The ending (spoilers)

[rman88]

Ya, not going to lie. When i seen the whole hand poking out of the wolf. I thought this would be more of a horror based point in click game. Like a more grounded version of say Bone Totem or whatever. Hell even the whole Science organization that just randomly showed up. Seemed to push that something was very very off.

Considering now the game had revealed that Gram. was more or less in stuck in a time loop. Where he kills the women he stalked. Only to manifest her in the form of a little girl. All the while Wolves go around tormenting him over this.

Didn't really leave a good taste in my mouth. Didn't help that everyone around him was a giant ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. Kinda makes me feel like he is just isolated from the world. To the point that his social skills have fell apart. just like everything else in his life.

combine with the whole, is any of this real feeling. As was the story of the mine real? Did the mine owner son actual have an affair with her? or was this all in his mind as all he did was steal a boat to stalk her.

Ya game didn't feel scary just sad. watching a man who at his lowest points just keeps digging himself lower. all the while the sins of his past torment him. And while this might be a poetic ending. IT just came out of left field as their was very little implying this was a thing.

In fact the only thing that indicated that gram was a stalker. Was a single image at the end of the story. Kinda makes me wish they just went with the whole Mutated Wolf monster thing with evil bad cooperation. Instead the whole Stalker story line.

Still what are your thoughts? are you happy they did this well bait and switch?

[American Dove Mitten]

I felt the same way more or less

I was kinda hoping for the transformation angle myself, but his attitude gave it away. If they wrote the dialogue with a bit more nuance I think it would work better.

It feels like there is more to the story at first, and the ending we got seems like the most obvious one. So much so it was a wrong thing to do

Even during the first chapter the responses give those vibes, so it’s like, it’s not really a twist, you just naturally assume it’s the most likely outcome.

[rman88]

Side note, i didn't see the stalker thing coming. The only thing that indicated it was him taking photos in his strange alter. But that was revealed like 5 minutes before the ending. So this was a twist at the 9th hour stora deal.

Maybe if he knew more about her. Maybe if he was more creepy when he talked to the little girl about her mother. I might have thought this was a good twist. But man its just like wow.

Everyone calls him trash and a horrible person. And turns out they were right he is trash and a horrible person. The redemption was just one giant lie.

I never like looking at the characters who are massive ♥♥♥♥♥. And saying "wow they were right to be a prick"

Just dose not feel right.

[American Dove Mitten]

I felt like his mannerisms were in line with the same type of character in movies, even his look reminded me of how these people are usually portrayed. Movies love to make them a working man with beard and glasses and tidy clothes.

There was definitely awkwardness to him which girl comments on which is a big give away

[AdventureGamer]

From what I understood. He actually is not stuck in time loop. Chapter 5 is actually beginning of the game and Chapter 4 is real ending from what I noticed. He also had mental illness which he confirmed in Chapter 5 when he was talking to women researcher. Wolves are illusion from his mind that represent his family.

[rman88]

ehh that is one way to interpret it. That said if this wasn't a time loop. And everything that happened before hand happened after he killed her. What was said before was more or less just a read hearing. As remember originally he was going to meet her because he had to tell her about her daughter. Guy pretty much decided to take her from her home and bring her to her grandparents. So makes sense that she would be worried about her. And well its only right to say," Hey you were missing and i was attacked by wolves. I didn't feel it was safe for her to be left alone in your home. while you could have been dead."

combine this with all the other red herrings. Like the strange sand at the mine. The talk about the area being cursed. Hell even the park ranger who may or may not have existed. Hell even her backstory was interesting. That said not even sure if any of this was true at this point.

The whole thing could have been a red herring. Not even sure she even had a kid. So it could have just been a mentally damaged man going crazy. Or something supernatural or he could be dead in a ditch. Who knows at this point, regardless it didn't feel satisfying.

[AdventureGamer]

yeah, I mean you can see this story from many different points, I just wrote what I feel like was going on in the story.

[rman88]

ehh to be fair you could be correct. the story started as just a hey. Lost in the wood and being attacked by wolves. To o look were now playing stalker / Blank. it was a bit of a twist. One i don't feel was really that necessary.

[Bobbert]

Originally posted by AdventureGamer:

From what I understood. He actually is not stuck in time loop. Chapter 5 is actually beginning of the game and Chapter 4 is real ending from what I noticed. He also had mental illness which he confirmed in Chapter 5 when he was talking to women researcher. Wolves are illusion from his mind that represent his family.

I agree with this. It didn't seem like a time-loop to me. Chapter 4 seems like the chronological ending. The chapters are cleverly arranged to make you think 5 & 6 are a continuation, but then the rug is pulled out from you at the end and you realise they're actually the start of the story.

Graham doesn't mention the daughter once in chapters 5 & 6 (not even to the mother) and it's clear from the pictures he's taken and the note in his diary that he's been stalking the mother for a while and is gearing up to make a move. That's his motivation for seeking Ava out, not the daughter (who he hasn't met yet).

In chapters 1-4 it is possible that he doesn't remember killing the kid's mother, or he even disassociated and believed that the wolves did it. The emotional trauma of his abusive mother and the blackouts (possibly caused by the toxins in the water that the researchers were testing for), mean he's not in the best of mental states.

I thought it was very cleverly structured and it made for a very impactful ending. If chapter 4 is the end then saving the daughter acts as some form of redemption for Graham, but he still has his demons (the wolves are still following him). Also, the fact that one of his last interactions with the kid at the end of Chapter 4 is to wipe away her tears with a cloth torn from her dead mother's dress is pretty brutal.

[rman88]

your actual wrong with mention the kid. He dose it first thing during the beginning of chapter 5. this is is actual reason for going to see her outside of the creepy stalker obsession. That he needs to see her to keep the promise he made to the kid.

That and lets be honest if the guy just wanted to talk to her. He could have kinda did it without needing to break into a secured facility. Its kinda really not that necessary to see her when you think about it. Least outside to confirm if she died or not.

So it really makes no sense that he would go to all this trouble to just visit her house. Also makes no sense with what happened to his camera. remember his original reason for being out their was to photograph nature. And clearly the guy dose do that quite often. so real question is, what happened to the camera.. if the whole, i lost it while being attacked by wolves thing was a lie.

[Bobbert]

Originally posted by rman88:

your actual wrong with mention the kid. He dose it first thing during the beginning of chapter 5. this is is actual reason for going to see her outside of the creepy stalker obsession. That he needs to see her to keep the promise he made to the kid.

That and lets be honest if the guy just wanted to talk to her. He could have kinda did it without needing to break into a secured facility. Its kinda really not that necessary to see her when you think about it. Least outside to confirm if she died or not.

So it really makes no sense that he would go to all this trouble to just visit her house. Also makes no sense with what happened to his camera. remember his original reason for being out their was to photograph nature. And clearly the guy dose do that quite often. so real question is, what happened to the camera.. if the whole, i lost it while being attacked by wolves thing was a lie.

All he says at the start of Chapter 5 is "okay, I'll find her. I have to". There's no mention of why he feels the need to and no mention of the kid at all. There are deliberately no narrative threads that put chapter 5 chronologically after 4. The only reason we initially think it takes place after 4 is because it's placed there in the game. Even the inventory totally empties by the end of chapter 4.

If you rearrange the chapters into chronological order it's much more likely that the urgency is just because he's obsessed with her. If you re-read the diary in his house, it's clear that he's unravelling and getting more desperate because he feels so alone, and the "But something gives me hope, maybe I can still find light in this place, I'll try again tomorrow" is him planning to meet up with the mother, who he mistakenly thinks is his soulmate and will save him from his loneliness and madness.

The photography excuse is definitely just a lie he tells the kid as an excuse for him being in the woods. I guess that means he does remember killing the mother.

I could be totally wrong, but the fact that the game doesn't spell everything out for you and leaves things up to debate is a big factor in why I loved the story so much. I get that you were disappointed the game wasn't actually about "Mutated Wolf monsters and an evil bad cooperation", but there are hundreds of games like that. This delivered a unique, touching and thought-provoking experience about the horrors humans are capable of.


Edit: I'd highly recommend checking out the last document in the Extras section after you complete the game, there's pretty damning evidence that Graham new what he did.

[Wyrtt]

honestly, its just a dissapointed mess. Why modern writers are so obsessed with 4th wall breaking, is was all a dream or everyone are actually dead and its and illusion tropes?
Some even advertise that as a selling point.

[nilen435]

Hi! Some extra thoughts I had after finishing the game. Did Graham kill the Grounds keeper? Or was he just imagining him?
Could he also have killed the Lighthouse keeper earlier? You could interpit it as the lighhouse have been abandoned for some time with the wine being in the water for a long time and the Siren scientists not having the keeper on the list of people allowed to go through. Though he says he only visits 2 times a week and the lighthouse starts in the end, but that could be automatic.

[Ark]

Originally posted by nilen435:

Hi! Some extra thoughts I had after finishing the game. Did Graham kill the Grounds keeper? Or was he just imagining him?
Could he also have killed the Lighthouse keeper earlier? You could interpit it as the lighhouse have been abandoned for some time with the wine being in the water for a long time and the Siren scientists not having the keeper on the list of people allowed to go through. Though he says he only visits 2 times a week and the lighthouse starts in the end, but that could be automatic.

The grounds keeper was probably just a hallucination, due to the headache, but there is always the chance of Graham offing him due to no real evidence. He does mention the Lighthouse keeper being at the lighthouse in chapter 6 though due to the lighthouse being on. But at the same time it is automated.

[nilen435]

He had definitely been at the lighhouse before. He knew he would get a good view from the top and the telescope was pointed at the correct direction, which he also suspiciously wonders why its there. It could ofc just be her father which rarely ses his daughter that could have done that. But that would be abit creepy. Then he also happens to have the oars in is "photo den" in the boat. That makes me think he had put them there for the purpose of using them to go to her but never did at some time in the past.

[Smurky Turkey]

There really are no winners in the story. That poor woman already had a miserable event in her past to then getting killed by her stalker. The daughter has lost her mother. As for Graham.. I am not sure how to feel about him. He is indeed an obsessive stalker and a killer due to things not going as he hoped for with his supposed savior. On the other hand, he was messed up real bad by his childhood, had no luck in life and was possibly influenced by the chemicals in the water?

And yes, I do agree with the theory that chapter 5/6 take place before 1-4. That seems like a more logical option to me than a time loop.