Pastelland Forum

Prupp wrote: The test humans

People who try to follow Mur just get in trouble, or don’t succeed any further. (“...for those who follow me: I’m sorry, and...”). A group of wanderers, after finding the Kent Lighthouse appearing with the light bulb protected with iron instead of glass, tried to find a way in, by letting a black cat run to the front of the lighthouse. It disappeared. After a few months the cat still didn’t come back. But then, at the 13:th of December, 2006, the cat came back to the followers, and they saw a way in. But when they at last came in, the people living in the area had already buried it (with complaint from the wanderers), and Mur wasn’t there anymore. They tried to follow Murtaugh on his journey: they ended up at the Loop (like the player), and almost got insane when their attempts to escape failed, unable to find a way through the puzzles.
So Mur found them, hid them, and used them to search the Submachine Network for him, after clues leading to success, finding that it was impossible to try and make them sane. Then he put up a note in the 12:th puzzle in the Loop, telling how to escape, so that others don’t get suspicious when more and more people disappear.
The confused notes were an idea by Mur. Their purpose was to prove that he didn’t have anything to do with the disappearances, too, that the people still were there, but just without memories. It was he who wrote them all (except for Sub6 and 7 – see The Memento theory).

The pearls

To make the people manipulate-able (they were insane), Mur made them amnesiacs by inventing a machine called “WGEA” (Wisdom Gem Experience Absorber). The Gems were made for radiating Karma power, but Mur inverted the process with his Karma arm. He absorbed their memories through a set of headphones, connected to a collector box powered by a Wisdom Gem. The Gem converted the memories to energy and sent them to a power ball that looked like a pearl. Mur made the machine and the power pearls with his Karma arm. In the future Mur made the machines go the other way, to make them open a passage when you put a Wisdom Gem in the headphones. Since Mur made those power pearls, he was now able to make a powerful energy circuit never invented before. He made them go around in a circuit which the player can see a part of in the lighthouse’s pipe parts, and in the ship location. If necessary, the pearls are again turned into Wisdom Gems in the turbine generator in the ship. That ship isn’t a real ship floating on a sea. It’s a technical secret study and lab for Mur, where he gets all of his Gems from. Nowadays the power pearls are used a little more spread out. For example, the clock in the Basement.
After the surrounding decided to bury the lighthouse Mur moved to the Lab to continue his work. Later on he used the power pearls’ energy to take over the portals made for sub-bots (three-digit ones). Since it was human energy in the pearls, he just put them where the Connection Pods should have been put, and the portals were turned into being made for humans. (“The prototype came into contact with human factor and was reverse-engineered in order to transport humans”) While they do that, other flow slowly throughout the massive network of pearl pipes and nurture portals from below.

The future

After the player succeeded with the mission at the Edge, Mur saw the player in the Core, since the player was transported with a new sort of portal device to the Core, at the same time as Mur invaded it. ("We can finally invade the core of the submachine." "unfortunately for you, your adventure ends here.") When he saw the player, he noticed that he was not insane. As they all should be!
Mur concluded that the player was smart enough to travel throughout the Loop unharmed, and that the player wasn’t safe for his plans, that he was about to finish.
Mur can’t let that happen after his 32 years of work. To prevent this he will try to erase the players memory too, or maybe even try to kill the player. (Bullet holes in Liz’s ship in Sub7 - see The Memento theory)

Prupp wrote: Now maybe it isn't very likely that Mateusz would base his Submachine games on a film (although a very good one), but maybe get some ideas from it. Memento is a film in which the protagonist has anterograde amnesia, a serious disorder that prevents the ability of creating new memories after the accident that caused the disorder. The accident could be for example taking drugs or being hit seriously in the head.

This theory states that the protagonist in Submachine has anterograde amnesia. In the second game, The Lighthouse, the player says:

“I didn’t wake up in a room

And I do remember


I remember I had a strange dream

I was playing a game

Submachine


I also remember finishing that game


But I don’t remember waking up from that dream"

This could indicate on that the player was a victim for powerful drugs (the drugs which created the anterograde amnesia) and that he thought he was dreaming while he was not, and therefore doesn’t remember waking up from it. Read this carefully now: Mur trapped the player in that basement after SubX, in which he finally got tired of the player hunting him. Before that the player had followed Mur the same route (maybe not the exact same route) as he does in the actual series. There are proof of this; the bullet holes of Mur trying to get rid of the player in The Core* (“…for those who follow me: I’m sorry, and…” when he wrote that in Sub2 he thought that the player made no harm, or he was sorry for misleading the player (before he started using the followers*)). After the drugs in the basement the player had gotten anterograde amnesia, and started doing the only thing he could: escaping the building. When he stood there on the grass with a sea in front of him, what would he do if not look backwards to the left and right? It was here the player found the entrance to the lighthouse, and Mur had set up the arcade game to trick the player to think that it had just been a game (hence why the player said “I was playing a game, Submachine”). When someone is GETTING anterograde amnesia, certain impressions may remain as memories afterwards, hence the slight remembrance in the quote from Sub2 ^.

In Sub6, a note says “don’t believe his lies”. This could be a quote from Memento (the protagonist writes this on a note to remember). The same in Submachine, the player writes this for him to remember if he returns. As you can see the player camped a while in the sewers, this was maybe to protect himself from Mur.

In Sub7, Liz promises to show up in the garden or somewhere nearby – this is an old and not actual note which the player has already followed.

Now, I know that you guys dislike mixing the additional games and the main plotline. However, SubFLF could be a sideshow to show what COULD have happened to the player after the drugs, he could have become this patient – “all memories are lost in time like tears in rain. It’s coming back to me now, and I almost remember my name, I know where I must go now, to find the root of all of this.”

To sum this entire theory up, the games we’re now playing (the main plotline) are a meaningless race to find something that is long forgotten and gone (therefore the absence of people).

see Mur’s workshop theory