Darkwood

[Music] I've realized something it came to me when we were walking through the tunnels you're like a disease you and your kind you wake up alone in a forest you don't remember what happened or how you're here you feel the insides of your coat Pockets mostly empty apart from a big metal key you clutch it tightly knowing it's the only way out before you can even begin to contemplate how you Ended up here you hear the thick grass being split apart by footsteps a man stands before you before you can make out his face he

lifts you onto his back you don't know his intentions but you don't have any energy to ask questions or fight back you lose Consciousness the infinite void of Blackness is almost soothing imagine never having to wake up and face the absolute hell ahead of you sadly the man who rescued you has other ideas show me where it's hard to make Out what he's saying but he's demanding for a way out of the forest and believes the key you had in your pocket is imperative to that he's right but you're not going to tell him that

after all it's your only way of getting out with a final heavy punch you fall to the ground unconscious again with the last audible words being the doctor cursing you out saying he'll kill you like a dog if he has to [Music] And that is the introduction to Darkwood one of my favorite alltime games and I still cannot think of a better way to open a game and because no one wanted to sponsor us we're selling Darkwood merch with permission from the creators you can buy two different designs one of them has characters you can

meet across the game including the protagonist looking edgy and the other one looks like a Saturday morning cartoon because as we all know Darkwood is a Familyfriendly game available now at parasitical do store linked down below seriously I know I pump out lots of slop but this video really put me in the red so buying a shirt helps me make more videos like this please thank you for big purchase of Darkwood shirt [Music] L happy my face with iing glassy shading wrapped in bubble plastic I'm fragile wash my hands and Gast my ches and car

Please handle me carefully damage me sparkly I'm clossed over come here I come over tell the sun's broken stop smell the roses I see things and stop motion skin bonus un lotion skin tone like col skin tone like col SOA I lost control of it block corck poises all crystal dissolve and cook off the tap water lay down at da and crawl back up and I fall home stop racing hard be soft hard stops and starts [Music] my racing hard is stop starts breaks apart and pains the walls where did all this PE up from

break the sell the car break my chain I change my locks I want to talk to the spirit gods I talk to through broken jaws broke my teeth on something [Music] hard I'm missing something I'll do it all for nothing [Music] I'm [Music] the for [Music] now I've begun so many videos by saying I hate horror games and especially I hate jump scares but Darkwood is one of my favorite games because despite being a horror game it has zero jump scares I've always hated jump scares because it's a cheap tactic to scare people have a

scary image appear appear on screen With a loud noise rinse and repeat and now you have an entire franchise based around a cheap trick why don't her pants fall down but Darkwood scares me in a completely unique way because instead of worrying about a PNG appearing on my screen and losing 6 minutes of progress instead I'll lose a valuable extra life with only a finite amount of them being in the game or I might lose that pistol I spent all my currency to get that fully upgraded shovel I spent the best Part of the game

searching in car wrex haggling with Traders and killing enemies to get the parts off or I might even get a full game over being forced to restart the game after sinking half a dozen hours or so there's no I died I died why did I not switch cry about it I feel happy sorry get a packet off to calm down shut up many games don't punish you for wasting time or resources standing in one place swinging a weapon or shooting a gun will Have no consequence apart from maybe slightly emptying your ammo pool of hundreds

of bullets or alerting enemies to your presence or giving you a wanted rating in most open world games but in Darkwood if you stood in the same area firing your gun you're wasting incredibly rare and expensive ammo given how the woods are cut off from the rest of the world and even if you acquired enough influence to buy ammo from Traders you're still at a l because now You owe them something in return you suck my dick and shut the [ __ ] up huh well okay instead let's say you swing a plank with Nails

in the air aimlessly you're not doing any durability damage because you're not hitting anything and even the stamina bar replenishes pretty quickly except now you just wasted the day because it's night and you've gathered no resources to fortify your hideout no traps to ward off Intruders hly ho neighborino no fuel to keep the Lights on it nice and now the scary Flor Gore is chasing you because you forgot to even turn the oven on something you can't outrun and once it catches up to you will slowly drain your health until it kills you even time

itself is an extremely valuable resource I manag my time very carefully Mr Alderson each beep indicates one minute of my time that has passed I have allotted you no more than 3 minutes she's trolling me now if you couldn't tell Darkwood is a Very hard game so hard in fact then less than 10% of people that bought the game actually have the achievement for reaching only the second chapter in the game it gives you three difficulties upon starting up a run normal hard and Nightmare normal is the forgiving mode as in when you die you'll

drop part of your equipment and respawn at your hideout where you'll have to go back and get it yourself a bit annoying but nothing you can't recover from Hard Mode Puts a spin on this because you spawn with skull icons next to your health these are your lives and once you run out of them the save file is deleted and you're bumped back to the main menu and Nightmare where the same applies but you only have one single life and if you decide to play the game on nightmare obviously whatever trauma you enjoyed as a

child clearly wasn't enough because it is one of the hardest difficulties imaginable and anytime you die you'll Totally feel like it's out of your control despite it probably just being that you didn't prepare enough Darkwood was developed and published by acid wizard Studios except if you played it on the switch which was done by crunching koalas and funnily enough is probably one of the few switch games to not run like a PowerPoint slides show they were an incredibly small team with only three employees programmer and I'm going to butcher this now Gustav staev Gusta [

__ ] hell Gustaf stashi artists ordas and yakob cook with yakob also doubling up as the game's music composer if you couldn't tell but the names being completely incomprehensible to read They're a Polish team meaning they already had a lot of experience with living in desolate wastelands prior to making Darkwood the company was originally founded on March the 1st 2013 you can even find some pre-alpha gameplay from that year on their YouTube Channel looking very different to the final product but the foundations are still there wait is that is that the painting of the soy

face man that's not in the final release orig orally Darkwood was funded as an Indiegogo campaign the website their UBS made a series on over 8 years ago you've now just been reminded how old you are the campaign was a success getting $557,000 of their $40,000 goal which is 143% of the goal for the Cool Math people minus Indiegogo's 5% cut and they're still well into the green of their initial goal they also had a stretch goal for a new game plus two additional translations and multiplayer but unfortunately the goal wasn't met so these were

into the void July 24th 2014 Darkwood entered steam green light and finally came out as a full release on August 17th 2017 acid Wizards said themselves they played hundreds of video games and tried to Analyze what would make the perfect game they play games all the time of every age platform and tipe I also found this from a video that they made for their Indiegogo campaign where they're all dressed up as Wizards in some random polish Forest what are your names and how are you involved in the production of Darkwood I'm gas and I am

Jacob there's also Arthur who is not joining us today I've been responsible for most of the technical stuff and most of the Marketing and also one3 of the game design and story and a little bit of story and stuff I was mainly responsible for the animation in the game Darkwood was made uh early uh by three of us when talking about the lore and design also and Arthur was uh responsible for pretty much all of the art and music and most of the story so what makes Darkwood so good well if you go onto the

frequently asked questions part of the game the devs give A brief summary that it's a horror game with elements of black comedy and I can confirm that is 100% true Darkwood like other games I've talked about like cruelty Squad and more recently lethal company it never holds your hand you'll be given brief tips on gameplay elements but most of these are done diegetically like the protagonist muttering to himself that he needs to get back to his Hideout before nightfall because being outside at night is a death [Music] sentence booting the game up it'll warn you

that you're playing a challenging and unforgiving game you will not be led by the hand but if you respect the woods and be patient focused there might be a chance for you to survive it's a game that forces you to experiment with items and how they interact with the world you can also find bottles of alcohol lying around in the woods because of course even in the Face of an apocalypse Polish people will still be making moonshine you could drink said alcohol to get a decent Health boost a great substitute if you don't have any

medical equipment on you but because it's polish vodka which is over 100% proof it'll impact your field of view speed and vision for about 30 seconds making you pretty much useless in combat oh sliver bits it's polish it'll make us go blind but let's say you're a tea toal Like PewDiePie you can instead wet some bandages giving you bandages with alcohol that gives you a much more potent healing item that will continuously heal even when you're taking damage making preading a very viable strategy just like that other Eastern European Survival game does does oh my

