The Cycle of Scorn*Spoilers*

[Wankershim]

Near the end of the game there is shown a couple of stone petroglyphs with some pretty clear indication that this was all intended to happen in some way. Much of the machinery all seemingly obtuse is clearly created specifically for the main character's species to interact with, so is the intention of this that the plot and lore are intrinsically tied to the overall structure of the environment? Every space we move through is not only an aspect of design but of exposition of the plot as well under this pretense. I see the foundations of the level/plot holding the symbolic foundations of complex life with these massive organs on full display in central areas of the levels. Even the tools you use are alive and moving, the foundation of your action within this world are also symbols of foundation of life. I think this whole world is working together to make all these moments happen. But I am unsure about the ending itself.

What are your thoughts as to what the new creature at the end is supposed to be?
Is this what was intended to happen?
Do you think the cycle of Scorn will continue or something new will happen?
I am unsure if the outcome of the game is fully explained from within, so I think we must create an answer until the developers say otherwise.

[maido]

Originally posted by Wankershim:

What are your thoughts as to what the new creature at the end is supposed to be?

A botched attempt at ascending. The parasite is a bio-engineered shell into which your consciousness would be transferred via the ascension ritual that you see in the Polis temple. It was defective due to having fused with the first Scornguy from the prologue, and in the ending you both fuse into a sad flesh blob thing, ironically planted in front of the gate that would have taken you to the higher plane of consciousness.

[tintilicmaliq]

I actually think the ending's impact is stronger this way than if they showed your ascension or god forbid what if anything lays beyond the portal in the end. We don't even know if there is any sort of "transcendence'. It might be that the elites of Scorn's world ruined their planet, turned their people into resource, caused all that untold suffering, ultimately conducted themselves to excruciating suffering in order to break free... and yet there was nothing else. No transcendent realm, no higher state of being. Just a deluded religious belief. All of it could be for nothing.

[Tr0w]

Originally posted by maido:

Originally posted by Wankershim:

What are your thoughts as to what the new creature at the end is supposed to be?

A botched attempt at ascending. The parasite is a bio-engineered shell into which your consciousness would be transferred via the ascension ritual that you see in the Polis temple. It was defective due to having fused with the first Scornguy from the prologue, and in the ending you both fuse into a sad flesh blob thing, ironically planted in front of the gate that would have taken you to the higher plane of consciousness.

Imho the purpose of the parasite is more mundane than that, weapons, locks, tools, etc all require the parasite as if it was a common use piece of equipment in that society. And in the ritual area there's a room with a surgical device for removing parasites. So imo the parasite is supposed to be destroyed or taken into storage post removal but it escapes the machine's claw. What i want to know is if the parasite is just a parasite or is it a messed up fusion of the parasite and the first Scorn guy due to being covered in whatever that fluid from the exploding machine was, and what we actually have is the parasite with the will and intentions of the first Scorn guy thinking he can also gain ascension by piggybacking on the second guy, but the nature of the parasite kicks in and we have ye olde frog and scorpion.

[Myrmuz [IRL]]

If you look at the area where protag 1 dies there are a lot of weirdly shaped pillars. These pillars look like a more older/advanced/fossilized form of the fused blob thing in the ending.
So, it looks like protag 1 died in a farm for these things. The flying drones seem to be tending to them. It's some kind of deliberate thing, but who knows for what purpose.

[kiario]

Originally posted by Myrmuz IRL:

If you look at the area where protag 1 dies there are a lot of weirdly shaped pillars. These pillars look like a more older/advanced/fossilized form of the fused blob thing in the ending.
So, it looks like protag 1 died in a farm for these things. The flying drones seem to be tending to them. It's some kind of deliberate thing, but who knows for what purpose.

I think they are pillars of flesh and bone that grows. To be used as lubricants or semen for new moldmen. Bones for structure building. Or could be containers. Drones are fertlilizers for the pillars.

[Myrmuz [IRL]]

Could be. Drones look like they're freezing the pillars to me. Plus it's mentioned in the artbook that the pillars are a reference to parasite final form, I think.
It could be argued that the parasite is just protag 1 mutated... but the fact that there's a surgical table specifically to remove the parasite suggests it's more than just a random chain of events - this happened in some way before to the extent that a surgical table is needed.
If the area with the pillars and drones is some kind of farm, or if the drones are trying to contain an outbreak of flesh pillars - what does this mean.
What was protag 1 trying to do by slotting the big battery/jar things into the tree before the explosion? Did he intend for what happened to him, was it an accident? Was he just trying to make some more moldmen, or something else?

[maido]

Originally posted by Tr0w:

Imho the purpose of the parasite is more mundane than that, weapons, locks, tools, etc all require the parasite as if it was a common use piece of equipment in that society.

Wrong. Prologue Scornguy doesn't have a parasite and he uses all of those things. The parasite only helps you by holding your weapon, healing item etc. because he fused with Scornguy 1 in the first place; they're his hands. The parasite itself in its intended form is the winged, tentacled Cthulhu brain you can see in the ascension mural in the Polis temple. The artbook explicitly explains that your consciousness was supposed to be transferred into those things during the ritual. It's like one of multiple evolutionary steps towards becoming an ascended being. Polis has parasite removal equipment because they likely knew there was a risk of the parasite growing out of control before the ritual can be performed, just as it happens to our protag.

[Tr0w]

Originally posted by maido:

Originally posted by Tr0w:

Imho the purpose of the parasite is more mundane than that, weapons, locks, tools, etc all require the parasite as if it was a common use piece of equipment in that society.

