*SPOILERS* Question about the true ending

[RobotParty]

In the true ending you talk to Circe, who has the synicle model. She says something that implies the whole game is just a cycle, but specifically one of guilt, even specifically saying its our guilt. I mean, Circe talks directly to YOU.

Now, I immediately thought of a story a character in the game tells you. I forget the NPC's name and it doesn't say who says it on the wiki, but you can find him after one of the missions outside of rimanah's office. He tells you a story of the proposed origin of the synicle, the same monster that Circe takes the form of. The story involves an unknown commander who tortured his wife, a wife who went to the lower levels of the HQ temple(presumably the place of the final fight with ramanah), was gone for several days, but then when she came back she was tortured and had her eyes removed. Several scenarios are suggested IIRC but the idea that the commander sent the wife down there is the one that caught my attention the most. The story finishes with saying that the commander was changed forever and was never the same before, something we hear from dialogue with the Mentor when he appears in the HQ. It's suggested that since the accident, we've changed drastically. The mentor also says that we haven't seen our wife in a while and that she's worried, and I found that very interesting, both because it's the only time it's mentioned and you have a dialogue option to tell the mentor to keep out of your business.

Basically my suggestion is that we are the "unknown commander" in the story. There's a few problems with this theory but I think they're either irrelevant or language translation problems. The biggest I can think of is the true ending achievement for breaking the cycle being "Dark Secret" achievement, in which the description implies its... Ramanah's secret? Also, through out the whole game we're told to not trust either the Mentor or Ramanah. We're told not to trust the Mentor in a video recording from ourselves, before the mission to the cave. We're also told not to trust Ramanah from the Mentor. Ramanah just doesn't trust the Mentor at all and wants to betray him.

My question is this : Am I the only person who has thought of this? I haven't found anything about the story or this theory online and virtually all of the theories I saw were more about the imagery (the ouroboros) and less about the dialogue in the game. The "mysterious stranger" in the dream at every basic ending also asks you if you've paid attention throughout the game, so I dunno. This story really clicked with me when I saw that Circe used the form of the synicle. Also as previous said, she talks directly to YOU, the player, not Ramanah, so I believe the story is about us and not Ramanah.

[[ACPL] Jon]

No, You're not the only one. Congratulations! You figured out the story, more or less.

The "unknown commander" is Rimanah. You're Rimanah. You're fighting your projection of guilt, for killing your beloved wife and most probably your mentor. And most likely death of Dutch.

The recording? Mentor? Rimanah? It's all fake man, "this strange dream again, deja vu!"

You've searched? Nah man... I think even great EYE Wiki has the whole story.

That's one of the reasons we love this game. Because of smart storytelling.

[RobotParty]

I guess I interpreted it differently. No posts I've found have mentioned that story that poses it as more or less the real story if you look at it in hindsight.

[[ACPL] Jon]

Depends on what you see as real. The only "real" thing in a sense of what exists RIGHT NOW, of what's left in a "real timeline" is what you see in the end of the end.

Everything else? Well, at some point in time it was more or less real.

As for what's not real? "Dreams... they feel real when we're in them, don't they?"

Think of it as a nightmarish twist on real recollections of the truth. A mirage.

Here's a fun question: why do we start in a cave?

[Ryouhiko]

Originally posted by ACPL Jon:

And most likely death of Dutch.

And/or most likely Huan, since he quite explicitly calls us his "old friend" in Rimanah's route.

[[ACPL] Jon]

I'm not sure after such a long time, but either the "wolf" story from the archives or the synicle story tells the story of a creature that was both so powerful and so sad and angry that it destroyed everything that opposed it, leading to the massive destruction of pretty much everything and everyone, leading to increased sadness and loneliness when he (it) realized that.

Guess who's all alone in the end, bois.

[sgj]

I've been digging alot lately about EYE's story, and there's a rumour about the actual "REAL" ending? Where you break the cycles of guilt. But from my understanding nobody has gotten it and the devs themselves said *coming from the wiki and various forums, haven't found the devs statement on this yet* that you had to complete an absurd ammount of stuff, like a lvl 50 character, all side missions complete etc. But from my understanding nobody bothered to check the code if there even is a refrence to this.

[[ACPL] Jon]

Originally posted by fnrcs:

I've been digging alot lately about EYE's story, and there's a rumour about the actual "REAL" ending? Where you break the cycles of guilt. But from my understanding nobody has gotten it and the devs themselves said *coming from the wiki and various forums, haven't found the devs statement on this yet* that you had to complete an absurd ammount of stuff, like a lvl 50 character, all side missions complete etc. But from my understanding nobody bothered to check the code if there even is a refrence to this.

Wrong. The real ending is the the one OP is talking about.

It looked differently and was "less subtle" before devs changed it and yes, it had a absurdly high requirements (based on Kladuum's Ladder score) so nobody got it. So later on, they decided to change the requirements, adjust the ending and implement it like it exists now.

