Can someone explain the endings?

[Khamas Tunnel]

I just played through both endings, loved the aesthetics of this game and how refreshing it was to play as a bug, very creative! made the whole walking simulator interesting to me as I DESPISE walking simulators.
But I have never really read about Kafka, can someone please explain what just happened?

[sleepy toad]

I've read Kafka's metamorphosis and it's nothing like this game beyond the basic idea of a human being turned into a bug. I've seen people say this game shares the absurdity of a lot of Kafka's novels but since i haven't read the rest of his stuff i can't confirm or deny.

As for the endings, i think they're pretty straightforward:

- If you burn Josef's condemnation paper, you essentially save Josef from a death sentence / life in jail but condemn yourself to remain a bug for the rest of your life (since the contract was that you could go back to being a human only after turning in Josef's condemnation).

- If you turn in Josef's condemnation as you're supposed to, your contract is filled and you're allowed to become a human again (even though the big boss bug tries to take that away from you by imprisoning you). So you go back to being a human, but you instantly get arrested by the same cops who tried to arrest Josef before you, thus creating a vicious cycle.

As a side note, since you don't see Josef during the "human" ending, i think it's possible that by censoring Josef's condemnation letter before turning it in you can save him from being condemned. The game never indicates whether or not this is the case since the ending is so brief, but it is possible.

[Qybat]

One point to consider of the 'censored certificate' ending: As the Tower's rigid, inflexible procedures dictate that Josef's condemnation can only be signed by his best friend, the same rule likely applies also to Gregor's trial. So assuming the censoring of the document was effective, perhaps all is not lost: It may be Joseph who next finds himself in the verdict box, realising why Gregor disappeared for a time and taking his own turn to smudge the ink. Since the story is deliberately left inconclusive, we may imagine any ending we wish providing it is consistent with the events of the game - and an endless cycle of utterly pointless trials fit that.

Though it is strongly implied that the smudging of the certificate really made no difference at all to Josef. Indeed, it makes no point if the certificate is signed at all: The outcome is already determined. It may be that once the certificate is submitted to storage it will never be inspected to verify the signature, rendering the whole process even more pointless. In this case the two endings become nothing but a mockery of agency - giving Gregor an apparent choice that only serves to illustrate how powerless he is against the system. I feel this is an interpretation Kafka would approve of.

Despite the title, this game is really based upon the Trial. Not the easiest book to interpret. People often call it a satire of bureaucratic processes, but I don't think that is quite right, personally. It is more of a horror story, but the horror is no simple monster lurking in the dark. It's the horror of being at the mercy of an utterly impersonal System that you can never understand. The dread every adult feels deep down that they might one day be imprisoned because they failed to get the correct permit for an action they never imagined might need a permit, or violated a law they did not even know exists, or threw away a vital document mistaken for junk mail. This fear that somewhere there exists a social engine that holds power of life and death over them, and this engine of looming ruin is built out of people who are forbidden from empathy. A cold, mechanical, inhuman system which turns people into cold, mechanical, inhuman components.