[SPOILER] Plot Discussion Thread *Spoiler Alert*

[grrrz]

randeh
Regarding the kids - I had this theory as well that he reanimated his children, but there is a catch - one of the letters from kids who were cleaning pipes said they meet "2 gents looking kids", which refers to Mandus twins. And they didn't note anything extraordinary about them, not a single trail they were mashed u[p from different bodies.

Also:

This is hinted at when you ride the pigline at the end of the game that leads directly to the temple - you see Enoch and Edwin standing with a ManPig directly behind them, arms held out like a proud father holding his sons. This is also why you wake up in a caged bed where the ManPigs slept. This is why people run from you and slam their doors when London is burning as if they do not recognize you as the rich industrialist philanthropist who treats them all so well.

The Machine, the man in the iron lung, is Oswald Mandus' body. But you... you are Oswald Mandus' clockwork soul remade into a new body to carry out his last wishes. This is why it refers to you as Mandus, and why Mandus via the Chapter title refers to it as Oswald (leaving himself described as "I" to remain vague). In all actuality, Oswald Mandus's original personality, his original soul, was completely dead and replaced by the entity who had assumed full control of his body by the time we play the game.

Also, I mentioned this one before as well, om pages 17-18. But someone pointed out that the hand that hold lantern is perfectly human.

The problem with "oswald being a pigman" theory is still the fact the lantern and all the other light sources don't blink.
If there are indeed two separate entities, it means it's something else.
As for the kids it really seems they die in Mexico, and where replaced by something else or revived (and nothing indicates they were killed again).
Also in the "office" part of the factory where you hear the awesomely creepy song from the phonograph, he marks an entry along the line of "everything is carefully crafted but this still seems like fake" and later "it feels like i'm in a big game"
Could be a direct wink to the player (that's how I took it), or it could indicate it's either all a construction from his mind, as explained before, the theory of the "influencing machine" and the story of James Tilly Matthews and his Air Loom, both being directly referenced in the game. Also worth noting and pointing to this interpretation, the graphic style of the real "Air Loom" as drawn by Matthews is pastiched in the map representing the sections of the machine.
Even if it's not to be taken litteraly it's definitely a major influence on the game.
Just look at it (sorry if it has been mentionned already, very long topic)


I put back wikipedia references in case you missed:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Orig...izophrenia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Tilly_Matthews