God or you can stick a rag in inside a bottle and light it with a match and now you have a Molotov cocktail which is great for setting up Areas of denial and choke points or you can add a wooden plank and now you have a torch a decent melee weapon that can also light the way in Darker areas that's just a single item in the game and you already have a multitude of uses for it but let's say you're cosplaying the average beod drunker parking loot dwelling polish Citizen and you drank the bottle anyway

well now your bottle's empty but it is still incredibly useful you can now throw it on the floor to Create a broken glass trap that will deal damage and alert you to enemies or you could even fill it with rotten mushrooms native to the dark wood and create a gas trap which deals low damage because the farts aren't very potent but you can also ignite the gas to create a huge explosion you can even make a lantern by combining it with fuel and Rags a much more powerful light source than the torch again you've got

so many options from literally a single item you Find in the forest and keep in mind there are over 200 items across the entire game you'll notice that you have a cone of vision wherever you're looking places you aren't currently looking at will still be present but will be purposely obscured things like important objects key items and of course enemies you want have sex it's almost like the player has a mental image of how the area would look like in their head you can still see big objects like tables Being moved around or doors opening

this can be terrifying for combat encounters because although you'll be able to hear an enemy at all times you won't be able to see them unless you're looking directly at them or relying on your pathetically small 36 of vision which will only show you the enemy when they're already chomping on your flesh which usually means a stun lock until you die it means certain strategies are way Harder to pull off like baiting enemies as you don't actually know how far away they are apart from their sounds according to the devs themselves they were inspired by

The Works of David Lynch most known for Twin Peaks the show where if you watch it with the knowledge that everyone is deeply mentally ill it actually starts to make sense [Music] but also science fiction writers like Stanis wavm and the staki brothers who Are most known nowadays for writing roadside picnic the book that directly influenced the stalker franchise but as much as it sounds like it this game isn't just a top- down stalker even though both have RPG elements looting merchants and quests look stalker doesn't have a woman that you can hit with a

shovel so this clearly isn't some poor imitation funnily enough whenever I see a top- down Perspective game I let out a comedically loud yawn and then Just turn the game off I usually gravitate to firstperson games for the best immersion and maybe compromise with a third person game but top down it has to be really really good to keep my attention and Darkwood does exactly that I have well over a 100 hours on this game and would happily do another run right after I upload this [Music] beginning the game we're playing as someone who knows

the situation is dire If the intro text and him waking up from a drunken stuper doesn't convey that you can see that this man is on at least stage six of male patent boldness pity he won't live long enough to see it this intro is mainly used to teach mechanics to the player and give some World building you'll notice that you have a cursor that you can use to interact with objects like open doors and drag Furniture but if you move your cursor too far from the player it will black Out as if you couldn't

reach it in the real world making it so you can't even see if an object is interactable food seems to be a real scarcity here with some of the last edible food left being basic potatoes I mean of course this is Poland after all the only edible thing growing on this land I still have some left the man also seems to have barricaded his house to keep Intruders out being in such a dangerous area the game doesn't even let you dismantle them Dismantling this now would be suicide this will be a vital mechanic once the

game begins proper [ __ ] walking into the lobby of the house you can see Rusty cages and investigating a drawer we can finally learn a bit about who we're playing as my tools they haven't been sterilized for years the local patients can't be helped anyways we can assume this is the local doctor though it seems like he hasn't practice proper medicine in quite Some time next to the drawer is a bag with a photo of what looks like to be some kind of human with the date marked 12th of June 1985 a medical bag

which the doctor calls useless and a zenic camera which is a real life Soviet brand of camera which was in production since the 1950s by now we know two things there's some kind of outbreak or infection to the point that normal medical tools don't work and the game takes place somewhere in 1980s Poland There's a good chance this takes place within the PPR and one of the main players of the warsa packed Alliance you know one of the teams you can pick in Card War Zone yeah those people you don't need to read into it

anymore the holiday time when we were kids looks like summer time in rural areas so we visited our grandparents for example and it looked like this like it's like Village and we wanted to make it like it from our experience we didn't want to Place Darkwood in some places that we don't know from our experiences we were born in the Polish People's Republic but it stopped being a thing when we were like two or three we didn't really um experience this time but our parents used to tell us a lot of stories about this time

it was a crazy time like totally different what what from what we have now and I think all of those stories kind of kept this crazy image in our heads of how how how that time Looked like this very kind of U surreal even time I don't think it was a very deliberate choice that about the setting I think it was just what we found was um cool and then it kind of went on from that we also know the doctor has taken drastic measures to try and treat the people in the village cages this

time they're empty and next to it a locked metal door I would rather not open it I spent too much time to log him in there for the last 800 hours I've been nonstop Gooning finding the Doctor's Medical book there's some vague outline of how the infection works with different stages of the illness progressing he's been obsessing over these notes to the point where if you interact with any of these scribblings on the floor he'll simply say this I know these notes by heart I don't want to read them now obviously all the studying and

research has yielded little little helpful results one very important item is a Radio in the middle of the room radio has been silent for years although sometimes I think I can hear voices through the static this seems like a throwaway line but it will play into the story very heavily especially later on exploring outside the Doctor's house you can find his wrecked car a Polish Fiat 125p which was a real car produced from 1967 to 1991 it was a variant of the italian-made Fiat 125 but instead of being made by fat it was manufactured by

The fabria samod aaba how kill you for you done or passenger car factory in English because it was the only passenger car manufacturer in socialist Poland still an icon for the Polish people as you can find them on online marketplaces where they'll usually be bought ORS solved by collectors or patriarch Boomers trying to relive the old days when the 125p was the peak of motorization but since all the access roads have been devoured by the woods it Became a useless pile of tra how closely would you say that Darkwood encapsulates average polish life more it's

like a meme thing the reviews are telling that oh it's my it's my average day in Poland I think there's a bit of this like Slavic kind of misery theme that is spring hooked ac across the game uh but obviously the the things that happened in the game were completely not real and not uh based on real events They are they real it's less than a few minutes into the game when Darkwood presents you with the first player choice there are dozens of choices you make across the game and some of them even Ripple across

your playthrough that Grant you access or block you off from certain items characters or even entire areas it's basically impossible to experience everything the game has to offer in a single playthrough but here your first choice with seemingly minimal Consequences is the doctor's dog my dog I don't think he's going to make it I should end his suffering the dog only takes up a few dozen pixels on the screen but thanks to the superb animation and audio design you can hear it writhing in pain you can choose to put the dog out of its misery

or leave it to suffer no choice feels like the right one here do you try to let the animal live despite its immense pain or do you put it out of its misery removing Any chance there it might recover you're presented with so many choices like this across the game and another game that I love that had much fewer but similar choices s I'm going to keep this brief because I do want to do a video on Sumer at some point and I don't want you guys to skim through that video because I've already spoiled

