This is truly amazing, and I really loved how you went about this. A spectacular follow-up video for what was an already remarkable telling of the events in Psychonauts 2! Phenomenal video! Psychonauts 2 especially feels like a love letter to mental health, it's approach makes what some people would think the "villain" to be someone more sorrowful and a person that is troubled and needs help. My math teacher from 8th grade (who was the former SSR teacher) had said this phrase; "This is no such thing as bad people, just people who made bad choices." In a sense, that also doesn't make Gristle Malik a villain either, he made bad decisions yes, and things could've ended very poorly for everyone because of it. Yet, he's not someone to blame... Psychonauts 2 does an excellent presentation that nobody is bad, after all, we all have something that made us think/behave this way in our minds. Again, really incredible video!
@@chee.rah.monurB But if he was in the game and you were able to jump in his mind, you'd probably find a little ruler archetype put there by some sort of traumatic event in his life, then you'd be questioning whether or not he was a true villain. It's also important to note that a villains and antagonists are narrative devices, not psychological diagnoses.
I mean, bad people do exist, but they are either a product of their choices or born a way so that they cannot change easily. They have good, but it is quite hard to find at that point.
Gristol/Nick may have been an immature narcist but I will give him this; he managed to uncover the truth about Maligula and orchestrate a huge conspiracy to bring her back under the nose of an international psychic spy agency. The scary part is he almost got away with it.
@@reese3141 which is brillaint. Place yourself in a position of the seemingly least responsibilty in an organization that is really super important. He had easy access to all the communication in the Motherlobe. He could learn and keep tabs on everything and no one would be the wiser.
Something I love about Maligula's fight is that, if you find a moment to use clairvoyance on her, you realize she sees you as a lice with protest signs. Lucrecia is so far gone that she actually sees other people as insects. I think it is obvious to everyone who played Hairdresser Ford's mental world that the lice you "wash" away end up being a metaphor for all the people Maligula killed in Grulovia, and how Ford goes from saying "that was just an accident, right?" to realizing she killed peaceful protesters. I just found it so impactful to realize that was not a metaphor... that she ACTUALLY saw people as just lice, that she fell so deep into the heart of darkness to cope with the guilt of killing her sister that she just dehumanized everyone.
Can we appreciate the small lil' fact that, as far as I remember, the Doubt enemies NEVER show up in Gristol/Nick's mind? It's the only enemy type that doesn't show up. Regrets DO show up but as the video explains, his regrets come from a selfish place like thinking his father wasn't ruthless enough. Meanwhile, he never DOUBTS himself of his plan or actions due to his endless narcissism. This also goes to all enemy types in that mind. Enemies never show up patrolling or poping up to attack Raz until either him or Lily step off the designated ride, showing how sure of himself Nick is that he WANTS people to admire his line of thought; He is THAT full of himself. At first I found it odd that Panic Atatcks show up when Gristol/Nick is suppose to be so full of himself, but that specific enemy only appears in the level in one specific combat arena: The one shaped like angry grulovian protesters. Heck, the emotional baggage is also a great little detail in the level! You always find the bags all across the Ride's setpieces, but never the tags. All of the tags are usually hidden inside these black deep pockets of darkness Raz has to break into and sue Mental Conenction to reach, really far away from the Amusement Ride that Gristol/Nick created in his mind. So basically, he likes to show off his emotional turmoil, probably as a way to allow himself to feel a victim, but he is deliberately hindering the progress of ever resolving that emotional baggage. A lot of people like to show off the Milkman Conspiracy as THE greatest Psychonauts example of story and themes melding with gameplay and level design, but after playing Psychonauts 2 I'd put Fatherland Follies , and Bob's Bottles, right up with it in the high echelon of brilliant levelmaking in the franchise.
There's also that most enemy types don't appear until that second combat section (not just the panic attacks), a circular arena surrounded by angry cutouts with torches. His panic, his ego, the terrible ideas, the judgement. *Everything* stems from the trauma he experienced as a child before Maligula saved him. He *weaponized* a near death experience from his childhood to try and stop you.
"Naaah not much, it was all Ford's fault" I honestly had a feeling when I first met Otto that he would be my favorite of the Psychic Six.... and he did end up being my favorite.
I love how considering how seemingly well adjusted he is compared to the other founding members one would just assume he's the mole but then it's revealed that no he's just really that well adjusted that one slide in Ford Forgets where he just walks in munching on chips is the icing on the cake
On one hand, the idea of the being something sinister with Otto has plenty of evidence, especially considering when you go into the minds of the psychic 6, none of them have anything nice to say about him. Cassie thinks he's not really that smart, Helmut kind of ignores him, he's a source of anxiety in Compton's mind, and he represents the other Psychonauts ignoring Bob in his mind. However, I think painting him as a villain is a bit unfair. Most of these depictions are probably just due to him being a bit more cold and distant than the others, kind of like Sasha, who he gets along quite well with. Plus, it's not like he forced anyone to use the astralathe, nor did he lie about what it did, Ford likely would have mentioned it if he did. Even Bob and Cassie subconsciously keeping people from the machine is less an indictment of Otto and more just a fear of the machine after what it did to Lucy. Plus, if Otto did all this so he could sell mini-astralathes, why is he only floating the idea now, 20 years after the original was created. There's an argument to be made that Otto doesn't take nearly as much responsibility for his actions as he should but calling him evil or the true villain of psychonauts 2 is a bit much.
He's sort of like an autistic person or asperger like me. He's focused and dedicated to his work, focused on a specific kind of work, lack of social skills, likes to be alone and he isn't too emotionally bothered if at all by much of anything happening. I really like his character cause he's just chilling with what he likes and moves on. He's a little morally ambiguous with how he jokingly point out the contract of putting everyone's brains in a collected tank. Plus his passion for discovery. He's not evil, but more grey than any ethical laws would acknowledge.
My quite-possibly-off sense of things is that he’s not the villain of _this_ story, but they might have intended him to be at some point (possibly predating the idea for the twist reveal with Nick) and the closing note about his desire to get the Psychonauts into the astralathe business is meant to set him up as the villain of some potential future installment that will interrogate the direction he’s steered the organization in during the decades he spent as the only member of the Psychic 6 who had his act together - expanding on the line in Hollis’ graduation speech about “flaws in even our most venerated institutions”.
(ofc the _real_ deep-lore True Villain Of Psychonauts 2 is Herndon Forsythe, the early version of Hollis who had a few lines of dialogue in a gameplay demo for Rhombus Of Ruin that really aggressively telegraphed him as the mole)
@@magnusm4 Just in case for some people, not all autist are like that, but indeed in that light I can totally sense a reasoning like: "We all knew the dangers, and we all agreed with it, and Ford should have interfered sooner. I most certainly did do nothing wrong and the damage is within the risks each one decided upon." Actually, I think he is logically not even that wrong, casting emotion and care aside.
I kinda like to think Otto is basically a dysfunctional parallel of Sasha's mindscape; outwardly extremely controlled, but done in a way that's less healthy than Sasha's method, even if it's not evident right now, is in reality in danger of causing problems for him once he can't control the problem anymore. He basically detaches himself from the pain of the past via his machinery and inventions, but it's still there. And given his statement about the astrolathe, who's to say he didn't end up using it on himself to make himself more detached from that pain? It's not like it was unusable for the entirety of the time between the breaking up of the Psychic Six and the present day.
After everything that happened, after all the pain and trauma she caused her friends, intentionally or not, the first instinct the psychic six has upon seeing their old friend is to hug her and welcome her back with open arms, no questions asked.
One point I’d like to add is the first one to step up to her is Bob. Bob, who lost his Husband, to the best of his knowledge forever, due to Maligula. And what does he do when he sees her after all these years? He hugs her.
The best part is that you never get to go into Otto's mind, who KNOWS how whacked out it is in there. He's clearly a bit reckless and self-centered, but I don't think he's actively malicious, he's just never considered the consequences of his actions before he takes them. He stuck some random brain he found in his collection and never Once checked who it might be!
@@FishyTheKobold Actually that was Ford, he found Helmut's brain but forgot about it when he shattered his own mind (shown in one of the vaults). Otto found it later and put it in his collection.
I love how the ball rolling mechanics always directly relate to joy. Mia says that explicitly for the levitation power, and the other instances of it are Ford's memories of love sickness, tennis balls in the flea circus, and the golden egg in malicks mind that you ride down a mental construct of his royal blood line
Interesting detail about Fatherland Follies: you fight every enemy in the game ACCEPT Regrets. Judges? yes. Panic attacks? Plenty. Doubts? A few. But that man doesn’t have a single regret in his mind.
21:00 I had caviar (and I mean real, high end one, not the supermarket kind) and it was actually really good (though might be subjective). However what I find really interesting is the the fact how Gristol is assossiated with caviar and his *need* for Maligula. Caviar is a potent mixture of umami, acidic and salty flavours and if a child consumed it in the amounts shown in his memories, they'd easily become *dehydrated.* Either that or his liver would give out.
@@KevinHelpUs Glad I can help ^^ I got to try the good caviar when my profesor invited me to his exhibition at college. You can tell the difference like between any high quality product and a supermarket brand. Though still you need to like umami flavour and don't eat it in spoonfulls (like Gristol). It's like when australian people see others put lots of marmite on toast.
Otto may not be as fine as he appears in the game. There is one extra response to emotional trauma that people have, and thats by distracting yourself with busy work, and I think thats what Otto was supposed to represent - even if we didnt dive into his mind - through his lab. Related to that note, one of the gadgets he gives to Raz, the thought tuner, probably was created to try to help look for Helmut Fullbear, as he theoretically would have a lot of stray thoughts around where he is located All in all, I dont think Otto is the villan in this story, as his inventions were only supposed to explore the secrets of their minds, its just that one of his inventions has a side effect of opening a psychic's door to their own power way too far while the group was still seeing what the extent of their powers were
All of the psychonauts used the astrolathe to stare into the abyss. The only problem with that, is that the abyss stares back, and you have to be careful not to be the first to blink
Otto definitely isn't the villain in this story, but I do think there may have been earlier drafts when he might have been the main villain. He's too entangled in everything (introducing Lucretia Mux, having Helmut Fullbear's brain, building the Astrolabe itself, the oldest Psychic 6 member whose mind isn't in shambles, etc.) while at the same time being the only person whose brain you don't venture into. He has tons of little villain cues that might at first just be red herrings, but I do think some of it might be signs that he was meant to be a villain originally and was changed later in development.
