The Secret Old Amsterdam (Spoilers?)

[MegaLobsterFace]

A secret/easter egg area in Versum Hill was just found, so what does everyone think its significance is?

For those who haven't seen, it was (as far as I know? maybe someone else posted about elsewhere first) discovered by Amysel in another thread on the discussions: https://steamcommunity.com/app/1353230/discussions/0/3806158166966621963/

The area itself seems to be clearly inspired by Kibogaoka Hill from JSRF, but even more abandoned than the undersides of that level were. From my perspective, its probably the Old Amsterdam that the Oldheads talk about, at least that's what a city underneath a city, devoid of life and buried in dirt, makes me think of. It also has a coffin that looks like the Felix mask, hidden behind a wall, surrounded by some even more ancient-looking walls, which reminds me of the Immortals gang from JSRF.

What do people think this is? Even if this is just an elaborate easter egg and not the start of some kind of extra content ARG, why is it here? Why is there a coffin hidden in an already hidden part of the city? Who was buried there? Was it Felix, or is this coffin where Felix got the idea for the mask from? Why is there a big, almost untextured-looking orange room with a swimming pool in the middle of this underground ruin? An Old Amsterdam-type area was kind of already hinted at in the shipping crate maze at Pyramid Island, so is this just an extra nod at that or is there another purpose to it? Are there other areas in the game like this that people just haven't found yet?

I am so invested in this game, and this secret area has been on my mind ever since I saw the post about it. Even if this doesn't lead to anything, I just want to hear other people's thoughts about it.

[Luis_Alberto]

Wouldnt be the only hint of an Old Amsterdam being under the new one. In the maze locked by the oldheads in Pyramid Island, there is a room that has a massive drop with what looks like an older city at the bottom.

[it's a gabe]

Originally posted by Luis_Alberto:

Wouldnt be the only hint of an Old Amsterdam being under the new one. In the maze locked by the oldheads in Pyramid Island, there is a room that has a massive drop with what looks like an older city at the bottom.

Whaaat? What room was that? I didn't notice anything at the bottom of the one pit I found.

[MegaLobsterFace]

There's a room in the shipping crate maze that's all orange, one door on each of the four walls, and a hole in the middle of the room. Jumping down, you'll end up in a giant, dirt pit with what looks like an old mansion embedded in the wall. As far as I can remember, there's nothing collectible down there, but it is reminiscent of the secret area found in Versum Hill.

As far as I know, neither of the two spots has anything you can really interact with, which is an interesting connection.

[it's a gabe]

Originally posted by MegaLobsterFace:

There's a room in the shipping crate maze that's all orange, one door on each of the four walls, and a hole in the middle of the room. Jumping down, you'll end up in a giant, dirt pit with what looks like an old mansion embedded in the wall. As far as I can remember, there's nothing collectible down there, but it is reminiscent of the secret area found in Versum Hill.

As far as I know, neither of the two spots has anything you can really interact with, which is an interesting connection.

Oh yeah, I found it o-o It's odd that there's nothing down the pitt, tho. Considering how easy it is to find, you'd think there'd be *something.* Maybe if we go down there as a specific character?

[MegaLobsterFace]

Based on anecdotal evidence of two people, the game reverts your save back a ways if you try to save & quit while in the Versum Hill Old Amsterdam. Either spits you back out in Versum Hill proper or in the area you were playing on before traveling to Versum.

Also, when I tried taking pics with the phone in Old Amsterdam, the phone camera stopped functioning and my entire photo gallery erased itself, but came back after reloading a save.

This really makes me wonder if those were all unrelated bugs that just so happens to have occurred around the time people were exploring Old Amsterdam, or if the area really is unfinished and unintended to be explored properly. I can understand the save revert, some people with less of a grasp of movement tech might glitch into the area and get stuck there with no way to get out, but the camera thing is super odd, that didn't happen in my entire playthrough up to that point.