it but there's a scenario in the game where you have a choice to terminate a character in the game it's Totally optional and unlike Darkwood doesn't really impact the story but it's still a choice that'll Linger on you for the rest of your playthrough you know if you made the right decision and that's why Darkwood is a game that no matter what choice you make you always feel like you've made the wrong one most games have a good and a bad choice with the good choice usually taking more effort to achieve I've got nothing more

to say to tricking players into thinking They're good people because they went the extra mile to get a good outcome but here in the woods there's no time for that because every second counts games can also just go down the Fallout 3 route where you have the Obviously good don't kill people choice and the one that blows up an entire town wow what an engaging moral dilemma in Darkwood though the choices are never that simple outcomes usually just being A slightly different shade of gray which makes the game feel so much more personal almost like

it's asking you personally what would you do in this situation so how hard was it to plan for like all the choices in the game it was really hard both in terms of game design because like the game started off as a rogue like and then kind of evolved into not Ro like it was hard to design all of this during the transition and on top of that you have kind of all technical Stuff like random generation and procedural generation and also kind of how it impacts the story and stuff like that so I don't

even know how we did that honestly just was just so [ __ ] hard after finding an Axe and cutting down part of a Fallen Tree you're probably wondering well if the situation is so dire in the woods why don't they just cut all the trees down Lau look it's like Minecraft guys if you punch the tree long enough it'll lose a block Maybe you can make a crafting table and cut down the trees faster well the doctor acknowledges how this was never a permanent solution these trees are growing too fast soon I won't be

able to cut them down fast enough you can even see the remnants of a road something incredibly rare in the forest but both sides have been consumed by the tree line the woods have been devoured all the roads that connect us to the outside world no one is able to pass through the [ __ ] coming across an abandoned house we can see the body of someone that's fused into a tree in a few days it'll be completely absorbed this gives us some indication that the plague is associated with the woods with bodies being absorbed

into the tree presumably for sustenance which could also be what the grainy photograph the doctor picked up shows past the house the doctor stumbles onto an unconscious man wearing a long damaged coat and a rather large rimmed Hat wa with a blood trail behind him it seems that he barely escaped whatever was chasing him I think this one is still breathing searching the man's Pockets the doctor finds a large metal key with the item description if there is an exit out of these Woods this key will surely open it he's unconscious I've never seen him

around before he's only carrying a key in some Journal since he managed to sneak in here he must know how to get out Of course he won't help me [Music] voluntarily but [Music] that is of no importance when the cut scene ends you're no longer playing as the doctor but the man he found in the woods with your health bar practically empty and having nothing in your inventory the doctor might have saved you from bleeding out in the woods but it was for Purely selfish reasons I need to get out of this our csed forest

you hear me rat show me how and I will let you go after the doctor searches you for a second time for any clues to escaping the forest or supplies he takes a moment simply staring into a corner of the empty room she's calling me calling me to return home you pass out again but when you wake up your character is tied to a chair while the doctor begins interrogating you where is the exit Where show me where I'll kill you like a dog if I have to ironic words depending on the choice you made

as the doctor minutes prior eventually the doctor will leave letting you free yourself from the restraints and getting back on your feet with the first words of your character saying that [ __ ] stole my key keep in mind that these subtitles appear at the bottom of the screen not in game like when the doctor was shouting at you These are your inner thoughts and not actual dialogue said out loud which will make a lot of of sense much later on already it's acknowledged how important that key is with the man completely focused on how

it was taken from him despite being beaten half to death and everything else that's happened to him the door the doctor left you in is locked so you'll have to improvise with the game giving you an incredibly brief example of the game's crafting system by Searching the doctor's jacket he left behind you can tear some of it off to make some rags and find some wire in his pockets with the game diagetic telling the player how to craft I'm hurt I could use these rags to craft some band and heal myself locked I could open

it with a lockpick after healing our wounds with the bandage and opening the chest with a lockpick we can find a flashlight and a shovel with the latter letting us break Down the door which completely breaks the already weary shovel but at least now we're out what the [ __ ] is this piece of [ __ ] but now we have another problem the power to the house has died which is indirectly your fault because the entire point of playing as the doctor was to refuel the generator and instead he had to bring your fat

ass all the way back to the house all we had to do was fill up the generator CJ before the power Goes out you can briefly see the doctor standing in front of you before disappearing if we were playing any other game there'd probably be a loud jump scare noise right after but we're playing Darkwood where instead of a scary face appearing on the screen you get scared More Often by the characters disappearing Once you turn around where is it so what was your policy on jump scar cuz obviously Darkwood I feel kind of Has

a reputation for being a game without jump scares like like the only one personally I can think of is like if one of the Banshee enemy spots you like you know little jpeg appears on the screen but it's not really a jump scare but what was your policy around that of like trying to make a game with atmosphere but not relying on jump scares it was very important for us to not make uh not rely on the jump scares because we didn't enjoy it also we don't Enjoy it in the in the horror movies and

we also said many times that we that Darkwood is a horror game made by people who don't like horror genre like maybe not at all but especially the jump scare part of the you know why jump scares like you go to a cinema and you just hate it yeah I can't stand it that's why I never see horror films in a cinema because I I feel like it's so predictable but it it kind of plays on that fital flight in your brain so it's Almost like you watch any horror film ever it's like when they

get ready for a jum scare all the music dies down the audio dies down it's like someone walking through a carage or really slowly and I swear I am like a child I will actually do this in the cinema I put my fingers on my ears because I know the jump scare is coming I know it's coming but it's still going to scare me because it's just such a loud sudden noise but yeah I think it's really good That you guys didn't really kind of rely on that it it does make the game very refreshing

definitely I think we we found it a little bit chip I mean I know that the people enjoy it because of the adrenaline or something you know like really hits you and I respect that but I don't really enjoy it and I find it a little bit cheap yeah I agree uh we actually were when we were talking about Inspirations of how we want to make horror I think we a lot of The Inspirations were completely outside of the horror genre you remember the the first UFO games yes and and stuff like that we remember

from the child or childhood and we like the idea that you have to kind of the horror plays in your mind not exactly in uh what what you see but uh what you hear and what you don't hear and see kind of makes this a bigger impact on you than just a jump scare right your imagination kind of filling in the blanks kind of thing yes yes yes Exactly so we like that and I think it's played really well in Darkwood we're now exploring the Doctor's house but without the knowledge of the doctor so everything

is alien to us the door that was best to not open will now present us with a combination that we don't know the code to and we can see more of the doctor's experiments a metal table with leather belts strapped on inside another chest is a half empty can of gasoline a table leg which we can use as a melee Weapon it's very apparent the doctor wanted to forget about this room because it was blocked off by a wooden shelf and there's also gasoline that he could have used earlier instead of having to scavenge pouring

the gasoline in and turning on the generator the seemingly useless radio in the middle of the room has now been replaced by something else entirely the corpse has two dials instead of eyes his mouth is wide open and I hear a distorted voice fairely Distinguishable from the radio static the corpse also tells us a code now this set piece can seem creepy just for the sake of it something that's either never explained or resolved with it all being in Le head but I'm happy to say for once it's none of those Darkwood is a game

that has answers to everything it just takes a while for it to slowly reveal its full hand what do you think woo very nice using the code to open the door and with the hindsight of playing As the doctor we know that someone is trapped in this room help me after turning a corner the man brutally attacks you probably mistaking you for the doctor taking all his aggression of being imprisoned out on you he says no more dialogue and can't be reason with he'll just keep blindly attacking you until he kills you or you beat

