[spoiler] lore discussion

[Exidan Fa'ol]

that ending was super strange.
Was the starworm "infected" by the bird?
Was the starworm the bird all along?
What prevented round leaves before?
Why the rose in the end is not round?
The worm killed the bird or the bird killed himself?
Why the blue parasites dies when the worm die? I assume that the gizz he release is ivory fuel collected by the bird lavos style (Chrono flashbacks). But isn't the parasites used to collect the fuel? Why would they die?

[Tae]

As far as I could tell, the worm was basically a spaceship/robot that the bird pilots. Who is the bird? I dunno. Most likely a metaphor, similar to the rest of the game, about the concept of putting your faith in symbols and religions that aren't at all what they appear to be.

No idea about the square leaves, but maybe it's a hint as to artificially created objects never being made perfect.

Rose at the end is the one that Royal makes after you meet him for the first time - he goes back to that area and creates it before the army attack the lab.

Bird died in freak accident I assume.

Just my opinion of it anyway, I think the game is meant to be taken however you want.

[RonaldKun]

The Star Worm is a spaceship made with extremely advanced organic technology, fueled by Ivory. The Birdman is a mechanic and the pilot of the Star Worm.
As for the round leaves, all the life on the planet is artificial, as the planet is essentially a giant machine. It also seems that humans, and the seeds, came to the planet at some point a long, long time ago and have been living there ever since.

[a cartoon duck]

I think the idea is that the blue eyes are an artificial lifeform created by the bird to monitor the planet while he's not around, but otherwise don't possess a whole lot of sentience themselves. They only start going nuts and taking everything over after the big one in the mountains sent a signal to the moon after Royal released it. Considering the world-ending schedule went from "the planet will fall apart in 50 years" to "in 5 days", the impression I got is the bird just gave the eyes an order to start spreading out and taking over, rather than choosing to do so independently. When the bird dies and Robin mashes the Star Worm full of seeds there's nothing left to control the eyes anymore so they probably just fell dormant.

As for who the bird is and/or what the bird means, there's good reason to assume he's there to parallel Robin, what with Robin being a mechanic named after a bird, fighting a bird who's the mechanic. There's a line by Pete in front of City One talking about how people try so hard to be more like creations, rather than to create themselves. I think the idea here is that all the One Concern people trying to be closer to Him/the bird by going whole-hog on Ivory are actually reducing themselves to be more like His machines, whereas Robin just wanting to tinker with stuff has more of that divine spark, the desire to create, and is therefore more godlike than the people trying to become more like God. That way Robin is both an icon, a symbol of divinity, and an iconoclast, one who destroys that very symbol and basically breaks the link between divnity and mechanic and affirms her own humanity, similar to how Chrome talked about how people needed equality, and to get that equality they needed to be rid of Him, and more broadly the separation between the divine and human.

[Outsider]

Bird made machine planet for whatever, maybe to grow square plants or something, since birds eat seed.
Bird went away to do its other business.
Human space colonization program found the planet and colonized it.
People found Ivory that is the best power source they ever encountered and built a cult over it, making super humans and flawed super humans in the process.
Meanwhile other people, possibly from other colonization program, built cult over natural reproduction and started fighting the other cult.
Generations pass.
Planet is almost out of ivory.
People start to suck Ivory outta moon, destroying it in the process.
Bird comes home seeing how alien monkeys sucked almost all its ivory.
It gets mad and tries to kill you.
You kill it instead.
Ivory from bird space ship flows into planet refilling its supply for some time.
Happy end.

Between her ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ strength, being able to not freeze to death, durability and tweaking mechanic I think Robin has either an agent or mother/father/royal equivalent somewhere in he lineage generations ago, giving her and her brother a bit of super human abilities, but not to the extent of real agents.

[Zevroid]

I kind of thought the Starworm crushing the bird's head wasn't an accident. That is, the worm itself was alive and being used by the bird for his own ends, and it killed him for making it his slave. But at that point it's too weak to act on it's own, and Robin finishes it off.

[ursahascutepaws]

Thank you, guys. It all makes great sense, my head get much clearer of confusion now.

[Eggmanronpa]

I thought the wyrm was entirely mechanical, but it had taken so much damage that when the bird tried to make it fight again, it wound up crushing the bird's head instead.

When I first fought this boss I was pretty much going WTF, even the music seemed to be far less dramatic than when you were fighting the wyrm itself.

[abstractAPPLE]

Originally posted by Eggmanronpa:

When I first fought this boss I was pretty much going WTF, even the music seemed to be far less dramatic than when you were fighting the wyrm itself.

It's nearly comedic how the Bird-Mechanic is trying to tell Robin something before the fight starts in his Bird-Language and then goes "Screw it, i just beat her up!".

[treehann]

I like that a lot of the story is up for interpretation. The game verges on being a little *too* cryptic but at least there's some fun stuff to figure out after the end of the game this way.

Side note, it's funny that there's another Zev in here...

[x-calibar]

Here's a topic... why did that fast/cloaking agent stick Chrome with one part of the binary liquid? Did captured Elro have anything to do with this? Did he break out and kill the guards himself? Or did he help or know that agent?

Or was it unrelated, just a failed assassination, not knowing that both compounds needed to be mixed, and Elro had a mixed version on him?