[Lesserred]

The Versum Hill area seems like an intentional and finished area to me, as it seems like it's the intended method of getting one of the music CD's, as the exit pipe spits you out right by the ledge it's on.

[Mace]

Its a great secret making me think maybe there are more places like this ? maybe there is one at the other Big Mall ! plus the coffin is really cool since it makes me think theres a way to open it and get a secret char yk? Maybe the three lil eyes on the coffin are something we should look for around all the maps

[MegaLobsterFace]

Originally posted by Lesserred:

The Versum Hill area seems like an intentional and finished area to me, as it seems like it's the intended method of getting one of the music CD's, as the exit pipe spits you out right by the ledge it's on.

IDK about that one. The exit is farther away from that ledge than the umbrellas I used to jump on to get there, idk how much use it'd be to actually get up there. I think the easter egg was intentional either way, it just might have been an unfinished area from earlier in the game that was left in for fun.

That pool room especially is super weird-feeling.

[MegaLobsterFace]

Originally posted by Mace:

Its a great secret making me think maybe there are more places like this ? maybe there is one at the other Big Mall ! plus the coffin is really cool since it makes me think theres a way to open it and get a secret char yk? Maybe the three lil eyes on the coffin are something we should look for around all the maps

The three eyes with the two tears makes me think of the Big Three, especially since the mask is on the coffin. Since there's no multiplayer, I don't think we could get Cyber, Felix, and Red (or even just Felix and Cyber, since those are the two left) in there all at the same time, though, so idk what else to do with that information.

[Mace]

Originally posted by MegaLobsterFace:

Originally posted by Mace:

Its a great secret making me think maybe there are more places like this ? maybe there is one at the other Big Mall ! plus the coffin is really cool since it makes me think theres a way to open it and get a secret char yk? Maybe the three lil eyes on the coffin are something we should look for around all the maps

The three eyes with the two tears makes me think of the Big Three, especially since the mask is on the coffin. Since there's no multiplayer, I don't think we could get Cyber, Felix, and Red (or even just Felix and Cyber, since those are the two left) in there all at the same time, though, so idk what else to do with that information.

Yea the issue is that not everything has been done in that room so we will probably not find anything anytime soon BUT i did find this dialogue one of the oldheads say to u in the big mall map https://gyazo.com/1bbe80cd8de8616ffb5c38417c054545
https://gyazo.com/501509a18cb16df3b8f14f60660b2026

[MegaLobsterFace]

Originally posted by Mace:

Originally posted by MegaLobsterFace:

The three eyes with the two tears makes me think of the Big Three, especially since the mask is on the coffin. Since there's no multiplayer, I don't think we could get Cyber, Felix, and Red (or even just Felix and Cyber, since those are the two left) in there all at the same time, though, so idk what else to do with that information.

Yea the issue is that not everything has been done in that room so we will probably not find anything anytime soon BUT i did find this dialogue one of the oldheads say to u in the big mall map https://gyazo.com/1bbe80cd8de8616ffb5c38417c054545
https://gyazo.com/501509a18cb16df3b8f14f60660b2026

If there *is* any ARG stuff happening, or even just lore stuff that the devs wanted to keep ambiguous, the Oldheads have something to do with it. Everything they say has something to do with the old city or some vague hint at tragic backstories.

Those lines specifically are what make me think that Felix got the idea for the mask from the coffin, or from whatever dead person is in the coffin, rather than the coffin being for Felix or Faux or Cyber or something like that. It was something Felix and Cyber "shouldn't have messed with." Felix and Faux end up without heads and Cyber doesn't have any friends or rep left by the end of the game, and that was only after breaking out of prison, so those three definitely don't have great luck lately.