him to death with the table leg searching his body you can find a small plastic chick and how do you want to get out now You think you could manage all by yourself suddenly monstrous voices can be heard outside the Doctor's house all the in the house goes out and ravenous claing and chomping can be heard at the doctor's barricaded windows and doors something is trying desperately to get in you can try to run to barricade yourself in a room or even try to fight back but it's no use you're not equipped to survive the

woods no one is but maybe it's not over Yet the blood soaked screen Fades to a washed out gray you make out the figure of someone in the distance behind the woods who recognizes you he reaches his hand out to you unlike the Doctor Who forc you onto his back it looks like he really does me to help you maybe you'll just make it after all when you wake up you're not in the doctor's cabin anymore but a dilapitated house with the man who seemingly rescued you nowhere to be found the first thing You'll probably

notice is a new buff that's been added above your health bar called night protection explaining that you're in a hyow and under the influence of its protective substance which will help you survive the night why are you and that's all thanks to the oven you wake up next to yeah this is going to help big time with interacting with it you can see what was originally a basic Stone oven used by someone here probably used to cook perogi or some Other traditional polish slop built with various mechanical and organic wires and growth spewing from it

looking more like a makeshift lab if any so yeah the average Slavic kitchen you then have the option of examining the oven which gives you the first hint of who your character is and why he's even here when I arrived here a couple days ago the oven was basically prepared I just needed to light it up to ensure my safety at night this Cottage must have Been one of our hideouts the inhabitants of these Woods don't need to inhale this revolting gas the second option the oven gives you is to examine a strange bottle the

label on the bottle says staying out of the reach of the protective substance after Nightfall results in immediate death in 99 out of 100 cases it is advised to evenly spread the gas inside the sleeping area warning even a properly prepared substance does not guarantee 100% safety remain Vigilant it Is recommended to stay in well lit indoor areas in order to minimize the risk the way the oven is set up and the way the character speaks it seems that both people have tried to set up camps inside the woods and also the person you're playing

as is some kind of outsid with external knowledge they're not a random villager that got lost but someone with real experience especially the way he says a pleasant warmth is emanating from the oven I can sense a Strange yet familiar scent it's the smell of the protective substance which gives me relative safety after dark the vapors rising from the huge cauldron are distributed all over the house via long pipes as long as I remain inside my Hideout I have a chance of surviving the night and how he mentions that he and the other people he's

with aren't from the woods because people here are so acclimated to the situation they don't need the protective gas that's produced From the oven the oven itself acts as a safe zone for the player if you're anywhere at night the unkillable floor Gore that I mentioned earlier will start to chase you and chop away your health until you die inside a hideout with the oven turned on the makeshift gases that cover the entire house will actually repel it but like the instruction said it isn't guaranteed safety and you should always be on your guard also

the fact that our protagonist can breathe in What's described as revolting gas with no issues could point to him being from CAU as anyone living in that city has long progress beyond the need for breathing oxygen I really hope you guys like the Polish Center jokes by the way because there's going to be a lot more there's one more option unlocked with the oven to look inside the pot pressing the cook option shows the player holding an empty syringe with probably the crustiest fingernails imaginable brother You'll see the oven's efficiency how many doses and how

much essence you need this is basically the leveling up system of the game which I'll come back to later you'll notice how the protagonist which I guess is what we're calling him now since the doctor is long gone mentions how he has no thirst or hunger since the accident despite Darkwood being a survival game there's no thirst or hunger mechanics that's actually kind of uncommon for Modern Survival Games Since the genre tends to crutch onto them as something to make you leave the safety of your base then oh [ __ ] anything you eat or

drink will usually heal you or give differing effects if you find common loots like breads eggs or potatoes they'll briefly give you the endurance that which reduces your stamina cost while sprinting or fighting so even though you don't need to eat anymore they do still have a use as basically Stimulants they also have another important use which I'll come back to later I I know I'm saying I'll come back later a lot that there are a lot of mechanics the protagonist also has a journal which you can access at any time here he'll write down

his thoughts and characters he's interacted with opening the journal you'll see that pages are missing ripped out with the doctor in the prologue finishing with a sentence that's missing context he ruined my Dream journal I did not into these damn Savages everything should go smoothly the next entry will always be entered as soon as you wake up in The Hideout for the first time giving us a direct time and date that the game is set in 12th of September 1987 I don't remember anything since the attack on our camp somehow I'm wearing a coat I

must have change my clothes on the way here I don't recognize myself anymore I can barely hold this pencil has my body changed I No longer feel hunger or thirst what has happened to me much like Arthur and John in Red Dead 2 he'll also draw in his journal while explaining events he's witnessed and what he has to do next I remember his face the face of the man who saved me then held me captive I don't know how I managed to escape his hurt and end up here what I do know is that the

insane [ __ ] took my key my only chance to get out of the woods he also tore out all the pages of my Journal I doubt that he was able to learn the location of the underground passage though I should check if the door is still locked just to be sure I must find him I don't think he's still lives in the same place where he held me makes no difference as I have no idea how to get back to that vile Place exploring the rest of the cottage you'll see a toppled over wardrobe

that was used as a barricade to keep something out before it broke inside searching it You'll find various crafting items but also a photo of a road inspecting the photo it's renamed to the road home with a highway with the forest either side but seemingly at the end a way out of the forest I'll be waiting for you in woods nvar now it's pretty obvious that you or someone you with set up this hideout out but in another diagetic tutorial on how to survive your protagonist will just say this outright yesterday I barricaded one of

the Windows if I want to stay here for some time I should do the same with the other windows barricading is one of your first lines of Defense in your hideout it can really help delay enemy attacks sounds like someone breaking in yes just like in Siege even though I hate to make that comparison keep in mind though I said delay not deter because once an enemy starts breaking down one of your barricades they usually won't stop until they break through or you go outside and Stop them which also puts you at a huge risk

of exposure but also at the same time the barricades can actually end up trapping you because while you can Vault over regular Windows to get some space from enemies or bait them into vaulting themselves you can't do that if the window is barricaded closing you off from potential Escape Routes one thing you might notice during multiple playthroughs of dark wood is The Hideout you spawn in after the prologue despite Having the same general layout could be differently shaped or have an entirely different orientation this is because every Darkwood game is randomly generated opening your map

you'll always have the same three General regions in Darkwood with you starting off in the dry Meadow the way to progress to each region is usually the same but the shape and placement of key locations will be totally random which could be a huge help or hindrance like for example if You're trying to reach a location to progress the story it might be right next to The Hideout or on the complete opposite side of the region you always start in the dry Meadow but like the orientation and like where locations are full generation it's random

generation and part procedural generation yeah cu the progression is always the same the areas you go through are the same but like where location in different places yeah that's the random generation cu the The locations themselves are mostly the same the loot is distributed among the biomes the orientation is different but the forest itself between those location is procedurally generated but it doesn't really I think impact the game like in a meaningful way now each Hideout will always have the same objects for you to survive in the forest that being the cooker I mentioned earlier

but also a generator wood shipper well and a workbench the Generator is filled with gasoline that you can find in the forest this is a very valuable item as you can't craft it so you'll have to rely on finding it as loose while exploring the woods the game is forgiving enough to already have the generator filled up to survive at least the first night with a full night's fuel cost being indicated by The Notches on the bar when you examine it but after that it's up to you to keep it filled generators help a lot

