Yurei

## Evidence

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> „*A Yurei is a ghost that has returned to the physical world, usually for the purpose of revenge or hatred.*”
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—The Journal

The **Yurei** is a type of ghost in *Phasmophobia*. Although it does not have any implicit bonuses to its ability to hunt, its main distinction is its ability to quickly drain sanity: if players are careless, it may become aggressive quicker than anticipated.

## Behaviour

### Activity

When Incense is used on the Yurei, in addition to preventing hunts and temporarily increasing activity, it will return to its favourite room and be trapped within it for 60 seconds, stopping it from roaming through the location. It can still leave that room by performing a ghost event, but it will return to it once the event ends.

### Ability

The Yurei has an ability that will cause the following when used:

* All players within 7.5 metres of the ghost will have their sanity decreased by 15%. Players outside the investigation area will not be affected by the sanity drain.
* If the ghost's current room has one or more open door, it will randomly select one and close it fully. This in turn produces an EMF 2 interaction, just like any other door touch.
	+ The Yurei cannot use its ability if the room it is in has no door.
	+ All ghosts can shut a door from in the same way the Yurei can, however the Yurei may do it more often as it is connected to its sanity drain ability.
* Locker and closet doors are not affected by the Yurei's ability. Tent doors and exit doors, however, are.

## Evidence

* Ghost Orb
* Freezing Temperatures
* D.O.T.S Projector

## Strengths and weaknesses

These are the strengths and weaknesses as listed in the journal:

*Strength: **Yureis** have been known to have a stronger effect on people's sanity.*

*Weakness: Smudging the **Yurei's** place of death will trap it temporarily, reducing how much it wanders.*

## Strategies

Generally, keeping doors wide open near the ghost will help one to observe when the Yurei uses its ability.

* If the ghost shuts a front door (exit door) fully without a ghost event or hunt, then it is definitely a Yurei.
* If the ghost shuts any other door fully, then it is likely (but not definitely) a Yurei.

Any ghost can shut a non-exit door in the exact same manner, including the delayed shut sound effect. There are three points to consider:

* The Yurei will perform this action much more often than other ghosts, due to this action being part of its ability.
* The Yurei can perform this action *without* draining sanity, since it is not exclusive to the ability. However, the chance of this happening is much lower than the ability itself happening.
* Any ghost can close doors (whether exit or non-exit) in the same manner during a hunt or an actual ghost event; one should only look out for the identifier outside of hunts and ghost events.

The Yurei ability does not involve opening doors, only closing.

Rarely, doors can be pushed without actually grabbing them to do so. This can be mistaken for the ghost slamming the door. Use an EMF Reader to check if the ghost actually interacted with the door.

All this being said, it is worth noting that the Yurei's ability is not particularly common, especially as, if the Yurei is occupying a room with no valid doors, then it will simply never use it. For an alternate strategy, one can look out for its special interaction with Incense once its favorite room is found: use it on the ghost, then set up Salt such that the piles cover the exit/doorway to the room. If the ghost passes through the salt and walks to other parts of the room within 60 seconds of it being affected by the Incense, then it is not a Yurei.

Ultimately, however, the Yurei is one of the more evidence-dependent ghost types to conclusively identify, making it particularly difficult to puzzle out on reduced evidences difficulties like Nightmare and Insanity.

## Trivia

* *Yūrei* are Japanese folklore ghosts known for haunting a specific location at a specific time (generally corresponding to their time of death). They are famous for having an appearance which strikes fear into their foes, often resulting in self-mutilation or suicide.
* The Yurei is commonly regarded as a very difficult ghost to identify, along with the Goryo, due to its lack of hunting abilities and/or lack of recognizable abilities.
* The Yurei, though regarded as having a "stronger effect on people's sanity", does *not* increase the passive sanity drain of players, nor does it have an increased drain from pseudo-line of sight like with the Phantom. Furthermore, the Jinn's ability to drain 25% sanity rather than the Yurei's meager 15% while the Jinn has other abilities ironically makes the Yurei weak when juxtaposed to other ghosts.

## History

 0.8.0 | The Yurei can no longer use its ability if it is in a room that does not have a door.

## References

1. ↑ *HIDDEN YUREI ABILITY in the NEW Phasmophobia 0.5 patch | BigMeik* (on YouTube)