Maybe they're hinting at some ancient curse of the funky mummy XD

[Mace]

Originally posted by MegaLobsterFace:

Originally posted by Mace:

Yea the issue is that not everything has been done in that room so we will probably not find anything anytime soon BUT i did find this dialogue one of the oldheads say to u in the big mall map https://gyazo.com/1bbe80cd8de8616ffb5c38417c054545
https://gyazo.com/501509a18cb16df3b8f14f60660b2026

If there *is* any ARG stuff happening, or even just lore stuff that the devs wanted to keep ambiguous, the Oldheads have something to do with it. Everything they say has something to do with the old city or some vague hint at tragic backstories.

Those lines specifically are what make me think that Felix got the idea for the mask from the coffin, or from whatever dead person is in the coffin, rather than the coffin being for Felix or Faux or Cyber or something like that. It was something Felix and Cyber "shouldn't have messed with." Felix and Faux end up without heads and Cyber doesn't have any friends or rep left by the end of the game, and that was only after breaking out of prison, so those three definitely don't have great luck lately.

Maybe they're hinting at some ancient curse of the funky mummy XD

legit im thinking the same thing that mask is cursed in some way and that it probs gives whoever wears it enough skill to be Best of the best and the oldheads do not like that one bit

[MegaLobsterFace]

Looking at the three eyes on the coffin, i finally realized what it reminded me of.
Red/Faux's shirt has three squares aligned the same way. Those squares are the same colors as the square 'eyes' on Red's cyberhead. The shirt is three cyber eyes. The coffin is three human eyes. The coffin in the old, dead city clearly (for this hard reach, anyway) represents the past, the thrown away, the dead. But the game ends with Faux's body, the one with the three 'new' eyes on it also being basically tossed away like garbage. Both the old and new are gone, so where does that leave us? I'm ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ sleep deprived man, I can't think about anything but this game and I'm coming up with matpat game theory level stuff istg i need sleep. I think I'm the only person who would look at Red's shirt and see the same eyes that are on the coffin but that's the closest piece of iconography in the game I can think of rn.

Anyway has anyone else found the talking fish in the dream sequence after the mall? idk if these will embed properly, so i'll just describe them

The dream starts with Red in a desert, with an entrance to a mall (maybe?) just jutting out of the ground. At the front entrance there's a fish at a ticket booth that you can talk to, and it asks "Have the fins been damp lately?"
If you say yes, the fish just says "That's great!" If you say no, it says "Oh, okay.../Me? I'm in a bad spot right now.../Ah... You wouldn't get it." which honestly all just makes me think of the way Solace talks.

If you go around the back of the building in the same desert area, like don't go in the big door but go all the way around, there's another fish attached to the back of the building, looking more like a decoration than a person. It just says "Where did they all go?/Probably jamming..."

Felix what the everloving ♥♥♥♥ is happening in your brain.

[Roareye]

Sorry I'm late to the party on this one, folks. This is fascinating.

I've been playing this on Xbox One, but am working out how to get the footage off of it as I did record my findings so far. But I'll try to explain my findings at the moment until the video footage is ready. You are more than welcome to do what I did to prove I'm not talking BS.

So it is well known by now that there are two ways to enter the Old Amsterdam in the underground mall. The legit (and easier) way from the right, allowing you to slide into the tunnel, and the janky hack way from the left (jumping around the outer wall from the snake platforms) which allows you to jump into the tunnel from the outside. I used this second method for all of these findings as the legit route is already very well catalogued.

Firstly, enter the glitch by hopping around the walls, get behind the poster but don't approach the tunnel to the underground. Instead turn the camera around and look down, you'll see that this area is not without secrets of it's own. Behind you is a set of escalators just out of bounds, which you can now reach if you hop down.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bMGvGucA0McJyo7nviqcDIjUwz6EW1gv/view?usp=drive_link

You'll find these perfectly useable, you can interact with them as normal, just make sure not to get thrown off the edge of the level by grinding them too fast.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XBbncR9-2PWg8IxA17IaUi9nwyN8bUab/view?usp=drive_link