because without Them you're basically fighting in complete darkness and also certain events during the night require you to stay near a light source or you'll be forced to experience what Polish people have to go through when they run out of alcohol next up the wood chipper now this thing is a gasoline guzzler because wood is such a huge part of crafting in this game for barricades and also many other items you'll also want to keep some planks handy now you're probably Wondering in a game called Darkwood which takes place pretty much entirely in the woods

why is it so hard to get wood well like the doctor explained in the prologue the woods are expanding at such a fast rate that no one can control them and normal tools aren't able to cut them down so unfortunately this isn't like Minecraft where you can just hit a tree until it turns into a block of wood in the intro he was able to cut down some branches with his fire axe but it Was basically a twig and secondly you don't have an axe you can find planks out in the world but very infrequently

but what you will find in aund are logging areas where people were harvesting trees probably before the outbreak you'll get a few of these in each area and looting the logs you'll be able to collect the wood among other important loot like nails and Stones what was I saw you put something in your pocket what was that what did you put in There the logs are useless on their own but by sticking them in a wood chipper you can turn them into planks with each log taking up an entire chunk of the wood Chipper's fuel

you'll need around two to three gasoline canisters to completely top up the wood chipper and carrying an entire stack of logs will use up pretty much all of that fuel so in my opinion always prioritize the generator then if you've got anything to spare stick it in the wood chipper the Well is located right outside any Hideout they always spawn broken but can be repaired with just four boards afterwards you can drink from them once a day to quickly and fully restore your health now this is a great option when you're out of healing items

when trying to survive the night or to save up using any healing items when going out to explore despite rain actually being very common in the game it doesn't actually fill up the well so it's apparent that The benefits you're getting are much deeper in the earth there's also a cut mechanic related to the well in early builds of the game you'd actually get a debuff called thirst in the evening forcing you to either drink from the well or continue taking damage throughout the night apparently it was supposed to be caused by the plague's influence

but probably more likely the protagonist suffering with alcohol withdrawal I mean it's never marked what The alcohol is you find in the game so it's probably just pure ethanol I assume it was a way to force the protagonist outside at uncomfortable times but obviously as I talked about earlier there's no thirst there's no hunger they're not mechanics in this Survival game there's also the workbench and essential tool of any hideout in it you're able to store any excess loot that you find because your inventory in Darkwood is comedically small to begin With and it actually

kind of makes sense because you have no backpack and you're probably just sticking everything in your coat Pockets again I don't really understand how you could fit an entire wooden log or a car battery in a coat pocket but video games but it also doubles up as a crafting bench you can only craft smaller items on your person like bandages torches and lockpicks you'll be crafting anything more advanced at your hideout workbench to Start off with your workbench will always be level one and the items you craft are pretty limited you'll be able to craft

a chain trap this costs two scrap metal an incredibly rare and important resource especially late game the most common way to find them is by Scavenging bear traps left around the forest which people were probably using to catch the last remnants of food here I don't have a bear trap for this video so I just I bought a mouse trap you can Interact with it where your character dismantles it luckily for you there's already a bear trap set up inside your hideout from whoever was last here the bear trap under the window is still open

looks like this night was exceptionally uneventful unlike bear traps the chain trap doesn't actually do any damage when stepping on it instead enemies that step on it will be stuck onto a chain for 30 seconds giving you the opportunity to get some cheap hits in the only problem Is unlike the bear trap it's single use and they won't any salvageable metal once it's used up but you can pick it up to get the scrap metal back if you want to place an unused one in a better location both of these traps are great to place

at choke points like doors and windows as enemies are never actually smart enough to do a Dark Souls eye frame to dodge the traps and we'll just take the fastest option to get towards you next up in the crafting is the Antidote now this thing costs one mushroom something I'll get into later it will cure any poisoning the player gets and gives you immunity from any other poison for about 30 seconds thankfully dark wood and I do want to say thankfully for how unforgiving this game is no enemies actually deal poison damage but what you'll

come across especially in later areas are patches of poisonous mushrooms randomly scattered across the map these skinny pale Mushrooms will poison the player when step on now usually if you step on one for the first time you'll panic and then you'll probably start running around probably onto other mushrooms and the thing is with poison it Stacks so if you step on too many you'll just end up dead on the ground I found this out the hard way when I was streaming the game and and had to give $100 to chat every single time I died

okay okay I'm losing Health very Quickly no it was a bit it was a bit it was a bit I'm not giving a $100 for a bit it was a bit please don't die for [ __ ] sake best thing to do when standing on poisonous mushrooms is to remain calm and wait the poison out if you don't have an antidote on you because with the screen effects sound effects and the literal Skull emoji appearing on your hood it's easy to lose track and end up dead a single poison effect doesn't even do too much

damage It's mostly just keeping you on edge psychologically but you wouldn't think that with all the onscreen information You' being given the next item is the first melee weapon the protagonist can make for himself the board with nails made with planks and Nails it's why Finding logging sites is your first priority because despite that guy in the prologue wailing on you with his sucker punches there's no way for you to actually abuse your fists in Darkwood It's a great melee weapon that you rely on for most of the early game like most weapons it has

two attacks a Charged Up attack that uses less stamina but slows you down before you swing and also leaves you open into being stun locked when out of the charge animation and also a quick jab with the trade-off being it uses up a huge chunk of stamina the reason why I mention planks with nails being so important is because melee weapons have durability and once They break you can't use them again until you repair them at a workbench and the board with nails has the durability of a YouTuber in a social situation so by the

time you kill two to three lesser enemies the thing will break thankfully the workbench has another trick up its sleeve weapon upgrades you can upgrade most melee weapons in the game with the board being able to get durability damage output and stamina drain upgrades the problem is once you upgrade it one Time you'll be locked out of any further upgrades until you upgrade the workbench itself having to upgrade it twice before applying a second weapon upgrade and a third upgrade when you upgrade it another two more times and so on the first workbench upgrade only

costs more boards and nails again pretty easy to come by but after that you'll need a toolbox and that's a good while away my advice is to upgrade the damage of the board with nails and always carry two in Case you're deep into exploring and one of them breaks now let's say you've already got enough wood and nails to upgrade your workbench to level two you won't be able to add a second upgrade to your board but now you'll have four more crafting options the hot bar upgrade inventory upgrade bear trap and gas bottle the

latter I talked about earlier the hot bar and inventory upgrades are essential mostly because in any semi-open game I'm a kleptomaniac and Try to loot every single item I can find that's the main reason why I only got around 2 hours into Starfield because once I became over encumbered I finally realized how mid the game was the heart bar upgrade will give you an additional slot in your quick selection and the inventory upgrade will give you two slots in your pockets sounds like a no-brainer upgrading your inventory but any item you want to use in

game will have to be in your hot bar unless you Want to rumage around in your pockets in the middle of a fight on top of that certain items like weapons have to be in the hot bar to even be usable another big thing is that on normal or hard difficulties you don't lose items in your hot bar when you die meaning you can use it as storage for any valuables that you're terrified of losing both the inventory and the hot bar can be upgraded three times you'll start off with 12 inventory which can be

upgraded To 18 and then you start off with three hot bar slots that can be upgraded to six and even with a fully upgraded capacity you'll still be deciding what loot is more important to take with you you can actually get around that six hot bar slot limit but I'll come back to that later both of these use the same items to upgrade a rope and fabric both of which again as you can probably expect are incredibly rare usually being found at preset areas in the game ropes Being found mostly in Wells and fabric being

