My interpretation of the Shade & the story (spoilers)

[elfypooh]

It seems like the Shade is an actual living creature that survives by eating mushrooms, as much as he says he doesn't need to eat. I consider the shade to be slightly psychotic and he is the one who, I think, sculptured the King to unconsciously help with his loneliness. The King is just a sculpture, but he sees it as a real god-like figure that will ultimately fix his loneliness. The breathing noises originating from the King are just whooshing noises from the wind blowing around in the complex cave system, and you hear this especially in hollow areas. The cave will collapse no matter what, as apparent when you get the good or the bad ending. He is eventually confronted with his own childhood trauma when he meets darkness (himself). His trauma of darkness manifested from him wandering around terrified in a pitch-black complex cave system when he first fell in the well as a child. As he sees coal falls to the ground he calls these pieces fallen brothers, as he understands on some level he fell into these caves. He's also not made out of coal, but rather just covered in dirt, grime and coal (as seen when he gets cleaned up in the good ending). He occasionally gets visual and auditory hallucinations, especially so when he experiences pareidolia (seeing faces in objects).

The Shade is delusional. However, he finds bitter sweet happiness in his activities, like reading, walking around, drawing, making friends with a tiny spider, etc. Of course, him not fully aware of the reality he's facing would be normal for anyone in his position. The Shade is just longing for companionship and freedom. The time before the King wakes up is his chance, not only before the caves collapse, but for his last ditch effort to reach the end of the infinite tunnel and keep what semblance of sanity he has left. Not that psychosis is necessarily bad, but he is longing to end his loneliness.

Where it get's interesting is how the story interacts with the player. The time that keeps ticking is reminiscent of real life. Ignoring problems, such as the Shade or real life, will only doom him to despair (i.e. ignore your problems or his by turning the game off doesn't stop time). Unfortunately, not only is tenacity, and patience required to reach the good end, but also luck. You see, the old man is blind which is why he survives, but the troll can see, so he gets a shock when he sees the Shade and the Shade dies. One never quite knows when the old man starts walking to the well even if you know the hours. Again, this is reminiscent of life too, as some luck is required in life. And if one cannot, chooses not to reach the good end, or decided to procrastinate, then one is forced (in some sense) to attempt to enjoy the good things in an ultimately bad situation. The player is the actual entity who needs to take up reading in the Shade's pastime, sharing some of his enjoyment in a lonely life. The player will also share in the Shade's psychosis, taking seriously everything that's happening to him.

It appears the moral or the story is to take comfort in situations: discovering sweetness in bitterness, glimpses of light in utter darkness, and the end of a tunnel that stretches to infinity, whatever end that may well be.

Thoughts?

[Sammun Mak]

One thing I like about your theory is that I've often wondered who the shade was before he was the shade. I've always theorized that he "came from" the man who died up in the wizard tower, but I still don't know what that guy was up to. It's fun to theorize that he was working on constructing the little underground world. And, the event with angst does suggest he had to overcome his fear of the darkness by "becoming" it.

But other than that, I don't think it fits the themes and facts too well. There isn't much evidence at all that he is an unreliable narrator other than his meeting with angst. There's just too much mechanically that makes no sense with your theory. For example: (1) the doors just above the king takes time to open because it hasn't been used in a long time, whereas if he needed to be eating he would have had to have been up there quite often. (2) He can spend infinite amounts of time not doing the things that humans need to do: - eat, use a bathroom, sleep. (3) The cave is destroyed as soon as he leaves it, rather than after some period of time, which means that he caused it. (4) He also, well, never or rarely ever signals fear even though you say that's such a strong motivator for the characters. The strongest emotions he indicates are loneliness, anxiety, awe and ennui. Of course with unreliable narrators you can explain away whatever you want, but I don't see the need to do that at all.

I also think it is premature to call pareidolia just because he is willing to have a conversation with himself using the face. He wouldn't have to talk to the "face" if he had any other single thing to talk to, and he's not going to do the same outside of the cave because he doesn't need to. It's just a little game for him. The "Return to your fallen brothers" line could also simply mean "I've already got a bunch of coal and now you're joining them." His visual and audio "hallucinations" are simply memories (of perhaps a previous life), and we know they happen in real life even before he has seen them.

