[Spoilers] Who are the cannibals?

[Survii Gecko]

So, I just finished the game and it clearly explains how the mutants are all different kids around a year after being ressurected, and the red man is the girls father etc. It fails to explain who the cannibals are though? They bow to you in red paint so I guess they see the lead scientist girls dad as their god/creator. Anything I missed on this?

[Briefcase Wanker]

Well it seems that the 'natives' were there before all the science experiments and in my opinion the canibals were vexed by the scientific experiments and became in control of the man in red paint. The story is quite confusing and it leads back to religion and the mining industry. I think who the canibals are is up to interpretation as it is a mystery of where the came from. I think Megan's dad the scientist was the fist contact of man on the island and was seen as something greater and therefore obeyed he was the man in red paint. I think what changed was govermental oganisations created a great change in the life style of the canibals and created this war between man and the canibals.

[Survii Gecko]

Originally posted by The Dude:

Well it seems that the 'natives' were there before all the science experiments and in my opinion the canibals were vexed by the scientific experiments and became in control of the man in red paint. The story is quite confusing and it leads back to religion and the mining industry. I think who the canibals are is up to interpretation as it is a mystery of where the came from. I think Megan's dad the scientist was the fist contact of man on the island and was seen as something greater and therefore obeyed he was the man in red paint. I think what changed was govermental oganisations created a great change in the life style of the canibals and created this war between man and the canibals.

Well I guess they might have been taught to be hostile towards plane crash survivors, as the red paint man (scientist) probably didn't want any survivors running off and being rescued, therefore revealing the island.

[TrefanSVK]

Originally posted by Survii Gecko:

Well I guess they might have been taught to be hostile towards plane crash survivors, as the red paint man (scientist) probably didn't want any survivors running off and being rescued, therefore revealing the island.

But they are not hostile at first. Only if you anger them.

[Syndicake ☠]

Story spoiler If you look around the lab you can see that it was a biomedical research lab that was experimenting on sick children to look for a way to cure their illnesses. Their ultimate goal was extending adult longevity (life span). Something went wrong with the experiments involving the ancient machine, it created the two anomalies virginia and armsy. It seems to trigger the rapid epigensis of cells in a cancer/tumour like fashion.

The adult cannibals on the island are obviously the test subject children having grown up to reach maturity. I was instantly reminded of lord of the flies, they killed all the adult researchers you can find their bodies in the lab. The red man was the head researcher and was probably a sole survivor.

The strange reaction to red paint is probably because he made a legend of himself or maybe because the exit corridor is all painted in red.

Because of how the device works its possible they grew to adulthood very rapidly it might not have been 20 years...but given the yacht being from the 80s and dead mining teams and film crews, it's likely that they were present on the island and were killed by the escaped children 20 years ago.

The religious missionaries probably found the device and activated it by mistake resulting in the first explosion which created the sinkhole, you can find a huge number of incinerated skeletons in the chamber where the device was found. That could have happened a century before. However there is some modern equipment like work lights in the chamber so the bodies could easily be researchers from the 80s who were killed suddenly when the device activated.

Another theory is that the sinkhole was the upper part of the research lab (maybe a landing pad, domestic facilities like apartments or even a reactor. The facility is clearly off grid, there is not even a road network so it would have needed an on-site power source.). The explosion could have been caused by the device or a more conventional explosion like a reactor or fuel tanks exploding.