A Complete Story Breakdown of SIGNALIS
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 16 มิ.ย. 2024
- “Are you still looking for answers where there are only questions?”
If so, then you’ve come to the right place! Join me on a deep dive into the abyss of Signalis lore, in which I provide a thorough analysis and explanation of virtually every aspect of the game’s haunting story from beginning to end. Topics addressed include the following:
- Connections with The King in Yellow
- The true identity of LSTR-512
- Isa’s purpose in the story
- The nature of Nowhere
- Swan Lake in the subtext
- The meaning of the Artifact
- How each ending is connected
And much, much more. Plenty of answers are to be found in Signalis, and there just might be more than “heartbreak at the end” after all…
CHAPTERS
00:00 - Introduction
06:21 - Background
27:19 - How It Begins
39:17 - The Dream
44:42 - Prologue
48:18 - Synchronization
01:01:31 - Liminality
01:24:01 - Gestaltzerfall
01:47:21 - The End
02:04:16 - Epilogue - เกม
Just wanted to add a few corrections here:
1. First and foremost, "Synchronizität" is more accurately translated as Synchronicity, not Synchronization, and the developers have confirmed that this is what they intended. While I still think my high-level explanation of Chapter 1 holds up decently well, it is admittedly off the mark, and is certainly incomplete - see "Part 2" for a discussion on Synchronicity.
2. At 11:33 I say that Rot-Front was a Russian village; this is incorrect. It is actually located in the country of Kyrgyzstan, was originally settled by Germans, and was known by the name Bergtal prior to being renamed by the Soviet Union. Whenever I discuss other cultures in my videos, I conduct thorough research & try my best to represent them respectfully and accurately, but I do make mistakes. Please feel free to call these out so that I can ensure correct information is being presented.
3. There appears to be widespread confusion and misinformation online regarding the nature of the Oort cloud, largely because it is a purely theoretical structure and there is no consensus on how big/far away it actually is. That said, the numbers I give starting at 32:06 - which were pulled from the National Schools' Observatory (NSO) - appear to be quite wrong and outdated, as pointed out by @Draco Rex. According to NASA (nasa.gov), the distance to the inner edge of the Oort cloud is currently thought to be within the range of 11-29 light days, and its outermost edge is POSSIBLY around 1.5 light years away from the sun. These are more accurate figures, albeit still speculative.
Ergo, the Penrose was traveling not at 50%, but 0.73% the speed of light - still incredibly fast, and fast enough (~4,895,501 mph) that I think my argument for bioresonance-powered spacecraft still holds up.
(P.S. I promise I will never mispronounce "tarot" again. Please don't unsubscribe :)
Actually, Rotfront have little to do with some village. I'm sure, it was tens or even hundreds similarily named places in the ex-communist block. Heck, even one of the most well-known Soviet confectionery factory and it's chocolate brand still bearing that name to this very day! Rotfront stands for Roter Frontkämpferbund - "Alliance of Red Front-Fighters", German socialist and anti-fascist paramilitary organisation, active in 1924-1929. First leader of the Rotfront was Ernst Thälmann, who was also a leader of German Communist Party, until he was imprisoned by Nazis in the 1933, the year Hitler came to power. Unbelievably, he was executed only in 1944 when Nazi Germany clearly started to lose the war. Of course, Thälmann and his Rotfront organisation was made a heroes in all socialist countries and was widely revered, especially in GDR, on which Eusan Nation is clearly based of.
First, your comment here should be pinned so it is the first one everybody sees.
Second, Signalis has so many similarities and connections with Silent Hill 2. It's a pity you never mention them, as I'm sure they would further help describe the game. Like, how you must crawl through a tunnel in a wall that makes little sense physically, jumping down pits over and over, the red save squares, several similarly designed puzzles (mostly box-related, but also the arms that need rings), the photo of the person you are searching for, the similarity of the Nue to the SH2 boss Flesh Lip, having to stomp enemies after you knock them down, and the bathroom stall that doesn't open.
Third, a couple of minor pronunciation errors. Tao is actually pronounced with a D instead of a T, and Tarot ends with a hard O and silent T.
@@jsmith6599 I'm surprised how little time the Cold War angle is given in most video analyses of the game, lol. I mean, the first analogy I thought of when seeing the story of Ariane, Falke and Elster was the annexation of the GDR in 1990.
That shows a lot of integrity to solve corrections and include that.
Thank you for making this video about this gem that deserves more recognition! I have subscribed to your channel.
Hearing that the promise ending is the hardest to get whilst I did it unconsciously proves that I'll do anything for a good ending
I envy you. I had no idea that there would be multiple endings when I first played. Also, my second play through I shot and killed anything I saw (which was what I heard was the way to achieve this ending?), yet I still didn’t get the “promise ending”. Does anyone know how to get the promise ending no matter what? Do I have to die a lot or something? Bc I didn’t die much in either play through even on the hardest difficulty where I killed almost every corrupted gestalt I came across.
@brayerkh basically play as though you'd do anything to get through that hell. I died trying to hold off bosses mainly. I healed constantly even when on yellow. I shot about anything that moved eventually running out of ammo and had to use batons. You die, you conquer, you never surrender.
I actually got it first time. I'm a cautious player, so I shot everything I encountered, loaded saves every time I took too much damage for too few kills and when bosses reduced my health, so I only died once but loaded tons of saves. Took me 14 hours to finish it, and the Promise ending absolutely broke me. Stupendous game.
Also playtime is important, you have to have a playtime over 6 hours
@@Cosmic.IB14 I got the promise ending my first game, and I was so curious why it was set up that way with all the requirements (I'm a super cautious player), but the way you describe it makes so much sense! Doing anything to get out of there alive. This game is truly a work of art.
If i was a game dev, i would be ecstatic knowing someone care so much about something i made and analyzed it thoroughly. Great job my man, made me connect so many dots and come to terms with my own interpretation, which i believe is ultimately the most important thing the game tries to tell you: how do YOU feel about this heartbreaking narrative?
I feel like keeping my promises, that's for sure...
