Some lore questions *Spoiler warning*

[Meatspace Diversion]

Hey, I really enjoyed this game and noticed not many people are talking about the lore. And after beating it I have some questions about the lore that I might've missed or are open ended, this includes some things about the end of the game, so if you haven't beaten it yet skip this.

Firstly, who is Benedict Fox, was he created from the ritual since Marie couldn't have a child? If so did he just kinda pop into existence with the Companion or was the ritual something to combine the two. On that note do we have any information on what or who the companion actually is? I know at the end he calls Benedict his brother, was that meant literally or more metaphorically. Back to Benedict's past, how did he get separated from James and Marie, did the first circle take him when they rejected them having a child? Is that why Marie lost all hope?

Secondly, why did James want to create the golem in the first place, I think it had something to do with them not being able to make a child, but I'm not sure. Speaking of that, is the golem and the pure being the same, that's kinda they way I interpreted it at least. But then again I don't know what actually happens to the golem after you put it's soul in the crystalized blood and give it to the weaponsmith.

Thirdly, are the old spider and mirage actual beings or are they more metaphorical for insanity and depression killing James and Marie? Similarly what is limbo specifically, I know it's referenced as hell, but is it actually hell or something else. On that note, did we actually get to heaven at the end of the game or was that just more of limbo.

I probably have more questions, but these are the ones I can think of right now.

[RooibosTea]

Here's a general timeline. Someone correct if something's wrong because there was alot to piece together, it doesn't cover everything, I probably mixed up some events & I'm still iffy about some details. I think it'll help answer most of your questions:

-James (Benedict's father) starts his career with First Circle, doing horrible experiments with the void

-Ordo Ira Dei/the Order is formed, and breaks up the First Circle. The Order makes a group called ORG/the Organization that's made up of orphans from rituals and experiments from First Circle to watch over former First Circle members.

-James makes deals with the Order, makes breakthroughs into the void, invents the amplificator (prototype of Ben), allowing a person to enter Limbo (or Hell according to the Order). Limbo and Hell are the same thing, its a matter of perspective. It's Limbo according to the First Circle and Hell according to the Order. Limbo/Hell in this game is an alternate dimension that responds to powerful human emotion.

-After the Amplificator, James attempts the 1st Ritual in secret & a better or perfect version of the amplificator, Benedict Fox is born. Ben's mother dies from the Ritual. The Ritual binds a demon, The Companion, to Benedict. The Companion, as far as I know, is just a (powerful) demon who is bound to Benedict and is not his twin brother or any family member. Benedict gets powers from the Companion but at the cost of his life slowly draining away each time he uses it.

-James is traumatized from the event, gives away Ben to the ORG anonymously? James tries to distance himself from the trauma & move on with life. No one knows the Ritual actually worked by this point in time.

-during training for the ORG, Ben's mask breaks, & his demonic powers awaken (the Rat Mask you find confirms this - also Ben has a scar on his face, which might be referring to this)

-Benedict runs away from the ORG (or he'll be experimented on until death), bumps into Harry Houdini while selling occult books, Harry raises Benedict, Benedict becomes a detective

-meanwhile, James marries Marie (2nd wife) and moves into mansion owned by Marie's father (von Bothmer). Her father has done experiments with her when she was a child and also some experiments on the void/limbo/another dimension on this very mansion (confirmed by that straitjacket you find). Von Bothmer starts working on a golem but stops midway to experiment on the void instead because of the Enigma or something, idk. Von Bothmer ends up dying at some point before the game begins.

-Marriage is actually pretty decent at first, then Marie wants to have a child.

-James's PTSD/trauma from the first Ritual kicks in, worsens relationship with Marie and they get into arguments about having/not having a child.

-Marie pressures James to request permission for a child from the Order. It's strictly forbidden for former First Circle members to have a gifted? child - and guess what, Benedict is a gifted child that flew under the radar for some years. James is worried that the Order (or Marie) will find out about the 1st Ritual involving Benedict & having a child triggers his trauma involving the Ritual.

-James goes full workaholic mode, works on whatever the Order asks him to do & working on the Golem in secret. He starts ignoring Marie more.

-James hesitantly sends all of his work to the Order in exchange for approval of having a child. At some point, Tomas makes a deal with James, probably about the Ritual.

-meanwhile, Marie feels isolated from James, contacts a doctor via letter (you learn this from the memoirs), then finds out she cannot conceive a child. She keeps this a secret from James. James keeps the secret about the Ritual and his first marriage from Marie.

-The Order denies their permission to have a child.

-At some point, Harry Houdini finds out who Benedict truly is, blackmails James for hush money, but Harry doesn't tell Benedict about it. The blackmail worsens James's psyche.

-Also James calls a private investigator, mistakes Maria's contact with the doctor as her cheating on him.

-Marie finds out about the Ritual, James thinks Marie is having an affair - and their relationship worsens even more. Marie wants to do the Ritual while James doesn't want her to die like what happened the first time with Ben's mother.

-2nd Ritual happens. I don't know the exact details of what happens here but the Pure Being is born. I don't know if Marie performs the Ritual in secret and James walks in on it while its happening or something else happens. 2nd Ritual is the breaking point for both of them.

-James goes mad from paranoia & madness and gets murdered by giant demon spider

-Marie becomes depressed because the Ritual failed to create an actual child, demons are drawn to her and manipulates her into suicide

-Both of them were probably murdered by actual demons from the Limbo, summoned by very intense emotions they both harbored at the time & also being in an area closest to Limbo due to Von Bothmer's previous experiments with the void. If they were in a normal mansion, maybe they would not have been murdered?