found on specific loot containers this is another reason why it's so important to do multiple runs of Darkwood because even if the map is slightly different each time you'll be able to recall placements of important loots that help you survive the bear trap is a direct up up grade of the chain trap it costs an extra scrap metal but will hold enemies completely in place it only works for Half the time of the chain trap but will deal heavy damage as a compensation you can also Harvest them after they've been stepped on just make sure

to never step on your own bear trap because you'd have no idea how easy it is to do that you know like if you place one inside your house to stop enemies from using the windows and then you use the same window to get in because you completely forgot about the bear trap looking around the rest of the hideout In a drawer all you can find a book talking about mushroom related culinary called oh my God I'm not reading all that bro can someone polish read this please it's not [ __ ] real this is

actually a real book written in 1928 by Yosef swaboda you can even read it online listing what mushrooms can and can't be eaten and how to even prepare them more on the mushrooms you might have noticed near the generator there's a growth of Pulsating mushrooms mushroom mushroom musom enough about the mushrooms we all know it's a mushroom we get it like the poisonous ones they will still damage you when you step on them but if you keep your distance you can actually Harvest them for a single oddl looking mushroom now this sounds weird but this

is essentially your XP because you can use them in the cooker to fill up the needle probably by making mushroom perogi the Polish equivalent to Magic Shrooms mushrooms always spawn in preset locations like houses and camps never as loot but can also appear as clusters in mushroom Fields a minor location in the game which will be marked on your map when exploring now remember how bad I said the poisonous mushrooms are well now you'll have to wait through a field of them because at the center are three of these invaluable mushrooms it's a great way

to level up early but that being said get ready to count the Literal pixels on your screen Trying To Shimmy through all the white mushrooms if you do step on one on accident like I said earlier don't freak out stand still don't move maybe even open Tik Tok for a couple of minutes to feed your Zuma brain and everything will be okay that is until later areas where a man made out of [ __ ] mushrooms climbs out of the ground chasing you while laughing knowing how [ __ ] you are only to explode when

he knows that he can't get To you like I said the game is pretty unforgiving oh and if that wasn't difficult enough any mushroom you do Harvest will immediately begin rotting so you'll have to run back to the cooker to turn it into Essence before it fully rots after it rots it can only be used in a gas bottle that I mentioned earlier because of this it's probably better to wait picking them until you know you're about to head back but but let's say you harvested all the Mushrooms you can find and you did manage

to fill up the needle before injecting yourself as any normal person would do with an unwashed old syringe you're presented with a skill tree of perks to pick with each syringe being filled unlocking another tier of perks probably an STD or two as well and casting more and more Essence with each level this isn't mandatory to progress by any means and you can complete the entire game without leveling up once but If you choose to each tier will give you a positive perk to choose from and a negative perk only in Darkwood would you willingly

spend time harvesting XP just to directly downgrade your character the first tier will give you the positive options of Eagle Eye moth Navigator and mushroom healing filling up the syringe a second time will let you pick a second perk from this tree before moving on to the next one and also locking all the previous options out Eagle Eye lets you See farther ahead now this sounds like a must you know to see Loot and situations further away but it's only about a 15% increase which is basic basically nothing despite knowing that I still pick this

perk for every run moth is an active ability meaning you have to voluntarily activate it in the perk selection screen all of the active perks can only be used once a day while passive perks will last your entire playthrough when you use MTH any light Source your next to will buzz giving you an incredibly slow healing boost it seems useless but it's a great perk when you low on health during the night and you don't have any healing items on hand Navigator is a mostly useless perk as mentioned in the prologue if you're not at

a key location in the game you won't show up on the map Navigator when activated will drop a part of your body onto the map which can be used as a marker but surprisingly it Can also be used as bait for some enemies the reason why it's useless is because in each region you'll usually 20 or so seconds away from a location that's marked on your map letting you know where you are now you might find it a bit weird how the protagonist can drop infinite body parts and never seem to run out of them

but if you remember near the start of the game he purposely wrote down in his that he doesn't feel the need to eat Anymore and he's not thirsty anymore something has changed and this explains why in a gaml in a law sense that you can be bit by dogs hit with big sticks or even shot with real bullets from a real gun and you can heal with just bandages and pills over and over something has changed and you're really not human anymore one thing that's interesting though once you drop a body part onto the map

and it's eaten by let's say a wild dog killing the dog You'll find a partly digested finger nose or ear with the description being the remains of my finger a very dead pad description for finding a part of your body in a wild animal the final tier one positive perk is mushroom healing which gives you the ability to restore Health by eating any mushroom that you harvest honestly the most useless skill because like I said earlier you'll want to score any mushrooms you find in the cooker to convert it into Essence to level up you

Could argue that late game once you're at your max level you could use it as a cheap Health Source but they heal worse than the basic bandages in the game if this was the cruelty Squad video I'd be putting them in F tier now anytime you pick a perk in a tier you'll also be forced to pick a negative perk and I do mean forced because believe me I tried to back out the menu after picking a good perk and it straight up won't let you Shadows is the only negative perk in Tier one with

a vague description saying staying in dark areas at night can be dangerous to me with picking this perk you're now forced to make sure the generator is always stucked up because now you've just spawned in a new night event when night falls you're forced to retreat back into your hideout and wait until the morning this is when night events kick in and are arguably one of the reasons why Darkwood is so talked About nights last between 8:00 p.m. and 8:00 a.m. but during this the clock will advance at Double its speed probably because if the

clock Advanced at the same speed it did during the day that being one real life second is a minute no one would be able to get past the first night there are 28 unique events that could occur each night and these all depend on which Hideout you're staying at and this doesn't even include all the normal monsters that try to Break in each night a few are beneficial but most will make surviving even harder but as a reward you'll get a Shiny Stone these are items that are intrinsic to the law of understanding the Darkwood

but for now they're an incredibly rare item that you can't craft but can be sold to certain individuals for a hefty amount and again I'll talk about that later you can even find randomly appearing glowing mushrooms that if you're brave enough you can run out Decide to harvest for a unique glowing mushroom that gives you double the essence of a standard mushroom yes you might even notice during the night that someone is watching you usually dropping a flare in the process but if you approach them they'll quickly run away into the forest they appear human

at least someone who's obviously lived in the forest for so long and they've adapted to the night unlike you an outsider night events are also when The amazing audio of the game comes to life doors can randomly open and your footsteps can slowly be mimicked tricking you into thinking someone else is with you are the monsters in the room with us right now a more obvious event might spawn a poltergeist in the room an unkillable entity that you can't see can't damage you but will throw around prop objects like wardrobes and lights purposely messing up

your plans of placing objects To block entryways or lights to see enemies from afar there's also visual events that don't damage you but can confuse you during a fight like how a large number of bugs might infest your hideout or you might hear a faint heartbeat during the night and when you investigate outside you'll see how all the trees and grass are replaced with pulsating flesh hinting that the forest is more alive than it seems earthquakes are also a Common occurrence with the shock waves kicking up dust massively affecting visibility and even temporarily killing all

the power to your hideout you've spent precious gasoline to keep running remember that negative perk you were forced to pick earlier now randomly at night shadows will invade The Hideout killing all light sources except a single random lamp that you'll have to hug to avoid taking damage drastically reducing your options for fighting back It'll also instantly extinguish any torches you've crafted I like how this is the first negative perk in the game since that effectively baits every new player into picking it forcing a trial by fire if you're lucky enough to get it early on

and basically teaching you that you should always try and stay near the light also I found this out apparently if you never leveled up the entire game and you never picked the Shadows perk it'll still be applied later on in the Game anyway the protagonist will also make a note of the encounter in his journal accompanied with a vague drawing it was a rotten strange night shadowy Silhouettes emerged from the corners of my Hideout I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me in the dark but I'm certain I've seen something if they come back

