“Type Help” is really good!
One thing I discovered while working on my walkthrough is that there’s a hidden file. (You can follow my walkthrough to find it.)
It includes a trivial puzzle, revealing the name of @, and also a number, whose purpose I don’t understand. Does anybody have any ideas?
(It wouldn’t surprise me if there’s a little something ARG-y here… maybe another YouTube video or something?)
Prevailing theory is that it’s the death number of the narrator, who intends it to be the final death count. That means counting up rather than down, though.
Started reading all the comments on the itch.io page, found this one: https://itch.io/post/12433030
The code (43092) is actually the real life code for the music roll for Because of You by Lee Sims for player pianos, the lyrics to which are written down in 00-dream. This mirrors partly the piano roll which started this all off by reminding Rupert of Amelia, which is 03746 I’d Climb the Highest Mountain, also by Lee Sims, which @ clearly found during his research. Maybe he also found 43092. Maybe the curse found it for him. If you know @'s name, maybe the curse is finding you.
EDIT: I’ve updated my walkthrough to explain 43092.
The bit about the curse maybe finding you feels like one of the I-wonder-how-well-it’s-worked-out parts of Type Help? I keep meaning to go back to think it through and see how well the text of the game supports it: I feel like you have to have actually known the person and not just their name and whatever, but you’ve also spent a lot of time with Richard Longley’s notes, so maybe that’s enough?
Yeah, people were mentioning Rupert Galley’s name a whole lot without dropping dead, even before Thornton died. You have to actually remember someone to be affected. On the other hand, you don’t appear to have to have known them well (see: Oswald and Tony, Annie and Oswald), so I guess it’s possible that the notes could have been enough. But there’s no precedent for what happens if you get to know about a victim after their death.
I think there are two requirements:
(The 00-list-of-names is particularly deadly, on that basis.)
01-ST-12 when he found Amelia’s programme recital.07-KI-11 after receiving Rupert’s key from John in 06-ST-1-11.09-ED-6-10 after Eddie brought hot cocoa that Thornton made.12-BI-1-2-3-4-5-7-8-9 after handling Eve’s engagement ring in 11-BI-6-9.13-VI-7-8 after handling Helen’s pocket watch.18-VI-2-7 after remembering Damian in 17-DI-6-7. (This is the one that doesn’t have clear physical evidence, but I think their baby is probably the evidence.)19-DI-4-6 after Tony handed him Victoria’s bracelet.20-LI-2-5 after John reminded her of her wedding in 17-MA-1-5. She found her wedding photos in 18-MA-5-6 but at that point, she couldn’t remember that Rupert was her husband. She died in 20-LI-2-5 with her family photos after hearing Eddie’s name.21-LI-1-2-4 after remembering the name “Martha” based on Annie’s physical 00-list-of-names.22-CH-2-3 after remembering Tony based on Annie’s physical 00-list-of-names.23-CH-1-2 after remembering Oswald based on Annie’s physical 00-list-of-names.25-AT-1 and dying in 26-EN-1. He learned Annie’s name in 24-DI-1, but that didn’t kill him, because he touched no further physical evidence of Annie before his death.25-WI-K. John reminded her of Annie’s name in 24-DI-1; she must have touched something in her house, quite possibly one of the mugs. (“There’s the clink of a couple of mugs.” Two mugs, for Kate and Annie?)I think Martha might have died in 04 or 05 if she’d touched Rupert’s body or the 00-invitation, but I think she never touched either one.
The one I can’t explain is Tony. It seems like he should have died shortly after he touched the box containing the pocket watch.
He’d definitely met Rupert before the start of 01-HE-4-9. (“He’s old enough that he won’t notice it anyway.”) And he touched the box again in 04-HE-4 because it had the name “Rupert Galley” on it, as he explains in 05-AT-2-4.
Anyway, it’s a good thing we never touched any physical evidence of @!
well … except that laptop, I guess
Hmm, that wasn’t how I read it at all. I’m pretty sure it’s just about remembering the person, connecting those memories with the name. I think the physical objects are incidental except that they often have a strong enough association to trigger memories.
So I would have said that John doesn’t die after Kate telling him Annie’s name because he clearly doesn’t remember anything about her as a person – it’s just an unfamiliar name to him and he’s trying not to reveal that fact to her on the phone in 24-DI-1 and then in 25-AT-1 he explicitly says as much: “I don’t remember her. I don’t remember any of them… I don’t even remember pulling the trigger…”
So it seems like he has made the connection between “Annie Beaumont” and the body in the chapel as the daughter he supposedly promised to protect, but now he thinks he has shot her so of course he’s trying to hide it from Kate.
Tony didn’t die after touching the pocket watch because he didn’t remember knowing Rupert Galley, he just recognized the name because he thought his mum was being suspicious about it. In 01-HE-4-9 he knows Rupert Galley, as you say (“He’s old enough that he won’t notice it anyway.”) but then the thunderclap comes and he’s still holding the box but has immediately forgotten Rupert (“Mum, what’s the name on this box?” / “I don’t know, darling. Just put the watch back in there and leave it alone!” / “All right! You don’t get this annoyed at Eve”).
Then in 04-HE-4 he’s not remembering Rupert the person, he’s responding to 03-LI-1-4-5-6-7-8-9 where John Hobbes mentions Rupert Galley’s invitation and nobody knows who Rupert Galley is so why was a box with that name in his mother’s room and “What the hell has Mum got herself into?”
And that’s consistent with 05-AT-2-4. Again, not about Rupert the person, just the suspicions about the name and about John Hobbes: “no one claimed to know who Rupert Galley was! […] Except, I’d seen the name once before — on a small box that my Mum keeps in her room. […] The stranger must be looking for it, right? And I don’t want my Mum to be caught up in this if things go wrong.”
The only alternative is that you actually do know @ quite well, but since the curse makes you completely forget a person until a minute or so before your death, you actually don’t recognise their name for that reason.
(This might have already been said, I haven’t fully read through…)
I think the Brief in your inbox makes that pretty unlikely – Alan Thomas was a junior back when this happened, Longley was hired specifically as someone who didn’t have connections, and this is happening much later and you’re presumably not on the list of people who were “prohibited from ever learning [the laptop’s] contents” so I suspect this all happened before you (the player-character) had anything to do with the agency, and possibly before you were born.
Oh, wait a second. It just dawned on me that there absolutely is a precedent for this: the Galley House case happened leading up to Sunday, the 7th of March, 1936, but Longley’s laptop has a bios date of 1992. He didn’t die from learning about the original victims; he died from knowing one of the friends and family of the most recent victim when it flared up again; the thing he was hired for. So I don’t think we’re in any danger, actually.
Also, I was re-reading Eddie’s death (19-DI-4-6) and I’m pretty convinced that he never touches the bracelet – he says he doesn’t want it and I feel like Tony would be hanging on to it and not handing it over to the guy threatening him with his own gun until he actually had a deal.
Anyway. This is speculation. Fun game, whichever way.
If it’s just remembering the person, then it certainly raises a question of why Martha lived so long. John mentioned Rupert at 03-LI-1-4-5-6-7-8-9. She saw his body in 04-1-5-8, and she at least read the 00-invitation in 05-DI-1-5.
If it’s nothing more than remembering the person, you’d think Martha would’ve said “waitaminute, that’s my husband (THUNDERCLAP)”
If not in Act I, then surely in 18-MA-5-6, staring at her own wedding photos, which depict her and the guy she saw dead on the floor in 04-1-5-8.
Maybe it’s just random. Perhaps each time you hear a thunderclapped name, and each time you come in contact with physical evidence of their existence, you have to make a “saving throw” to remember them, but if you do, you die.
(It certainly seems to have been Eddie’s name that finally thunderclapped her, not Rupert’s.)
I’m pretty sure the only victim that’s dangerous to remember is the latest one, hence why Longley refers to it as a chain, and why his death should end everything. So knowing about the Galley victims shouldn’t be dangerous either way.
But yes, I agree that we’re likely safe. The game places a lot of emphasis on remembering. I think it would feel kind of cheap to go against that just for an ending twist.
To be honest I don’t think there’s really a specific condition that needs to be satisfied. If you remember the previous victim, you die. Knowing their name or seeing physical mementos of them can help jog your memory, but it won’t necessarily happen every single time, depending on what you’re thinking about and what your state of mind is.
Oh, right, good point.
I guess that part felt to me like the curse was putting a Somebody-Else’s-Problem field on the names and faces of the victims. So most people couldn’t wouldn’t come at it directly – we know from multiple examples tha you could be in mid-conversation with a person and thunderclap and you don’t go “Yikes, that’s my mother,” you go “how did this strange body just appear in front of me?!” And an SEP field effect could also explain how chill people are about finding dead bodies everywhere…
So Martha can see the name Rupert Galley, see the photos of them together and be weirded out by “who is this guy?” and not even consider the idea that he’s the same as the dead guy, but then go “oh, Eddie loved this song, if he was here he’d sing you all the lyrics” and thunderclap.
I think it’s only near the end where we see people’s stubborn determination to keep picking at the inconsistencies their minds are throwing at them override that and let them approach it directly (maybe just Tony and Annie?). Compiling them for convenience:
01-LI-3-5 (he left because) “this song reminded him of something” and 01-ST-12 “Amelia! Yes, Amelia… It’s been so long since I’ve heard her play… I knew I recognised that piece from somewhere…”06-ST-1-11 “Ah! Thank you, sir. It must have slipped out of Mr Galley’s pocket.” “You don’t mean Rupert Galley, do you?” “Yes, sir! Poor Mr Galley. He used to visit the Chapel often, sir — a pious man as ever I’ve met one.”09-ED-6-10 “It tastes good, but I had some earlier. In fact, it tastes exactly how Thornton always makes it for me. Are you sure you didn’t just take it from the pot on the stove that was already there?”11-BI-6-9 “It certainly doesn’t look like you’re doing much of anything! Did you end up finding the ring, or did you just give up?” […] “I gave you this ring for a reason, Eddie. Where is my daughter?”13-VI-7-8 (presumably emptying his pockets before bed?) “Sweetheart, what’s that?” “You remember, Vic. Mrs Dauer asked me to find it over dinner… Isn’t it awful? I didn’t even… I didn’t realise it was her…”17-DI-6-7 (Eddie 19-DI-4-6 (Tony shows him Victoria’s bracelet; he doesn’t immediately recognize its significance and responds with sarcasm) “Do you know what, I have exactly the same one upstairs! What does that make us, friends for life? Eternal companions? Drink up!” (Tony offers a deal, etc.) “You’re a sly rat, aren’t you? Threatening me with her old bracelet? You creepy little coward.”20-LI-2-5 “(Annie) Do you know who Eddie is?” “He’ll be here in a minute, I’m sure! Oh, he loves this song. I’m sure he’d sing the lyrics for you if you asked him to! Do you know what, I think the two of you would get along!”21-LI-1-2-4.22-CH-3 “The gun! Good heavens, that thing was terrifying. You haven’t brought it here, have you?” “Where did you see it? Who was holding it? Tony? I can’t think…” “Oh, that funny boy? Yes, I caught him with it in his bedroom. I wouldn’t trust him. It’s better if he doesn’t know we’re here, I think.”22-CH-2-3 (immediately after Oswald dies, she checks her list, realizes there’s a new strange name) “Oswald, used to live here, family drawing. The drawing! He showed it to me! He… No…”24-DI-1 “(John) Do you know someone called Annie?” “Annie?” “I found a note in the Chapel by one of the bodies. Did she use to live here?” “She’s there with you, is she? She’s all right?”I don’t think that’s an anomaly. That “Annie?” feels to me like like she’s confused by the name, then she remembers her after a second and continues the conversation without realizing she’d forgotten her. You see similar situations with other characters. Also note that she doesn’t ask about Annie at all before John mentions her name, and they chat for a bit before that. Had she remembered that her daughter was there in a house with multiple dead bodies, don’t you think her first concern would have been to find out if she’s all right?
Also, I think the reason why Martha doesn’t remember Rupert after seeing the photos is because the only person who can be remembered at all is the last in the chain, which at that point was Eddie. Otherwise you’d think that some memories of previous victims would start to crop up eventually, but judging by the way Longley talks about the case the victims are completely forgotten by everyone.
I don’t know, while we don’t see Oswald mention Rupert by name, the bit where Oswald says he remembers being at Martha’s wedding heavily implies that Oswald has remembered Rupert at that point. Remembering the last person who died is the only thing that brings the curse on, but it does still seem possible to remember other people in the chain. It may just be that it requires having been very close to someone/knowing them for a very long time, and that iteration of the curse, having wiped out several entire families, left no one who was as close to any of the victims as Oswald had been to Rupert? (That would require Damien to have no close family, which I can’t remember if the game ever said anything about, but I’m pretty sure it at least doesn’t say anything to the contrary.)
Hmm, I’m not sure that’s the case? In 16-KI-1-2-3-4-6, he says:
[3] I remembered… I remember where I met Martha…
[1] Oh? Where?
[3] At her wedding! I was there at her wedding… Ask her who she married…
And in 19-KI-3-5:
[5] I was looking through our old photos… And there’s someone there. In all of them. A man I don’t recognise. I swear, I’ve looked at these photos before and he was never there… He’s just appeared. I don’t understand…
[3] Well! That’s unexpected.
…
[3] If they can alter physical objects, then it means they’re getting stronger. I’d be afraid, if I were you.
It seems to me that he remembers the wedding and has realized that something doesn’t quite add up but doesn’t actually understand what it is. When Martha talks to him, he seems surprised that there’s a man she doesn’t remember in there and urges her to destroy the photos because he thinks they’ve been tampered with by whichever forces he thinks are causing the dead bodies to appear.
And I don’t think he’d lie or pretend he doesn’t know Rupert. In his death scene, he seems convinced that forgetting people is what causes the curse (“If you can’t remember those close to you, then you will surrender yourself to the curse!”). If he remembered Rupert at that point, I think he’d be urging Martha to remember him too.
I think this is basically right, but when you say “remembered at all,” it’s too strong. They can sometimes remember something about people who died before the last in the chain, even their names.
I suspect you just can’t get thunderclapped from remembering people earlier in the chain.
(Of course, there’s no way to prove that a person can’t get thunderclapped from remembering someone earlier in the chain; we just know that nobody did. The text only depicts people dying from remembering the last person in the chain.)
In 06-ST-1-11, Thornton remembers Rupert (marking Thornton for death), and tells John that Rupert is the dead body from the Study.
In 07-DI-1-2-4-5-6-7-8-9 John announces it, without saying that Thornton told him who the body was. After that announcement, Thornton gets thunderclapped, and then in 08-KI-1-6, Eddie asks John how he knew that Rupert was the dead body.
John can no longer remember hearing anything from Thornton in 08-KI-1-6, but he does retain the knowledge that “Rupert Galley” is the body found in the Study.
[6 Edmund Galley] How did you know Rupert Galley? Why was he here?
[1 John Hobbes] I have no idea. I don’t know who he was.
[6 Edmund Galley] Then how did you recognise him?
[1 John Hobbes] I just… I knew it was him.
When Martha reviews the photos in 18 Martha doesn’t recognize Rupert, not even as “the same person as the body found in the Study.”
In 19-KI-3-5:
[5 Martha Galley] I was looking through our old photos… And there’s someone there. In all of them. A man I don’t recognise. I swear, I’ve looked at these photos before and he was never there… He’s just appeared. I don’t understand…
She “should” have at least realized that the face in the photos matched the body in the Study. And, if she had, she “should” have remembered that John announced that the body was Rupert Galley. If she had remembered that, she would have remembered that the man she married = the body = Rupert Galley.
But she didn’t make any of those connections.
10121318192021222325“Rupert” is the only name mentioned after Thornton’s death, but after Eve died, nobody mentions aloud that “Rupert” was found dead in the Study.
I’m still liking my earlier theory: when exposed to a reminder of the last thunderclapped person, you’ve got a chance of remembering them, but it’s not a guarantee.
The more powerful a reminder, and the stronger your personal connection to that person, the more likely it is that is that you’ll get thunderclapped.
Under this theory, Martha and Tony survived Act I by luck. They each had clear physical reminders of “Rupert Galley,” but they simply didn’t remember him.
(Martha was especially lucky that she didn’t get thunderclapped after reading 00-invitation in 05-DI-1-5.)
I took “ask her who she married” to be an attempt to prompt Martha’s memory rather than a genuine “I don’t know but assume she will know” question, and then I guess I assumed he forgot some of it again, but @svlin’s interpretation probably does make more sense. That scene does still suggest it’s possible to recover some lost memory surrounding people who were disappeared by the curse, but looking at it more closely it’s true there’s nothing to indicate that one can remember the people themselves.
On another topic, here’s the thing that’s really been nagging at me since I finished the game, which I’d love to hear people’s thoughts on:
In-universe, the most important thing here, the specific single thing the PC has been asked to do, is to figure out what @ did that stopped the later chain of deaths from continuing. But completing the game, secret files and all, doesn’t actually require you to figure that out, and I’m not sure it even gives you enough information to know for certain.
So, what do we think he did? On the face of it, the hangman game suggests suicide, but @'s comment in the file where Annie dies pretty explicitly tells us that that isn’t it. In the Itch comments, someone said that before finding 00-dream they thought that @ was Alan and had stopped the curse by giving himself amnesia, and the creator said that that was “close to the truth”, but I’m not quite sure where to go from there. If @ did wipe his own memory and is another character that we know but not Alan, it would basically have to be the PC, but then that raises questions about why no one at the organization realized he was the same guy they hired before (since the early unsealing of the computer presumably means people from that time are still around). Or I guess it could just be that he wiped his memory and didn’t take on some other identity that we’ve encountered?
I think @/Richard didn’t “do” anything. He was just a loner. No one cared about him enough to remember him.