Exactly beautifully said
2H BRO.....thats a lot
How???? How could you know all these concepts from different philosophies, arts, books…???
IMPRESSIVE WORK. This video deserves an Oscar
And also the Best analyser.
Reading is something we used to do in the past.
I just want to share how I feel devastated. For Ariana and Elster for the unending cycles of bitterness, yearning, and hopelessness for there will never be an happy outcome. For Falke who has to experience the love that’s not hers. Ariane’s note about last good night destroys me. I feel so connected and I still don’t know how to process these feelings yet.
I think you can reasonably assume that the "artifact" ending as a happy one, and the "promise" ending as maybe not happy but at least a bittersweet one.
@deadbunny2938 In some ways, I find the existence of the artifact more emotionally devastating than the promise. Something about those 2 dancing, knowing it's their last moments together, for eternity. Idk it just makes me more sad.
@@deadbunny2938Honestly the promise ending is the happiest ending for me,even though they'll never relive those happy 8 years they spend together,or live more happy memories after finding eachother again,they at least can finally rest,including all of the people stuck in the cycle
@@deadbunny2938imo the artifact ending is likely a "selfish" ending.
I said "selfish" because Elster wished to be with Ariane because of her selfish love to be with her side again leaving everything, the promise, the penrose, the mining facility, and the rampant corruption.
Its just the both of them now, in a broken down ship, dancing in the dark.
However, this ending is not what Ariane wanted. She wanted to die and finally end this suffering nightmare, she needed Elster to do it and fulfill their promise.
But Elster isnt even in the same dimension in Ariane's dream.
I theorized that Elster became another dreamer having her own pocket dimension with "Ariane". The "Ariane" in the artifact ending is not Ariane but something else, because of the presence of the red eye observing Elster and "Ariane".
The "Ariane" in that ending is likely to be Elster's figment of memory where the artifact conjured a version of Ariane. A ghost like version of Ariane to be with Elster.
@@deadbunny2938promise ending seems like a happy ending for me, Elster get to fulfill her promise with ending Ariane's suffering after going through hell to reach her. They both died next to eachother not alone, finally reunited. A bittersweet ending? yes. But its good outcome.
My initial interpretation of the Artifact Ending was that of a wedding.
The Key of Sacrifice, the Key of Love, and the Key of Eternity all could be interpreted as wedding vows. To love someone till death due them part and to sacrifice oneself for the other. In a sense, Elster has made these vows as she literally sacrifices multiple versions of herself, seemingly forever all for the love of Ariane. These vows are also shared by Ariane, with her sacrificing Isa, a dream version of herself, to aid Elster, her eternal dream of Elster fulfilling their promise out of love.
The artifact can then be seen as a wedding ring or proposal from Elster to Ariane, due to the Tesseract being placed in a tomb similar to Ariane's pod. As a wedding ring symbolizes marriage, so is the tesseract a symbol of their love and promise to one another.
The Red Eye and the verses could be pointing towards Ariane basically ascending to Godhood and peering down on her new home since when Elster picked up the King In Yellow, it said it was time to go home, specifically with Ariane. Ariane never felt like she belonged and was an outcast, so she had nowhere to return to except Elster. In a sense, Elster is her home, where she could stay for eternity.
As stated in the video, the promise has a double meaning: the promise of death and the promise to be together. With the Promise ending, Elster fulfills the promise to end Ariane's suffering. In the Artifact ending, Elster fulfills the promise for her and Ariane to be together. They also dance forever which contradicts Falke's saying that they would never dance again.
Even the lily supports this. Since Lilith placed a lily on Alina's grave, so does Elster, including all other variations of her. This means that their promise extends not only to half of LSTR-512's memories but also to Lilith's as well. It is a complete promise.
This theory also explains why "Remember our promise" appears. It could be that Ariane is reminding Elster for them to be together. While this next part is more pure speculation, Lilith could have also wanted to marry Alina, but due to Alina's death, left the promise unfulfilled. The "Remember our promise" line could be Elster/Lilith remembering to marry Ariane/Alina.
This theory probably isn't true at all, but it's what I first thought of and I like thinking that the lesbian Goddess gets to dance with her robot wife forever in peace.
This reminds me of those math problems where you dont have a fixed set of points to a problem, but rather an set of infinite mathematical conclusions where we can take a valid one from the pool to justify our conclusion to the problem.
So you are right, Ariane ascends to godhood and become like the folk lore she belived in her homeworld and preserve the promise by remembering it.
This is such a cool interpretation
Let this bro cook 🔥🔥🔥
I agree that the Artifact ending strongly implies marriage. However, there is another very overt reference to marriage in the game - the Empress' Hand. If we see the Empress' Hand as a parallel to the endings, they actually line up very neatly, as does the order of events I believe takes place. Because it parallels so closely, and because Ariane is possibly related to the Empress in some way, I think it ought to be taken seriously as spelling out what happens, and I'm surprised almost everyone theorycrafting about this game misses it out, as I think it completely clears up how the endings link together.
1. On the first day she was crowned - admittedly we are starting with where the comparison is weakest. However, you could say that the Memory ending is what initiates and continues the loop, as such "crowning" Ariane as the master of this pseudo-reality. The Memory ending upholds the status quo and I believe this one happens many times before the others follow. The Regent's Ring that lines up with this day says "this too shall pass" - this is just another step in a loop that won't end.
2. On the longest day nothing was done - the "longest day" part here I think is irrelevant as this is for solving the puzzle, what we care about is the order of events. Nothing being done matches the Leave ending, where you die without meeting Ariane at all. Maybe this is caused by Elster being unable to deal with her conflicting identities, but it could also be caused by Elster remembering or otherwise realising what happens in the Memory ending and not wanting to confront the cryo chamber again because she knows it won't work.
3. On the next day she was wed - this matches the Artifact ending for the reasons you already said. Since at a meta level you cannot get this ending unless you know the game, perhaps Elster remembers the other loops this time around, possibly as a result of dying alone in the Leave ending rather than next to Ariane, or because you have disrupted the normal course of the loops (since what Elster salvages body parts from after the fakeout ending is clearly from the Memory ending, we can assume this one is the "default"). Realising that nothing she has tried has worked, Elster just tries to spend a little more time with Ariane.