@@ShadowSaberBaroxio If anything his biggest flaw is A lack of Empathy or a skewed sense of it. He's probably Extremally effective at Compartmentalization. If we were to enter his Mind, I Would visualize it Much like a Panopticon Or the Oldest House from Control
@BlueBD I wouldn't doubt he tried to Bury his feelings because he probably got hurt too much. But didn't have a Mela like shasha did. Closest he had was otto And since he was gone, he probably just secluded himself and focused on his work
Oh my GOD literally everyone I've seen talks abut how sus it is that Otto is just chill the WHOLE TIME but no one has ever pointed at him and gone "yea this guy is kinda... he's the most likely to be evil."
I figured the main antagonist would either be Forsythe or Otto but I figured that since the writing made those just a little too obvious it couldn't be it. Of course looking at yourself through Truman's eyes using clairvoyance made me question why he sees the kid who saved him as some sort of peasant. So good subtle foreshadowing on the writers.
@@DickThunderchamp When Truman told Raz he didn't understand why he needed bacon was confusing to me at first, the guy's got a even photo of Ford laying around and still didn't get why he'd need it, the guys knew what they were doing writing that exchange in. Despite that didn't see the twist coming, but if it didn't set off some flags.
@@tuser8 I saw it as Truman not understanding how Ford could be brought to the Motherlobe with only bacon, having not experienced Raz's first adventure like we have. Sure, he might have known about Ford liking bacon (in hindsight we know GRISTOL probably didn't), but it would still be very strange to hear a child essentially imply: "I will transport a human hundreds of miles using bacon".
It's a little thing but watching Bob walk up to Nona and without saying a word, he just hugs her... that brought me to tears the first time i played the game, you have to realize that, out of the rest of the psychic six, Bob lost the most in the battle against Maligul(next to Ford of course), so for him to embrace her, even after all the years grief, it's so touching
I can't stress enough how cool it was that the battle between Maligula and The Psychic Six happened 20 years ago specifically. It gives the scene of Ford calling down Raz after the reveal a second meaning. "Tim, you're telling me that you've been keeping this secret for 20 fucking years ever since the first game???"
I’m pretty sure everyone’s noticed this but when Raz uses his psychic powers his eyes (well his goggles) glow Considering he is Maligula’s great-nephew I’m at least 99% sure that was intentional
Im pretty sure it was intentional, my potato brain cannot process the aquato family tree will you tell me, raz father is the son of raz grandma and grandpa that died on the flood and then became an orphan?
@@matheusexpedito4577 Grandma and Grandpa died, Grandma's Sister is Lucrecia. Great Aunt is the term you use for when your parents just say Aunt. Like, Great Grandma when your mom would just say Grandma.
@@matheusexpedito4577 grandma (maroona) married raz's Grampa, she then got killed by her sister (Nona/maligula) leaving Augustus (raz dad) an orphan in an orphanage, following that ford took both maligula and Augustus to make them forget, he then made it so that Augustus would believe that Lucy/Nona was his mum
I still can not tell if Otto has problems or not. If they are just a reasonable well adjusted person or a person who hid behind a mask after the trauma and then became the mask. Has Otto dealed with the Trauma? Or has he burried it? Has he even been traumatised? Cause Otto handles death kinda like I do: By just going on and living on (reasonable) normally.
The word I would use for Otto is "detached". They don't seem to make emotional links like other members of the psychic six. Yes he considers the other members his friends, but you can tell from his personality and his lab that he doesn't really interact with people, preferring to work with his machines and experiments. It also is why they get along so well with Sasha as both have a more logical thought pattern than an emotional one. Its just how his mind works but I can easily see it getting him into trouble in a later adventure with how he talked about making more Astralathes without really looking at the chaos it created.
Fun fact about this: if one goes through all the voice lines in the game, there's actually unused lines for a cut game mechanic called Distilled Emotions, with the line from Otto explaining it being: "Ahh, my Distilled Emotions series. I find them much easier to deal with when they're... contained. That's 98.5% pure distilled anger! Daangerous stuff. That's the essence of love~! Probably even more dangerous than anger. Pure sadness in a bottle! People are always trying to get rid of that stuff, so it's easy to collect." And then there's a few lines from other characters where they react to a specific heightened emotion like the ones mentioned above. So it seems, if we take this cut content as part of canon, that Otto's maladaptive coping method is to LITERALLY remove his emotions when they were too much to deal with and store them for later. Or, you know. Never. (Though I gotta say, the idea that he's the only one who just went to therapy is hilarious to me for some reason)
Blaming everything on Otto... it's an interesting take, possible certainly, but it's also one I disagree with. In my opinion, the world of Psychonauts doesn't have one singular major villain, it has several minor ones. Otto is counted amongst them, but only in so far as being a person who, while not actively malicious in his actions, is... neglectful, passively letting tragedy happen to his friends without supporting them. Certainly he was an active combatant against Maligula and helped his friends against Maligula in battle, with his tech, but Otto, for all his technical expertise, isn't a Psychologist/Psychotherapist, he's great for exploring technologies and abilities related to Psychic phenomena, but not the actual structure of the Psyche. The Last Gzar of Grulovia is a villain, for obvious reasons (heck, even Gristol is right about one of them, namely betraying Maligula, though he's wrong on WHEN that betrayal really occurred, which was basically after Gristol gave her her position of power within the Grulovian Government, using her for war and submission of his opponents). And love struck Ford Cruller is a villain too, but the kind who does horrible things for the right reasons, though shattering his own mind, in protectiveness and penance really was a big mistake. But no, Psychonauts' World doesn't (yet) have a single true big villain.
I think that it makes an interesting story if we avoid good vs evil and focus on people facing the unintended consequences of their actions, or else people trying to ignore/avoid their problems in all the wrong ways. They're not bad people, they're just people capable of making colossal mistakes which I think makes them feel all the more human.
Incredibly well done video! Personally I believe that Grulovia and it's leaders are the villains here. Had Gristol's father never appointed Lucy to minister of war, maybe things would've went differently.
One of my favorite things about Psychonauts is the people with truly deep-seeded mental issues are NEVER the villain. In the original, they made it clear that Boyd is not rational and was essentially picked to be the guard BECAUSE he couldn't truly understand what was going on. And Dr Loboto, one of the most obvious cliche looking doctor-themed villains you could find, is ALSO being manipulated into the plot because he can't rationally understand the harm he's doing. And it's not a throw away thing. In Psychonauts 2 Loboto doesn't cooperate with people wanting to help and protect him because he STILL can't reason out that he's safe and that revealing his boss would help him. It just does not connect. He cannot process his world like that. Psychonauts 2 is very clear that Maligula is NOT because Lucy was weak or inherently evil. They say it over and over that every single person on earth has a "maligula" inside them buried so deep down a vast majority of people never even know it exists. The whole Maligula fight has Lucy literally reaching out to escape. Lucy WANTED to stop. But she couldn't. Her mind was in overdrive and would never stop until it was forced to stop.
Again about Loboto, in Rhombus of Ruin, it’s heavily implied that Loboto’s extremely anti-psychic father literally lobotomized him in order to remove his psychic abilities, lending to his current mental state.
I also like how it characterizes "madness." Most tv and movies just make it seem like the person is evil and wild the second they go "mad" but still able to tell what they're doing is wrong. However, true madness is a lot like Lucy and Maligula. The person is so lost, they literally can't find themselves and only the dark, lost version of themselves remains.
I'm sort of on the fence about Otto having ulterior motives. While it would definitely make for an interesting story, ultimately I think he's meant to show a thematic purpose that while a lot of people are scarred from their experiences, it doesn't always mean every person that makes it out is damaged in some way. Some people really do just have their priorities straight with what they value so even a situation like with Maligula wouldn't have a massive effect on Otto. To be fair though, if they showed he had just a bit more remorse for the situation and still feels a bit sad that his friends are split apart and hurt I would buy that he isn't uh, slightly nuts.
Like my dad. When I got anxiety it was terrible but I helped myself and became better than ever mentally, emotionally and personally. Mom said it was the worst thing she's ever had, and she's had a stroke that made per wheelchair bound and lost all her memories that all came back over time. Me dad just said "I've never had that cause I didn't see the point of it". He's the stereotypical non emotional father whose all business but do care, in his own way but family meetings, holidays and emotions. He finds it pointless and a waste of time. He can do it for a time but it's annoying and exhausting for him.
And the other members don’t say the best things about him, something he doesn’t really care about either, so another thing could be that Otto is just the most distant of the Psychic 7, so the tragic events didn’t affect him nearly as much as everyone else, and also unlike the rest of the group, Otto didn’t lose the one thing he loves most, his hobby, that also happens to be his job
Considering the hints of him wanting to form some kind of business, it would be interesting to explore an anti-corporate angle for the third game. Perhaps explore the cost of being detached and removed with Raz's role being a symbol of empathy.
Thank you for pointing out that water detail after the fight with Maligula. It was so cute to play after that part and fall in water and not have it drag Raz under, but hold him up in like a trapeze stance. I haven't seen enough people talk about it
While it is pretty funny to pin the whole thing on Otto, Yea it really is a combination of Grulovia's leaders and the Psychic Six as a whole. Obviously the Royal Family are pretty much just assholes and really put a lot of the events in motion, but they were worsened by the Psychic Six's experiments taking things too far without considering their own well being. Presumably Lucy does actually take *some* blame as she was a fairly early member of the group and thus almost certainly was involved in a lot of those experiments. But at the end of the day she's obviously far more of a victim than a villain. And I do love that the game does a pretty good job of portraying Lucy as a victim imo. As her full story was unravelling in the ending, I never really thought of her as the villain.
