I honestly had no idea of what to expect of the Minisodes. All I knew going in is what I heard from others, that it would give us a peek at Sigmund Corporation. It not only did that but it was certainly an interesting peek for a lot reasons.
If you just stumbled here and have no idea what this post is about then here is the deal: this Play-Along project is like a book club except for video-games. It is being hosted by Naithin of Time to Loot and you can find more information as well as a link to all the participants here.
With that said, let’s get to the questions!
WARNING: Spoilers ahead for the minisodes of To the Moon. Proceed at your own risk!
1. Protesters. Perhaps not too surprising to find they exist in this world. Many of us were not entirely comfortable with the concept of what Sigmund Corp does. What did you think about getting a look behind the curtain as it were, and seeing some of the responses of the employees?
I felt bad for the employees of Sigmund Corp. Yes, I was one of the people who didn’t like much the idea of this kind of technology (well, maybe a little less now) but I really felt like all the doctors there really believe that what they are doing is a good thing for their clients.
For them there isn’t really a moral dilemma, they bring some joy to the last moments of someone that is about to die and that is it. Seeing from that angle it isn’t something inherently bad.
Of course, we probably could keep going a lengthy discussion about the ethical applications of their work. But for them it is just a job by now.
2. For how short these two (aptly named) Minisodes were — we were given a LOT to wonder about, from Ghost Eva on the road, to Neil’s mum or dad on the phone, to what on earth he was doing with the memory unit in his office to… whatever it was that happened post-credits. So, yeah… My extended version of the ‘WTF?’ question is: What do you think is happening? Speculate wildly!
I think it is finally time for some Conspiracy Theories! *adjusts tinfoil hat*
My guess about how the machines work is that they have a lot of built-in mechanisms so that it is used *only* on those who are near death. It is probably the only reason that they are even allowed to exist and for the Sigmund Corporation do its business.
If you would try to use someone who is healthy, or at least, their body not giving signs that they will die soon then the machine wouldn’t allow memory changes at all. It would be only a very fancy VR helmet.
What Neil was trying to do was to bypass all those mechanisms so he could change his memories. My guess is he has some deep guilty about something he did to his parents that he wish he could either forget or change his memory of what exactly happened so he could forgive himself.
Unfortunately his attempts are already changing his memories. Just not in the way he wants or that he would have noticed.
Now that I think about it I wonder if that is what he was taking the painkillers at the end of To the Moon. Maybe headaches are a side-effect of his tinkering with the machine.
Eva may have been trying to do the same for her own ends and going by the post-credit scene has largely succeeded. But even her attempt has left some bugs on the system like “Ghost Eva”.
Why she would want to do use the device on herself? I don’t know. Maybe she lost her sister. Or maybe she just wants to be relive some good times as a way to deal with stress. There is an infinite amount of possibilities here but the game didn’t give any hint to that. Only that scene where she was obviously using it and I couldn’t see much of the background, but I believe it was in her house? At least I think I saw her wearing casual clothes and with a glass of wine in one hand.
Which also raises the question of how she was able to sneak out a machine outside of the Sigmund Corp building as I imagine there would be a ton of security details involved with it.
Now I wish I had recorded it so I could check that scene again. Maybe I will look for a YouTube video later.