Wrong. Prologue Scornguy doesn't have a parasite and he uses all of those things. The parasite only helps you by holding your weapon, healing item etc. because he fused with Scornguy 1 in the first place; they're his hands. The parasite itself in its intended form is the winged, tentacled Cthulhu brain you can see in the ascension mural in the Polis temple. The artbook explicitly explains that your consciousness was supposed to be transferred into those things during the ritual. It's like one of multiple evolutionary steps towards becoming an ascended being. Polis has parasite removal equipment because they likely knew there was a risk of the parasite growing out of control before the ritual can be performed, just as it happens to our protag.

He does have the parasite, he literally has the tail to plug into the melee gun that doubles as a key. Second Scorn guy is only able to use weapons after the parasite attaches itself to him as he now has the tail for fitting into weapons.

[Myrmuz [IRL]]

I thought that too but when protag 1 picks up the piston gun it has a detachable handle of it's own. The pick-up anim shows protag 1 pick it up, unattach the handle then reattach it.
It implies he attaches a tail but some other guy did a freecam to see the 3rd-person view and he just reattaches the handle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qg8JrLlMP1s
01:35
When you see it in 1st-person protag 1 detaches the handle, looks at the gun then attaches it to a handle that is somewhat offscreen. You could argue that this is deliberately ambiguous and maaaaaybe he has his own tail attachment. They might have just used the protag model like this for convenience. 3rd person of protag 2 doesn't show most of the parasite either, just the hands sticking into your chest.

[Tr0w]

Originally posted by Myrmuz IRL:

I thought that too but when protag 1 picks up the piston gun it has a detachable handle of it's own. The pick-up anim shows protag 1 pick it up, unattach the handle then reattach it.
It implies he attaches a tail but some other guy did a freecam to see the 3rd-person view and he just reattaches the handle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qg8JrLlMP1s
01:35
When you see it in 1st-person protag 1 detaches the handle, looks at the gun then attaches it to a handle that is somewhat offscreen. You could argue that this is deliberately ambiguous and maaaaaybe he has his own tail attachment. They might have just used the protag model like this for convenience. 3rd person of protag 2 doesn't show most of the parasite either, just the hands sticking into your chest.

I mean the game isn't designed as a third person title so using third person to look for things would be mostly pointless. Remember when people wanted to know what Master Chief looked like in Halo 1 and moving the camera just revealed that he had another helmet under his helmet.

[maido]

Originally posted by Tr0w:

He does have the parasite, he literally has the tail to plug into the melee gun that doubles as a key. Second Scorn guy is only able to use weapons after the parasite attaches itself to him as he now has the tail for fitting into weapons.

Nope. You can see your character's body if you look down. There is no parasite. There's also no parasite attached to the gun when Scornguy 1 first picks it up; it just has a normal grip. The parasite is born when Scornguy 1 starts up the pillar I think, and fuses with him while they're stuck in the goo. The piston gun fuses with one of parasite's tentacles which has fused with Scornguy 1's spine and has become its "tail," which is why Scornguy 2 acquires it after parasite latches on to him.

Look at the parasite again (there are freecam vids of it on Youtube that show it in detail). It is very clearly a chaotic and unintentional fusion of one of those Cthulhu brains from the mural with Scornguy 1.

[Tr0w]

Originally posted by maido:

Originally posted by Tr0w:

He does have the parasite, he literally has the tail to plug into the melee gun that doubles as a key. Second Scorn guy is only able to use weapons after the parasite attaches itself to him as he now has the tail for fitting into weapons.

Nope. You can see your character's body if you look down. There is no parasite. There's also no parasite attached to the gun when Scornguy 1 first picks it up; it just has a normal grip. The parasite is born when Scornguy 1 starts up the pillar I think, and fuses with him while they're stuck in the goo. The piston gun fuses with one of parasite's tentacles which has fused with Scornguy 1's spine and has become its "tail," which is why Scornguy 2 acquires it after parasite latches on to him.

Look at the parasite again (there are freecam vids of it on Youtube that show it in detail). It is very clearly a chaotic and unintentional fusion of one of those Cthulhu brains from the mural with Scornguy 1.

When does the parasite fuse with the the first guy then? When i did the part where the machine explodes all that happened was getting covered in fluid and then passing out, we don't see anything else come out of the machine iirc.

[maido]

Originally posted by Tr0w:

When does the parasite fuse with the the first guy then? When i did the part where the machine explodes all that happened was getting covered in fluid and then passing out, we don't see anything else come out of the machine iirc.

It happens while they're in the goo. You literally see it in the menu screen - the parasite's tentacles already fused with Scornguy's neck and head. We don't see the parasite emerge because our character loses consciousness before it happens. It's also possible that it comes out of one of those cylinders that are getting sprayed by the drones; they're called "fertilizer drones" in the artbook iirc.

[Tr0w]

Originally posted by maido:

Originally posted by Tr0w:

When does the parasite fuse with the the first guy then? When i did the part where the machine explodes all that happened was getting covered in fluid and then passing out, we don't see anything else come out of the machine iirc.

It happens while they're in the goo. You literally see it in the menu screen - the parasite's tentacles already fused with Scornguy's neck and head. We don't see the parasite emerge because our character loses consciousness before it happens. It's also possible that it comes out of one of those cylinders that are getting sprayed by the drones; they're called "fertilizer drones" in the artbook iirc.

You see it in the menu but you don't actually see it happen which doesn't make much sense to me. Also the whole needing to buy an out of game book to know what anything is called or what it's function is is absurd.

[Spiffington]

I think the consciousness of the parasite is meant to get the second suit. Are there 2 suits just for the pressure plate lock?