I didn't need much motivation to love psychonauts 2 more but you've gone and taken it to new depths. Thanks for such a solid and rounded video essay on my favourite game this year.
Well now that doublefine is officially owned by microsoft, and the psychonauts 2 has done exceptionally well. I'm sure microsoft will definitely view a 3rd game as something they'll want to see happen.
@@bakacdaz Sushi definitely helps a little bit with the taste, but if you ever have it just straight out of the tin or even on crackers it's like eating unprepared raw fish, scales and all in my opinion.
Otto is more of the cause of the game's events rather than the villain. Gristol, as the mole, is the villain of the game. Maligula is more akin to Coach Oleander in this game's story.
Also, something funny (Or maybe dark) about the game's start menu is that when you go to "New Game", you enter a brain and the game starts... that brain is probably Raz's brain, remember when Otto said that Raz's brain will be in the hall of brains someday too
If that's the case then, imagine how cool it will be if Nonna taught us Hydrokinesis if there was a third game, that ability would be pretty useful, if you actually think about it
Interesting detail about Fatherland Follies: you fight every enemy in the game EXCEPT Regrets. Judges? yes. Panic attacks? Plenty. Doubts? A few. But that man doesn’t have a single regret in his mind.
Man, I love Raz so much, he's not like a perfect brave hero, it's clear that he's afraid and unsure most of the time, but he knows that if he thinks too much the fear will get to him so he dives in before that and hopes to do his best. He is the best boy. Also yeah, I wonder if there ever is gonna be a Psychonatus 3 (Or a DLC expansion with say, more 4 hours of content) if it's gonna be about Otto, he do be sus, but not exactly hatable either.
Amazing video! Your readings of the Psychonauts games have given me a deeper appreciation for the great work that went into them. The section where you detail the direct contrasts of Raz and Nick I didn't even think of when I first played the game. I also just realized why Nick as Truman said "I know" when Raz told him "That's not Nick from the mailroom" because he already knew about the identity swap twist. I thought he somehow knew that was Helmut but in retrospect that makes no sense.
Thanks so much! And yep, I admit I didn’t pick up on why Truman wasn’t more surprised by Nick not being Nick at first. They pulled off their red herring very well.
In hindsight, we should have been suspicious about Nick from the beginning, since his fake name contains two first names, "Nick" and "John". As Ray Narvaez Jr always says, never just a person with two first names
It’s obvious Lucy in some way pushed forward the events of the psychonauts game. Though her mind was altered to more or less forget and bury, enough was able to seep out and change things. This would also affect the real world as the curse Rasputin’s family experience. The water curse could have been caused by 3 factors. The first is the repression of Lucy’s power and Ford’s tampering so they avoided water. The second is Lucy and her family’s adamant avoidance of water, with a bunch of psychics this would unconsciously make the curse real amplified by Lucy. Third Maligula subconsciously reaching out from Lucy’s mind making the curse that much more real
Psychonauts has always had a habit of revealing some detail that makes it's villains not be villains. We saw it with Coach, Loboto, Maligula and Gristol. However, now that the magnifying glass of determining villains is on Otto, to some extent Gristol's dad, and even Loboto's parents and Oleander's father, I can't wait for the detail that makes their life decisions somehow understandable. This loop is kind of genious if you look at it from the point of view of creating more media.
Oh please. Gristol was born a villain, raised a villain, and when his father wasn't villainous enough, he became a bigger villain. We don't need to woobify this despot egg motherfucker, we really don't.
Phenominal video! I love your explanation of things and I loved playing this game and the story! I was sus of Otto in the very beginning but after it was proved to be "Nick", I felt he was off the hook, but that still didnt explain why he was "happy" in those magazine covers while everyone else was sad, I KNEW something was up with him, maybe more in a dlc or sequel?
About the "retcon" from the end of Rhombus of Ruin to the beginning of Psychonauts 2: I assumed that Loboto snuck aboard the ship, as shown in the ending, but was subsequently captured while aboard.
15:13 - I'm speechless. Just... thank you for pointing this out. 25:31 - Holy shit what a brilliant realization!! I hope Psychonauts 3 (if it ever comes out) leans into this and lets you go on missions with the other members of the 7! (Though I kinda wish Lili was part of that 7... Psychic 8 no longer has that ring). Thank you for bringing this up! I LOVE THIS CONCLUSION! This will be headcanon until further notice. Great video! Subscribed!
Fun fact, about the timeline: Psy series is sent in the early 80's, and the events of Deluge of Grulovia in the early 60's. As there's a magazine cover in "Ford's Follicles" which has a date - October 1962.
I assumed the 60s for the events leading up to the Deluge, but I hadn’t considered the present timeline being in the 80s. Looking at the tech present (including Otto’s inventions), it makes sense though!
If they do a third game I'd like to see Oleander's father. It would be interesting to see what he was actually like, like maybe he comes by HQ to try to make up with a son that he hasn't seen for decades, never realising what he did. My head-canon is that he bought the rabbits specifically to sell as meat and never realised how attached Morceau had gotten to them, and never noticed that his son saw him kill them.
Honestly I kind of wonder if Otto really is okay. It doesn't seem like he wanders too far from his lab anymore and it makes me wonder if that's his way of coping: staying in his lab which is kind of a safe place for him where he has complete control. Where he feels like he can keep control and he won't lose anything again
Counterpoint: the building of the Astralathe and adding Lucy to the team happened long before the events of the game or what happened in Grulovia. The team falling out afterwards could be argued to be on his shoulders, but not what happened to Lucy.
It's explained in game she's not the villain. She's always explained as the Fight response. The need to protect one's self at any means necessary. All beings not only have this, but the right to have this. It's required. It's needed. It's not evil, but like the ID portion of the mind it's not a warm and fuzzy thing. But the deepest parts of nature have teeth and aggression. She's less an enemy and more a mental trauma like El Odio or Raz's mental image of his father. Edit: Something interesting to notice with the symbolism is that all water in the game is dangerous, but most of the water in Fatherland's Folly is not a threat. He's too shallow to bring Raz harm.
I'd like to point out, in Fatherland Folly, the water is actually drained before Raz leaves the ride. He can still drown in the places where water remains; but I also really like this idea that Gristol is too shallow, that's much funnier.
@@HonestMagpie It gets drained? I've only watched playthroughs, but I've never seen anything to indicate the water gets drained or that there's any place where Raz can actually drown.
It's not fully a good point of evidence But it's a nice detail that maligula is the opposite color palette of Lucy Blues and purples instead of oranges and yellows As well the blues and purples could be a reference to how drowned victims turn a slight blue from lack of oxygen Or maybe this is all a style choice
I loved how the inside gristols mind the record players playing the grulovia song are all hidden away backstage, showing that it was propaganda and the people running around while the town is being flooded aren’t singing at all and are just running for their lives or are being swept up by the waves.
I dont think Gristol Malik is completely unredeemable and incomprehensible, imagine beign fed all your life stories if what you were supposed to be and then have it stripped away.
Gristol Malik has been living for well over 40 years plotting this shit. If forty years of getting adjusted to not being Czar is not enough, neither is therapy. Not all characters need to be redeemed.
The twist about the mole's true identity is absolutly great. At 1st I thought that Otto was gonna be the mole, because his mind is the only 1 you don't get to enter. I also thought that Nick was Otto's acomplice whose brain was removed by Otto, because Nick was planning to back out of the plan. I'm gladd that I was dead wrong. Not only is the twist super insane, but it makes complete sence both with the naritive and with glues that have been presented to the player. It's also a good thing that this twist at the end of the game as it gives the player more reasons to replay the entire game all over game as well as the previous games. The only thing I don't really like is that after the twist is revealed, you are forced endure a big exposition dump that you can't skip. Off you could, Fatherland's Folly would be a really short level.
This is my favorite video of 2021. Has anyone told you that your voice sounds like a young Rod Serling? (Of the Twilight Zone fame) Psychonauts 2 was easily my favorite Game of 2021. Bob & Ford's characterization. Raz's relationship between him & his family & THEN his Nona. Bob & Helmut's 'Matter-of-fact' relationship. Raz's VA being the best in the Industry now, IMHO. (Raz, Sheogorath the Mad God, the Stilted Cast of Silent Hill 2, Mario, Legacy of Kain) It's a game about Generational Trauma, Empathy & doing what good you can when you can. A video so good, i didn't realize how good it was until I thought about it at the end of the year. So elequant & poinent I got chills like listening to Neil d. Tyson or RagnarRox. 11/10 Editing & Script!
I was really on the fence about this video. Watched it all the way through, and having played it, I had one person in mind as the main culprit, being that of Ford Cruller, for selfishly hiding the identity of his S.O., but that ending is something I never did piece together in my head. At no point did I connect the parts together and realize THAT was the main villain.
25:30 It's actually not the first time the water helps you back to shore. In Psychonauts 1, the first time the hand grabs you at the lake, there's a cutscene of it *throwing* you out of the water. The implication is that every time you get grabbed, the hand merely tosses you out. This tracks, because it is a manifestation of the Aquatos' intense hydrophobia.
Also something to mention: Gristol Malik and his family WERE exiled from their homeland, but they lived in a fancy suite in a casino eating Caviar. They weren't hurting for money, and clearly lived a wealthy life, but Gristol wanted that seat of power despite his lavish upbringing.
Otto is the only one in the Psychic Six always be happy after the fight, as seen in photos and memory vaults. Raz even commented once. Either he went to therapy, or he is too busy with his own stuff and let it go, or maybe he just hide his emotion as Lucy did.
