[SPOILER] Plot Discussion Thread *Spoiler Alert*

[pikmintaro]

I have another question that I had forgotten!

In Mandus's house in the dining room, by the Violin (Or whatever it is a big Violin looking thing I don't know much about instruments sorry.) there is a note you can pick up, but it is all in German! or at least I think it's German, has anybody translated it yet? I want to know what it says!

[Alardem]

Playing through the game again just because I want to discover all the stuff I missed. Already noted that Enoch and Edwin were still alive as of October 11 1899 with their journal entry of how Daddy is always busy and away and that they heard sounds of a pig and he told them to get inside immediately. So the Manpigs were already made by that time.

So...okay, I'm lost now. When did the boys die?

[Deep One]

Does anyone have any idea why Mandus wakes up in bed?

In the original amnesia Daniel wakes up after drinking the amnesia potion, which makes sense and you have to follow the trail of liquid...

So what happened to Mandus to forget the events that lead to his going to bed (other than his unstable state of mind)? Hope I'm not missing a huge detail

Also why the bars on the beds?

Fever, tropical disease and madness took all his strenght and forced him to go to bed. I guess this is also the part where he lost his memory.

[Alardem]

Does anyone have any idea why Mandus wakes up in bed?

In the original amnesia Daniel wakes up after drinking the amnesia potion, which makes sense and you have to follow the trail of liquid...

So what happened to Mandus to forget the events that lead to his going to bed (other than his unstable state of mind)? Hope I'm not missing a huge detail

Also why the bars on the beds?

Fever, tropical disease and madness took all his strenght and forced him to go to bed. I guess this is also the part where he lost his memory.

But why on New Year's Eve and not sooner? From what I understand Mandus was ill and bed-ridden ever since his visit to the Aztec ruins.

[tickldkfiifo]

Daniel's cause of amnesia was totally different altogether.

But as for when the boys died, probably later in October (I'll check the notes one more time).

[Cobra5]

Also why the bars on the beds?

There is a note about that in the game directly. The entire mansion complex you start in was built to host parties for rich people. When they got in bed the cage would snap down, and the bed would flip over and they'd be sent to the machine below to be used for food, many times to be used as food for the next party.

[Alardem]

Also why the bars on the beds?

There is a note about that in the game directly. The entire mansion complex you start in was built to host parties for rich people. When they got in bad the cage would snap down, and the bed would flip over and they'd be sent to the machine below to be used for food, many times to be used as food for the next party.

Makes me think of Sweeney Todd.

Spoiler below!

Oswald Mandus, the demon butcher of Hanbury Street.

[Kein]

Tobi
This destroys the theory that Mandus killed his sons in the Temple, as a sacrifice.

Anyway, so far we have few theories, most of them rely/using Mandus insistence as a basic ground:

A ghost - Mandus was a ghost (second part of the personality?) all along and his dead body is in the iron lung sarcophagus. Makes little sense since we can interact with the world and Pigs can hurt us.

Hallucination/mental play - my favorite. Mandus builds a Machine on the bones of his children, he himself becomes part of the Machine, a machine itself, lying in the sarcophagus. His personality splits on two - The Machine and Mandus. Since he is the heart of damned device, each time when these personalities clash they cause havok to actual machine: Mandus wins at some point, "sabotaging' device and shutting it down. The Machine manages to shoo him, but in order to restore device it needs Mandus. So it "wakes" him up, and with trickery get his help in restoring "power" again (I assume the consciousness of his body in the lung can somehow operate machine). Second personality, ie Mandus. realizes it and he fights Machine again. Remember how he talks about making himself "whole again"? In the end I think Mandus wins, he accepts the truth, what he did, he accepts his damnation and thus completely takes over the machine (1st personality), becomes whole again and shuts down The Doom's Device since nothing can prevent him to do so anymore.
Now, what is about what we see in-game, all the locations and actions we do? This is the brain's interpretation of the clash of the personalities that happens in his mind. The notes we find is the memories his 2nd personality uncovers, it is all in his head. Pigs are obstacles, but that does not mean they don't exist in outer world, they do.

A cadaver
Somehow Mandus either managed to split himself on two (???) or may be he made a Pigmen out of himself, with second personality. That explain many things well, but what about that damn hand that hold the lamp? It is not a pig hand. Although, even there could be some explanation, even if far-stretched:
1. Instead of making a Pigmen he used professor's body to put part of his personality into. That does not make much sense, but it would if there was an orb actually involved into story. But it is not, we don't see it at all, seems like it was cut just like 2 other endings.
2. Remember the note about mirrors? Perhaps Pigmen can recognize themselves as manpigs only in their reflections, but when they look upon others or themselves their mind plays trick and they see humans. Too thin, too weak theory, though.


Either way, even though Orb's existence is mentioned, it is not in the game. We can't see it anywhere or read about it directly (except one vague note), but its presence would explain a lot. As I mentioned here:
http://www.frictionalgames.com/forum/thr...#pid259111
seems like the machine was supposed to be powered by Orb originally.

Did I miss any other theories?

[Alardem]

The 'Stone Egg' taken from the temple is this game's equivalent of the orb. They just never got around to showing it. Good thing, too - glowing crystal balls are not horrifying at all.

I recall a note talking about how deeply the machine extends - or, at the very least, how the earth has an iron core. Could be a hint that the Machine, through supernatural means, is somehow located at the earth's core? That may explain the enormous amounts of energy required to keep its heart frozen rather than crushed or burned by the core, and why the Machine speaks of 'spinning the world wheel'.

A 20th century far worse than our own is a morbidly fascinating idea.

[Kein]

That may explain the enormous amounts of energy required

In the game we see analogue of the nuclear reactor, based on Compound X specs and when we go to restart it, we can literally hear these "radiation crackling sounds", just a bit altered: