Cryostasis: Who would have thought it!

A critique of Cryostasis's story, symbolism, and influences.

Bon voyage

It is unfortunate that the reputation of Cryostasis: Sleep of Reason has suffered for its technological ingenuity that, while impressive and thematically valuable, practically lends far less to Cryostasis's story than to its atmosphere otherwise. The term 'gimmick' feels insultingly reductive of the fluid simulation and neat tricks entailed in Action Forms's physical attention to detail in Cryostasis. And while such attention to detail does greatly contribute to the immediate context, the almost absolute attention it received clearly detracted from the story's reception, therefore I consider the story to be disappointingly unsung. So, overshadowed by its own, demanding technology, Cryostasis was regrettably received as a mediocre horror game.

Yet this attitude is severely mistaken, as a basic reading of the game's subplot, aesthetic choices, and discernible themes, collectively reveals a thoughtful, compelling story worthy of examining. Although disappointing, it cannot be said that Cryostasis's lacklustre reception, in regards to its story, is surprising. And as much as I roll my eyes at the recommendation to experience something a second time; doing this is necessary to clarify Cryostasis's fragmentary storytelling. But with such a method of storytelling, seemingly enigmatic symbolism, and parallel plots that require parallel comparison to be coherently reconciled, fully understanding Cryostasis requires more still.

The subtitle Sleep of Reason refers to a print of the same name, seen below, by Francisco Goya. The full title of this print is The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters, and it is 43 of 80 in a series by Goya, titled The Caprichos. The sentiment of the print's title is fairly self-explanatory, but is of particular value in its namesake's story. Although the influence of The Caprichos does not end there, context regarding Cryostasis's story and its other primary influences is necessary first.



Cryostasis primarily takes place on the fictional, nuclear icebreaker, North Wind, with the prologue and epilogue briefly entailing the protagonist's, Alexander Nesterov's, arrival at the North Wind by dog sled. While it seems apparent that North Wind is physically based on the actual Arktika class of icebreaker; it is also patently clear that the story of North Wind could not be derived from any Arktika class icebreaker, but only from the other, actual nuclear icebreaker, Lenin. This is necessary for several reasons, the first of which being that North Wind has been trapped near the North Pole since 1968, and is discovered by Nesterov in 1981. Considering Lenin was the only nuclear icebreaker in existence, and commission, in 1968; it is fair to say that if the expository details of North Wind are derived from any actual ship, it must be Lenin.

Furthermore, Lenin was the only actual icebreaker to have had nuclear accidents of comparable severity to that of North Wind's. One such nuclear accident took place on Lenin in 1967, roughly corresponding with the fictional timeline of events on North Wind. So, as a contextual basis, Lenin seems to be the most likely candidate to have inspired North Wind. With that said, North Wind otherwise departs from reality, and "abandoned by reason produces impossible monsters ... ".

Aboard North Wind, Nesterov's actions are limited by the freezing cold, having him constantly seeking warmth, mostly in the close proximity of remaining light sources. Nesterov's movements are slow and deliberate, stifled as they are by his thick parka and mittens. The vapour in his exhalations is visible, denoting the low temperatures of the derelict ship. Frost crystallises onto his mittens and most other surfaces, and visibly melts when a source of heat is turned on.

While exploring North Wind, Nesterov encounters the illustrated fragments of a folk tale in Maxim Gorky's Old Izergil, titled The Flaming Heart of Danko. Seemingly narrated by the disembodied voice of the eponymous Old Woman Izergil, the narrative parallels the events leading up to the ship's present state. These fragments are interspersed by vignettes of the ship's captain and commanding officers, and their interactions leading up to and throughout the nuclear disaster. Nesterov is initially only a spectator of these episodes, but upon finding frozen crewmen whose illuminated hearts still beat, he is able to spare them their untimely fate by guiding them through past events, overcoming mutual obstacles.

Danko's burning heart

The exposition on board the North Wind primarily entails the ship's captain dismissing the advice of his first officer to rely on a divining rod to navigate through the ice. Arrogantly, the captain sets a course based on his intuition, instead of using the first officer's superstitious device. It is on this course that the ship collides with an iceberg, prompting the first officer to report the captain's culpability for the error, in turn spurring on the decision to decommission the ship once it reaches port. The fellow security officer recommends the first officer not break the news to the captain, lest it greatly demoralise him, but in spite of that the first officer gloatingly follows through. Turning to the lead engineer for solace, the captain is met only by further disdain, as he is the cause of the trying circumstances.