So I don't really agree with your assessment of what he's fighting. I think what's he's facing is just sort of a worst possible loneliness, an impossibly deep, desperate loneliness. The game is about weathering that torture, together. But as you said, he did find peace and happiness in this home after a time, and despite his awful situation his existence isn't as pathetic as it could have been. The wait at the end for the old man is, for the player, a small example of what our shade has gone through to a much greater degree. We only have the choice to wait and be patient while waiting for the old man, and we can reflect on the fact that his wait has been many thousands times worse than ours.

[elfypooh]

Originally posted by Sammun Mak:

But other than that, I don't think it fits the themes and facts too well. There isn't much evidence at all that he is an unreliable narrator other than his meeting with angst. There's just too much mechanically that makes no sense with your theory. For example: (1) the doors just above the king takes time to open because it hasn't been used in a long time, whereas if he needed to be eating he would have had to have been up there quite often. (2) He can spend infinite amounts of time not doing the things that humans need to do: - eat, use a bathroom, sleep. (3) The cave is destroyed as soon as he leaves it, rather than after some period of time, which means that he caused it. (4) He also, well, never or rarely ever signals fear even though you say that's such a strong motivator for the characters. The strongest emotions he indicates are loneliness, anxiety, awe and ennui. Of course with unreliable narrators you can explain away whatever you want, but I don't see the need to do that at all.

Thank you for the thoughtful response. I'll comment on some stuff where I disagree.

For 1 and 2, there could have been mushrooms nearby that the player cannot see. In most games, even highly realistic ones, characters are never shown attending to bathroom needs, sleeping, eating or other private activities. These activities are always implied and done so off-screen. Nonetheless, the same logic can be applied here to demonstrate that he is a living creature. We know that he can eat, get high, kill himself, sleep, and dream when we control him. The player could control him to eat thousands of mushrooms, but where do they all go? Does his body simply disintegrate them or does he do something off-screen? Haha. Obviously some are absorbed otherwise he wouldn't get high. I take these actions to signify that he is not a magical entity but a living, breathing being. It's not just activities when the player is present, as with most games, but stuff does happen off-screen. What's most telling is when he's washed at the end and then is shown drinking tea.

For 3, it could be the case, but it is implied that the King caused it after 400 days. However, when the Shade leaves the caves, then this would mean the King wakes up just as he's pulled from the well, gets angry, and then collapses the caves for whatever reason. The King originally intended to collapse the caves to end his longing, but now its for a different purpose? Rather, I consider 3 artistic licence, as the dots wouldn't connect if this didn't occur. It appears as if the caves were always going to collapse.

For 4, his fear of darkness is so intense that he dissociates and then wakes up back home. His fear acts more as a deterrent than a motivator, preventing him from exploring further. Angst only emerges in the darkest places, while the rest of the caves maintain some measure of light. This may explain his reluctance to venture further and why the King forbids it.

Some of the things that go against my theory, as you've mentioned. His premonitions and discussions with the face come true or are true to some extent, which may possibly go against a psychosis interpretation. However, I definitely think the narrator is unreliable. For example, he dreams that he was the King. That doesn't make sense, unless he actually was the King (i.e. if he sculpted the King and perceives it as some measure of himself - as all psychosis originates from the same mind). Whatever is going on, I definitely think its a fantasy universe.

[Sammun Mak]

You're right that the darkest area does correspond to where the king doesn't want him to go and it's fun to imagine that he's turned that phobia into some order from an imaginary authority. And if you take a fully 'reliable narrator' view of the story, it's hard to explain the existence of Angst. It seems unlikely that when he 'fails' he is magically transported back home (even though I assume time doesn't jump) and much more likely that he walked (or ran) back without being consciously aware of it. And he does solve this issue by 'becoming the darkness' which very much seems like letting go of your fear of the dark.

But (1) he starts feeling nervous about going too far even before it gets dark, (2) he can walk through darkness on the way to that spot with no problem. (3) When he gets to the area with the light in the mine, he says something like 'Strangely, I have no desire to go back'. It wouldn't be strange at all for him not to want to go back through darkness. He's saying it's strange because he knows he is disobeying the king. I think your theory just pushes aside too many things even though it makes thematic sense with how that particular angst challenge goes. I think Angst is more fear/uneasiness about disobeying the king as well as anxiety about a world he knows nothing about existing beyond that point.