4. On the last day she took her life - the first reading of this implies suicide, but if you look closer the actual words never say this. "She took her life" could easily mean one person taking another's life, with Elster being She and Ariane being Her. Since this is on the last day, this implies that doing this is what breaks the loop, especially considering the serpent ring is fashioned into an ouroboros, a symbol of infinite looping - this is the death of the cycle. This is also added to by the wedding ring on the previous finger - "till death do us part" - the loop won't end until Ariane dies.
I do not think that "remember our promise" appearing in the Artifact ending means a promise to be together. On the contrary, I think it is Ariane trying to get Elster to break out of her delusion and stop dancing with ghosts. You wouldn't remind somebody about a promise if they've already fulfilled the promise, this doesn't really make any sense - the promise is to end Ariane's suffering and break the cycle, which can only be done by killing her. Realising that her effort to spend more time with Ariane in the Artifact ending is futile, Elster resolves once again to keep the promise no matter what. Perhaps it is the ritual performed in the Artifact ending, or perhaps it is just Elster's determination to kill Ariane this time even if she doesn't remember, but on the final time around Ariane does remember the promise, and thanks Elster for keeping it with her last dying breaths.
I haven't read The King in Yellow, but I've heard that lilies are related to awakening in that story, so this could be another link. This could be about awakening Elster to what she needs to do, or awakening Ariane so that she remembers the promise, or - more likely - both. All this points to the Artifact ending not being a happy one, not granting closure and not allowing them to be together, it grants no peace to anyone - though it does directly enable the final resolution of the Promise ending.
‘This theory is not true at all.’ I wholeheartedly disagree sir.
I love how the quote "Great holes secretly are digged where earth's pores ought to suffice, and things have learnt to walk that ought to crawl.” can be linked back to bioresonance and just how little humanity understands it. Its mysterious nature leaves a lot of questions unanswered, but that's only because humanity never thought to ask them. They built an interplanetary civilization on something they barely understand, and are now completely out of their depth.
Doesn't that also apply to aerodynamics?
Awesome interpretation
It's definitely a classic Lovecraft quote
Its simple human behaviour we just want stuff even if we dont understand it
I swear ever since I played and finished Signalis I have been pondering and theorizing about it. It doesn't let me go, none of it. I watched plenty of analyises this that and what not. but finally I can make peace. Your breakdown is amazing, in depth and colludes with a lot of my own theories about the game. So many questions were left unanswered and I am that type of person that needs to know it. I just have to and man.... I love you for this video, finally helping me understand it all.
How the hell are we all ever supposed to recover from this 😭
@@venezuelanomori15we weren't meant to
We are those who walk that were meant to crawl
@@airplanes_aren.t_real that's deep man
Kinda late but I just finished Signalis last week, my brain is broken. I got the Promise ending and dude, it’s the first game to ever make me shed some tears. It hurt.
Why cant the space lesbians be happy...
why cant they be happy :(
because communism is hell
sesbian lex
Domestic violence
Lack of men.
Perhaps it's just because it's the ending I got, but I much prefer the Promise ending rather than the Artifact ending. As you said, seeing an image or word a bunch of times can cause the image/word to become meaningless, especially when everything else deteriorates around them. I think as sad as it is, Elster holding onto their promise and finally giving them both their peace is better.
I really like that idea of Ariane and Falke being simultaneous dreamers that resonate off each other as that I feel explains quite a few details.
And, it also explains why the concept of resonating signals is brought up early on, and even used in game mechanics.
@@vogonp4287 exactly. And you literally do this when you align the 2 signals in the computer to resonate on the same antenna.
I finished Signalis yesterday, and thankfully got the Promise ending. I definitely tried to interpret a lot of what I was seeing and the story as a whole, but playing it at somewhat face value did not prepare me for the sheer depth that was within this game, and having sat completely glued to this video really enlightened me to everything else I missed or gave only a small amount of thought to. This game is a true stroke of genius and I thank you so much for making this video for me to understand it all the more.
I could have just might written the very same.
I think the eye during the lily ending dance scene has a different meaning now that isnt Arianne still witnessing and suffering in the penrose.
The use of it during the game was her dreaming and witnessing the events. But in the lily ending there is a literal giant eye looming above the penrose. So it could be interpreted differently. The eye could now be Arianne ascending beyond life and death with the help of the artifact to get both of the things she wanted when originally she could only pick one. Her death to end her suffering or her life to love Elster.
And the "remember our promise" that's still there during this ending could also be post tense instead of it being pretense during most of the game. So instead of originally it meaning "remember our promise so you can uphold it." it's now "remember our promise you went through hell and back to do?" Which is just to recall everything Elster did for Arianne out of love.
Tried to wrap up loose ends which is hard to do for this game
I love your video here. And after watching fiftyeleventeen videos on Signalis theories, I'm convinced that yours is the "most accurate." Or at least, that it retains the highest level of emotional impact while connecting that largest amount of evidence in a way that still makes sense.
One thing I'm very curious about is why no one mentions the significance of the name of the ship. I've only seen one video so far where the person who made it seems to know the correlation between "Penrose" and "Penrose diagrams." But, given that I think it really supports your entire theory here, it's worth mentioning.
A Penrose diagram is a way to help visualize 4D spacetime, specifically as it pertains to liminal boundaries, like the edge of the universe or the event horizon of a black hole. Like the ship that Ariane is trapped within, a Penrose diagram details the way to travel from one reality to another.
Penrose diagrams are "real" things, btw. This isn't like a fictional science tool. It's a real, fake, science tool. Anyway, here's a great video explaining Penrose diagrams.
th-cam.com/video/4v9A9hQUcBQ/w-d-xo.html
So the two dreams are different "Penrose realities," conjoined by the "Nowhere" liminal space as you mentioned. Ariane, alone and trapped in eternal suffering, but reaching out with her dream to find Elster. Her dream "activates" Falke, who then begins her own dream. Because when you can modify reality with the power of your imagination, the shortest distance between two points isn't a line, it's how few dreams need be dreamt.