One more set of questions... What happened to Robin's dad? Did I miss how he died? What was his job?

[RonaldKun]

Robin's dad Polro was a mechanic, just like her. I don't think it was stated how he died, I can't really remember. I think it may have been something to do with falling off a ladder, but that may have been a cover story.

[x-calibar]

Originally posted by RonaldKun:

Robin's dad Polro was a mechanic, just like her. I don't think it was stated how he died, I can't really remember. I think it may have been something to do with falling off a ladder, but that may have been a cover story.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1283958115
Ahhh, how did I forget. One of the first things you read in the game. So much happened...
Thanks btw~

[What]

Originally posted by a cartoon duck:

I think the idea is that the blue eyes are an artificial lifeform created by the bird to monitor the planet while he's not around, but otherwise don't possess a whole lot of sentience themselves. They only start going nuts and taking everything over after the big one in the mountains sent a signal to the moon after Royal released it. Considering the world-ending schedule went from "the planet will fall apart in 50 years" to "in 5 days", the impression I got is the bird just gave the eyes an order to start spreading out and taking over, rather than choosing to do so independently. When the bird dies and Robin mashes the Star Worm full of seeds there's nothing left to control the eyes anymore so they probably just fell dormant.

As for who the bird is and/or what the bird means, there's good reason to assume he's there to parallel Robin, what with Robin being a mechanic named after a bird, fighting a bird who's the mechanic. There's a line by Pete in front of City One talking about how people try so hard to be more like creations, rather than to create themselves. I think the idea here is that all the One Concern people trying to be closer to Him/the bird by going whole-hog on Ivory are actually reducing themselves to be more like His machines, whereas Robin just wanting to tinker with stuff has more of that divine spark, the desire to create, and is therefore more godlike than the people trying to become more like God. That way Robin is both an icon, a symbol of divinity, and an iconoclast, one who destroys that very symbol and basically breaks the link between divnity and mechanic and affirms her own humanity, similar to how Chrome talked about how people needed equality, and to get that equality they needed to be rid of Him, and more broadly the separation between the divine and human.

that was beautiful

[top kek]

here's my own:
The bird tried pointing out how his Ivory fuel was empty and he needed more from humans. I believe the bird is piloting the worm (may or may not be the just one word) through millennia, colonising, being considered a deity and spreading that it needs Ivory at any cost or the world will end.
It's seen multiple times that people are trying to gather all ivory they possibly can, with exception of Isi, who do not believe in such deities, and less aggressively collect their own Ivory. Thing is: the world is running out of Ivory, and that'll be the end of it.

SHE knows it, and it has been her motivation since the beginning: her mission is to come to a new world, form a cult, select the very best (the tower), fill the rocket with a gigantic amount of Ivory, and set off with the very best to the moon, where she'll deliver Ivory to the worm and be granted another chance, another world to colonise and repeat the process. All the triangular machines, buildings and people are from Mother.

What I couldn't put together is how Mother sees Royal, Robin and friends as being the culprits of the mission's failure: perhaps because they have ruined the tower project, releasing people to know the world is fully inhabitable as opposed to what they believed, that only City One is?

And there's more: we've also seen two arks, large star ships that probably contained population and technology enough to colonise another world. This was probably the first rocket of humans, and the Isi have long lost their original progenitors, making their own folk and tales. I like to think that the Isi are much more integrated with nature, and do not harm the world for the sole purpose of collecting Ivory. It is like the two Arks have one idea each: 'collect all the ivory from the planet to the space worm' and 'procreate, fill the world with life'.

It's a seemingly shallow but really, really deep game! Be free to comment or correct me at any point :)

[sumwun]

I personally thought the final boss fight was kind of disappointing. Other bosses, such as Inti, Possessed Thunk, Mother, Lawrence (only because of this video), and Black used more creative game mechanics and soundtracks. I'm not the only person complaining[bandcamp.com] about this, and I believe the disappointing and uncreative final boss is intentional. It seems like the game is trying to tell people to not dedicate their life to one purpose (ie. worship one icon) and saying that such dedication can have these possible consequences. (these are the ones I remember. I might have missed stuff)

Originally posted by Agent Black:

In my pocket, there's a piece of paper that states my latest order.
It hasn't changed for a long time. Whoever wrote it, made me.
I've spent too long on this now. I don't care whatever, or whoever, steps in front of me.

People die trying, as seen with Mother, Chrome, and Black.
People spend a long time failing and later realize it's impossible, as seen with Royal, Elro, Tolo, and the Tower pupils.
People get what they want and realize it's not so great, as seen with Leticia, Ash, Joel, and any player who interpreted the final boss like this.

Thor seems to be the only character who got a reward and enjoyed it, but he had it for only a few days before Robin and Chrome walked in and ruined everything.

Originally posted by konjak:

He feels like he should be a certain thing. He keeps trying to go down a road that’s destructive for him. That’s true for all the characters. They’re doing a thing they’re not really passionate about, but they feel like they should for the sake of their society and loved ones, but it’s just destroying them instead because it’s not what they really want. It’s sort of reflective on me having worries about making a game for so long.

source[www.gameinformer.com]
And here I am, dedicating myself to a community that's obviously old and decaying, and writing posts that likely will never be read.