Cleared Hot
by Not Knowing Corporation · 20 Nov, 2025
97 downloads
About the Game
Cleared Hot is a top-down helicopter shooter that pulls hard from the late-90s arcade genre — Strike Commander, Desert Strike, those zooming-around-with-a-cannon-and-a-rope vibes — but with modern physics and light tactical depth layered on top. You fly missions across handcrafted maps, drop a squad of infantry on the ground, swing a magnet rope to grab and reposition objects, and deal with whatever's shooting back at you.
Not Knowing Corporation launched the game into Early Access in November 2025, and this download is build 21248438 — the current stable version with all the early-access content patches included. The campaign clocks in at roughly 8–10 hours, with mission variety leaning more toward physics-puzzle solutions than pure twitch shooting.
Released with CSF + Goldberg, fully offline-playable, achievements unlock through the local stub. 1.4 GB installed. Single-player only — Early Access has not introduced multiplayer modes at this point in development.
Screenshots
10 images
Version Information
Steam Patch Notes
Official update history
v0.4.3
Combat
Pave Low: the side mounted miniguns now converge on the crosshair
A Boom of One's Own
Fixed a music transition that didn't play correctly
Training Run
Fix some props that were placed incorrectly
Get It While It's Hot
Fixed terrain glitches
General
Updated to a newer version of Unity
THANK YOU for all your thoughts + feedback on the new update! I'm happy to announce our hotfix with 40+ fixes or improvements.
I am tracking all your feedback, so keep it coming. Please join our Discord if you want to report anything or discuss the game.
Patch Notes
Helicopters
Alligator (Ka-52) has a bit higher acceleration and higher top speed.
Pave Low (MH-53) has a higher top speed.
Mouse sensitivity no longer scales with FPS. You may have to reduce your sens if you have a fast machine.
Apache: Longbow Salvo missiles can no longer hit your own helicopter under a certain missile configuration.
Missile Select Bug: Missiles no longer get stuck firing if you change weapons while firing.
Huey: door gunners no longer shoot through your own helicopter for targets ahead of you.
The aim laser now turns off during cinematics.
Combat
Player Airstrike: the laser lock is twice as fast (2s to 1s).
Player Airstrike: adjusted timing of the jet.
Enemy gun-jet strafing runs now do half as much damage. Your Airstrike still hits as hard as before.
Smoke Screen now blocks the sight of enemy infantry on the ground.
Fixed missile-lock warnings misbehaving once the missile has been fired, including after a roped MANPADS missile is released.
BTRs have less health (6500 to 3000). Fair warning though, i'm going to add some armored tank later on...
Shilkas have less health (5000 to 3000).
Ataka and Shturm missiles are now armor piercing
Helipads
Trucks at helipad bases no longer spawn on top of pickups or your helicopter. They spawn at the start of the mission and change teams when you capture the helipad.
The van and cargo truck now show up from the start as enemies and switch to your side when you capture the helipad.
Helipads now have lights that show which side holds them.
Destruction
More barbed wire fences can now be destroyed.
A Day at the Beach & A Boom of One's Own
The extraction marker now disappears as soon as you reach it, so it's clear the objective is done.
A Boom of One's Own: moved a van that was clipping into a building.
A Boom of One's Own: updated audio mix.
A Boom of One's Own: fixed a music desync issue.
Fast Times at Lakeview Prison
The objective now has a proper marker instead of only a radar blip.
Fixed a floating light pole and other light poles around the prisons.
Updated the look of the prison's weak spots.
No Takesies Backsies
Fixed a bug that could stop the beach landing from triggering.
Training Run
Flying over the bridge is smoother. The helicopter stays above it more reliably.
Updated audio mix.
Fixed a music desync issue.
Get It While It's Hot
Fixed the ammo crate at Crater Base Three handing out the wrong ammo type.
Piña Colada Strike
The drone section is much easier :) the drone has more health, flies faster, starts with 10 grenades, and gets twice as many grenades from crates. Grenades fly towards your crosshair and have a shorter fuse, and the rope has a longer range to grab things/enemies.
Enemy waves in the drone section are now lighter-armed jungle fighters.
Fixed grabbing a container launching the drone out of the map. (lol)
Fixed the drone turning red when flying low near blood.
Fixed the first download wave's dialogue never playing.
The final cruise-missile chase kills you less often.
The "pleasure palace" now breaks apart more smoothly.
Opened up doors around the bank, including in the basement, and cleaned up the area around the vault.
Moved the big turrets away from the streets.
Fixed power poles and cables, plus small city touch-ups to make our 3d artist happy. :)
Updated audio mix.
Getaway Day
Fixed a bug when an Airstrike hit the friendly carrier boat.
Fixed dropping troops onto the ship sometimes killing a main character and blocking progress.
The Storm
The submarine now surfaces on its own after a while.
The Comanche's Radar Cloak now works in the submarine fight.
Modding
Added a Help button to the Mods Panel that opens the modding guide.
The "Not Knowing Samples" mod now ships with the game.
Localization
Translation updates.
Other Fixes
Controller: the Boost button now shows its proper name instead of a raw text key.
Map panning and zooming now move at the same speed at any frame rate.
Now I'm going to take a long weekend. Whew. Thanks for playing.
- Colin "cfinger" and the Cleared Hot team
Hotfix: v0.2.5#17788
Keep the feedback coming everyone. This is a small update to fix some common issues. Our focus will now move to the Chapter 1a update.
Fixed: all helos loadout stats.
Fixed: end of mission screen navigation issue when using quit button from pause menu.
Balance: hydra and hellfire missiles.
Localization: hold ctrl to land is now localized.
Fixed: press escape while loading was starting the game with the pause menu open and game running.
Fixed: blackhawk cargo stats.
Changed: improvements in ui scale support
Changed: increased font sizes in homebase to improve Steam Deck legibility.
Fixed: ps4 and ps5 controller icons.
Changed: reordered upgrades to show light and heavy missiles ordered.
Fixed: "The Battle of Big Rocks" misison now continues when picking up special weapon crate without using the rope.
Fixed: "A West Texas Road Trip" bridge can't be destroyed out of order now so the mission and exchanges run normally.
Changed: removed some unused instructions and added the next weapon/previous weapon in pause menu.
Fixed: localization in homebase for some languages.
Fixed: looped sounds playing after quitting mission to the abandoned screen.
Known Issue: Quitting mid mission will hide the mouse cursor until you get back to the home base.
We are working on a fix, for now, here are some temporary solutions:
You can alt-tab to unhide the cursor
Use arrow keys and enter key
Use the mouse, it's invisible but mousing over the buttons will make them highlight. The buttons are still clickable.
Hotfix: v0.2.4#17671
Thanks for your feedback. We fixed the most pressing things we could manage to fix in a day. Enjoy!
Fix: Improved performance in Mission 10: Data Harvesting.
Fix: Improved performance of jet enemy on all missions
Fix: When rescuing or delivering people made them invulnerable to prevent accidental deaths when dropping them
Fix: Tweaked volume and frequency of scientist barks
Fix: Fixed how instructions were shown for controls that have positive and negative axis (ex: altitude control)
Fix: Made chickens a priority target for the rope
Fix: Fixed ally npcs entering the van and breaking the objectives (Data Harvesting)
Fix: Fixed dialog overlap in dialog when killing humvee (Tail Risk)
Fix: Fixed music in The Battle of Big Rocks
Fix: Added explicit drop zone in The Long Way Home
Hello Players! Thank you for all your feedback! We just pushed a quick fix for the below issues.
Fix: Fixed some texts that were using a font without support for localization
Fix: Fixed main fonts using fallback for cyrilic characters
Fix: Added code to prevent issues when the options or savegame can't be loaded
Fix: Fixed gas tank from "An Odd Tool for Odd Jobs" that was not blowing up when using the Easy of Custom difficulty options to lower Ally damage.
Carry on, pilots. It's great to have you in the game, finally !
- Colin "cfinger" and the Cleared Hot rapid response dev team (Ariel and Ruben :D )
Current Release
Build 22370936
Uploaded Jun 21, 2026
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System Requirements
How to Install
ClearedHot.exe to play
Troubleshooting tips
• Run Redist/_CommonRedist installers if game won't start
• Add folder to Windows Defender exclusions
• Run as administrator
Download
Direct link available
Needed when extracting (WinRAR / 7-Zip) — not a site login.
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8948f1266e6ed7eb20e67b4ef403cffb0552532b7d666157c0ec8026ed7f7828
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Download Cleared Hot for PC with a direct link or via torrent. Get the full version of Cleared Hot for free. Cleared Hot is a Action released by Not Knowing Corporation.