Anyway, Elster has to "hop" from one dream to the next to find Ariane. Moving from Ariane's dream to Falke's dream, just like Penrose diagrams detail the path for moving between realities.
This is a great insight, thanks! Can't believe I never thought to look deeper into the meaning of the Penrose itself 😅
Building on this, I wonder how much we can even speak of different realities.
Whatever is happening in the facility itself, the main point is the idea of everyone (or at least, Replikas) merging into a single entity, both being part of it, being it itself and being imprisoned within this larger super-being.
I would read the events of the game as Elster reliving the same events while changes in this "being" happen around her. Space and Time are clearly fucked in their own way, there is no reason why the same place can't change shape as well. Or location, for that matter. Nowhere is in theory found at the bottom of the mine, yet it mirrors the structure above.
TL;DR: I didn't read the multiple cycles as literally different realities but rather as the one "reality" the facility is located in being changes and modifed by whatever the events of the game are.
Characters with a particular strong will/obsession become capable of interacting "with the Door" and somehow be active players in the events rather than being turned into flesh-mass or mindless angry zombie robots.
I read Penrose to be in contrast to Sierpinski - Penrose tiles being a geometric pattern that extends infinitely outward without repeating, and Sierpinski triangles being a geometric pattern that repeats infinitely inward.
@@RevCosmosisV2I had not even thought to juxtapose the two against each other conceptually. But yeah, I think you also have a great point there.
Regarding Ariane's bioressonance, I think it's important to note that Ariane and the Falke units look identical and the Falke units are explicitly modeled after the great revolutionary and her daughter and have appropriately immense bioressonant power. This certainly implies some kind of connection between them though what specifically I'm not sure.
The newest update gives a clue regarding synchronicity. It explains that pauli effect, remote viewing, and doppelgangers are the direct result of bioresonance. That The Great revolutionary and her daughter, Alina Seo, and Arianne look alike aren't coincidences, but more likely doppelgangers as a result of bioresonance.
Also I think there's some examples of each effect on the game. Remote viewing = the ever present red eye (Ariane) watching Elster remotely. Doppelgangers = Ariane, The Revolutionary figureheads, and Alina.
For the Pauli effect (which means the effect of technical equipment breaking down at the presence of someone) I'm not too sure, but it could be why the cryopod Ariane was sleeping in malfunctioned into keeping her in a half suspended state?
Can we take a moment here to appreciate that this was made by just two people????
I finished Signalis yesterday and it's left me emotionally devastated. I'm really glad I got the Promise ending because the others don't seem at all like thr loop is over, that somehow, Ariane's suffering lives on for another loop, potentially forever, although that suffering changes with your interpretation of the Lily ending.
I’ve recently finished it for the first time as well, including having gotten the Promise ending. It has to be one of the most beautiful and tragic endings I’ve ever experienced.
Two star crossed lovers, trapped in their own little slice of Heaven, living in their own personal Hell…
I will personally hold this ending as canon. It’s too fitting for the kind of story that Signalis is. As tragic as it is, as horrific as everything turned out, with how much I’ve struggled to reach Arianne…
In the end, I kept my promise.
Wherever they are now, I hope that Arianne and Elester are together.
I reached memory. It felt fitting, and make me happy to be my first experience to conclusion. I think promise would have fitted too, but leave seems a wrong conclusión for my gameplay.
@@alexber8838 Getting leave for my first time would have been devastating.
@@xxzxxwI randomly got signalis on a whim cause I thought it looked similar to metal gear solid (PS1) and resident evil
Words, colors, numbers or characters cannot describe how unprepared I was for the psychological torment that was this game
Yet it's so good
This is a very insightful video! One thing to mention is that It turns out a patch was released a couple months ago for the Steam version of the game that changed some art assets in the game. One of the big changes is giving Ariane her short hair in the Penrose scene where they are sleeping. Another one also reinforces your point made about Lilith not being the mother of the Itous. It might be worth a look at to see the changes but no others really effect the points you've made.
Once again, excellent video!
Thank you for pointing this out, I hadn't heard about the patch!
I was able to find the updated Penrose scene & Nikolai photo, but I didn't see anything about Lilith - is there a good source to see all of those changes listed?
@@indiexplorergames The letter from Itou Bookstore to the Rotfront blockwart is signed by an "Anja Itou" now. Anja is a female name
@@mdd4296 Thank you! Interesting indeed...
@@indiexplorergamesthe 1.2 patch also added two secret rooms. Edit: Correction that they’ve found so far, because 6 is a VERY prevalent number in the game.
The "Remember our promise" line in Lily ending flashed before their dance, not after. In the same manner Memory and Promise had it flashed before Elster's conversation with Ariane.
This is the most thoughtful, in-depth, and sensible analysis of Signalis that I have seen so far, and I think that I have seen them all. Fantastic job!
This is the best video out of all the ones I've watched in my quest to understand Signalis.
A great summary of the story, influences, explanations and the most convincing and reasoned interpretations that I have come across so far. No bullshit, no filler, no memes.
Pure quality content.
same over here
The outcome really reflects the 6 months you spent on creating this masterpiece. The eloquant, yet simple to understand writing, elegant editing and choice of music, that really fits with whats being shown on screen, make this an immensely enjoyable watch. I've been trying to understand Signalis' story for the past month and feel like I've been failing miserably, but you did what I believed to be impossible, finding a plausible answer for everything in the game. Thank you so much for putting this together! :)
One thing a lot of people miss, the bandaged version of Ariane, has the exact same bandage mark/locations as Alina. Also the symbol represented throughout the game is a Runcinated 24-cell Octahedron Tesseract, which extends much past the rule of 6 as it has 8 "sides" externally.
Definitely a result of synchronicity. I think that's also exactly why I think Isa Itou was prone to accidents too (and almost looked like Ariane with her injuries at the book store). Not because they were casually related, or that they were somehow reincarnations of each other. They both just experienced synchronicity.