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ATU_HyKGwgWgDQRYwv7ufQOZruXUFcHY/view?usp=drive_link
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cQDvrB0cwRs81mGpta9zgjsAgFTtPvec/view?usp=drive_link
Here you can see where it should have been accessible, behind the wall by the red/white pill. The other surprise is that this area with the escalators is still present on the map, which is what made me look for it in the first place. That suggests the escalator was removed late into production, who knows where it would have led. The legit entrance to the tunnel is also shown on the map, by the way, as a small outward dent.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1hhnOvBg40QXJ7erbflpkdNwM56vhD7ba/view?usp=drive_link
https://drive.google.com/file/d/12oVIf0OH1VHg8J077_6qyJWVXlHPbaO4/view?usp=drive_link
There's also an advertisement box out here for some reason. Sure one side is visible in the main hall, but why use the whole box? Maybe that, and the ceiling above it, are the only other remnants of this deleted area?

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1hq2BtnQb3iHpepLyl3LwtFgn50DdNOmF/view?usp=drive_link
It's hard to make out on this picture from my phone (still trying to get the footage off the Xbox One) but if you go to this location on the map (The platform the big snake leads to, with the large graffiti), you'll notice the platform you're standing on is shown as an L shape on the map. When you go out of bounds for the elevator, you can get around the other side of the mall the other way, but I can't find a way to reach the other side of this wall from out of bounds. Not enough floor or things to jump onto. My closest guess currently is to glitch the poster on the left of the platform, but I can't quite reach that upper-most ledge. It cannot be done from the second ledge (the one we use to break out of bounds and get into the secret area).
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1aO7MUo4CIAxp7klnhypTFO1r89Y6_Mme/view?usp=drive_link

So, then. The biggie. Breaking out of bounds allows you to access the underground area in ways you weren't intended to. Here's where I am in comparison to the mall itself;
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KvqRTmzYnNjnm4zxRjgjXpeiUNKs-j_H/view?usp=drive_link

And here is a more complete view of the map;
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zyxznWkYliegsNuoh2xEkiZAJkkyJLav/view?usp=drive_link

To get this to show is a little tricky. When you jump down to the elevator area, you need to travel along the platform (towards the front of the mall) only slightly. There is a slight lip where the ground is incomplete this side and the next piece of ground is slightly higher than you. That's where you need to be. At the right camera angle, the model of the underground will pop in. As you can see, there are two white boxes near the middle. Boost-jump off the roof towards them and aim for the larger one. The smaller one has no collision and pushes you back into the level proper. I have been able to jump around the outside of the map (from the white box) until the room with the jump-vent (after the large pool room), but am struggling to get past it to the tomb. Just a matter of seeing which bits of broken scenery let you collide with them or not (you can stand on some invisible parts too).

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sizPNSScmKj8Z9lCKgSRYajauCEzf6wC/view?usp=drive_link
This is the Tomb from afar, doesn't look like there's much around it but not much has loaded in, just the bare bones. There appears to be a black dot next to or under the room, which may signify something there, but until I can get closer, I cannot be sure.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sdnqUa6w4Nsi6Pdj84NSaX0v5SZH-C4G/view?usp=drive_link
The only other major significance is the first dead end, the only place in the entire map with any items! You don't see much past the grating behind the items, but thankfully I was able to get myself behind the map here;
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sbnPExrIcqONRH1S9vIVisuoC8qgTSQN/view?usp=drive_link

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sQK6U_O3_jqRBdxdHXSaaU3sJKNpSGRi/view?usp=drive_link
Last image shows the behind the scenes, including that the water in the pool is one square object by itself. I usually aim for the white box when I jump down here, as you can see it is some distance away. I was unable to reach it from this position. Also strange is the steel girders you can see above the pool, they are complete interactive and have full collision, making them viable platforms, however they are much harder to get onto than the white box. I will upload the video here as soon as it is able to be shared.