We never got to know how the ORIGINAL first "real" ending looked like. People bothered to checked the code - since the devs mentioned how hard it will be to get the real ending...

But the current one is simply genius, so there's no reason to dwell heavily on it.

[abcd]

It's unclear if we are Rimanah, or if we are so similar to Rimanah that Circe is unable to perceive us otherwise. It's unclear if this is explicit memories or an amalgamation, if the Metastreumonic Force is a personified entity formed from the merger of Shinji and the Wolf, or what the Artifact is outside of some sort of massive psi-catalyst that actually works (unlike a certain research you can do whose description says basically 'this is a hoax we should've seen coming.')

Akmal reveals that the meeting on Mars with the aliens went very differently than the official story, and it's implied that the Artifact was split up, reburied or kept hidden in various places, and watched over by the Secreta.

One was buried under the Vindico factory on Mars, one was kept in a Federal temple-ship watched over by the Federal's psykers (who are a splinter faction of the Secreta), and one was hidden in a Secreta temple-fortress.

It seems like Circe is responsible for retrieving the artifact, or a part of it, from a temple-fortress for Rimanah. She was executed as a result, and Rimanah is attempting to use the artifact to distort time in order to undo that but is instead trapped in an endless cycle of guilt.

It's also possible that it was the same Artifact either switching hands or existing in multiple places at the same time. Or, different memories of the people from different timelines who have possessed the artifact, of which you are some sort of personified meta-identity journeying through the layers of their collective stories. Sort of a post-merger Shinji/Wolf entity coming to know the different facets of itself.

Original ending required getting 10/10 Kladuum's on all levels, following certain dialog paths where you roleplay as Rimanah, and no continues. Pretty sure it's inaccessible now, but I've never tried. Supposedly the original ending explicitly takes the "you're Rimanah and that's that" interpretation.

If I'm remembering correctly though, at the time it went in the devs more or less said that they wanted to support both/as many interpretations as possible, but that they broke the series of triggers which activated the Rimanah ending trying to fix other stuff so they just took the junk data out. Steam also charges, or charged at the time, for achievement alterations.

[RobotParty]

Originally posted by tausoldier:

It's unclear if we are Rimanah, or if we are so similar to Rimanah that Circe is unable to perceive us otherwise. It's unclear if this is explicit memories or an amalgamation, if the Metastreumonic Force is a personified entity formed from the merger of Shinji and the Wolf, or what the Artifact is outside of some sort of massive psi-catalyst that actually works (unlike a certain research you can do whose description says basically 'this is a hoax we should've seen coming.')

Akmal reveals that the meeting on Mars with the aliens went very differently than the official story, and it's implied that the Artifact was split up, reburied or kept hidden in various places, and watched over by the Secreta.

One was buried under the Vindico factory on Mars, one was kept in a Federal temple-ship watched over by the Federal's psykers (who are a splinter faction of the Secreta), and one was hidden in a Secreta temple-fortress.

It seems like Circe is responsible for retrieving the artifact, or a part of it, from a temple-fortress for Rimanah. She was executed as a result, and Rimanah is attempting to use the artifact to distort time in order to undo that but is instead trapped in an endless cycle of guilt.

It's also possible that it was the same Artifact either switching hands or existing in multiple places at the same time. Or, different memories of the people from different timelines who have possessed the artifact, of which you are some sort of personified meta-identity journeying through the layers of their collective stories. Sort of a post-merger Shinji/Wolf entity coming to know the different facets of itself.

Original ending required getting 10/10 Kladuum's on all levels, following certain dialog paths where you roleplay as Rimanah, and no continues. Pretty sure it's inaccessible now, but I've never tried. Supposedly the original ending explicitly takes the "you're Rimanah and that's that" interpretation.

If I'm remembering correctly though, at the time it went in the devs more or less said that they wanted to support both/as many interpretations as possible, but that they broke the series of triggers which activated the Rimanah ending trying to fix other stuff so they just took the junk data out. Steam also charges, or charged at the time, for achievement alterations.

Yeah, this makes a lot more sense. A lot of what you said I already knew because I've owned the game for a long time, including the previous ending. The streumonic force in this game really makes theories a bit odd though, since IIRC there is(or was) a synicle you can speak to (on mars I think?) that speaks very vaguely about things in the game, implying that there's more to the story. At the very least, the streumonic force seems to be meta( the word IS in the name ) to the point that it can mimic a human's shape, presumably with the implication that it does it intentionally. I'm pretty sure that's what the synicle is supposed to be, anyways. A visibly conscious and intentional side to the force.

[Ryouhiko]

Originally posted by RobotParty:

IIRC there is(or was) a synicle you can speak to (on mars I think?) that speaks very vaguely about things in the game, implying that there's more to the story.

There are three of them - Harmony, Serenity and Felicity, all can be found in the same place in the Monolith mission. They tell the same story of a man without a name (which kinda reminds me of a tale about a weak boy and an amarok), but from slightly different perspectives.