There's something about the major symbolisms and references in AMFP that I haven't really seen many people touch on so I decided to make an account to add to the discussion.
Honestly, the whole story seems like it's based around a specific type of delusion called the Influencing Machine, stemming from the psyche of an insane Nietzsche fanboy.
Spoiler below!
To sum up as neatly as possible, Mandus himself makes several references throughout the game to the case of James Tilly Matthews. The first that I can see is from a journal entry in the church:
Quote:It appears I have no choice. Thus I descend and may God have mercy upon my soul. If this is my Bedlam, and I am to be cast as Matthews, then I will wear that mantle for the sake of my boys, and face whatever horrors lie beneath the altar.
James Matthews was a man, committed to Bedlam Psychiatric Hospital, who is to be considered the first medically recorded case of paranoid schizophrenia and had vivid delusions of a Machine that was designed and operated by unseen, unknown enemies to torture him psychologically and physically through bizarre advanced scientific means. It is now known that this type of delusion of an extremely complex torture machine is fairly common among schizophrenics. Matthews called his machine the Air Loom. You may have seen Mandus mention the Air Loom by name more than once:
Quote:Mandus, you clever old goat, I can feel this horror, this grief, this betrayal buil into fury. I will not stand, I will not be undertrodden. If this machine is my air loom, I am the overman.
I believe he also announces through dialogue that he "beat God to death against the Air Loom". Mandus also references the specific types of torture that Matthews claims the Air Loom performed, including something called Lobster-cracking which stops blood circulation:
Quote:I cannot pass without fear of scalding. I am a lobster, cracked, my circulation stagnated, my vital motions impeded. The steam will boil my whole unless I can find a way to shut it off.
There's clearly very heavy allusion to Matthews and his Machine, waving a big colorful flag that a whole lot of this could really just be in Mandus' head. Or it's more abstract that, but I do not know.
Moving on to how I called Mandus a "Nietzsche fanboy", references to Nietzsche and his philosophies and ideas are littered everywhere in this story and I don't think I can catch them all. But, the ones that stand out most are his repeated references to Nietzsche's famous themes of "God Is Dead" and "Übermensch". I linked the Wikipedia page to "Thus Spoke Zarathustra" above (here it is again). If you have time, have a read and see if anything looks familiar in the context of AMFP. Time and time again Mandus refers to rejecting God, killing God, replacing God. From the section titled The Madman from Nietzsche's The Gay Science:
Quote:God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. Yet his shadow still looms. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?
Nietzsche philosophises a lot about man themselves becoming gods or god-like after the Death of God, most prominently through the idea of the Übermensch. An Übermensch is one who has become more than man, moved on from weakness and has become a master of the self. To an Übermensch, humans are animals who have no control over themselves, who look to otherworldly God/gods because they are weak. The Übermensch becomes the new "worldly" God who wants to bring about a civilization of people that are truly self-aware and not weakened by animalistic feelings and urges. Much the same way Mandus sees people as pigs that he would bring up out of the filth.
Mandus even uses Nietzsche's terminology (the English translation of Ubermensch is "overman" and Mandus uses that word as well several times), most recognisably in the note where you all probably giggled (well I did...):
Quote:I stand and look at myself in the mirror, penis in hand and my reflection grins at me and his mouth is full of the sulphur mustards. "Vain fool", he sneers, "Are you really so very different? Do you genuinely believe your works of evil are any greater than the rest of them? You are simply a weak man, a product of his age, the same as any other. This is Empire, cretin, this is the killing idiocy, the natural result of this social Darwinism. If you are evil, then this world is evil. You just let the blood run in the street rather than hiding it in the poorhouse. You hold the blade and slide it home yourself, you do not pay a man to do this for you where you cannot see it. If you are evil, at least yours is an honest evil and that alone makes you Ubermensch". And thus I wash my hands and take to bed.
(There's some crazy references to WWI (and WWII?) Germany in there and I honestly don't know what to make of that. It's like he's seeing the future through someone else's eyes like some sort of prophetic episode.)