I should keep close to the light there's also a unique night event to this specific Hideout there's a bed in The Hideout that can't be moved or Searched and on a random night you'll see a man sat on the bed wishing to go home and saying we need to move on he'll sit there the entire night until dawn arrives or if you hit him which if you do will make him disappear and you'll end up taking damage look I I promise this entire game isn't all in lhe head please just stick with me here if

you somehow manag to survive the night you're notice how The Hideout is covered in gray roots and growths Wherever you're not looking and you'll have a new buff called time freeze this is one of the very few forgiving elements the devs added essentially the in-game timer won't activate until you leave The Hideout giving you time to organize your inventory and board up any barricades that were destroyed but on top of that there's someone here to greet you next to the cooker he has a backpack and a hood but Interacting with him you realize what he

truly is even from afar I can smell your putrid stench be glad I don't have an appetite for carcasses meat the figure hides its face under the hood it smells of wet soil and fur I know what you're after I can help you reclaim what you've lost if you help me attend to a certain matter what do you say comrade as he leans towards me I hear him giggling under his hood I knew it would interest You before we make a deal you need to prove that you can do the job I'm I've got no

time for weaklings meat you follow Show Me What You're Made Of get through the Silent Forest you think it's so easy if I were you I would prepare myself well before setting out when you get there you will find me in this spot remember it the wolf grabs my map and scribbl something on it the likes of you always crawl back to me this is The Wolf Man and to be fair it does look like Someone's furry self-insert into the game is that your [ __ ] Persona that's cringe bug infestation but somehow completely makes

sense as to why a literal furry would exist in Darkwood he wears a long coat with a single Bullet Hole while carrying an assault rifle on his back an incredibly rare weapon in the woods it's obvious he knows that you've lost your key and he wants to help you get it back but only if he gets something in return you have Two options here try to progress to the next area the Silent Forest and meet him at his Camp to progress the story or if you really really hate furries which I hope is most of

you you can go outside The Hideout go up to this Locker that you don't know what the code is as it was meant to be exclusively for early backers the code is by the way take out the explosive Barrel inside single shot pistol place the barrel next to him and then blow him Up to which he'll probably still kill you anyway because he has insane Health but if you do manage to kill him you're still allowed to progress the story is normal you probably just have no idea where to go now what the hell heck

is this if you don't want to kill him that Locker does still have some really good early items like nails and boards and items to make a single inventory or hot bar upgrade there's even a knife in there which as a British man I can Always appreciate if you hear The Wolf Man out which to be fair he doesn't give you much of a choice not to you'll be presented with three options which many other characters you meet also share to sh him and isome to trade or gossip gossip is usually just law dumping like

a character giving context to the woods or talking about themselves The Wolf Man on the first encounter will only give you three pieces of incredibly basic advice I wouldn't recommend wandering Around these Woods at night it would mean certain death for you meat better hide out in that Hideout of yours before dark and pray for Morning Light if I were you I wouldn't venture too far from here unless you got bored of your lousy life meat only a few returned from the dense woods and those who made it back were not happy to share their

stories I'd avoid getting into trouble if fire you meat or at least until you get a decent weapon you can also show Him some key items that you found so far most players will only have the road home photo they found in The Hideout what's that you got there the wolf snatches the photograph from my hand and studies it carefully finally he snorts his thick yellow spit landing on the photo this road doesn't exist anymore overgrown with trees like all the other ones the wolf throws the photo to the ground better forget about the road

home meat around here all roads lead to Nowhere and the plastic chick on the body of the man that attacked you in the prologue beautiful item perfect for a church fair on a rare occasion during one of the nights you might actually hear a knocking on the door answering the door you'll see an invitation left for you on the floor inviting you to a celebration and giving you a randomly generated code to get in if you've already had this event happen you can show this invitation to The Wolf Man excellent meet an invitation to a

wedding party the wolf snorts with laughter his putrid landing on my face it's an invitation to that house in the edge of the dry Meadow the music there has been playing non-stop since I remember day and night a never ending wedding the wolf throws the invitation back at me it's wet with spit have fun meat just remember to hide that disaster of a face or it's no dancing for you his last words are a clear indicator that The protagonist's disfigured face isn't just what he perceives it's how others see him as well there's also one

more thing The Wolf Man offers as you might imagine there are no zabka stores in the forest even despite their aggressive expansion which I'm sure has no problem crossing the boundaries of time by now so instead if like me you need to buy three boxes of lacroy what why is that in the script you [ __ ] I don't [ __ ] buy lroy you [ __ ] [ __ ] so instead if you need to buy three boxes of sparkling water you're going to have to trade any real world money is long useless in

the forest the only way to trade being something akin to basic bartering every Trader has a reputation ation value which works as the game's currency with it going up if you do something they respect you for like for example surviving a night or just giving them stuff which is why it's basically Just bartering but with extra steps items you have vary and how valuable they are like how I mentioned earlier these shiny stones are useless to you but valuable to Traders they also give you 100 reputation to start with so it's a great way to

access some of their inventory when you first meet them most items can be traded but depending on who you're talking to they might not be interested in certain items like how the wolf man has no interest in wood and Scrap metal you can never go into negative reputation with the trader if you make an offer which puts you in the red they'll just flat out refuse the entire deal you'll use them as a great way to stock up on items that you might not be able to easily find yourself like how the Wolfman will always

sell a toolbox that you need to upgrade your hideouts workbench to get access to better equipment and also all that food I mentioned earlier you can sell it to The Wolf Man here to fetch a good amount of reputation which you can use to buy a random gun component you probably won't even be able to craft with until about 10 hours later each Trader will sell the exact same stock every single day but every one of them has a unique variety of stock most of them you won't even be able to afford until after the

first couple of nights reputation does stack though so if you give away half your Inventory to a Trader they'll still keep that reputation earned for when the next time you trade with them but it's also important to keep in mind that all Traders are incredibly stingy anything anything you buy from a Trader is worth double what you actually get for selling it to them one item that's always a must from Traders early on is the watch the icon looking like a Casio f91 W which was actually made in the late 80s having this anywhere in

your inventory will Show you the time of day at the top right of the screen which is a lifesaver in planning your day ahead and not having to rely on the sun setting to let you know it's time to go back home after talking to the Wolfman the protagonist makes another entry into his journal accompanied with a sketch of the Wolfman my mind must be going if I'm not delusional the man whom I met had the head of a wolf he told me he will help me get the key back I just need to get

