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There's actually a theory that some of the endings lead into the "next" story. For example, it hypothesizes that the Elster that you take the armor off of to repair yourself was from the Memory ending.
Just come up with your own. That's what I did after beating it and unless developers outright confirm what the official canon for them is I'll stick with my own interpretation. That's the fun part after all.
The main character (Elster unit) is speculated to have her personality imprint originate from the character we read about known as "Lilith". There's a lot of thematic inspiration sourced from the biblical character, which was the first woman who were cast out and replaced by Eve.
All of the endings are likely cannonical and the ultimate desire is for both Elster and Arianne to cease to exist - because they're trapped in three different realities at once - so basically, limbo.
The signal that warps reality - known as the magpie signal; intermingles with another source, creates the interstice and the world we traverse is trapped in this. Ocasionally you dip into another layer (out of 3).
The game is deliberately vague and very ambiguous. Lots of symbolism going on such as the isle of death paintings (symbolizes Elster and Arianne's conjoined desire) which Elster is "supposed to usher Arianne to" i.e. "the promise".
Sorry if it's too cryptic. That's kind of the writing for this game in a nutshell.
Theres evidence leaning to multiple directions at the same time, so its up to what you think makes the most sense to you.
And spoiler alert, there are no time loops. The crux of the story revolves around memory and perception.
Obviously my thoughts and understanding of the narrative have gotten more nuanced and deeper since making this thread, but this gives you the most important baseline details. Read everything, not just the first post.
Timeframe is all broken. We know Elster we play as is not the original, but a copy of one of Penrose program Elsters. Narratively it implies that we play as a copy of Elster Arianne spent time with, i.e, our Elster is nuts right from the conveyor belt. But how would she ever be retrieved if Penrose ships were catapulted out of the system? Did some other ship somehow intercept Penrose 512 specifically (and ONLY Penrose 512 with clearly pattern-broken LSTR unit) and then used the data to produce the new Elster unit, or is this a metaphor of Elster's renewal and redefinition of her goal? If so, can we ever trust ANY document in the facility? Because even the facility itself structurally is too reminiscent of Arianne's potential path if she'd reject Penrose program appointment.
As said, I don't really see the way to conclusively appoint a real solution to Signalis' narrative. Whatever theory you build, there will always be a big BUT MAYBE that will also explain stuff more or less cohesively. Say, I made this perversion some time ago for funsies: https://www.reddit.com/r/signalis/comments/131a01j/the_hard_scifi_theory_spoilers_of_course/
And the big thing everyone seems to ignore is... that the game actually never gives you hard evidence for any sort of time manipulation on the part of Ariane happening. None. Zero.
In the entirety of the game, there is one single piece of writing (Dream Diary) that could be read to suggest that Ariane can have dreams of other people and places, and seemingly time periods, but that's as far as it goes. Kinda similar to Prescience from Dune. But not actual time manipulation.
Instead, it gives you plenty of information that directly contradicts such a reading. Most importantly, the game goes out of it's way to concretely (with an overwhelming amount of textual evidence - more than for any other concept in the game, including bioresonance which is the only way an Ariane time loops explanation could be possible at all, and the game never says bioresonance can manipulate time, only reshape material reality) establish Synchronicity - false sense of reality and who you are, and reliving other individuals' memories. Among other elements that relate to perception, and not time itself.
You seem to be working from the biased assumption that things can't be figured out. But if that was the case - why would the developers waste their time building such an intricate web of interconnected characters, events, narratives and symbols if it all amounts to meaningless fabrication in the final analysis?
You say you "don't see a reasonable method to establish even the reality of the Sierpinsky facility we see in game", but that's a wholly backwards way of going about things. To entertain such a question you must have strong evidence from the game itself that it's a valid point in the first place. And yes of course, the surrealist nature of the game inherently promotes such an *initial assumption*, that's totally intentional. But the game showers you with information which lets you make a case for the Sierpinsky we see in game to be "real", at least was real in different specific time frames in the mine's history, a lot more easily than to make a strong argument for not taking *anything* we see there as "real" or trustworthy. It opens a whole lot of unnecessary plot issues as well - if it all boils down to time loops generated by Ariane, how does she know all of these details about the facility, machinery and mechanisms, manuals, the people there, their lives and personalities, and events? What about stuff like the spy on Rotfront? That's information that she just couldn't have or be expected to come up with on her own (for example being part of established interests of hers or something like that). A more reasonable, supported by the game itself view to go by is that *most* (admittedly some details are hard to argue for) of what we see to be the result of real memories.
I agree that the time frame of the events of the story is very difficult to put together in a coherent manner that also makes sense in terms of time span. But that is an issue in itself, not supporting evidence for time loops. And the game does give you all relevant details in terms of cause-effect relationships. For example regarding retrieving the original LSTR unit - the game presents us with two (at least) distinct Penrose crash sites. One is on a snow planet, of a LSTR unit looking not for Ariane, but Alina Seo instead (and we also have to remember that the original LSTR unit was *decommissioned* as well, meaning it might not have even gone on the journey at all). The only snow planet we know of is Rotfront. So the game has presented us with something concrete in terms of thinking that the original LSTR might have not left the solar system as the Penrose program ships are supposed to, and from Rotfront (or anywhere in the system really) extracting her would be both possible, easy, and quick. You can poke holes at this of course, but again, we have to think in terms of textual evidence, what is there and what isn't, and think about why the developers chose to tell/show us what they do, and about what and why they decide *not* to. Why do they keep giving us details that support the memory angle (for another example - Adler being "confused" about an LSTR unit on Sierpisnky which the Kolibri's say "isn't actually there") rather than give evidence for something else instead if that's just a red herring? There is an obvious pattern the game works to slowly but strongly establish over it's whole duration, and it's not time loops.
I also want to point out, the main thing in my thread that could be characterized as a big assumption or speculation is the bit about "Anna Huang" (or potentially the original LSTR unit) going to Sierpinsky to look for Alina Seo, but that is actually supported by the game, with the photo switch in the opening (where its Alina on it). So even the most stretched out I get, I still have something from the game to back myself up. On the other hand the time loop people neither have concrete evidence (they just use the general surreal nature of the game to be their only piece they point to), nor have I ever seen them even attempt to explain why the game is full of so many contradicting details then. The only other thing I can think of that they might use as evidence to support time loops is one piece of abstract writing towards the end you find on Avalon I think, but I think that refers to perception (my argument) not actual time manipulation, so I haven't seen them try to explain how it works in their favour either.
That said, when last I checked, it seemed that most people were leaning towards something close to a dreaming / illusion scenario. I personally think that Elster is in her cryo / stasis / repair pod, and the "game" itself is a combination of her heavily damaged mind, the computer circuitry, and even her partner's bio-resonance as she tries to force herself awake to fulfill her promise. With the ending being what happens once she awakes, primarily being too afraid to make good on it or actually going through with it.