During repairs to the damage caused by the collision, North Wind gradually becomes trapped in the ice. The captain, seeking to break out of the stalemate, attempts to ram the ice at full speed. However, before coming to fruition, the captain is wounded in the event, which is halted by the ship's officers, who then put the ship in greater danger by ordering an emergency reverse. This procedure ultimately compromises the ship's nuclear reactor core, jeopardising the welfare of the entire crew by exposing many to radiation, cutting off most of the ship's heating, and exacerbating the failing repairs to the ship's hull. At the height of this crisis, the head officers attempt to abandon the ship by helicopter, taking the wounded captain with them, but this is interrupted by the detonation of the nuclear core.

The narrative of The Flaming Heart of Danko describes a tribe forced into the forest beside their village, due to the threat of neighbouring tribes. Among the hesitant tribe, the handsome, and therefore courageous Danko proclaims himself leader, and the tribe sets off. But the forest was dark, laced with swamps that emitted noxious fumes, and seemed as if to never end. Many people disappeared in the forest's depths, or were consumed by the swamps. On the night of a great storm, the tribespeople dissented against Danko, blaming him for their forlorn circumstances. Danko retaliated verbally, scolding them for their dependence on him, and in their anger they turned on Danko. Although his sentiment was no longer of anger, but of grief, for he saw that it was not malice, but fear that caused those he loved to turn on him. The flames of his passion burgeoned in his heart, and illuminated his eyes, but those around him thought it a sign of his rage. Fearfully, they still sought to kill him, even as he cried out over the thunder, “What else can I do to save these people?” Danko rent his flaming heart from his chest, and, raising it high, totally dispersed the forest's darkness. Having revealed the rolling hills of the steppe, Danko looked out over it joyfully, and died. While his followers were overcome with joy, they had not noticed his death, nor his still-burning heart, except one apprehensive person, who stomped on it in fear, extinguishing its flame.

Clearly, The Flaming Heart of Danko is an exceedingly optimistic narrative to parallel the original story of the North Wind. So much so that the fate of the North Wind is altogether incompatible with that of Danko's tribe, unless resolved through some other means. But this optimistic input is not left unchecked in the story of Cryostasis, and is rivalled by the critical nature of Goya's influence, as mentioned previously.

Here comes the bogeyman

The influence of Francisco Goya's The Caprichos is twofold. First and foremost, the influence of The Caprichos social criticism is transparent in the petty, vengeful, superstitious, and thuggish nature of the North Wind's officers. Goya summarised the series as to depict "the innumerable foibles and follies to be found in any civilised society, and from the common prejudices and deceitful practices which custom, ignorance or self-interest have made usual". With a variety of vitriolic, allegorical criticisms made through the 80 prints of the series, one particular sentiment stands out among the rest. Found in Capricho 62, seen below, the print depicts two desperate figures fighting on a flat rock, while a pair of clawed monsters come out of the shadows to attack them. Whether out of ignorance or irrational hatred for each other, the pair fight as though unaware or unconcerned of the greater danger looming around them. The sentiment of Capricho 62 is therefore demonstrated in the North Wind's staff by their unwillingness to cooperate, selfish preferences, and negligent attitudes towards the greater dangers they were presented. Rather than cooperate to avoid jeopardising the ship's entire crew, they instead pursued a petty squabble, for vengeance and individual glory.


Capricho 62 Who would have thought it!

The second influence of The Caprichos is mostly aesthetic, and can be found in the North Wind's crew. Having been transformed presumably by radiation emitted from the ship's failed nuclear core, many crewmen aboard the ship were zombified into cloudy-eyed beings that attacked the remaining human crew, and eventually Nesterov. An encounter with one such transformed crewman, pictured below, reveals that, once he ran out of ammunition with which to shoot at his fellow crew, his expression and posture filled with fear and desperation, and not malice, much like the apprehensive tribespeople of The Flaming Heart of Danko, but I digress.



As Nesterov delves further into North Wind, the things he encounters are a far cry from the relatively mundane, zombified crew he met with initially. Instead, he begins to encounter monsters such as those described in the full epigraph of Capricho 43. Several of these monsters have been absolutely adapted from other Caprichos, namely, the grotesqueries of numbers 50 and 63, that can be seen below. I surmise that the hooded figures of Caprichos 3[upload.wikimedia.org] and 8[upload.wikimedia.org] may have also had some influence on the several, brief encounters Nesterov has with a hooded figure[i.imgur.com] markedly similar to those mentioned, but unlike Caprichos 50 and 63, these hooded figures are too vague to be absolutely reconcilable.