-The Order finds out about James's work with the Ritual, or his death, and send people to James & Marie's Limbos to get info

-Tomas goes ahead of the Order to find the Ritual before them for his own plans to summon Heaven

-Benedict finds a lead to his father and the Last Case starts

As for why James wanted to create a golem in the first place, its more like Von Bothmer started the golem and James wanted to finish it (for curiosity's sake mostly & ignoring Marie). He did think of using the Golem as a replacement for a child but I don't think he was serious about it. Making a golem is really difficult and illegal to do so, and probably really dangerous if something goes wrong. I did kinda think they could put the Pure Being in the golem but they don't follow up with what happens to the Golem other than the Weaponsmith escaping with the Golem in the ending.

As for whether it was actually Heaven, who knows. But you probably shouldn't open a portal to another dimension in case demons/angels/monsters start pouring out and you can't close it.

As for Benedict Fox, he's like the magnum opus of James. He doesn't need complicated rituals to go to someone's Limbo. He has the link to the Companion to rescue him each time he 'dies' in Limbo. Ordinary people (like the Organization members you fight) sent to Limbo can easily die, whether by the demons, by Benedict or the transfer goes wrong like in one of the camps. And I guess he can't die in the mortal/human world according to the post credits scene.
My brain hurts typing all that.

[Meatspace Diversion]

That's a very comprehensive timeline, thank you! I can see why it would hurt to type all of that lol. The companion saving Ben each time he "dies" in limbo makes a lot of sense, I was wondering why killing the org members actually killed them. And somehow I forgot that Marie wasn't actually Ben's mom, so that's probably where a lot of my confusion came from. I also like the idea that the mansion got affected by all the experiments von bothmer did and that the two's emotions attracted the demons that killed them. I do hope that they get a chance to make a sequel or dlc to go over some of the loose ends, like the what happened to the golem, and the little epilogue scene makes me hopeful that they plan on continuing the story more, but who knows.

[Croik]

To clarify, Marie didn't actually have an affair. She was seeing a friend of hers who was a doctor, who said in one of their letters that she can't have children. Marie hid this from James - he's the one that leapt to the conclusion that she was hiding an affair. It was only ever a misunderstanding.

[RooibosTea]

Originally posted by Meatspace Diversion:

That's a very comprehensive timeline, thank you! I can see why it would hurt to type all of that lol. The companion saving Ben each time he "dies" in limbo makes a lot of sense, I was wondering why killing the org members actually killed them. And somehow I forgot that Marie wasn't actually Ben's mom, so that's probably where a lot of my confusion came from. I also like the idea that the mansion got affected by all the experiments von bothmer did and that the two's emotions attracted the demons that killed them. I do hope that they get a chance to make a sequel or dlc to go over some of the loose ends, like the what happened to the golem, and the little epilogue scene makes me hopeful that they plan on continuing the story more, but who knows.

Yeah, I got confused alot when I first started playing and some of the dialogue & text didn't make sense right away. Like I assumed that the Organization members project themselves onto Limbo like they're dreaming and they'd just wake up after being banished. But dialogue from Tomas talking about his scars after waking up and Wasp talking about how she's losing men when Benedict is 'banishing' them implies they can actually die. And whole thing about Marie not being Ben's mom threw me off too because I was wondering what happened to his real mother while investigating 2 other people at the same time. I'll keep an eye out in case there's a sequel because I had fun with this mess of a plot (and hopefully, an improvement on gameplay on the combat/movement with more powers or abilities).

Originally posted by Croik:

To clarify, Marie didn't actually have an affair. She was seeing a friend of hers who was a doctor, who said in one of their letters that she can't have children. Marie hid this from James - he's the one that leapt to the conclusion that she was hiding an affair. It was only ever a misunderstanding.

Yeah, I remembered the tidbit about her being unable to have children but I forgot about the memoir mentioning the letter she sent to the doctor. I was trying to make sense of James's memory of hiring a private investigator, but I forgot about what happened on Marie's side while trying to make sense of the timeline.

There's still some things I'm wondering about, like who or what Enigma is (is that another group?), why von Bothmer was experimenting on Marie & in a hurry, what's the deal with the dialogue about the Hanged Man card, how no one died during that looping part in Limbo, etc. but I'm gonna give it a rest.

[RedbirdXlll]

I just finished the game, this summary was definitely helpful

I also wished they had explained some things a bit more, the ending left me feeling somewhat unsatisfied. I believe I collected every tidbit in the game and got every possible extra note and bit of lore, and I don't think I have anything extra that I can add. I'm wondering if Enigma IS the Pure Being??

But VonBothmer was talking about defeating Enigma, so maybe not. I really hope they add on more, the gameplay was really fun and the story was super engaging - though I do also hope they give some better tutorials for how certain puzzles work the first time you encounter them

[shadowpanther10]

Clearly that ending was intented to be open as to maybe one day there would be a sequel either with Benedict or the demon using his body as in the final boss battle

[Gunheart]

I just finished this on PS5 and wanted to add there are some additional details you can get from the tutorials as well, namely Ben befriended a girl while he was at the Organization, presumably Wasp, and when his powers manifested she was the only person she confided in. Unfortunately she proceeded to rat him out to the rest of the ORG. Assuming this really is Wasp that explains her and Ben's complicated relationship.