Speaking as someone who learned the hard way, working out how to open a GATE Security Crate in is a fool's errand in the early game. The Half-Life-inspired survival adventure teases your scientist with loot drops out in plain sight, but you can't open them for quite a while.

I mean a mid-to-late game kind of while, too—you can't open the crates until ages after first stumbling upon the first one in the Office Sector. Warren, the security guard hanging out in front of the cafeteria, quite literally holds the key to opening these, but you'll need to come up with something worth trading for a GATE Security Key first.

How to open a GATE Security Crate

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To open a GATE Security Crate, you'll need to exchange one Nyxshade Seed with Warren Bunning in the Office Sector Tram Plaza for a GATE Security Key. The key is a one-time pass to any GATE Security Crate of your choosing.

If you're still near the beginning and limited to [[link]] the Office Sector, go ahead and bookmark this guide for later. You can't obtain a Nyxshade Seed, and so a GATE Security Key, until you've entered the Security Sector. Abiotic Factor loves to tease, so you'll spot plenty of crates long before you can unlock them.

For those ready to trade, you can craft a Nyxshade Seed after picking up [[link]] a Night Essence for the idea.

• (10) Night Essence
• (5) Leyak Essence
• (1) Anteverse Wheat Seed
• (1) Enethiol

How to make a Nyxshade Seed

Night Essence is the biggest pain to come by, but you'll get one for stunning the Security Sector's nasty Reaper entity with an X-Ray Lamp. Don't worry about missing it. The giant shadowy figure stomping about is hard to miss, and if you don't find it first, then it'll find you.

Aside from farming the Reaper, I also found one or two Night Essence on the ground in the Night Realm, but wound up fishing for Inkfish to get the bulk of my supply.

The five Leyak Essence aren't so bad. While the brain scared me to death in my first few encounters, listening for its weird grunting eventually became second nature, and I popped out my X-Ray to stun it for a drop every time. They're easy to farm in bulk if you've got the spare materials to set up an X-Ray Tower at your base. Every time the Leyak pops in [[link]] to visit, the tower stuns it for a free essence.

Finally, the single Anteverse Wheat Seed comes from dismantling Anteverse Wheat. You're probably drowning in them after reaching the Security Sector, and the same goes for the Enethiol. Those are the yellow bottles sitting out on facility shelves and inside lockers.