The End of the long dark

[Alexg]

Am I the only person who feels the end of the long dark will be bitter sweet I mean what exactly do we think is gonna happen the world has ended is it possible the end might result in the death of MacKenzie or Astrid 

Edited January 4, 2020 by Alexg

[Guest jeffpeng]

Has the world ended? There is evidence to support that the phenomenon is local to Great Bear. Even if it has "This has all happened before". The end of the world as we know it doesn't neccessarily the end of man. As for Mac and Astrid .... possible. But I personally expect the end where both find each other in the end, and then look towards an uncertain future together (aka open ending). 

[UpUpAway95]

I think they find each other, get back together and settle down on Great Bear together after having used whatever is in Astrid's case to stop whatever evil is causing the geomagnetic events that are disrupting the climate  (Yep, I'm a sucker for fairy-tale endings).

[wizard03]

It could be, many of the olden movies was sort of this way as well. Granted its a bit of a troupe, but we may not know until the very end.....a boat stuck around till the very end? A hot rod pilot dies and leaves the key's to his plane behind? Maybe an old snow cat APC is gassed up and ready to go without a driver? Many different 'outs" could await us for the final scene.....apparently astrid absolutely wants to get to someplace on greatbear, maybe compared to the rest of the "summer camping" island, there is one small modern city, and that could provide the way of escape. Sadly however, it all rests on how the devs decide to call the shots. Either way, I find it very interesting and thirst for more.

[Guest jeffpeng]

@Raphael van Lieropdoesn't strike me as the kind of person that would write a cheesy 1960's happy ending. More like a silently-hopeful-but-open ending, like The Road has, or a more bittersweet one where Astrid and MacKenzie find each other, maybe even save a bunch of people in the process, but eventually must realize that their struggle against the inevitable is just beginning. I could even imagine Astrid being lost in a self-sacrifice as the ultimate conclusion of her redemption arc (for whatever she seeks redemption for). I have a feeling she is the real hero of the story. But in any case: The Long Dark is gritty tale about gritty people fighting for their lives with everything they can throw at nature. I'm almost certain there is no easy way out waiting.

[desertedone]

On 1/4/2020 at 4:14 PM, jeffpeng said:

Has the world ended? There is evidence to support that the phenomenon is local to Great Bear. Even if it has "This has all happened before". The end of the world as we know it doesn't neccessarily the end of man. As for Mac and Astrid .... possible. But I personally expect the end where both find each other in the end, and then look towards an uncertain future together (aka open ending). 

I feel it's not just Great Bear. 

 

The way the stranger that was beating on McKenzie seems to talk in a way that it effected the entire world.

"A locked metal case is a thing of the old world stranger. It's a world of closed doors, and things being off limits... see I was part of that world but that world is over. This is my world now and in my world I make the rules. In my world see, there are no locks."

Also Methuselah also speaks in a way that the entire world has changed not just Great Bear. There are two types that can explain the geomagnetic storm. It's localized or it could be the entire earth's own magnetic field that's effected.

Edited January 9, 2020 by desertedone

[Guest jeffpeng]

15 minutes ago, desertedone said:

The way the stranger that was beating on McKenzie seems to talk in a way that it effected the entire world.

Well or "his" entire world? But yeah, after EP2 I too was very certain we're dealing with a global phenomenon. But then EP3 happened.

Spoiler's ahead:

 

Father Tom keeps mistaking Astrid for a survivor of the crash. But Astrid was hold up with Molly for days, recovering from her ordeal in Milton. This would suggest that the Plane in Crossroads Elegy went down much later, several days later. So ... if there is a global catastrophy going on ... why are there still passenger planes in the air?

In fact we have no outside confirmation that the Aurora Phenomenon is global. Even our axe wielding friend here probably doesn't know anything about what's going on on the Mainland. He's probably just working off the assumption that whatever happened there must have happened elsewhere as well.

Even the end of Episode 3 doesn't confirm this.

 

While we do see stranded Orcas,

 that might be due to a local rather than global alteration of the magnetic field.