It's definitely a bit more than synchronicity as the info from the game points out. It's just not clear on which connection to each the other has, or if Alina was never actually there and it was just Elster's memories of her Gestalt overriding her perception of reality and the photo was of Ariane the entire time. If it is just synchronicity then it's a bit of a connection to Elster's gestalt being Lilith, of which is naturally heavily referenced to.@@asophxs
This has been one of the most comprehensive and well written essays I have had the pleasure of reading. I want to thank you for the deep research you did and helping me understand Signalis.
This is one of the most beautiful, yet sad games I’ve played since I was a child when silent hill 2 came out.
Plus the artist soundrunes did the most beautiful work covering these songs from the ost.
Things like this happen once in a blue moon(or should I say red eye).
Honestly, I wish game devs like these would come around more often. If they did then we'd be living in the next golden age.
This was a phenomenal breakdown. Signalis was an unforgettable Survival horror game that left me with many questions.
This thorough breakdown helped clear things up, and provided worthwhile conclusions for what Signalis meant.
I got the Promise ending, and out of all endings it’s the one that feels like a proper end. No blanks, no missing pieces. You kept your promise and perished alongside the one you loved.
I feel incredibly fortunate to have only discovered Signalis after you released this video. It's the perfect epilogue to the experience of playing the game. People talk about love letters to other artists' creative expressions; your exploration of Signalis feels like the apotheosis of that concept. Thank you.
Wonderful deep dive into the lore of Signalis, I especially appreciated the exploration of all the different endings!
Personally, I lean towards the Promise ending, as that is the only one which truly fulfills what Ariane has been asking us to do from the very beginning. Even the conditions to get this ending kind of subverts the usual survival horror expectations (most would give you one of the "bad" endings), but in this case it makes a lot of sense lore-wise, as it gives the impression that Elster has gone through this so many times that by this point that she's just aggressively pushing through to fulfill her promise to her beloved.
Each of the endings correlate to a facet of Elster's character IMO:
- Lilith Elster for Leave, where she leaves Ariane behind to "go home" because in this cycle she is more Lilith than Elster by the end.
- Elster Elster for Memory, where she can't bear to fulfill her promise because she loves Ariane too much, and it parallels the original Elster unit never getting to do it either as she broke down first.
- Falke Elster for Artifact, where this is more of a meta ending reflecting Falke's/the Player's desire to see them dance together again, even if it's just in another constructed reality. But they are dancing in the ruins of the decrepit ship, stuck in another type of unending loop that they can't let go of.
- Ariane's Elster for Promise ending, where she breaks Ariane and all the others affected out of this cycle of decay and despair, since the bioresonance will only end when she dies. Ariane recognizes this Elster (and not the one in Memory), probably because in her constructed world, her Elster would fulfill their promise, even if it's devastating and bittersweet. (Or I should say, Ariane's desire for Elster to fulfill this promise is the reason why we are going through the events of the game in the first place). In the end, Ariane is free from her pain, and they lay in rest together.
Also something fun about Elster's code name of Magpie, is that in a famous Chinese folktale (The Cowherd and the Weaver Girl), magpies form a bridge to reunite the lovers for a single day once per year, as their romance was forbidden and they were banished to opposite sides of the heavens. It's a very nice fit for the character.
I am currently re-running the game again, and I found out that in the [52:15] moment the lift does not malfunction. In fact, the key card belongs to a STAR unit from the medical floor 3, and I assume she shouldn't have access to other floors in this particular lift (STAR quarters below have different means of accessing them, if she lives there). It is logical that her card is confiscated and she is summoned to the administrator to receive a warning about overstepping her boundaries. Even this small moment is carefully thought of. This game doesn't cease to amaze me!
Great find. Every time I come back to these videos and read the comments someone has found an additional overlooked, yet intentional, detail regarding the story. Just speaks to how phenomenal and thought out the game is.
Great video. One interesting detail that comes from the king in yellow is the significance of the lily’s role in signifying the “waking” of the sleeper in the short story where is plays a part. For anyone interested, this particular story is called “The Mask” and is a pretty short read.
So, in regards to part of the game being on Leng, I always thought that after 3000 cycles, the Pennrose turned back around to the solar system and crashed on Leng after 8 more years, which resulted in the Bioresonance Corruption outbreak in Sierpinski. Falke went out to investigate and came back with Elster's memories and by proxy, Ariane's. This then resulted in the Replika's corrupting and Gestalts dying and fading away.
1:06:36 you may have glossed over a very important detail i noticed just now while watching this. hell i glossed it over the first few times i saw it too. i thought vaguely when i saw it at first that it kinda looked like metatrons cube and maybe the symbolism would add up. used to know much more about spirituality and all back in the day and whatnot and the symbolism of it all felt vaguely fitting but couldnt quite remember what it was. upon further inspection. DEAR GOD I WAS RIGHT.
to quote a few sources here
"Metatron's Cube includes all 5 Platonic Solids hidden inside, symbolizing the underlying geometric patterns found throughout our universe."
remember how each key to this door has a sort of element not as in the typical air fire water etc? i think they could be the very aspects or elements that make uo bioresonance. each one of these doors is more akin to a ritual as well with its own symbolism pertaining to the superstitions in the game or even the magpie signal itself or bipresonance in this case.
to quote another source here
"It is considered a powerful symbol in sacred geometry, representing the underlying structure and order of the universe."
and another
"Many people use Metatron's Cube to meditate or manifest their desires." as an ex spiritualist i can confirm this is something i used to do. manifesting desires similar to how the magpie signal manifests the desires of elster and ariane.
"An ancient symbol, believed to hold the secrets of the universe, Metatron's cube is complex and multi-layered in its symbolism and beauty."
i dont think i need to keep explaining.
also another interesting thing noticed unrelated to metatrons cube here is that signalis is esperanto for signal further backing up that this game is about the magpie signal itself.
also an even more interesting thing i noticed was at 1:32:20 when we hear about the note that ariane wrote about her teeth falling out but i also notices something there that wasnt mentioned in the video being at 1:29:31 there is falllen out teeth i can only presume to be arianes due to the note she wrote earlier.
suffice to say. thats very much an amazing piece of hidden symbolism i figured out and i cannot tell u the satisfaction i have discovering that. wow. just wow what a perfect symbol for this game. the devs really put a lot of love into this game in every detail and it shows.
When Falke is pierced with the spears and the blood bursts through her head, it reminds me of Neon Genesis Evangelion, a scene during EVA 01's fight with Sachiel, where the second does the exact same thing to EVA 01.
Oh, also Asuka's death in the final battle.
This video was great! I couldn't stop watching.
With your idea that the endings relate to different versions of Elster I wonder if the Lily ending might be the one that corresponds to the wishes of Falke. It can only be accessed in a second playthrough, when Elster has already inherited Falke's memories (if you assume the loops continue after all but the Promise ending). And it was Falke who expressed the desire to dance with Ariane "again" above all else. She also has the ability to create bioresonant dreams herself so crafting her own perfect dream seems like a fitting end to her desires.
Ik you posted this 10 months ago, but I just wanna say this is an amazing video that is extremely well put and done, gluing me in for 2 hours. Also i knew this game has a lot of lore but I did not expect it to go THIS FAR.
A very well put together video. The part about the red eye overlaid on the screen is wild. This game has so much detail in it and so many possibilities for what is going on in the story. Again great video.
I felt guilty of not... analyzing the story myself... but I realize that, I would not have been able to find these correlations to these paintings, books, religions, I thank you truly, for your insight, and for helping us see all of these. 2 Hours of my life, well spent, as well as the 11 hours it took me to play the game.
The fact that you were able to condense a game *this* dense into a video only 2 hours in length, and have that video be completely coherent and understandable, is an astounding achievement.
Incredible work and a stellar analysis.
this was incredible, i'm not really the type to watch long videos since i have the span attention of a two year old, but this had me hooked. signalis is a masterpiece
On the first playthrough of the game some cutscenes might appear pretentious and even vapid, with some shots or symbols seemingly being there just because they look cool.
Yet once you start replaying the game and digging around further, it really shows how much thought was actually put in every scene. Absolutely beautiful game, and fantastic analysis on your part.
Fantastic video, however I was watching it with my girlfriend who is a native German speaker and she had a few things to say about two translations used in this video. Though they don't ultimately change the meaning of what's being presented, they do dull the poetic nature in both cases:
-In the scene where "Sie" and "Ich" converge to create "Wir", this video translates "Sie" to read "You". The usage of "Sie" in German for "You" is an incredibly formal way to refer to a person, which would be unlikely to be used in the context of a romantic relationship. As such, it's far more likely that "Sie" means "Her" in this context, which is another usage of the word.
-In the Memory ending, "Ich bin wieder ich" does not translate to "I am back" but rather "I am me again". We aren't sure how you came to the translation that made it into the video, maybe your method of translation was dodgy or maybe the second "ich" was missed. Again, it doesn't change the message, but severely reduces the emotional weight of the line.
That being said, these are two simple mistakes in a TWO HOUR LONG video that does a far better job of collecting and understanding the disparate hints of the story than I could ever hope to do myself.
Thank you for this correction! I actually find these accurate translations more satisfying than the ones I came up with; "I am me again," especially, as it emphasizes the fact that Elster's return to the Penrose was more a psychological effort than a physical one.
@indiexplorergames I woke up this morning with a bunch of texts from her about how she had brainrot about the story, she can probably thank you for that :)
I just finished Signalis yesterday, and saw this video in my feed despite never having searched for anything on TH-cam about it. My feelings are a wreck, and many times I had to stop to cry because of the sheer pain and confusion, the dissonance, present throughout the game. The tragic story is a gift to us, but also it makes me constantly think about it, and it did from beginning to end. Your explanation helps me sort through the noise a bit, but still. I'm reminded of Everywhere at the End of Time, where the sound also plays a strong role in the experience.
It slowly degenerates. Memories at first that were vibrant start to degenerate over time, you can hear small distortions that don't feel quite right and certainly weren't there before. Then discoloration, the confirmation that you have indeed been here before. Things aren't as they were before, however. As the cycle repeats, you go through a similar experience as Elster, cycling again and again, taking apart what was once beautiful. Ripping violently, taking it apart, feeling it become more confusing, more full of noise, and flesh, and nothing. Until at the end, there is nothing. Mostly empty, with some discordant notes played with several minutes apart, they can't even be placed within the wider set of memories you had at the beginning. It's disturbing, heartwrenching, painful to go through. But it's also beautiful, at the end there is a light at the end of the tunnel so to speak, and you get to make of it whatever you would like.
Thank you for spending the time to make this analysis, it's as beautifully crafted as this game is. I disagreed sometimes with your interpretations, but as you unveiled layer upon layer, I also found myself agreeing with you sometimes. We need a lot more of this in media today, thank you.
"Drastically brightening the footage reveals the red eye in the background."
Oh God. That was there the entire time? That's terrifying! I must have been playing the game for 12 hours and never noticed.
I watched the whole video. Then i tought my self that ive never seen any of the game has soo much symbolism, feeling to being a human, how we much care about our loved ones, i cried when i reached the end of the video. This game is not just a "videogame". Its Literally an art.😢
It’s a sad love story that really made me think hard about it. Thank you for taking the time to make this video, I really appreciate it.
"Destruction, or preservation."
You brought it all around. That is an amazing read on this content. I'm in awe at how anyone could come up with this stuff, this game, and then anyone else come along and make any sense of it. You made perfect sense of it.
I have no idea how you figured everything out, but my words can't thank you enough for helping me understand this beautiful game.
Thank you.
Stellar video through and through, from research to linking the game's aspects & references together, as well as the calm reading and explaining of it all.
Your work here deserves much praise.
Mate, I swear to god, please make more videos analysis because you made in this 2 hours long watch one of the best videos i have watched even though i ve seen lots of long youtube videos. I swear this is one of the few interpretions of whole game that i can take, its so cohesive and leaves me with only few questions. I beg you for more
Signalis is an amazing game and you did a phenomenal job explaining it, seriously well done.