"Maligula" may also be a reference to "Malignant". Like a tumor. Also, interesting how 'Nick' is obsessed with eggs, and one of the weirdest memories in P1 was "The World Shall Taste My Eggs". And also how he never truly grew up and has the motivations of a fragile child sheltered from the world.
Otto probably just went to therapy. Or maybe he is one of those people who can move on faster? Like I know a few people that get devastated when a tragedy in their life happens but move on faster than others, that doesn’t mean they don’t feel bad about those things, it just means that they find their own peace of mind faster than others.
The villain of Psychonauts 2 is not Gristol Malik, but his father Theodore. If he hadn't pushed Lucy to protect his reign, the events that created Maligula wouldn't have happened. If he'd been a better father, Gristol wouldn't have grown into the monster he became. He quite literally created both the antagonistic forces in the game, even if he never shows up. That said, I never realized just how involved Otto was in all this. And we never got to explore his mind, did we?
10:50 but with an extra "n". i'm Italian myself. the Italian word for Grandmother is "Nonna". i believe "Nona" is how the Aquato family say "Grandma" in English.
i heavily doubt that otto is the antagonist, i think he was just the one who took it best with inviting lucrecia, it wasnt like he had the foresight that she would become maligula with the astralathe, i assume he wouldve perfected it and made it not as extreme and with the whole guilt thing, it would be certainly easier for him to dismiss the idea that he was at fault, and also although its a joke, i do think he had some form of therapy that the others didnt have the courage to go for he does seem like the most outgoing of the group, after all
23:00 it looks like the hands help raz through the water wall. They rip it open or pull him through or smt. It happens while maligula blinks. Maybe it's the same situation with bob and the vine.
Actually, we’ve never gotten to play in Raz’s mind, have we? The Brain Tumbler in the first game was supposed to do that, and it did at first, but it sent him to the Collective Unconscious instead.
Maligula murdered countless civilian protestors, including her own sister... and she has absolutely zero remorse for it. Then, she was prepared to murder her closest friends... all because they had the temerity to try to stop her from doing anything worse! She's _absolutely_ a villain. She's a mustache twirl away from a textbook cliché! You can certainly argue that she isn't _the_ villain of Psychonauts 2. Even if she is the focal point of everyone's actions, her involvement comes about through other people's machinations. She isn't driving any of the plot until she's finally unleashed in the climax, and even then, she's simply being herself, rather than acting out some grand scheme... but "herself" immediately attacks her friends, again, as well as her great nephew... and she doesn't have the excuse of not knowing he's there, this time. To suggest that she isn't _a_ villain is to fundamentally misunderstand what a villain is. She committed horrific acts for no greater good than people were in the way, shows no remorse... and she seems more than willing to the same or worse, going forward. You don't get much more villainous than that! Now, obviously, that stain doesn't transfer to Lucy, even if she was the one who committed the precipitating atrocity. Her horror at what she'd done is what created Maligula, and she does fight back, ultimately reclaiming her mind from Maligula's influence. But the Maligula personality, or whatever you want to call it? She is _absolutely_ villainous. "My hands are already stained, so who cares about a few dozen more?" isn't a valid justification. There's no mitigating circumstances; no greater evil that was averted... Lucy's powers went too far and innocent people paid the price. When she hid from the horror of what she'd done, Maligula took over and was all too happy to _keep_ doing it. The atrocity was no longer an accident... it was the intent! That's textbook villainy.
I actually remember thinking Otto was going to be the big bad of the game. Then the whole Gristol Malik thing happened, and the more than obvious Maligula final fight was foreshadowed for most of the game. The idea kinda got flushed that down the tube the more of the game I played. Not to say his inventions weren't the root cause of what happened, but it wasn't something Otto WANTED to happen.
The conclusion of the video is 110% what I was thinking at the end! I was like, "Huh...we never did go into Otto's mind, get to know him better or resolve any of his issues. Maybe it was a cut level?" But then he seemed so disconnected emotionally from everything going on, was so focused on profit, the others obviously didn't think well of him in general...mmmyeah. I'm anticipating a rugpull moment about him in a future game.
I think Otto is potentially something that i never thought I'd see in psychonauts: a good example. Assuming he's doing so well because he went to therapy and sorted out all that trauma with Lucy and Isn't just distracting himself with inventing to avoid it, (which isn't healthy at all if you needed to be told that) then he's the only one of the psychic six to cope with the deluge of grulovia in a healthy way
Otto is SUPER suspicious, but tbh I have an idea what might've happened with him. He and Ford were the original 2 Psychonauts. He's the only brain of the Psychic 7 we never enter. He was once Ford's closest friend... ...maybe they made the same choice in the wake of what happened, but in different ways. Remember how when we first enter Otto's lab, he shows Raz a bunch of inventions that focus around one emotion each? I think Otto Mentalis used the Astrolathe to remove or suppress his negative emotions. Including his ability to feel regret. But this also caused him to no longer be able to see other people as people. Remember: when you use Clairvoyance on him, all he sees is another brain in a jar.
Dude you also so the suspicions in Otto too. I found it so messed after finishing the game the one person we didn't enter the Brain was Otto. I still think something is up with Otto because compared to the other he seemed fine, which is so suspicious.
Amazing video! And it’s funny, my original guess for who the mole was ended up being Otto. It’s pretty cool to see that I’m not the only one who thought he seemed a bit suspicious Oh yeah and when I realized the eggbeater thing halfway through fatherland follies I got really really excited
In a way, a lot makes sense in the original after the Tomb of the Sharkophogas. The water curse, which drags you underwater, could be saving Raz from going to far from helping figure out both the truth of his father and Coach Oleander. It also shows how Augustus was able to have psychic powers. In this way, it allows Raz to fight his own inner demons of being told psychics are bad.
I say that the tyrant Gzar of Gulovia also has something to do with it, through his influences in created the climate in Gulovia where Lucy had experienced all that pain in, and as we see with Nick, even his son hates him so imagine what would have happened if he was better and more good willed influence?
![Lp. Сердце Вселенной #60 РОЖДЕНИЕ ЛОЛОЛОШКИ [Финал] • Майнкрафт](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/YoR0pAV9FVQ/mqdefault.jpg)
This is truly amazing, and I really loved how you went about this. A spectacular follow-up video for what was an already remarkable telling of the events in Psychonauts 2!
Phenomenal video! Psychonauts 2 especially feels like a love letter to mental health, it's approach makes what some people would think the "villain" to be someone more sorrowful and a person that is troubled and needs help.
My math teacher from 8th grade (who was the former SSR teacher) had said this phrase; "This is no such thing as bad people, just people who made bad choices."
In a sense, that also doesn't make Gristle Malik a villain either, he made bad decisions yes, and things could've ended very poorly for everyone because of it. Yet, he's not someone to blame...
Psychonauts 2 does an excellent presentation that nobody is bad, after all, we all have something that made us think/behave this way in our minds.
Again, really incredible video!
Thanks so much for sharing that - and I’m so glad you enjoyed it!
Huh never thought of it that way.
The Gzar is a good candidate for villian,he is literally a dictator.
@@chee.rah.monurB But if he was in the game and you were able to jump in his mind, you'd probably find a little ruler archetype put there by some sort of traumatic event in his life, then you'd be questioning whether or not he was a true villain. It's also important to note that a villains and antagonists are narrative devices, not psychological diagnoses.
I mean, bad people do exist, but they are either a product of their choices or born a way so that they cannot change easily. They have good, but it is quite hard to find at that point.
The fact that Gristol/Nick was able to hide all that from an entire organization of psychics is actually pretty impressive.
It is! His plan technically worked perfectly. If not for Nick’s body being mailed in, I doubt anyone could have stopped him.
Gristol/Nick may have been an immature narcist but I will give him this; he managed to uncover the truth about Maligula and orchestrate a huge conspiracy to bring her back under the nose of an international psychic spy agency. The scary part is he almost got away with it.
its probably because nobody ever suspected nick from the mailroom
@@reese3141 which is brillaint. Place yourself in a position of the seemingly least responsibilty in an organization that is really super important. He had easy access to all the communication in the Motherlobe. He could learn and keep tabs on everything and no one would be the wiser.
His plan was pretty smart, being in another person's body was simply genius
I think this quote fits maligula well "just because a character is a antagonist doesn't mean they are a villain"
Well said!
Well just ignore the mass murder she committed then. That's the only way that can fit.
@@dave_the_slick8584 did you watch the video it literally explains how she isn't the villain
"You are bad guy, but this does not mean you're a 'bad guy'."
She literally murdered innoncent protestors including Raz's grandparents.
God, that "Is that really.. is that really how I look in your mind?.." hits hard
Such a great moment.
Something I love about Maligula's fight is that, if you find a moment to use clairvoyance on her, you realize she sees you as a lice with protest signs. Lucrecia is so far gone that she actually sees other people as insects.
I think it is obvious to everyone who played Hairdresser Ford's mental world that the lice you "wash" away end up being a metaphor for all the people Maligula killed in Grulovia, and how Ford goes from saying "that was just an accident, right?" to realizing she killed peaceful protesters. I just found it so impactful to realize that was not a metaphor... that she ACTUALLY saw people as just lice, that she fell so deep into the heart of darkness to cope with the guilt of killing her sister that she just dehumanized everyone.
Wow, I’d never tried clairvoyance on Maligula. Gives a whole new weight to the Ford’s Follicles scene. Thanks for sharing!
Can we appreciate the small lil' fact that, as far as I remember, the Doubt enemies NEVER show up in Gristol/Nick's mind? It's the only enemy type that doesn't show up. Regrets DO show up but as the video explains, his regrets come from a selfish place like thinking his father wasn't ruthless enough. Meanwhile, he never DOUBTS himself of his plan or actions due to his endless narcissism.
This also goes to all enemy types in that mind. Enemies never show up patrolling or poping up to attack Raz until either him or Lily step off the designated ride, showing how sure of himself Nick is that he WANTS people to admire his line of thought; He is THAT full of himself. At first I found it odd that Panic Atatcks show up when Gristol/Nick is suppose to be so full of himself, but that specific enemy only appears in the level in one specific combat arena: The one shaped like angry grulovian protesters.