My belief is that this underground maze was originally a race to get Felix's body. The layout isn't good for much else and the few branching paths all lead to the same place eventually (bar the first one that goes off to the items). If it wasn't, then the area was heavily cut down once it was "de-levelled" and kept as an easter egg. However very little seems to have been cut - looking at the map shows little in the way of abandoned areas, everything is in use. The mall we use to access this has unused materials, but the underground itself doesn't so far as I have seen.

Before I shut up and await your opinions or views on this stuff, I have one last note to make on the Oldheads. They mention Old Amsterdam, we have seen a piece in the Pyramid maze (the one with the shipping containers - the place someone mentioned with the only real tree). The Oldheads mention there used to be real trees once, they mention the mask and not to be messing about with it, and I've seen you guys mention these - which is great. I've not seen anyone acknowledge the oddity that the only Oldhead standing by a tree (top of the first part of Millennium Mall) is wearing the green outfit rather than the otherwise uniform brown outfit. This can be used (you'll see it in one of my screenshots) but so far hasn't unlocked anything. Another oddity is that when you play as Oldhead, all the other Oldheads in the game disappear! Not a single one remains at any area, but they'll come back if you switch characters. Not sure if it's relevant or if it was just a way to not program in new dialogue, but thought it was worth a mention.

What do you guys think? Can you see something I've missed?

[Amysel]

Originally posted by Roareye:

Sorry I'm late to the party on this one, folks. This is fascinating.

I've been playing this on Xbox One, but am working out how to get the footage off of it as I did record my findings so far. But I'll try to explain my findings at the moment until the video footage is ready. You are more than welcome to do what I did to prove I'm not talking BS.

So it is well known by now that there are two ways to enter the Old Amsterdam in the underground mall. The legit (and easier) way from the right, allowing you to slide into the tunnel, and the janky hack way from the left (jumping around the outer wall from the snake platforms) which allows you to jump into the tunnel from the outside. I used this second method for all of these findings as the legit route is already very well catalogued.

Firstly, enter the glitch by hopping around the walls, get behind the poster but don't approach the tunnel to the underground. Instead turn the camera around and look down, you'll see that this area is not without secrets of it's own. Behind you is a set of escalators just out of bounds, which you can now reach if you hop down.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bMGvGucA0McJyo7nviqcDIjUwz6EW1gv/view?usp=drive_link

You'll find these perfectly useable, you can interact with them as normal, just make sure not to get thrown off the edge of the level by grinding them too fast.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XBbncR9-2PWg8IxA17IaUi9nwyN8bUab/view?usp=drive_link

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ATU_HyKGwgWgDQRYwv7ufQOZruXUFcHY/view?usp=drive_link
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cQDvrB0cwRs81mGpta9zgjsAgFTtPvec/view?usp=drive_link
Here you can see where it should have been accessible, behind the wall by the red/white pill. The other surprise is that this area with the escalators is still present on the map, which is what made me look for it in the first place. That suggests the escalator was removed late into production, who knows where it would have led. The legit entrance to the tunnel is also shown on the map, by the way, as a small outward dent.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1hhnOvBg40QXJ7erbflpkdNwM56vhD7ba/view?usp=drive_link
https://drive.google.com/file/d/12oVIf0OH1VHg8J077_6qyJWVXlHPbaO4/view?usp=drive_link
There's also an advertisement box out here for some reason. Sure one side is visible in the main hall, but why use the whole box? Maybe that, and the ceiling above it, are the only other remnants of this deleted area?