It looks like Mandus got in a craze over and abused the philosophies of Nietzsche in a similar way to that which a certain Nazi party would just a few decades later. Result: Mandus committing genocide to prevent a genocide inspired by similar ideas. An irony that most people caught anyway, but perhaps more interesting when you dig a little deeper.
The last theme philosophised about by Nietzsche that I'll bring up is "Eternal Recurrence" which is basically the idea that everything recurs, all events happen over and over and all actions done by a person will be repeated. Just something I thought was comparable with Mandus having to start up and to sabotage his Machine twice and he willed for a way to end the circle of events.
Oh and did I mention Nietzsche was struck the idea for all of this after gazing upon a huge pyramid-shaped stone? Weird, man...
All these themes and references are so pervasive, I don't know if I should take them more literally, or accept them to be just literary undertones. I kind of enjoy the idea that the events of the game were him battling his way through his own fractured mind and through his Influencing Machine. Anyway, just wanted share with you guys some of the stuff this story seems to be built on that I haven't seen much talk of. :3
(09-13-2013, 10:03 PM)Integria Wrote: My apologies if this spans too much. I just wanted to grab it from a few different angles, if there's something particular you're looking for. Note, it's JUST at the last save in the game, so it is easy to access if you have the game.
Use spoiler quotes next time if you wanna condense: [.spoiler]*stuff goes here*[./spoiler] (without the periods after the brackets).
I assumed the person in the tank was the professor, since there's no real explanation where he goes after being blindsided by Mandus in one of the recordings.
I think people saying that this game
has not puzzles fail to see that the story is one big puzzle it self,
and it's multi leveled as well. You can look at it as literal and
have your story, congratulation you just beat easy mode now try hard
mode.
I'd like to offer my observation if you will have it.
Spoiler below!
let talk about the middle part when you come back to London during the pig apocalypse. when entering the street if you turn left quickly you will see the only living male fond in the game and looks perfectly human. he is finely dressed with a mustach, a hard felt hat, collar and tie and a respectable appearance. he is not attack by pigs and dose not seem afraid but rather annoyed and slams the door in you face. right next to this is a street name. Bucks Row
Bucks row is famous for the site where Jack the Ripper killed Mary Ann "Polly" Nichols on 31 August 1888
If you travel around the corner you find your self on Berner Street the site that Jack the Ripper killed Elizabeth "Long Liz" Stride on the 30 September 1888.
It is on or close to this street you will see a women open a door but then get attack by a pigman and the door slams shut. Also thru some bars you will see a women drag off into a ally with two pigs soon to follow.
after going thru one of the houses you end up on Hanbury Street the place where Jack the Ripper killed Annie Chapman (born Eliza Ann Smith on 8 September 1888
you then enter an ally named Dorset Street this is where a pig man chases you but also where Jack the Ripper killed Mary Jane Kelly on 9 November 1888. after escaping from the pig you can turn arond and see a street name Miller's Court which is part of Dorset street in real life. (I thnk you might see the top hat man in this ally as well.
You then find yourself on Pinchin Street where a a female torso was discovered by P.C. William Pennett On September 10, 1889, at 5:15 AM some think it was a women named Lydia Hart .The body was missing both head and legs. Now in the game right by this street is another street name Arch street but I could not find anything on this, it might refer to the woman torso was found under a railway arch in Pinchin Street. committed by a single serial killer, dubbed the "Torso killer". Whether Jack the Ripper and the "Torso killer" were the same person or separate serial killers active in the same area is debatable.
right after this part you go down a elevator to the machine and can see male torsos with out heads or legs moving down the machine to be grinder by the iron butler.
This is not just fun easter eggs, everything in ths game has symbolism. At first I was thinking that when after his wife died was when a part of him went crazy and became Jack the ripper but the murders happen 1888-1889 and his wife was bured in 1890. most of the streets are not close together in real life but are all connected in the game
(09-13-2013, 10:04 PM)aquilantiqua Wrote: There's something about the major symbolisms and references in AMFP that I haven't really seen many people touch on so I decided to make an account to add to the discussion.
Honestly, the whole story seems like it's based around a specific type of delusion called the Influencing Machine, stemming from the psyche of an insane Nietzsche fanboy.
