Category: Guides

Shakedown: Hawaii launched this week on Nintendo Switch, PC, and Playstation! I really enjoy the game so I thought I’d publish a little mini-guide to how to get the most out of the game. Look for a little more fleshing out over the next few days.

As always, if you have questions or anything to say at all, please drop a comment at the bottom of the page; I read every one!

Updates

2019-05-17: The first content/bugfix patch released today! Features:

• More guidance to finish main story to get money early on
• More Shakedown Scenarios (even more variety!)
• Car Repossession (earn extra cash for your Subprime Auto locations)
• Weapon Pawning (earn cash and clear out inventory)
• Shop Icons added to the map
• Expands some building interiors
• Character upgrades can now be unequipped
• Faster property and multipliers purchasing
• Salary can now be increased quicker
• Police chases improved
• Horns/sirens added to vehicles
• Bug fixes (nearly all reported bugs have been fixed)
• More detailed info on the official site

General Tips

Secret? Hold L+R to change characters…I never noticed.

Relax! Shakedown: Hawaii is one of the chillest games you’ll play and there’s nothing you can really do wrong to meaningfully screw yourself over. No permanent negative choices, no missable achievements, nadda.

The property management aspect takes a little time to get used to, but you can safely mess with it at your own speed early own and know that buying the ‘wrong’ property doesn’t matter long-term. Eventually, you want everything anyway.

Once you unlock the ability to Shakedown businesses, it’s not a bad idea to make a sweep of the map and clear most or all of them early on. It’s fun, it’s varied, there’s no extra prerequisites, and it’s free extra money every day.

There’s no need to rush the main story, but it does unlock a lot of stuff, and many of the early missions serve as a gradual tutorial. If you don’t know what to do, you should usually just go to the next mission.

Sidequests are often unlocked by buying a certain amount of properties, which is a major part of Shakedown: Hawaii, so don’t neglect it.

For some reason, only one of the 3 Veterinary Clinics actually lets you buy character upgrades (Kee Replacement for double jumps etc). It’s the one in the south-east of the map just below the river and just east of the weird bottomless pit things.

Combat

Restore your health with heart drops from enemies, buying snacks in various stores, or hopping in an Ambulance (seriously).

Some late Shakedowns have very large amounts of heavily armed enemies. It can be best to use a car as a weapon/armor in these cases; if the car is destroyed you are not instantly killed!

The cops matter a lot less than in Grand Theft Auto; you can easily get Cop Cloaking Devices by beating cops to shake them off, and half the time they don’t even respond if you’re driving down the sidewalk mowing down dozens of people. Which, by the way, is a great way to get early-game cash.

Gold Medals in challenges are usually pretty easy, but if you’re having trouble note that cars give a large amount in most challenges, but only if they’re destroyed. Don’t hit a car unless you’re going to destroy it. Keep moving as well, and take any easy shots you see.

Shopping

Cosmetics in Shakedown: Hawaii seem super expensive at first, but as you Shakedown properties, it’s less of a big deal. If possible, Shakedown a store and buy the property before buying anything with your pocket cash

You’ll eventually be able to pay yourself a salary, turning your “business” cash into pocket cash.

Most enterable businesses have weapons behind the counter you can take with impunity.

You don’t lose weapons when you die, so you should rarely need to buy any. Just spread out your weapon use and you’ll be given plenty during missions and Shakedowns.

Properties

The biggest addition over Retro City Rampage is the property/business management side of things. You can buy every building on the map (eventually), and there’s some (just some!) strategy into what to buy and when. The best way to find what to buy is to use the Business tab in the main menu rather than the map.

Generally, when you have the money to buy something you should buy it; money is best used on getting more money due to compounding returns. If at all possible, buy all of (this is easiest with low-count properties, like fast food joints; Subprime Auto is the easiest one to get very early.

Go for the “Premium” businesses (red color, icon is two buildings) in the For Sale tab; Natural Gouge Fine Foods under Grocery are particularly cheap yet high income.

Later on, once you’re earning at least 100,000+ per day, you might start looking into houses. Houses start out with terrible income and low-ish prices, but the point of houses is to simulate the real estate bubble. As you buy houses the purchase and rent prices will exponentially increase; slowly at first, but by the end each bought house significantly raises the earnings from the rest.

Note that once you unlock multipliers, they must be bought per-property. Buy multipliers for your highest-value properties and don’t forget to stack them after you unlock more! Multipliers are unlocked by progressing the main story Missions (M).

Shakedown: Hawaii Achievements

Continue reading “Shakedown: Hawaii Quickstart Guide”