Heck, the emotional baggage is also a great little detail in the level! You always find the bags all across the Ride's setpieces, but never the tags. All of the tags are usually hidden inside these black deep pockets of darkness Raz has to break into and sue Mental Conenction to reach, really far away from the Amusement Ride that Gristol/Nick created in his mind. So basically, he likes to show off his emotional turmoil, probably as a way to allow himself to feel a victim, but he is deliberately hindering the progress of ever resolving that emotional baggage.
A lot of people like to show off the Milkman Conspiracy as THE greatest Psychonauts example of story and themes melding with gameplay and level design, but after playing Psychonauts 2 I'd put Fatherland Follies , and Bob's Bottles, right up with it in the high echelon of brilliant levelmaking in the franchise.
Oooh, good catch!
actually, doubts do appear in his mind, BUT Regrets do not. so your point still stands.
Awesome analysis!
There's also that most enemy types don't appear until that second combat section (not just the panic attacks), a circular arena surrounded by angry cutouts with torches. His panic, his ego, the terrible ideas, the judgement. *Everything* stems from the trauma he experienced as a child before Maligula saved him. He *weaponized* a near death experience from his childhood to try and stop you.
So, you copied the TV tropes one. Still good though!
"Naaah not much, it was all Ford's fault"
I honestly had a feeling when I first met Otto that he would be my favorite of the Psychic Six.... and he did end up being my favorite.
He’s pretty great. I’m holding out hope we’ll get his mind as DLC.
@@KevinHelpUs Would love that, curious as to what it would look like. Would imagine it's incredibly mechanically driven
@@KevinHelpUs Yeah, I mean the one responsible is a bit of a plot hole
I love how considering how seemingly well adjusted he is compared to the other founding members one would just assume he's the mole but then it's revealed that no he's just really that well adjusted
that one slide in Ford Forgets where he just walks in munching on chips is the icing on the cake
I'm thinking he has sociopathic tendencies
On one hand, the idea of the being something sinister with Otto has plenty of evidence, especially considering when you go into the minds of the psychic 6, none of them have anything nice to say about him. Cassie thinks he's not really that smart, Helmut kind of ignores him, he's a source of anxiety in Compton's mind, and he represents the other Psychonauts ignoring Bob in his mind.
However, I think painting him as a villain is a bit unfair. Most of these depictions are probably just due to him being a bit more cold and distant than the others, kind of like Sasha, who he gets along quite well with. Plus, it's not like he forced anyone to use the astralathe, nor did he lie about what it did, Ford likely would have mentioned it if he did. Even Bob and Cassie subconsciously keeping people from the machine is less an indictment of Otto and more just a fear of the machine after what it did to Lucy. Plus, if Otto did all this so he could sell mini-astralathes, why is he only floating the idea now, 20 years after the original was created.
There's an argument to be made that Otto doesn't take nearly as much responsibility for his actions as he should but calling him evil or the true villain of psychonauts 2 is a bit much.
I agree with you that Otto isn't a villian, but he is a good red hering.
He's sort of like an autistic person or asperger like me.
He's focused and dedicated to his work,
focused on a specific kind of work,
lack of social skills,
likes to be alone
and he isn't too emotionally bothered if at all by much of anything happening.
I really like his character cause he's just chilling with what he likes and moves on. He's a little morally ambiguous with how he jokingly point out the contract of putting everyone's brains in a collected tank. Plus his passion for discovery.
He's not evil, but more grey than any ethical laws would acknowledge.
My quite-possibly-off sense of things is that he’s not the villain of _this_ story, but they might have intended him to be at some point (possibly predating the idea for the twist reveal with Nick) and the closing note about his desire to get the Psychonauts into the astralathe business is meant to set him up as the villain of some potential future installment that will interrogate the direction he’s steered the organization in during the decades he spent as the only member of the Psychic 6 who had his act together - expanding on the line in Hollis’ graduation speech about “flaws in even our most venerated institutions”.
(ofc the _real_ deep-lore True Villain Of Psychonauts 2 is Herndon Forsythe, the early version of Hollis who had a few lines of dialogue in a gameplay demo for Rhombus Of Ruin that really aggressively telegraphed him as the mole)
@@magnusm4 Just in case for some people, not all autist are like that, but indeed in that light I can totally sense a reasoning like: "We all knew the dangers, and we all agreed with it, and Ford should have interfered sooner. I most certainly did do nothing wrong and the damage is within the risks each one decided upon." Actually, I think he is logically not even that wrong, casting emotion and care aside.
I kinda like to think Otto is basically a dysfunctional parallel of Sasha's mindscape; outwardly extremely controlled, but done in a way that's less healthy than Sasha's method, even if it's not evident right now, is in reality in danger of causing problems for him once he can't control the problem anymore.
He basically detaches himself from the pain of the past via his machinery and inventions, but it's still there.
And given his statement about the astrolathe, who's to say he didn't end up using it on himself to make himself more detached from that pain? It's not like it was unusable for the entirety of the time between the breaking up of the Psychic Six and the present day.
He does say the inventions he made are from his emotions
After everything that happened, after all the pain and trauma she caused her friends, intentionally or not, the first instinct the psychic six has upon seeing their old friend is to hug her and welcome her back with open arms, no questions asked.
Yeah, that was a really great moment.
One point I’d like to add is the first one to step up to her is Bob. Bob, who lost his Husband, to the best of his knowledge forever, due to Maligula. And what does he do when he sees her after all these years?
He hugs her.
The best part is that you never get to go into Otto's mind, who KNOWS how whacked out it is in there. He's clearly a bit reckless and self-centered, but I don't think he's actively malicious, he's just never considered the consequences of his actions before he takes them. He stuck some random brain he found in his collection and never Once checked who it might be!
otto is do first think later kind of guy tbh
He did actually know that was Helmut's brain, he just forgot about it, leaving it unnamed and unused
@@FishyTheKobold Actually that was Ford, he found Helmut's brain but forgot about it when he shattered his own mind (shown in one of the vaults). Otto found it later and put it in his collection.
@@theonlyosh4088 you're right, I was misremebering, so thanks for correcting me!
@@FishyTheKobold No problem man!
I love how the ball rolling mechanics always directly relate to joy. Mia says that explicitly for the levitation power, and the other instances of it are Ford's memories of love sickness, tennis balls in the flea circus, and the golden egg in malicks mind that you ride down a mental construct of his royal blood line
Psychics love balls.
Interesting detail about Fatherland Follies: you fight every enemy in the game ACCEPT Regrets. Judges? yes. Panic attacks? Plenty. Doubts? A few. But that man doesn’t have a single regret in his mind.
21:00 I had caviar (and I mean real, high end one, not the supermarket kind) and it was actually really good (though might be subjective). However what I find really interesting is the the fact how Gristol is assossiated with caviar and his *need* for Maligula. Caviar is a potent mixture of umami, acidic and salty flavours and if a child consumed it in the amounts shown in his memories, they'd easily become *dehydrated.*
Either that or his liver would give out.
This is great information, thanks! Maybe I’ve never tried good caviar - but I’m glad you enjoyed it!
@@KevinHelpUs Glad I can help ^^
I got to try the good caviar when my profesor invited me to his exhibition at college. You can tell the difference like between any high quality product and a supermarket brand. Though still you need to like umami flavour and don't eat it in spoonfulls (like Gristol). It's like when australian people see others put lots of marmite on toast.
Monster Liver
Otto may not be as fine as he appears in the game. There is one extra response to emotional trauma that people have, and thats by distracting yourself with busy work, and I think thats what Otto was supposed to represent - even if we didnt dive into his mind - through his lab.
Related to that note, one of the gadgets he gives to Raz, the thought tuner, probably was created to try to help look for Helmut Fullbear, as he theoretically would have a lot of stray thoughts around where he is located
All in all, I dont think Otto is the villan in this story, as his inventions were only supposed to explore the secrets of their minds, its just that one of his inventions has a side effect of opening a psychic's door to their own power way too far while the group was still seeing what the extent of their powers were
A lot of the inventions they showed of his also dealt with emotions like when he was showing Raz around his lap when you first meet him.
All of the psychonauts used the astrolathe to stare into the abyss.
The only problem with that, is that the abyss stares back, and you have to be careful not to be the first to blink
Otto definitely isn't the villain in this story, but I do think there may have been earlier drafts when he might have been the main villain. He's too entangled in everything (introducing Lucretia Mux, having Helmut Fullbear's brain, building the Astrolabe itself, the oldest Psychic 6 member whose mind isn't in shambles, etc.) while at the same time being the only person whose brain you don't venture into. He has tons of little villain cues that might at first just be red herrings, but I do think some of it might be signs that he was meant to be a villain originally and was changed later in development.
@@ShadowSaberBaroxio If anything his biggest flaw is A lack of Empathy or a skewed sense of it. He's probably Extremally effective at Compartmentalization. If we were to enter his Mind, I Would visualize it Much like a Panopticon Or the Oldest House from Control
@BlueBD I wouldn't doubt he tried to Bury his feelings because he probably got hurt too much. But didn't have a Mela like shasha did. Closest he had was otto And since he was gone, he probably just secluded himself and focused on his work
Oh my GOD literally everyone I've seen talks abut how sus it is that Otto is just chill the WHOLE TIME but no one has ever pointed at him and gone "yea this guy is kinda... he's the most likely to be evil."
He’s not evil by mad scientist standards and he might not be mentally stable hence why he over engineers things
I figured the main antagonist would either be Forsythe or Otto but I figured that since the writing made those just a little too obvious it couldn't be it. Of course looking at yourself through Truman's eyes using clairvoyance made me question why he sees the kid who saved him as some sort of peasant. So good subtle foreshadowing on the writers.