This is a brilliant analysis. Thank you for taking the time. I needed this.
This is so beautifully done. Loving your analysis so far.
Woah this video is long :o I'll play SIGNALIS before I watch this, I promise to one day return!
I will wait for you
Remember your promise
It’s a wonderful game
Remember your promise.
@@mrflyman4543 I played it with my brother watching me on twitch, it was so fun.
This game analysis broke me. Left me confused and melancholy for several days, trying to find reason within this universe and my own.
But the answer I found was simply:
Be kind.
Be more kind than the systems, than the leaders, the administrators, and all that follow them.
In a world of beauty, they have lost their kindness. And everything turns ugly without it.
The world is what you are. Be kind indeed
Thank you for making this video about this gem that deserves more recognition! I have subscribed to your channel.
This video is amazing! Thank you so much for putting so much effort into it, it's now my favorite of all the Signalis analysis I have watched 🤗
this is a so complete breakdown, seeing all this ideas combine in this very game is so incredible
Love your work, please keep on doing what you do
This was an unbelievably amazing video. Such time and care and passion went into the research of such a complex and layered story. Well done. Jolly good show
thank you so much for making this breakdown video, ive been looking at stuff for weeks and your video is the only one who has came avross about the red eye illuminating the border of the screen. im so shellshocked, thank you so so much for this video!!
This is an extremely well done story breakdown that made the story a lot more understandable to me. Well done!
Quite possibly one of the most well-thought-out videos I've seen on this platform. Not to mention how respectful you are when it comes to discussing other cultures and how well you string together your thoughts, especially for as ambiguous as a game like Signalis. Stellar work!
This was a fantastic breakdown. Your mastery of the references was especially great. You've certainly earned my subscription and I hope to see more similar content.
this is a wonderfully thoughtful and well-put-together video - you have a real talent for clear explanation! thank you so much for this!
This video is actually amazing, you picked up on so many things I missed, I had a reasonably good estimate as to what the story was and what it had meant, but you opened my eyes to possibilities I hadn't considered or even knew existed.
Well done, this deserves more attention
Incredible analysis, I hope it gets traction eventually, it’s the best one I’ve seen so far
This is an incredible analysis of Signalis, probably the best one I've seen on youtube so far. I would absolutely love to see more of these. Thank you, you have given me a whole new appreciate and deepened my understanding of one of my favorite games. Thank you so much!
i finally got around to watching the rest of a playthrough from release myself today, and im kind of glad i waited so long because i was able to immedately find your fantastic video essay on it. this is some monumentally impressive work youve done!
Very insightful video! Thank you for making this. :)
What absolutely crazy effort went into this video. I had goosebumps at some parts of the explanation, absolutely stunning work in interpreting this game.
The research done is insane, very well put together + a soothing voice. Lots of details I never noticed on my multiple playthroughs.
Keep up the great work!
Bro, amazing video. For real. The editing, the research, the script. Nicely done
Incredibly thought out and well-researched. Besides your solid and fair interpretation of the story's events, I'm always interested to see where the symbolism, inspirations and references in games like these possibly came from.
Hope to see more from you.
Signalis has been living in my head rent-free since I finished it. Immediately after finishing it, I said I couldn't wait for all the analysis videos to pump out: yours is fantastic, and I appreciate you for taking the time to share!
Incredible video. So well done. Thank you so much for all the work you put into it.
I love this video. This is beautifully put together and was a true delight to follow along. From one small creator to another, I hope you go places!
This video deserves more views with how masterfully you've broken down the whole story of signalis. Everything just falls into place when you explained it all. Such a deep and multi-layered story and analysis.
Bravo sir 👏
Amazing video! I've been subscribed since your first Ender Lilies video, and I was super excited you put out this one since I just played Signalis myself! Really looking forward to seeing what else you put out!
Nice! Thanks for sticking around, sounds like we have similar taste 😊
This was a beautifully made video. Thank you for you time and effort to make this and explain in so much detail what aspects are hidden in plan sight or sound as it will. Props to the devs for putting together such a complex narrative with creative story telling.
Amazing work! I'm speechless, both about this game and your video. Thank you very much!
I’m definitely replaying this game and definitely rewatching this video. This needs a million views for the amount of effort put in it. I still have not clue what this really means and I’ll have to play the game multiple and multiple times to even catch the most minuscule of detail.
I appreciate the time and effort you put into researching and editing this video. After finishing the games memory ending i wanted to get a bigger picture of the story as a whole. What i found here blew me away. You did an amazing job creating a narrative thats comprehensive to follow, despite all the moving parts that is the story of signalis. Your narration was great through out the entire video. Thank you so much for this 2:06:07 work of art to commemorate the beauty of signalis
Thank you ❤
Thank you for the video! This genuinely was one of the best media interpretations and story break down videos I think I have ever seen. So thank you very much for putting so much effort, time and research into making this. :)
Beautiful breakdown video, I now feel like I can wrap my head around what I just played through. Thanks for you work!
This was such an amazing dissection of the different themes present in Signalis. If you haven’t done other horror games already you should. I feel like I could play the game over and over and not get even half of the different references that you described, super helpful. Cheers.
A tremendously insightful and comprehensive overview- I don't think it can be overstated how challenging it is to put such an intricate story, purposefully told exclusively in ambiguous tidbits, in such a clear perspective. You've had me riveted for the entire duration of the video. As a different, but equally beloved, game so eloquently put it: "Real art is dense and difficult. If it didn't feel like you had to wrestle a suicidal bear to get through it, you weren't really reading."
Thank you for providing me with a renewed appreciation for this beautiful, beautiful game.
What an absolutely amazing video. I am truly speechless, both at the incredible narrative of this game and your analysis of it. Thank you for that.
