Any Story Theories Now that the Full Game is Done?

[CptRainbowBeard]

I feel like a lot of the most interesting story implications are during the final few levels of the game, especially when you consider the Homecoming level and some of the lines about memories that "fade and crumble" (or whatever the exact wording was)

My theory now is that Dusk Dude has some sort of personal connection to the town of Dusk and may have even lived in the area at some point (hence why his home is affected by the corruption). We know that Dusk Dude has a very personal vendetta against the cult, to the point where he's willing to go through literal hell to track down the leader and even go toe-to-toe with a Lovecraftien deity in order to eradicate them. I heard one theory that maybe he was trying to hunt down Jacob in order to intentionally prove himself worthy to the deity and take control of the cult himself, but I'm not so sure about that since many of Jacob's lines (as well as the narration in the graphic novel) hint that Dusk Dude doesn't actually know what's going on or who he's really up against. I think at some point Dusk Dude either abandoned his family to hunt down the cult, or possibly the cult even murdered his family and he came to Dusk in order to seek revenge before getting captured.

[Killerspinach]

My theory is that it's intentionally left for the player to decide his motivations. Something modern gaming doesn't understand is that you don't need 50 zillion pixels. You just need to trigger the player's imagination. That's what any good entertainment product should be setting out to do.

[CptRainbowBeard]

Yeah I love that the game gives enough environmental clues to give a general idea of what's going on while still requiring you to fit the pieces together. There's so many good little details that could spur so many different theories.

"It hurts to remember"
"The closer they got, the more they suffered"
"Memories fade and crumble"
"Complete the circle"

[JohnnyTheWolf]

The comments are most likely just David Szymanski making fun of himself. I mean, I assume the picture of the Cult Leader you see in the first two episodes is his own graduation picture and the "scary" cat picture is of his own cat. I also would not be surprised if the pictures you see in DuskDude's house are just his own family photos.

[D4NUK1]

My own theory is Dusk Dude lived on Dusk and with that old age that we see on the comics, had some adventures, maybe was a relics and gold hunter like Nathan Drake, or a mercenary/farmer, something that explain he knowlege of weapons. He come backs to Dusk, because he hear that stuff is happening there, maybe he will kill some crazys dude and take the gold for himself, but is capturated and hooked. Not going down easy he goes all the way to escape the city of Dusk, killing a lot of cultist and monsters.

But with the ending of Episode 1, he know some weird stuff is happening, and he can't let that stuff go away, so make his way to the infernal machine, where he discover all the sacrifices and blood they are recolecting, that are powering up the erebus reactor, the eacher labs, and all the crazy demonic stuff. So he goes all the way to stop in there, but with the kill of the guardian, he take part to the hell to take care of the cult itself.

Knowing on the level blasphemy he kill all the cultist on the area of adoration, giving him free pass to the earth again, but something is wrong, hell and cultist is still there. And worse, is like hell is coverting with earth, like we see on homecoming or E3M8.

With nothing more to lose, he give up his soul to be worthy, closing the cycle with the cult to sacrifice the intruder. and he show's worthy indeed killing up almost 300 enemies in the trial. Taking a chance face to face with the leader of the cult, he try his best to kill him. He don't show with ideals to take the cult, he just wanted to end it. And he almost go it. But the real leader was other, the elder god, and he prove to be powerful, so now the elder god take the soul of dusk dude and make it worthy of his ideals of the cult.

That my own head canon, also i dont readed up the comic, im planing buying it pretty soon.

[Rognar]

In the homecoming level one can assume duskguy visit his own house and the sfx for it sounds like burning and a crying woman/baby, guy probably lost his familly to a fire and later in the level there is also another connection thats made with the esher labs and Jacob saying something like "we accomplished so much togeter".

[XLightningStormL]

Actually he says "Look at all we've done together" at first it seems to hint at an Escher Labs-Duskdude connection, but technically this happens just before the next level which is legit just Duskdude being teleported into his own memories (hence looking at all him, and the cult leader have done together, cult leader being a sort of Invisible Sparx)

Personally I don't really care about Duskdude's background, he's a treasure hunter, that's about it, everything beforehand is meaningless "Who you were is insignificant, who you willl become is inconceivable"

My interest is rather Dusk itself, my theory is that the cult's been around for years, then sometime before the events of the game the town's largest Grainary (E2M1) during maintenance expansion work accidentially unearthed the ruins (E2M2) which triggered bit of histeria, and media news (to the point that Dusk sort of became a little hotspot hence why page 9 of the comic has the "Welcome to Dusk Banner") also attracting the attention of the US Army (Chemical Corps specificially) and various government scientists. Eventually the cult grew in power, became more fanatical, and started becoming violent, which basically triggered the army into declaring Martial law, and sealing the town and surrounding area off.

Obviously in that time between then and DUSK, the scientists, and army became influenced and empowered by the cult whilst evacuating, and studying the ruins (and reinventing technologies such as teleporters, and jumppads) and the artefacts, and started culling the population for the Thresher shortly after the town was sealed off..

[Vorpeseda]

I'm not really all that familiar with Lovecraft beyond the common references in geek culture, but aren't the really powerful ones basicaly invulnerable to anything in this dimension, no matter how badass?

So, while blowing through this cult may be able to destroy it, such an extreme display of power does attract the attention of a creature that can basically turn you into it's minion quite casually, and only does so because you're so powerful by human standards, that you've become more useful than the cult.

Given the player's immunity to falls and drowning, I get the impression that Duskguy is, at least by the start of the game, not quite human to begin with.