@@DickThunderchamp When Truman told Raz he didn't understand why he needed bacon was confusing to me at first, the guy's got a even photo of Ford laying around and still didn't get why he'd need it, the guys knew what they were doing writing that exchange in.
Despite that didn't see the twist coming, but if it didn't set off some flags.
@@tuser8 I saw it as Truman not understanding how Ford could be brought to the Motherlobe with only bacon, having not experienced Raz's first adventure like we have. Sure, he might have known about Ford liking bacon (in hindsight we know GRISTOL probably didn't), but it would still be very strange to hear a child essentially imply: "I will transport a human hundreds of miles using bacon".
@@sillykola50 Yeah saw the comedic side of it, just was how I found it odd during gameplay
Something that I find funny, is how"nick from the mail room" sounds like a scooby-doo reveal. But actually makes sense.
It's a little thing but watching Bob walk up to Nona and without saying a word, he just hugs her... that brought me to tears the first time i played the game, you have to realize that, out of the rest of the psychic six, Bob lost the most in the battle against Maligul(next to Ford of course), so for him to embrace her, even after all the years grief, it's so touching
It is. That he still missed Lucy after all this time, even when he had every reason to hate her, says a lot.
I can't stress enough how cool it was that the battle between Maligula and The Psychic Six happened 20 years ago specifically.
It gives the scene of Ford calling down Raz after the reveal a second meaning.
"Tim, you're telling me that you've been keeping this secret for 20 fucking years ever since the first game???"
I’m pretty sure everyone’s noticed this but when Raz uses his psychic powers his eyes (well his goggles) glow
Considering he is Maligula’s great-nephew I’m at least 99% sure that was intentional
Im pretty sure it was intentional, my potato brain cannot process the aquato family tree will you tell me, raz father is the son of raz grandma and grandpa that died on the flood and then became an orphan?
@@matheusexpedito4577 Grandma and Grandpa died, Grandma's Sister is Lucrecia. Great Aunt is the term you use for when your parents just say Aunt. Like, Great Grandma when your mom would just say Grandma.
@@helpfulDeathgod oh
@@matheusexpedito4577 grandma (maroona) married raz's Grampa, she then got killed by her sister (Nona/maligula) leaving Augustus (raz dad) an orphan in an orphanage, following that ford took both maligula and Augustus to make them forget, he then made it so that Augustus would believe that Lucy/Nona was his mum
I still can not tell if Otto has problems or not. If they are just a reasonable well adjusted person or a person who hid behind a mask after the trauma and then became the mask. Has Otto dealed with the Trauma? Or has he burried it? Has he even been traumatised?
Cause Otto handles death kinda like I do: By just going on and living on (reasonable) normally.
The word I would use for Otto is "detached". They don't seem to make emotional links like other members of the psychic six. Yes he considers the other members his friends, but you can tell from his personality and his lab that he doesn't really interact with people, preferring to work with his machines and experiments. It also is why they get along so well with Sasha as both have a more logical thought pattern than an emotional one. Its just how his mind works but I can easily see it getting him into trouble in a later adventure with how he talked about making more Astralathes without really looking at the chaos it created.
otto is a psychic capitalist, of course he has problems
Fun fact about this: if one goes through all the voice lines in the game, there's actually unused lines for a cut game mechanic called Distilled Emotions, with the line from Otto explaining it being:
"Ahh, my Distilled Emotions series. I find them much easier to deal with when they're... contained. That's 98.5% pure distilled anger! Daangerous stuff. That's the essence of love~! Probably even more dangerous than anger. Pure sadness in a bottle! People are always trying to get rid of that stuff, so it's easy to collect."
And then there's a few lines from other characters where they react to a specific heightened emotion like the ones mentioned above. So it seems, if we take this cut content as part of canon, that Otto's maladaptive coping method is to LITERALLY remove his emotions when they were too much to deal with and store them for later. Or, you know. Never. (Though I gotta say, the idea that he's the only one who just went to therapy is hilarious to me for some reason)
Blaming everything on Otto... it's an interesting take, possible certainly, but it's also one I disagree with. In my opinion, the world of Psychonauts doesn't have one singular major villain, it has several minor ones.
Otto is counted amongst them, but only in so far as being a person who, while not actively malicious in his actions, is... neglectful, passively letting tragedy happen to his friends without supporting them. Certainly he was an active combatant against Maligula and helped his friends against Maligula in battle, with his tech, but Otto, for all his technical expertise, isn't a Psychologist/Psychotherapist, he's great for exploring technologies and abilities related to Psychic phenomena, but not the actual structure of the Psyche.
The Last Gzar of Grulovia is a villain, for obvious reasons (heck, even Gristol is right about one of them, namely betraying Maligula, though he's wrong on WHEN that betrayal really occurred, which was basically after Gristol gave her her position of power within the Grulovian Government, using her for war and submission of his opponents).
And love struck Ford Cruller is a villain too, but the kind who does horrible things for the right reasons, though shattering his own mind, in protectiveness and penance really was a big mistake.
But no, Psychonauts' World doesn't (yet) have a single true big villain.
I think that it makes an interesting story if we avoid good vs evil and focus on people facing the unintended consequences of their actions, or else people trying to ignore/avoid their problems in all the wrong ways.
They're not bad people, they're just people capable of making colossal mistakes which I think makes them feel all the more human.
Incredibly well done video! Personally I believe that Grulovia and it's leaders are the villains here. Had Gristol's father never appointed Lucy to minister of war, maybe things would've went differently.
Very true! (And thank you!)
One of my favorite things about Psychonauts is the people with truly deep-seeded mental issues are NEVER the villain.
In the original, they made it clear that Boyd is not rational and was essentially picked to be the guard BECAUSE he couldn't truly understand what was going on. And Dr Loboto, one of the most obvious cliche looking doctor-themed villains you could find, is ALSO being manipulated into the plot because he can't rationally understand the harm he's doing. And it's not a throw away thing. In Psychonauts 2 Loboto doesn't cooperate with people wanting to help and protect him because he STILL can't reason out that he's safe and that revealing his boss would help him. It just does not connect. He cannot process his world like that.
Psychonauts 2 is very clear that Maligula is NOT because Lucy was weak or inherently evil. They say it over and over that every single person on earth has a "maligula" inside them buried so deep down a vast majority of people never even know it exists. The whole Maligula fight has Lucy literally reaching out to escape. Lucy WANTED to stop. But she couldn't. Her mind was in overdrive and would never stop until it was forced to stop.
Exactly. And on the other hand, Gristol is merely a narcissist, and the only true villain in the series barring inner demons like the Butcher.
Again about Loboto, in Rhombus of Ruin, it’s heavily implied that Loboto’s extremely anti-psychic father literally lobotomized him in order to remove his psychic abilities, lending to his current mental state.
I also like how it characterizes "madness." Most tv and movies just make it seem like the person is evil and wild the second they go "mad" but still able to tell what they're doing is wrong. However, true madness is a lot like Lucy and Maligula. The person is so lost, they literally can't find themselves and only the dark, lost version of themselves remains.
Loboto's mind was rigged with traps and had locks set up so that he can't reveal the mole even if he wants to.
Maligula may not be a villain but she's definitely got one part of a supervillain down: *PRESENTATION*
Fr her style reminds me of Cruella de Vil
I'm sort of on the fence about Otto having ulterior motives. While it would definitely make for an interesting story, ultimately I think he's meant to show a thematic purpose that while a lot of people are scarred from their experiences, it doesn't always mean every person that makes it out is damaged in some way. Some people really do just have their priorities straight with what they value so even a situation like with Maligula wouldn't have a massive effect on Otto. To be fair though, if they showed he had just a bit more remorse for the situation and still feels a bit sad that his friends are split apart and hurt I would buy that he isn't uh, slightly nuts.
Like my dad.
When I got anxiety it was terrible but I helped myself and became better than ever mentally, emotionally and personally.
Mom said it was the worst thing she's ever had, and she's had a stroke that made per wheelchair bound and lost all her memories that all came back over time.
Me dad just said "I've never had that cause I didn't see the point of it".
He's the stereotypical non emotional father whose all business but do care, in his own way but family meetings, holidays and emotions. He finds it pointless and a waste of time.
He can do it for a time but it's annoying and exhausting for him.
And the other members don’t say the best things about him, something he doesn’t really care about either, so another thing could be that Otto is just the most distant of the Psychic 7, so the tragic events didn’t affect him nearly as much as everyone else, and also unlike the rest of the group, Otto didn’t lose the one thing he loves most, his hobby, that also happens to be his job
Considering the hints of him wanting to form some kind of business, it would be interesting to explore an anti-corporate angle for the third game. Perhaps explore the cost of being detached and removed with Raz's role being a symbol of empathy.
Thank you for pointing out that water detail after the fight with Maligula. It was so cute to play after that part and fall in water and not have it drag Raz under, but hold him up in like a trapeze stance. I haven't seen enough people talk about it
Who, playing this game all the way through, thought that Maligula was the antagonist? Who would think that?
Your comment got liked 69 times.
@@pustota7254 are you really going around pointing that out whenever possible
@@Josuh yes.
While it is pretty funny to pin the whole thing on Otto, Yea it really is a combination of Grulovia's leaders and the Psychic Six as a whole. Obviously the Royal Family are pretty much just assholes and really put a lot of the events in motion, but they were worsened by the Psychic Six's experiments taking things too far without considering their own well being. Presumably Lucy does actually take *some* blame as she was a fairly early member of the group and thus almost certainly was involved in a lot of those experiments. But at the end of the day she's obviously far more of a victim than a villain. And I do love that the game does a pretty good job of portraying Lucy as a victim imo. As her full story was unravelling in the ending, I never really thought of her as the villain.
Lucy is not a villain, but I feel Maligula is a villain in the most classic Disney way I can think of.
Your comment got liked 69 times.
I didn't need much motivation to love psychonauts 2 more but you've gone and taken it to new depths. Thanks for such a solid and rounded video essay on my favourite game this year.