Capricho 50 The Chinchillas


Capricho 63 Look how solemn they are!

Features shared absolutely between the monsters in Cryostasis and the the horrors in The Caprichos are as follows:

• The blindfold and chinchilla ears of the darkened figure in Capricho 50, and the blindfolds and chinchilla ears of the flying, insectoid creatures whose legs have been hewn off at the knee[i.imgur.com] and tied on in a bent position, with sharp sharp stinger-like protrusions[i.imgur.com] instead of fingers.
  
  
  
  
• The beaked mouth of the clawed humanoid in Capricho 63, and the beaked mouths of the same insectoid creatures mentioned above.
  
  
• The men with bolted locks fastened to either side of their heads in Capricho 50, and the wretched figures with identically fashioned, bolted-locks fastened to either side of their heads, except these have been mounted onto cages that replace the top portion of the skulls onto which they're attached, leaving a large portion of the brain exposed.
  
  

What one does to the other

Other monsters important to Cryostasis, but unrelated to The Caprichos, are as follows:

• Figures wearing shirt-tunics and pants with thin red stripes on either sides of both legs to convey that they were once soldiers, with metal cages around their torsos and shackles around their wrists and necks, and two rivets inserted into their eyes that protrude flat-heads first, holding cell keyrings that are strapped to their hands.
  
  
  
  The purpose of these devices was apparently to be steered and ridden, like with reins on a horse, but this version of the design was omitted in the final product along with an Elizabethan collar. Although it cannot be said with absolute certainty, this design was probably inspired by Capricho 77 (both of which can be seen below); one example of the human/anthropomorphized-mount motif that is also visible in Caprichos 42[upload.wikimedia.org], 63[upload.wikimedia.org], and 65[upload.wikimedia.org].
  
  
  
  
  
  Capricho 77 What one does to the other
  
  
• Also wearing military uniforms, although from the knee down their legs have been replaced with bundles of pipes that make loud clanking noises as they shuffle around, the interior of these monsters' heads are prison cells.
  
  
  
  Resting above their mouths (which are clamped shut on a large ring of keys), where their eyes and nose should be, there are instead barred cell doors, behind which are miniature prison cells within their skulls, containing amenities such as a window, ceiling light, bench, and bed.
  
  
  
  
• An air-raid siren sounds at the arrival of this figure; it wears a long coat, and a metal mask, with a keyhole between the eyes, through which it sees.
  
  
  
  Large bolts fasten its hands onto its head alongside its temples, and in each bolted hand it grasps a flashlight.
  
  

The consistency in the motifs is no mystery. While I would be loath to attribute any singular, symbolic meaning to any individual figure than cannot be vaguely conveyed by simply describing them, I believe the theme of confinement can absolutely be discerned from their collective imagery. Devices such as locks, large rings of keys, and cages, all contribute to this theme. Furthermore, the placement of these devices particularly in and around the heads and hands of the figures that bear them seems implicit of mental, sensory, or otherwise allegorical confinement. Another common feature is blindness, in this case applying to every figure previously described, but such an ambiguous motif offers little meaningful insight. The last shared feature is of being maimed, whether by the gruesome attachment of some device, or having had both legs severed below the knees, or the bodily insertion of rivets or bolts; all seem indicative of constraint, with peculiar deliberacy to their execution, and minimal organic transformation.

It seems that these themes, of confinement and constraint, are actually congruous with the central themes of Cryostasis. The self-evident meaning of the title, referring to the frozen stillness of the North Wind and the constricting ice that parallels the impenetrable forests of The Flaming Heart of Danko. Both the forest's darkness and the North Wind's frozen corridors are relieved by light. And while the parallel of the North Wind's captain as equivalent to Danko may be tempting; it is not the captain's burning heart that illuminates the North Wind, but those of the crew.

[syronくらい]

Brilliant write up.

[papalazarou]

very nice commentary

[Emotional_Supporrrt_Gunner]

I've always found this game severely underrated. Despite all its technical hiccups, it is a true work of art and deserves to be more well-known and discussed. Too bad it was removed from Steam, I would really like to play it again. Thank you very much for your analytical piece, it is greately appreciated.

[serygalacaffeine]

Very impressive game! I wish titles like this wouldn't be so rare.

[Explorerbc]

Good game with great story. I thought goya's only influence was the sub-title.

[Brain Laser]

Interesting read, thanks for posting.