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1hq2BtnQb3iHpepLyl3LwtFgn50DdNOmF/view?usp=drive_link
It's hard to make out on this picture from my phone (still trying to get the footage off the Xbox One) but if you go to this location on the map (The platform the big snake leads to, with the large graffiti), you'll notice the platform you're standing on is shown as an L shape on the map. When you go out of bounds for the elevator, you can get around the other side of the mall the other way, but I can't find a way to reach the other side of this wall from out of bounds. Not enough floor or things to jump onto. My closest guess currently is to glitch the poster on the left of the platform, but I can't quite reach that upper-most ledge. It cannot be done from the second ledge (the one we use to break out of bounds and get into the secret area).
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1aO7MUo4CIAxp7klnhypTFO1r89Y6_Mme/view?usp=drive_link

So, then. The biggie. Breaking out of bounds allows you to access the underground area in ways you weren't intended to. Here's where I am in comparison to the mall itself;
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KvqRTmzYnNjnm4zxRjgjXpeiUNKs-j_H/view?usp=drive_link

And here is a more complete view of the map;
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zyxznWkYliegsNuoh2xEkiZAJkkyJLav/view?usp=drive_link

To get this to show is a little tricky. When you jump down to the elevator area, you need to travel along the platform (towards the front of the mall) only slightly. There is a slight lip where the ground is incomplete this side and the next piece of ground is slightly higher than you. That's where you need to be. At the right camera angle, the model of the underground will pop in. As you can see, there are two white boxes near the middle. Boost-jump off the roof towards them and aim for the larger one. The smaller one has no collision and pushes you back into the level proper. I have been able to jump around the outside of the map (from the white box) until the room with the jump-vent (after the large pool room), but am struggling to get past it to the tomb. Just a matter of seeing which bits of broken scenery let you collide with them or not (you can stand on some invisible parts too).

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sizPNSScmKj8Z9lCKgSRYajauCEzf6wC/view?usp=drive_link
This is the Tomb from afar, doesn't look like there's much around it but not much has loaded in, just the bare bones. There appears to be a black dot next to or under the room, which may signify something there, but until I can get closer, I cannot be sure.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sdnqUa6w4Nsi6Pdj84NSaX0v5SZH-C4G/view?usp=drive_link
The only other major significance is the first dead end, the only place in the entire map with any items! You don't see much past the grating behind the items, but thankfully I was able to get myself behind the map here;
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sbnPExrIcqONRH1S9vIVisuoC8qgTSQN/view?usp=drive_link

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sQK6U_O3_jqRBdxdHXSaaU3sJKNpSGRi/view?usp=drive_link
Last image shows the behind the scenes, including that the water in the pool is one square object by itself. I usually aim for the white box when I jump down here, as you can see it is some distance away. I was unable to reach it from this position. Also strange is the steel girders you can see above the pool, they are complete interactive and have full collision, making them viable platforms, however they are much harder to get onto than the white box. I will upload the video here as soon as it is able to be shared.

My belief is that this underground maze was originally a race to get Felix's body. The layout isn't good for much else and the few branching paths all lead to the same place eventually (bar the first one that goes off to the items). If it wasn't, then the area was heavily cut down once it was "de-levelled" and kept as an easter egg. However very little seems to have been cut - looking at the map shows little in the way of abandoned areas, everything is in use. The mall we use to access this has unused materials, but the underground itself doesn't so far as I have seen.

Before I shut up and await your opinions or views on this stuff, I have one last note to make on the Oldheads. They mention Old Amsterdam, we have seen a piece in the Pyramid maze (the one with the shipping containers - the place someone mentioned with the only real tree). The Oldheads mention there used to be real trees once, they mention the mask and not to be messing about with it, and I've seen you guys mention these - which is great. I've not seen anyone acknowledge the oddity that the only Oldhead standing by a tree (top of the first part of Millennium Mall) is wearing the green outfit rather than the otherwise uniform brown outfit. This can be used (you'll see it in one of my screenshots) but so far hasn't unlocked anything. Another oddity is that when you play as Oldhead, all the other Oldheads in the game disappear! Not a single one remains at any area, but they'll come back if you switch characters. Not sure if it's relevant or if it was just a way to not program in new dialogue, but thought it was worth a mention.

What do you guys think? Can you see something I've missed?

It's cool how much you looked into this, but at this point on pc we have freecam mods so we can pretty much look anywhere we want now and it doesn't really look like there's much else to look into at this point