It’s an easy game to keep going back to. :) And thank YOU for watching!
Depends on whether or not we'll be graced with a Psychonauts 3, but yeah, so much potential in this observation.
True, who’s to say if we’ll see this differently in 2037 when the next game comes out?
Well now that doublefine is officially owned by microsoft, and the psychonauts 2 has done exceptionally well. I'm sure microsoft will definitely view a 3rd game as something they'll want to see happen.
21:00 As someone who's tried caviar, I can confirm that. Other than a status symbol, why anyone would eat it is beyond me
Right?!
It's pretty damn nasty, rich people are weird.
Weird taste bud mutation?
It's pretty good on Sushi but I never trying it on western dish. Maybe Japanese version is toning it down.
@@bakacdaz Sushi definitely helps a little bit with the taste, but if you ever have it just straight out of the tin or even on crackers it's like eating unprepared raw fish, scales and all in my opinion.
Otto is more of the cause of the game's events rather than the villain. Gristol, as the mole, is the villain of the game. Maligula is more akin to Coach Oleander in this game's story.
“Maligula is not a villain”
“Those were peaceful protestors Lucy…”
Honestly when you think about it, she was a victim of circumstance. The cezar pushed her to disperse the protesters but she lost control of her power.
Also, something funny (Or maybe dark) about the game's start menu is that when you go to "New Game", you enter a brain and the game starts... that brain is probably Raz's brain, remember when Otto said that Raz's brain will be in the hall of brains someday too
He should've read the NDA more carefully.
If that's the case then, imagine how cool it will be if Nonna taught us Hydrokinesis if there was a third game, that ability would be pretty useful, if you actually think about it
It would be cool! She clearly 'knows' Hydrokinesis on some level. I assume it's too late to expect any DLC for 2, so I'm hoping we get a 3.
I think a quote fits here: "War makes monsters of us all."
Very applicable here.
Interesting detail about Fatherland Follies: you fight every enemy in the game EXCEPT Regrets. Judges? yes. Panic attacks? Plenty. Doubts? A few. But that man doesn’t have a single regret in his mind.
Man, I love Raz so much, he's not like a perfect brave hero, it's clear that he's afraid and unsure most of the time, but he knows that if he thinks too much the fear will get to him so he dives in before that and hopes to do his best. He is the best boy.
Also yeah, I wonder if there ever is gonna be a Psychonatus 3 (Or a DLC expansion with say, more 4 hours of content) if it's gonna be about Otto, he do be sus, but not exactly hatable either.
Amazing video! Your readings of the Psychonauts games have given me a deeper appreciation for the great work that went into them. The section where you detail the direct contrasts of Raz and Nick I didn't even think of when I first played the game. I also just realized why Nick as Truman said "I know" when Raz told him "That's not Nick from the mailroom" because he already knew about the identity swap twist. I thought he somehow knew that was Helmut but in retrospect that makes no sense.
Thanks so much! And yep, I admit I didn’t pick up on why Truman wasn’t more surprised by Nick not being Nick at first. They pulled off their red herring very well.
In hindsight, we should have been suspicious about Nick from the beginning, since his fake name contains two first names, "Nick" and "John". As Ray Narvaez Jr always says, never just a person with two first names
It’s obvious Lucy in some way pushed forward the events of the psychonauts game. Though her mind was altered to more or less forget and bury, enough was able to seep out and change things. This would also affect the real world as the curse Rasputin’s family experience. The water curse could have been caused by 3 factors. The first is the repression of Lucy’s power and Ford’s tampering so they avoided water. The second is Lucy and her family’s adamant avoidance of water, with a bunch of psychics this would unconsciously make the curse real amplified by Lucy. Third Maligula subconsciously reaching out from Lucy’s mind making the curse that much more real
Psychonauts has always had a habit of revealing some detail that makes it's villains not be villains. We saw it with Coach, Loboto, Maligula and Gristol. However, now that the magnifying glass of determining villains is on Otto, to some extent Gristol's dad, and even Loboto's parents and Oleander's father, I can't wait for the detail that makes their life decisions somehow understandable.
This loop is kind of genious if you look at it from the point of view of creating more media.
Oh please. Gristol was born a villain, raised a villain, and when his father wasn't villainous enough, he became a bigger villain.
We don't need to woobify this despot egg motherfucker, we really don't.
Phenominal video! I love your explanation of things and I loved playing this game and the story! I was sus of Otto in the very beginning but after it was proved to be "Nick", I felt he was off the hook, but that still didnt explain why he was "happy" in those magazine covers while everyone else was sad, I KNEW something was up with him, maybe more in a dlc or sequel?
Thanks so much for saying so - and yes, I’m holding out hope for some DLC for Otto. It seems too obvious an omission.
About the "retcon" from the end of Rhombus of Ruin to the beginning of Psychonauts 2:
I assumed that Loboto snuck aboard the ship, as shown in the ending, but was subsequently captured while aboard.
15:13 - I'm speechless. Just... thank you for pointing this out.
25:31 - Holy shit what a brilliant realization!! I hope Psychonauts 3 (if it ever comes out) leans into this and lets you go on missions with the other members of the 7! (Though I kinda wish Lili was part of that 7... Psychic 8 no longer has that ring). Thank you for bringing this up!
I LOVE THIS CONCLUSION! This will be headcanon until further notice. Great video! Subscribed!
Thanks so much for saying so, I’m so glad you enjoyed it!
-norma doesn't get to join-
Fun fact, about the timeline:
Psy series is sent in the early 80's, and the events of Deluge of Grulovia in the early 60's. As there's a magazine cover in "Ford's Follicles" which has a date - October 1962.
I assumed the 60s for the events leading up to the Deluge, but I hadn’t considered the present timeline being in the 80s. Looking at the tech present (including Otto’s inventions), it makes sense though!
If they do a third game I'd like to see Oleander's father. It would be interesting to see what he was actually like, like maybe he comes by HQ to try to make up with a son that he hasn't seen for decades, never realising what he did. My head-canon is that he bought the rabbits specifically to sell as meat and never realised how attached Morceau had gotten to them, and never noticed that his son saw him kill them.
I think it's (mostly) canon he passed away shortly before Psychonauts 1?
Yes, Oleander's father passed away before the game started, and presumably aggravated his psychological issues.
Love the foreshadowing with the clip from Big Lebowski, nice touch. 👍
Honestly I kind of wonder if Otto really is okay. It doesn't seem like he wanders too far from his lab anymore and it makes me wonder if that's his way of coping: staying in his lab which is kind of a safe place for him where he has complete control. Where he feels like he can keep control and he won't lose anything again
I have this feeling that Otto just buries himself in his work to cope, inventing all these handy nick-nacks to make himself feel better
When Lucy pulled out her shears I was like Ohh Shitt Granny bout to cut a bitch. but the emotional value values it
Counterpoint: the building of the Astralathe and adding Lucy to the team happened long before the events of the game or what happened in Grulovia. The team falling out afterwards could be argued to be on his shoulders, but not what happened to Lucy.
It's explained in game she's not the villain. She's always explained as the Fight response. The need to protect one's self at any means necessary. All beings not only have this, but the right to have this. It's required. It's needed. It's not evil, but like the ID portion of the mind it's not a warm and fuzzy thing. But the deepest parts of nature have teeth and aggression. She's less an enemy and more a mental trauma like El Odio or Raz's mental image of his father. Edit: Something interesting to notice with the symbolism is that all water in the game is dangerous, but most of the water in Fatherland's Folly is not a threat. He's too shallow to bring Raz harm.
I feel at some point if we can't call the unchecked personified desire to harm people a villain, then what truly is?
I'd like to point out, in Fatherland Folly, the water is actually drained before Raz leaves the ride. He can still drown in the places where water remains; but I also really like this idea that Gristol is too shallow, that's much funnier.
@@HonestMagpie It gets drained? I've only watched playthroughs, but I've never seen anything to indicate the water gets drained or that there's any place where Raz can actually drown.
One thing I notice with Nick is his name. If you think on it his name, Nick Johnsmith, is a combination of 3 common names, Nick, John, and Smith.
It's not fully a good point of evidence
But it's a nice detail that maligula is the opposite color palette of Lucy
Blues and purples instead of oranges and yellows
As well the blues and purples could be a reference to how drowned victims turn a slight blue from lack of oxygen
Or maybe this is all a style choice
I hadn’t thought of that!
I loved how the inside gristols mind the record players playing the grulovia song are all hidden away backstage, showing that it was propaganda and the people running around while the town is being flooded aren’t singing at all and are just running for their lives or are being swept up by the waves.
You know, I think Otto maybe one of those scientists who does an experiment to see the results of it, without any clear goal
I dont think Gristol Malik is completely unredeemable and incomprehensible, imagine beign fed all your life stories if what you were supposed to be and then have it stripped away.
Gristol Malik has been living for well over 40 years plotting this shit.
If forty years of getting adjusted to not being Czar is not enough, neither is therapy.
Not all characters need to be redeemed.
The twist about the mole's true identity is absolutly great. At 1st I thought that Otto was gonna be the mole, because his mind is the only 1 you don't get to enter. I also thought that Nick was Otto's acomplice whose brain was removed by Otto, because Nick was planning to back out of the plan. I'm gladd that I was dead wrong. Not only is the twist super insane, but it makes complete sence both with the naritive and with glues that have been presented to the player. It's also a good thing that this twist at the end of the game as it gives the player more reasons to replay the entire game all over game as well as the previous games. The only thing I don't really like is that after the twist is revealed, you are forced endure a big exposition dump that you can't skip. Off you could, Fatherland's Folly would be a really short level.
I was so excited for this. Your love for Psychonauts really shines through in your content. Great Stuff!
This is my favorite video of 2021.