The work you must have done to piece it all togheter in such a tight way alongside researching each bit of symbolism must be absolutely insane. Thank you for this
amazing job, i've just beaten the game today and went digging for some related stuff as i usually do with games i liked and this is better than anything one could hope to find. Also i've already went through some Lovecraft and an entire rabbit whole of wikipedia articles in the process of watching which was worth it just by itself
What a cool video. This game has lived in my head rent free since I played it, and it's really cool that you've managed to craft such a cohesive understanding of this crazy ass game. Using your logic, I would actually say that the artifact ending is tailored to the player's motives, though not through the same means as the other endings. At the end of the day, Elster prioritizes their memories of their relationship over the wishes of her lover and the rest of reality itself. In the same way, I think that the artifact ending is purposefully meant to give players that dig through a game for a fuller experience something bittersweet. As admirable as their dedication to the game is, they became so interested in trinkets that they break their own immersion. As a result, the ending is disconnected to the rest of the game and while they see something happy, Elster and Ariane's dance has straight up lost its color and it's forever preserved in the ruins of what was.
Full disclosure, I got the promise ending, and given the narrative implication that a replay would be sending one more Elster to this eldritch cosmic slaughterhouse, I'm keeping it that way. I view games and entertainment in general as its own promise. If something earns my immersion, I'm not letting go until credits roll. My ending, while brutal, has me feeling so much. I've fulfilled my promise as a player and as Elster, hopefully sparing any survivors of all the story's chaos in the process. It's the truest ending to me, and I'd personally love to see if those who got their endings feel the same about them.
Man this video was a journey and really helped me understand this game so much more. Awesome stuff man
Bro this is the best game analysis I've seen on this website, fantastic job
Even though I only understood 50% of this video this is very insightful. I'm glad I found this comprehensive analysis and thank you for making it.
One interesting thing that you may have missed is the use of norse runes at several points in the game. In Norse and Germanic mythologies Woden sacrifices an eye for spiritual knowledge. In Signalis all of the characters lose an eye when they learn/accept that they are multidimensional and not just the individual character they are playing. Isa's character may be something to be looked into more, she loses her eye as well. Although I think there was something I missed with her character in specific. Maybe I'll see it on a second playthrough.
Of the many Signalis analysis videos I've seen, yours is the best. I learned a lot here that I hadn't considered.
This video was absolutely incredible. The level of care, thought and detail is phenomenal. Thanks so much for this.
Excellent video! I just finished playing Signalis today, and immediately set about trying to find what other people had made of the story; I had some ideas, but I had a feeling that I was missing some of the greater details that helped tie things together.
I'll admit, when I heard you describe your theory as a "dream theory," I was hesitant, since I had seen other people pitch the story as Ariane's dying dream and I found that thoroughly uncompelling. However, as I continued on, I realized the point you were driving at and it made more and more sense to me, especially in light of one fact; Signalis is very heavily inspired by Silent Hill, specifically the first one. As you point out, the Nowhere location is a direct homage to SH1, and the plot of that game is particularly relevant to the plot of Signalis.
If you'll recall, in SH1, what we ultimately learn through what is told to us and piecing together lore to fill in the gaps in the overt narrative, that game's plot is set into motion and driven by Alessa Gillespie, a girl with immense psychic powers. She is deliberately burned by her mother and trapped in a coma so the town's cult can exploit her psychic powers to resurrect their god, Samael. However, Alessa's plight has two unintended consequences.
The first is that, to escape the burned, comatose shell she is trapped in, Alessa splits her soul into two and sends one portion of it out of Silent Hill to live free. This soul fragment manifests itself into a baby girl, who is adopted by the protagonist Harry Mason and becomes his daughter, Cheryl. The second is that the remaining fragment of Alessa's soul, still trapped in her body, goes mad with the suffering she experiences and tries to lash out at the people who she blames for her pain. In doing so, Alessa's power finds and joins with the power of Silent Hill itself, a malevolent, supernatural intelligence inhabiting the land on which the town is built, a genius loci as it's known in occult circles.
Alessa's power and the awakened genius loci combine to split the reality of Silent Hill into three separate planes of existence: the town in reality, the "fog world" that most of the game takes place in, and the nightmarish Otherworld. In the latter two, Alessa traps those she blames for her condition, namely her mother Dahlia, Dr. Kaufman and his hospital staff, and nurse Lisa Garland (Harry and police officer Cybil Bennett are trapped as well, being in the wrong place at the wrong time). Their combined powers also create monsters to attack and torment Alessa's tormentors by drawing upon her own psyche and shaping them in the image of things Alessa knew and was interested in (like insects and dinosaurs) and things she was scared of (dogs, the children who tormented her in school). And once Alessa dies at the end of the canon ending of the game and is reborn as Heather, the worlds of Silent Hill that she created with the help of the genius loci persist, reaching out to lure others in and punish them as they punished Alessa's enemies.
This arrangement matches up well with your theory of how the story of Signalis works. Like Alessa, Ariane is possessed of psychic abilities but is trapped in a sick, suffering body, and uses her power to reach out to find a way to end her suffering. She synchronizes with another entity, in this case Falke, creating the world the player character must explore to find the suffering victim at the heart of it all. The result is a warped reality created by two suffering minds operating in synchronicity, catching innocent victims in the crossfire as Ariane struggles to accomplish her goal, and that reality is shaped by the perceptions and memories of the two "dreamers," including monsters shaped by the affliction Ariane suffers from, namely radiation sickness. And the hero, Elster, begins by seeking out the person she thinks she needs to save (Aline), but ends up realizing she actually needs to find another connected person at the heart of the warped reality (Ariane). In much the same way, Harry spends most of the game seeking his daughter, Cheryl, only to realize that to resolve this nightmare he must release the person he's actually looking for, Alessa, from her suffering.
Much like all the literary, artistic scientific and philosophical subjects directly referenced in the game (great job cataloguing and explaining all those, BTW), the Silent Hill references are quite deliberate, and I think the only conclusion that can be drawn is that Signalis' story must be understood with Silent Hill's story in mind. And that aligns very with what you've come up with here.
I truly believe this to be one of the best videogame analysis I have seen on this platform. Excellent work.
i agree, one of the best analysis ive seen in awhile
Such a clean and well explained breakdown from an incredible game. Thank you for this video
I appreciate you connecting so many dots for me. This is really impressive and I appreciate your dedication.