I've theorized before that Great Bear's real life counterpart - at least geographically - might be Nootka Sound. Nootka lies next to the Nootka Fault (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nootka_Fault). This is further hinted at by the earth quakes that devastated Great Bear. Volcanic activity at this scale could potentially lead to a localized weakening of the magnetosphere - which may or may not be expanding, but could possibly be a precursor to a global polarity shift of Earth's Magnetic field. Such a shift wouldn't occur like flipping a coin as it is popular belief, but take years or even decades - which, admittedly, is still a blip in geologic timescales.

So .... maybe we are both right  

Edited January 9, 2020 by jeffpeng

[desertedone]

21 minutes ago, jeffpeng said:

Well or "his" entire world? But yeah, after EP2 I too was very certain we're dealing with a global phenomenon. But then EP3 happened.

Spoiler's ahead:

  Reveal hidden contents

Father Tom keeps mistaking Astrid for a survivor of the crash. But Astrid was hold up with Molly for days, recovering from her ordeal in Milton. This would suggest that the Plane in Crossroads Elegy went down much later, several days later. So ... if there is a global catastrophy going on ... why are there still passenger planes in the air?

In fact we have no outside confirmation that the Aurora Phenomenon is global. Even our axe wielding friend here probably doesn't know anything about what's going on on the Mainland. He's probably just working off the assumption that whatever happened there must have happened elsewhere as well.

Even the end of Episode 3 doesn't confirm this.

  Reveal hidden contents

While we do see stranded Orcas,

 that might be due to a local rather than global alteration of the magnetic field.

I've theorized before that Great Bear's real life counterpart - at least geographically - might be Nootka Sound. Nootka lies next to the Nootka Fault (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nootka_Fault). This is further hinted at by the earth quakes that devastated Great Bear. Volcanic activity at this scale could potentially lead to a localized weakening of the magnetosphere - which may or may not be expanding, but could possibly be a precursor to a global polarity shift of Earth's Magnetic field. Such a shift wouldn't occur like flipping a coin as it is popular belief, but take years or even decades - which, admittedly, is still a blip in geologic timescales.

So .... maybe we are both right  

The geomagnetic storm doesn't seem constant. It doesn't happen every night. Not sure what you're getting at. Methuselah said "the end times are near." And he talks about how the world is changing, that humans interaction with nature is changing it's course and that it's the start of the quiet apocalypse. It's likely the first changes are happening around Great Bear first. I mean the game is advertised as an apocalyptic world (https://www.thelongdark.com/about/). I just think that residents of Great Bear were the ones that were best equipped to handle this kind of apocalypse that's why the story may have centered around it. Anyway that's just how I see it.

Edited January 9, 2020 by desertedone

[UpUpAway95]

20 hours ago, jeffpeng said:

@Raphael van Lieropdoesn't strike me as the kind of person that would write a cheesy 1960's happy ending. More like a silently-hopeful-but-open ending, like The Road has, or a more bittersweet one where Astrid and MacKenzie find each other, maybe even save a bunch of people in the process, but eventually must realize that their struggle against the inevitable is just beginning. I could even imagine Astrid being lost in a self-sacrifice as the ultimate conclusion of her redemption arc (for whatever she seeks redemption for). I have a feeling she is the real hero of the story. But in any case: The Long Dark is gritty tale about gritty people fighting for their lives with everything they can throw at nature. I'm almost certain there is no easy way out waiting.

An ending the resolves the primary problems on Great Bear does not necessarily make it a "cheesy 1960's happy ending."  There is an indication that Astrid's case may hold a solution... or at least a way of preventing things from getting worse; and Methuselah says that we're there to "witness an apocalypse of an apocalypse"... which is a double-negative that foreshadows a possible end to the apocalypse.  That doesn't mean that everything instantly turns balmy and people flood back to the island.  Rebuilding can taken a long time (leading to some great possibilities for ongoing play after the end of the story... with Astrid and Will having learned many new skills over the course of their adventure that they can put to good use helping rebuild the island.

[Guest jeffpeng]

54 minutes ago, UpUpAway95 said:

which is a double-negative that foreshadows a possible end to the apocalypse.

That's actually an interesting interpretationg of it. I understand it as .... mankind is the apocalypse.... and now it's being apocalypsed... if that is a word.