Well that surely was a big and interesting piece of context, thanks.
(09-13-2013, 10:04 PM)aquilantiqua Wrote: There's something about the major symbolisms and references in AMFP that I haven't really seen many people touch on so I decided to make an account to add to the discussion.
Honestly, the whole story seems like it's based around a specific type of delusion called the Influencing Machine, stemming from the psyche of an insane Nietzsche fanboy.
I've brought up the refences to James Tilly Matthews a few times through this chest, in relation to the concept of the air loom and the probability of dealing with a protagonist affected by schizophrenia. I'm glad to see someone else bringing it up, because it seems quite pervasive to the entire story.
As for Nietzsche, I'm not sure how his works directly translate. I've read The Antichrist and Thus Spoke Zarathustra, but I didn't really consider any of it through my playthrough. His thoughts were evident at the time though, along with the entire concept of nihilism. It is quite possible that the pervasive part of the protanogist's schizm was influenced by Nietzsche. The reason I don't see it is because his works are never mentioned, he himself is never mentioned, and it is a very slim subset of Nietzsche's thoughts we'd be dealing with.
Besides, any proper Nietzsche fanboy knows to take arguments such as "God is dead" with a ton of salt.
(This post was last modified: 09-13-2013, 10:27 PM by Integria.)
(09-13-2013, 10:09 PM)bluel0bster Wrote: I assumed the person in the tank was the professor, since there's no real explanation where he goes after being blindsided by Mandus in one of the recordings.
Yeah some people said the professor just got turned into mulch or became a pig but I think he's the dude inside the Iron Lung too. Just because of how long they leave it for you to find out what happens between them, it's right at the end where you hear the professor getting whacked on the head by Mandus.
Maybe it's HIS heart being used and the Iron Lung keeps him alive without it. though I don't know why, I'm just spit ballin
Prettz,
Interesting, but do you mean to say that Jack the Ripper was Oswald's alter ego and in reality there was no manpigs as it was Mandus all along who killed the whores (which he mentions btw)?
I was trying to assemble my "facts" until now. But I have trouble with the logic, since the start.
The first note in chronological order (from Kein's post) reads:
Spoiler below!
August 4th 1898
More experiments with Compound X. Took the dog and injected it with strychnine. After the expected convulsions and spasming, it died just after midnight. I immersed the body in a large tank of Compound X and introduced an alternating current via induction coil for a period of three and a half minutes. Partial return was induced. However, damage incurred prior to death was retained upon revival, meaning the dog continued in the acute state of strychnine poisoning until I put a bullet in its skull. But drowning? Perhaps, yes. It is after all known to be the kindest of suicides. If one were to drown, replacing the fluid in the lungs with Compound X should theoretically be perfectly possible as a revival method.
According to this note, Mandus was already running reanimation tests, but why? He hadn't gone to Mexico, he hadn't had visions, his kids hadn't die... to resurrect the bones of his 9 years dead wife? This lead me to believe that maybe his wife was being preserved in the cryogenic chamber and that's why I asked for gender confirmation of the subject inside.
But months later there's this note...
Spoiler below!
August 19th 1899
Von Reichenbach writes of the Odic Force, whilst that ignorant charlatan Blavatsky pontificated upon the soul. They are both cretins. To think one could strive for such great heights without wading first through puke and innard, without standing upon an architecture of bones! Montezuma was the wiser. But here, in our temples of steel, I have witnessed the severed head of a man, recently trampled to death by a runaway carriage, immersed in a solution of the Brennenburg compound open his eyes, and cry "Oh where are my legs Sir? Where is my body?" We are breaking through the barriers of death itself. Oh my dead darling Lily, it is too late for you, but I promise you this: I will save our children from death and, if need be, I will wrench them back from the blackness with this wonderful concoction!
Here he acknowledges it's too late for his wife, which brings again my previous question. In addition to that, here he states he wants to bring back his children. Didn't he kill them to spare them the horrors of the future? Now he wants them back? There is something wrong with the timing of the kids' death, or the reason of their death. I have to check back some things.
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[SPOILER] Plot Discussion Thread *Spoiler Alert*