Has anyone told you that your voice sounds like a young Rod Serling? (Of the Twilight Zone fame)
Psychonauts 2 was easily my favorite Game of 2021. Bob & Ford's characterization. Raz's relationship between him & his family & THEN his Nona. Bob & Helmut's 'Matter-of-fact' relationship. Raz's VA being the best in the Industry now, IMHO. (Raz, Sheogorath the Mad God, the Stilted Cast of Silent Hill 2, Mario, Legacy of Kain)
It's a game about Generational Trauma, Empathy & doing what good you can when you can.
A video so good, i didn't realize how good it was until I thought about it at the end of the year.
So elequant & poinent I got chills like listening to Neil d. Tyson or RagnarRox. 11/10 Editing & Script!
I haven’t heard Rod Serling yet - I’ll take it, thanks!
I was really on the fence about this video. Watched it all the way through, and having played it, I had one person in mind as the main culprit, being that of Ford Cruller, for selfishly hiding the identity of his S.O., but that ending is something I never did piece together in my head. At no point did I connect the parts together and realize THAT was the main villain.
I somehow completely missed that, with Raz, there were seven Psychonaut interns on my playthrough. Thanks for pointing that out.
Gristol is Darth Sidious, Maligula is Darth Vader, Otto Mentalis is whoever thought making lightsabers out of Kyber crystals was a good idea.
I love this.
Me and my brother loves to point out that psychics are the Earth's force sensitives
25:30 It's actually not the first time the water helps you back to shore. In Psychonauts 1, the first time the hand grabs you at the lake, there's a cutscene of it *throwing* you out of the water. The implication is that every time you get grabbed, the hand merely tosses you out. This tracks, because it is a manifestation of the Aquatos' intense hydrophobia.
Excellent detailed analysis here! Really tied in well with the mental health themes in the game!
Thanks so much, so glad you enjoyed it!
Also something to mention: Gristol Malik and his family WERE exiled from their homeland, but they lived in a fancy suite in a casino eating Caviar. They weren't hurting for money, and clearly lived a wealthy life, but Gristol wanted that seat of power despite his lavish upbringing.
Otto is the only one in the Psychic Six always be happy after the fight, as seen in photos and memory vaults. Raz even commented once. Either he went to therapy, or he is too busy with his own stuff and let it go, or maybe he just hide his emotion as Lucy did.
"Maligula" may also be a reference to "Malignant". Like a tumor.
Also, interesting how 'Nick' is obsessed with eggs, and one of the weirdest memories in P1 was "The World Shall Taste My Eggs". And also how he never truly grew up and has the motivations of a fragile child sheltered from the world.
Otto probably just went to therapy. Or maybe he is one of those people who can move on faster? Like I know a few people that get devastated when a tragedy in their life happens but move on faster than others, that doesn’t mean they don’t feel bad about those things, it just means that they find their own peace of mind faster than others.
The villain of Psychonauts 2 is not Gristol Malik, but his father Theodore. If he hadn't pushed Lucy to protect his reign, the events that created Maligula wouldn't have happened. If he'd been a better father, Gristol wouldn't have grown into the monster he became. He quite literally created both the antagonistic forces in the game, even if he never shows up.
That said, I never realized just how involved Otto was in all this. And we never got to explore his mind, did we?
10:50 but with an extra "n". i'm Italian myself. the Italian word for Grandmother is "Nonna".
i believe "Nona" is how the Aquato family say "Grandma" in English.
i heavily doubt that otto is the antagonist, i think he was just the one who took it best
with inviting lucrecia, it wasnt like he had the foresight that she would become maligula
with the astralathe, i assume he wouldve perfected it and made it not as extreme
and with the whole guilt thing, it would be certainly easier for him to dismiss the idea that he was at fault, and also although its a joke, i do think he had some form of therapy that the others didnt have the courage to go for
he does seem like the most outgoing of the group, after all
he may also be going with the stress response of "and now i'm just never going to think of that again"
23:00 it looks like the hands help raz through the water wall. They rip it open or pull him through or smt. It happens while maligula blinks. Maybe it's the same situation with bob and the vine.
I unfortunately skipped the psychonauts series and this video is gonna make me actually play the games. Great video 🔥
Thank you! The gameplay’s great, it’s definitely worth trying yourself.
I can't believe how much did I miss about the story, or maybe I forgot it but still it's impressive. Great video
Thanks so much for saying so!
One thing:
Nona is not the italian for grandma
*Nonna* is the italian for grandma
Otto isn’t exactly a villain but that’s only coming from a medic main
16:29
"My name...is Rasputin. But everybody calls me--"
*"--MY GOD!"*
Anyone else think Raz needs some goddamned therapy after all he went through?
Actually, we’ve never gotten to play in Raz’s mind, have we? The Brain Tumbler in the first game was supposed to do that, and it did at first, but it sent him to the Collective Unconscious instead.
Also yes.
Maligula murdered countless civilian protestors, including her own sister... and she has absolutely zero remorse for it. Then, she was prepared to murder her closest friends... all because they had the temerity to try to stop her from doing anything worse! She's _absolutely_ a villain. She's a mustache twirl away from a textbook cliché! You can certainly argue that she isn't _the_ villain of Psychonauts 2. Even if she is the focal point of everyone's actions, her involvement comes about through other people's machinations. She isn't driving any of the plot until she's finally unleashed in the climax, and even then, she's simply being herself, rather than acting out some grand scheme... but "herself" immediately attacks her friends, again, as well as her great nephew... and she doesn't have the excuse of not knowing he's there, this time. To suggest that she isn't _a_ villain is to fundamentally misunderstand what a villain is. She committed horrific acts for no greater good than people were in the way, shows no remorse... and she seems more than willing to the same or worse, going forward. You don't get much more villainous than that!
Now, obviously, that stain doesn't transfer to Lucy, even if she was the one who committed the precipitating atrocity. Her horror at what she'd done is what created Maligula, and she does fight back, ultimately reclaiming her mind from Maligula's influence. But the Maligula personality, or whatever you want to call it? She is _absolutely_ villainous. "My hands are already stained, so who cares about a few dozen more?" isn't a valid justification. There's no mitigating circumstances; no greater evil that was averted... Lucy's powers went too far and innocent people paid the price. When she hid from the horror of what she'd done, Maligula took over and was all too happy to _keep_ doing it. The atrocity was no longer an accident... it was the intent! That's textbook villainy.
This video deserves millions of views and I hope one day you will get them. Thanks!
Aww, thanks so much for saying so!
tldr "she isnt a villain shes an antagonist!"
Exactly!
I actually remember thinking Otto was going to be the big bad of the game. Then the whole Gristol Malik thing happened, and the more than obvious Maligula final fight was foreshadowed for most of the game. The idea kinda got flushed that down the tube the more of the game I played. Not to say his inventions weren't the root cause of what happened, but it wasn't something Otto WANTED to happen.
The conclusion of the video is 110% what I was thinking at the end! I was like, "Huh...we never did go into Otto's mind, get to know him better or resolve any of his issues. Maybe it was a cut level?" But then he seemed so disconnected emotionally from everything going on, was so focused on profit, the others obviously didn't think well of him in general...mmmyeah. I'm anticipating a rugpull moment about him in a future game.
- My name....Is Razputin! But everybody calls me...
- My God!
Didn’t plan for that moment, but it came together in editing and I had to leave it in. :)
I think Otto is potentially something that i never thought I'd see in psychonauts: a good example.
Assuming he's doing so well because he went to therapy and sorted out all that trauma with Lucy and Isn't just distracting himself with inventing to avoid it, (which isn't healthy at all if you needed to be told that) then he's the only one of the psychic six to cope with the deluge of grulovia in a healthy way
Otto is SUPER suspicious, but tbh I have an idea what might've happened with him. He and Ford were the original 2 Psychonauts. He's the only brain of the Psychic 7 we never enter. He was once Ford's closest friend...
...maybe they made the same choice in the wake of what happened, but in different ways.
Remember how when we first enter Otto's lab, he shows Raz a bunch of inventions that focus around one emotion each?
I think Otto Mentalis used the Astrolathe to remove or suppress his negative emotions. Including his ability to feel regret. But this also caused him to no longer be able to see other people as people.
Remember: when you use Clairvoyance on him, all he sees is another brain in a jar.
This channel is criminally underrated
I AGREE!
Dude you also so the suspicions in Otto too. I found it so messed after finishing the game the one person we didn't enter the Brain was Otto.
I still think something is up with Otto because compared to the other he seemed fine, which is so suspicious.
The true villain is Gristol for getting that goddamn song stuck in my brain for a solid week after completing the game.
Try editing a video for three weeks with that song. I'm still singing it.
Kinda off topic, imagine psychonauts 1 was elevated to psychonauts 2 level of design.
I love the fact Raz save Lily in Psychonauts 1 and in Psychonauts 2 Lily saves Raz in Gristol's mind xD
27:12 Look at Otto's face on the photo. Like, compared to others, who are in different state of distress, he's friggin' SMILING.
As far as Otto's concern, his experiment was a success. It's eerie.
“My name.. is Razputin.”
“But people call me…”
*”MY GOD”*
Amazing video! And it’s funny, my original guess for who the mole was ended up being Otto. It’s pretty cool to see that I’m not the only one who thought he seemed a bit suspicious
Oh yeah and when I realized the eggbeater thing halfway through fatherland follies I got really really excited
In a way, a lot makes sense in the original after the Tomb of the Sharkophogas. The water curse, which drags you underwater, could be saving Raz from going to far from helping figure out both the truth of his father and Coach Oleander. It also shows how Augustus was able to have psychic powers. In this way, it allows Raz to fight his own inner demons of being told psychics are bad.
I just realize something, Lucretia Mux/Maligula is basically the Psychonauts version of Dark Phoenix/Jean Grey.
Kinda yeah!
I mean maybe they caught him while on the flight back home cause he sure does make alot of noise.
I say that the tyrant Gzar of Gulovia also has something to do with it, through his influences in created the climate in Gulovia where Lucy had experienced all that pain in, and as we see with Nick, even his son hates him so imagine what would have happened if he was better and more good willed influence?