, keys become more common, and, in "Unearthing the Sun" and "The Power of the Underworld", keys are required to gain entry to most of the temples, which contain four Sirian Seals needed to access the plasma generators.

Some keys are also needed to gain access to secret areas, like secret armor in "The Dark Bride" and the 'Vista' secret in "The Power of the Underworld".

Serious Sam's Bogus Detour[]

Keycards appear in every level in the game, and are required to access another portion of the level. In some cases, they hide secrets such as stars.

In "Biological Illogical", keycards appear more frequently than in the rest of the Bogus Detour campaign; all four of them are required for deactivating the shield responsible for transmitting power to the portals that allow Mental-Altani troops to get to Earth.

Serious Sam: Tormental[]

Keys are very common items, and are often dropped by tough enemies or are rewarded for completing quests. They have a higher chance of dropping when the player performs a 'brutal' kill on an enemy.

Serious Sam 4[]

Keys are quite rare, and usually appear before the activation of a side quest. Just like in Serious Sam 3, they are often kept inside offices or portable buildings. They first appear in "Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse".

Serious Sam: Siberian Mayhem[]

Six Octanian keycards appear in the level "Siberiade". The first three can be found in the first segment of the level, before the player heads to the church. Acquring the keycards requires solving difficult puzzles where the player has to configure the pipes in the right order to provide power to the storage locker. Acquiring all three keycards grants the player access to a locked equipment case that contains a Sirian Artefacts of Might egg. In the second part of the level, three more keycards appear after the player destroys an Octanian sentry tower. Getting all three keys allows the player to open a locked case near the end of the level that contains a second S.A.M egg.

Trivia[]

The keycards that appear in Serious Sam: Siberian Mayhem feature a QR code that, when scanned, sends the player to the official music video of Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up". This is an obvious reference to "rickrolling".
- It is hard to see these QR codes close up during gameplay, but they can be seen more easily in the Serious Editor.