Movement & Swimming

Overview

Hell Let Loose: Vietnam introduces the most significant expansion to player movement in the franchise’s history. Where the original HLL was designed around WWII’s relatively flat European terrain, Vietnam’s rivers, jungles, hills, and waterways demanded an entirely new movement system. All of the following are officially confirmed by Expression Games and Team17.

Confirmed Movement Mechanics

Swimming

Players can now swim — fully traversing rivers, lakes, and waterways rather than being blocked by them. Vietnam’s complex river network is a core part of the map design, and swimming is what makes it fully navigable on foot.

How it works:

• Move into water and your character transitions to a swimming state
• You can vault out of the water while swimming — transitioning directly to land movement without stopping
• Rivers are no longer impassable barriers; they are terrain features with crossing options at any point

Underwater Diving

Players can dive underwater by double-tapping Ctrl.

Key stats from closed beta:

• Approximately 11 seconds of underwater time before needing to surface for air
• Vaulting out of the water while swimming works — you can surface and immediately enter a run
• Underwater movement creates stealth crossing opportunities on contested waterways

Climbing

Players can now climb — navigating terrain features, obstacles, and environmental objects that would have been impassable in the original Hell Let Loose. Vietnam’s highland terrain and jungle environments are built around this capability.

Fast Crawling

An enhanced prone movement speed — fast crawling allows players to move more quickly while staying low. In dense jungle where standing height immediately exposes your position, fast crawling is the practical default movement mode for cautious infantry.

Why it matters: In Vietnam’s jungle terrain, the difference between standing movement and fast crawling is often the difference between being spotted and not. Dense foliage provides concealment at low height but none at standing height — fast crawling is how you move through it.

Dragging Wounded Allies

Players can drag incapacitated teammates away from active fire to give them a chance to heal and re-engage. This is a confirmed new interaction that changes how the Medic role operates and how squads handle casualties.

Tactical implication: A downed soldier in the open is no longer an automatic write-off. If a teammate can reach them and drag them to cover, the Medic has a viable revive window. This adds a new layer to casualty management — drag first, then revive, rather than exposing the Medic by asking them to come to the open.

How These Mechanics Change Gameplay

River Crossings

Rivers in HLL: Vietnam are no longer obstacles — they are contested terrain. Both factions can:

• Swim across at any point rather than being funnelled to bridges
• Dive for stealth crossings on watched approaches
• Use patrol boats for fast, armed crossings

The result is that rivers require genuine defensive coverage. A team that only covers the bridge is a team that will be flanked by swimmers crossing upstream.

Jungle Movement

Dense jungle punishes upright movement and rewards low, careful positioning. Fast crawling through vegetation keeps you concealed; standing to sprint across open ground in the jungle is how you get spotted and suppressed.

The NVA faction is especially well-suited to Vietnam’s movement system — tunnel networks, jungle ambush doctrine, and fast crawling through dense terrain all work together.

Casualty Management

The combination of dragging and improved Medic mechanics means squad casualties are more recoverable than in the original HLL. A well-coordinated squad will:

1. Suppress the enemy position as soon as someone goes down
2. Drag the casualty to cover while suppression holds
3. Let the Medic work safely while the squad maintains the firefight

This requires communication — specifically a callout the moment someone is downed and a callout when they’ve been dragged to safety.

Standard Movement Inherited from Original HLL

These movement options carry over from the original game:

• Sprinting — Left Shift (default)
• Prone — Z (default)
• Crouch — Left Ctrl (default)
• Jump — Space (default)
• Lean left / right — Q / E (default)
• Breath hold (ADS) — hold breath while aiming to reduce sway at range

Related

• Patrol Boat Combat — river warfare enabled by swimming
• Suppression System — why staying low matters
• Medic — the role that benefits most from dragging mechanics
• Rifleman — dragging and casualty management is a squad responsibility