Ending (SPOILERS)

[Crunchy[Daz]]

Wow what a great experience that was, they really did a good job on it.

So my take away from the story was that he killed his wife and kid in order to copy them into a simulation. Their bodies, or at least their brains, were whats in the freezer in the garage.

But i'm not sure why the simulation went wrong and what exactly that shadowy figure was.

Anyone have a different take on this?

[Android Vageta]

No, I think this is one of those "the story is kinda crap and the game isn't fully developed" type things.

The crystals make no sense...where were they originally in real life? Who were you and why? What was that evil digital spirit thing?

I don't know about anyone else here but I'm getting really tired of these whole #2deep4u "we aren't going to give you an actual ending we want you to make up what ever crap you can from our vague and broken story" type ishhhhh we keep getting.

The story made no sense because the mechanics of what you were doing made no sense. That's all there is to it. You can try to break it down or someone can try to explaining but they'll just be making up crap too.

This is like Bioshock Infinite in which the dev's want you to think it's deep, people will argue about meaning, but at the end of the day it's just more crap filler.

[Noxbi 🌈]

Originally posted by Android Vageta:

No, I think this is one of those "the story is kinda crap and the game isn't fully developed" type things.

Basically this. As almost every Ubi title. I'm still salty about Splinter Cell Double Agent.

This game tries so hard with environmental storytelling so it's making the story itself a puzzle, which the PS4 demo "Walter Case" seems to be a part of. Anyway, my take is that Raymond has been making this machine since his years at university and he got fired for this Walter Case thing, so he's got fixated about making it anyway for his own at his own garage. You can find clues he's been experimenting on mice and their own dog. I think that the first one to get transferred was Laika, then his wife, theb kid and himself.

They can't see eachother because they represent different emotions, and all have different problems. Katherine is a failed musician (or thinks she is), she's depressed and she blames Raymond go her misery. Benjamin feels unloved by his parents as none of them has time for him, Kath is playing at filharmony, and Ray is sitting at his garage, and finally Ray is just some crazy ♥♥♥♥, I guess schizophrenia but who knows.

Anyway, Raymond came up with the idea that crystals can combine all emotions and create a stable virtual recreation of their worlds. He has a crystal on one of his video logs but looks more like an ice cube (cheap probs? ;P).

Now comes my take on "pixelated monster thing". This may be all of them. I mean, their virtual Apartment is unstable and it's full of corruption, maybe thay've found the way to "visit" eachother's perspectives but since it the simulation is corrupted, they appear as this pixelated thing. The clues are Benjamin's drawing on the walls, he draws his mother as this monster thing, also the radio puzzle, Ray orders Ben to go to the garage right after asking "Kat, are you with Benji?", also after the piano puzzle the monster attacks when the Kat is standing there, it might be Ray trying to meet her since he can't enter the bedroom at all in his version of apartment. And the ending when it's Ray's voice streaming at the player.

As for the player,I guess we are playing as one of his students or ex co workers from university that he decided to send the copy of his project in hopes to prove something. That gloating video at the end suggests something like that.

[Android Vageta]

Originally posted by Noris Nordberg 🌈:

Walter Case

Wow...I guess that whole part of the game and story just wasn't needed for PC gamers or something? What idiot thought that was a good thing to leave out of the game? The fact that they decided to leave that out of the already short as hell game says a lot about these people..

As for your take, it makes sense, but to me there's still way too little evidence to even hint at this. Again, maybe I'm just dumb or lack the ability to see deep into stories but I just think there was way too much "huh?" and "why?" for me. I play a game so I can experience something and see a story...not to be confused by something that makes no sense.

[Noxbi 🌈]

Oh yes, I totally agree with you.
All my thoughts above are just me trying to answer all my "huh? Wtf? B..b.. but why?" I had during all of my playthroughs. I guess we'll never know what the story really means or what it's trying to tell... Assuming it actually tries to tell something.

[shredingskin]

Basically a mad scientist that uploaded (and probably killed) himself, his son and his pregnant wife to a computer. The crystals may represent each of their consiousness, that form the white crystal at the end (the whole memory).
There's not that much there, you get basically all the "story" with very heavy handed "symbolism", and leave it to "players imagination).

Kinda cliche from the start TBH, it feels more like a bunch of guys trying to make a "game" than actually tell a story, and trying to sell it off as so deep actually hurts the game.

[Planguy]

I think the tech the guy used was a destructive form of brain uploading, so he has to kill in order to upload someone. Now, someone who isn't a crazy person would think, "Maybe I shouldn't kill my family in order to upload their consciousness into a digital existence that hasn't been tested and that they never agreed to" but this guy isn't going to let such small concerns stop him. Basically the whole thing is an elaborate way of this guy murdering his family so that they can never leave him.

I think the distorted entity was a gestalt form of the individuals who are in the simulation. Their minds are bleeding into each other and their relationship with each other is so toxic it's creating a monster.

[Crunchy[Daz]]

Totally forgot about this thread.

Looking back i tend to agree the pixelated monster was a form of all of them. Perhaps created because the machine could only really handle one mind and didn't know what to do with 3 of them.

I don't really view this game as pretentious or trying to be too deep. Its shrouded in mystery while you wander an enigmatic world and thats a good fit for VR. I'm one of those people who wished movies went on just 15 minutes longer to get more of a resolution and see what happened and i really didn't mind the direction they went with here.

I think the ending is fine and fits the tone of the game. I don't think i'd prefer and ending where you're just spoonfed the answers at the final moments. They could pull it off if they did some sort of Black Mirror type mind ♥♥♥♥ like in Torn, which was done pretty well, but i respect the choice they made.

[Android Vageta]

Originally posted by CrunchyDaz:

Looking back i tend to agree the pixelated monster was a form of all of them.

You sure though? How did the machine and computer fix itself?

[dan]

I loved this game. Need more like it. It's probably something that would appeal to more mature players. I remember as a kid going to the video store and wondering who the hell watches those arthouse movies! Well, now I'm in the depths of middle age I appreciate a different perspective.

My interpretation is that the wife suffered from depression. Her obsessed husband was trying to save her from the illness. The demon was her depression and was also transferred. You play the role of the son who is trying to complete his father's experiment.

Is there anything from the creators that provides some insight?

Technically the effects of the digital distortion were brilliant. Overall creative direction was amazing. Audio was unnerving as hell! I didn't even play this in VR but I'm pretty sure I'd need a therapist if I did!

Very well done!

[Lucafg - Video Games & Art]

Ray transferred the minds of his wife and son and his own mind to the virtual world through resonant crystals; the crystals resonate with brains such to record the minds! Something went wrong, the experiment is a failure. They are imprisoned in a digital nightmare, they cannot interact or talk or relate each other. It's a metaphor for a problematic family whose members are not in tune; the crystals are another metaphor.

Ray, his wife and his son live in three separate virtual realities that represent different feelings and memories of the same reality and facts from the minds of Ray, Ben and Kat. Ray understands that the crystals have also to resonate with each other. That means that the family members need to love and understand each other. Their memories and feeling have to reconcile. The black monster made of sprite represents the hate, the evil, the dark side that doesn't allow the family members to be happy and together; and at the same time it's the bug, the virus that corrupts the virtual world.

Ray is clearly a psychopat; at first he kills the dog. He think that its brain must be freezed for the transference. Then he understands that he needs ice crystals! Ben and Kat witness the growing madness of Ray; the family breaks. Before they leave, Ray transfers their minds and his own mind to the virtual world. In a few words, Ray kills them and himself. When he enters the virtual world, he understands that it's a nightmare. The player has to make the crystals to resonate, that means to reunite the family together in the virtual world. You go up and down through the three different minds of Ray, Ben and Kat to make them reconcile; that means that you have to browse their memories and find the crystals. Once the crystals are resonating in one single white crystal, the monster disappears, and you can access the virtual paradise you longed for when you were alive. But there is no paradise. You are beyond the virtual world, outside the servers where the minds are stored. It's just a metaphor for the beyond in virtual reality! So the minds are still trapped in the servers, nothing changed!

Ray recorded the videos you see at the beginning and at the end before to kill the family and himself, as proof for his research.

I think it's a very good game; we need more games like this!

[okay_1]

Yup, I think Lucafg pretty much got it. Although I'm not sure about the ending. Ray's experiment resulted in their minds being fragmented in a nightmare instead of united in a digital paradise because he didn't account for the fact that the family's minds which are stored in the crystals needed to be "in tune", but they weren't because they rightfully hated him for obsessing over his work and killing their dog. By collecting their memories, you help them reconcile somehow and unite in one crystal. So I guess they ended up together in a virtual world after all. But should they? I don't think Kat and Ben could forgive Ray for killing them, especially Kat who gave up her music career to raise Ben who now will never be able to grow up, so how could they harmonize in the end? Ray doesn't deserve a happy ending, and Kat and Ben don't deserve to be stuck with him for eternity, so I feel like you are helping the bad guy achieve his goal.
It's a cool concept, but kinda poorly executed and morally questionable in my opinion.