Through to the other side of the forest I am to meet him in the part of the Silent Forest I should explore the surroundings before venturing forth I do not wish to act too hastily the dry Meadow is the first biome you'll always spawn in no matter which way the map is generated it's covering grassland and is the most forgiving biome that being said it's still incredibly difficult especially for new players wolf man also has a camp set up here as well and you Can meet him there to trade if you wish to spend some

more quality time basking in the Striking yet natural beauty of my features before you head off to the Silent Forest you will find me in my camp in the dry Meadow the wolf points to a location on my map the main creatures you'll face here are dogs they'll Ram around and are incredibly territorial if you get too close to one they'll bark at you to stay away and if you don't he their warning Much like any beloved Rottweiler they'll charge you biting into your flesh until you're dead all while the owner will probably go on

an incredibly long rant how their dog is a beautiful princess and wouldn't hurt a fly dogs are fairly easy to deal with because of their easily telegraphed single attack of lunching at you and once you kill one you'll always find a single piece of meat on its body this can't be crafted into anything and selling it to a Trader You get amily Five Points of reputation but it can be used to bait and distract any other dogs from attacking you even mid combat has apparently they can't give up a free serving of Rottweiler and will

instantly stop attacking you to take the bait so yes you technically can do a non-lethal dog run of the game the only other enemy in dry Meadow is the elk these things are terrifying they have a similar attack pattern of the dog but instead of being Territorial at the dogs will instantly attack as soon as they spot you charging straight towards you with a much larger width than the dogs thankfully the game gives you the ability to quickly back step for a small stamina cost Something Dark Souls would shame ly steal 3 years earlier you'll

always want to bait an elk into attacking as there's a brief window to swing at it before it attacks again getting too close to it before it attacks will make them swing their Antlers around doing massive damage it only takes around two to three hits to kill you meanwhile you'll probably go through two boards with nails to kill a single elk with the reward of making the forest a little bit safer and harvesting its antlers I'll tell you what which again can't be used for crafting but can be sold to a Trader with the same

value as a Shiny Stone but also strangely enough you can actually eat the antlers to give you the biggest health regen in The entire game although you should always sell it you'll need the reputation to repair all the weapons that you broke killing it there's also passive creatures in this part of the forest crows which will fly away whenever you get near usually feasting on a nearby corpse that you can loose and rabbits they always flee when you get near them but if you're able to kill one which is usually near impossible because you're such

a fat bastard you Run out of stamina before being able to catch up to them thankfully rocks are abundant in Darkwood they worth absolutely nothing to a Trader actually taking them away for absolutely free and as a weapon you'll need to throw about 15,000 to kill a sing dog but because rabbits have one HP if you throw one at a rabbit you'll actually onap it finally all those hours in The Long Dark paid off it's time for the mean Course everybody you please and because the world technically functions without your input there's actually a chance

that a rabbit you're chasing might even wander into a random bear trap the same applies to poison mushrooms by the way and is a very viable strap for both catching rabbits and disarming shrooms in dodgy placements Lau looting a rabbit instead of having meat like a dog will have odd meat which you can actually cook in the Oven for more Essence to level up if you can score it before it rots of course odd meat can also be eaten which gives you a stamina buff but also an armor buff which harves any damage you take

for just under 2 minutes but again it's always best to cook this stuff someone cooked here also the meat actually decays into rotten mushrooms for some reason I guess the forest is big on plant-based Alternatives you'll also see creatures that resemble humans Sometimes you'll see them preying to a destroyed Shrine most likely Christian Poland's current Christian population is 98.5% after all Europe these kinds of roadside shrines are actually very common in Poland especially near small villages where the locals are usually very religious you can also find a couple of these creatures at specific markings in

the dry Meadows they'll flee as soon as they see you but the markings they left Behind are incredibly strange lines and circles drawn with sticks but if you hang around long enough you'll start to see Visions firstly the key that you lost to the doctor but also a bunker door with the same number printed on it opening your map you'll always have the location of a huge X going towards it you'll see a ruined house with bear traps covering most of the entryways clearly someone was trying to defend this much like The Hideout searching the

Wardrobe you'll be able to find a pack of cigarettes some gasoline and match sticks I've already talked about the importance of gasoline but it's a great combination with match sticks father I crave petroleum dragging the Wardrobe out the way you'll see a trapo which will take you into an old tunnel Network thankfully when you're anywhere interior in the dark wood time will actually freeze until you're outside again This area is incredibly dark so you need a light source unless you want to hump the walls for the entire game going deeper into the tunnels you can

see that there's something above watching you and up ahead is a bizarre growth almost like a gaping mouth pulsating you got fired so you drowned your sorrows in booze the protagonist won't comment on this but searching the growth you'll find some more odd meat that you can cook you can also find a motorcycle Magazine with the Description being from this year showing a 1975 issue of chess of Pismo motor a real polish motor Magazine with a Fiat 126 on the cover eventually you can reach the bunker door heavily rusted and covered with growths and Vines

locked it's my only way out I won't be able to open it without my key you're then given the option to look at the handle the hatch handle is covered in a thick layer of dust it hasn't been opened for at least 2 weeks next you can press your ear against the keyhole I hear a faint voice throughout the howling wind it sounds familiar is seems to be coming through the keyhole someone is calling me finally you can look through the keyhole the art change is to show the keyhole with a faint light emanating from

the other side the protagonist doesn't comment on this you now know where you can escape the woods but first you need the key that the doctor stole from you Trying to leave the tunnels The Way You Came the power will go out with a sudden cave in you can still get out but now there's something chasing you you can try to fight it but with how the tunnels are it's basically a death sentence as most of combat is relying on Sid stepping enemies and attacking them once they're cooling down despite that I'm such a greaser

I somehow managed to do it first Try this is an important enemy that I'll talk about soon but for story's sake let's say you never fought it and you escape back to the surface after which the protagonist will make another entry in his journal the armored door in the underground passage is closed it hasn't been opened in around 2 weeks the thief who took my key apparently doesn't know how to find the passage good I on the other hand have no idea where to find the Thief not so good exploring more of The dry Meadow

before meeting The Wolf Man in the next biome you can find various locations like a former Hideout that's been totally consumed by the forest with only small parts of it now accessible there's a generator here with barely any fuel left but turning it on you can see the corpses infused with the tree writhing in pain before the power dies out as unforgiving as the forest is at least you escape this fate but in true Darkwood fashion when you go to Leave the game will spawn a dog to attack you again Darkwood moment going towards one

of the choke points in the map you can see a burned house though you're unable to open the door because it's made of metal wooden doors can be destroyed with enough Force but metal doors are usually implemented to stop the player from progressing too early until they have the right key code or open it from the other side as a shortcut but what's interesting is you Hear shouting from the other side of the door in evacuation order out the truck is here no please get the [ __ ] out maybe you're not completely alone here

and there's still some kind of military presence trying to establish order here exploring further you can find broken tractors heavily overgrown with valuable loot like scrap metal gasoline and a battery it's not used in crafting and it can't be sold to Traders but you might want to keep hold of something uncommon In the forest you can find collapsed trees these can't be harvested for wood but strangely enough have bite marks all over them with the corpse of one of the humanoid creatures underneath it almost like it was easting it before it collapsed you can also

find crop fields which act as mini mazes to navigate through usually only having a couple of ways in or out but your reward for reaching the center is usually worth it with an untouched crate having great Early game loot like a lantern that you probably can't craft yet just don't do what I did and get stuck in one when the sun is saying wait wait wait wait wait more on the lantern it's a great early game way to have a reliable light source you can only explore during the day but you'll quickly notice with how

numerous the trees are the forest is incredibly dark increased by the common rain that hits the forest it's really hard to see a few feet in front of you as long as You have the lantern in your hot bar it'll emit a glow all around you giving you a bit more visibility and unlike other light sources lets you use another weapon without losing the light source just as long as it's always kept in your hot bar it'll last around 20 minutes real time which is pretty long compared to other light sources if you explore enough

you might even stumble onto the wolf man's camp in the dry Meadow that I mentioned earlier he marked his location Of the other camp on your map but you can meet him here and trade in the day in case you want to drop off any loot with a dark lingering theme kicking in whenever you approach him now let's say you did a run of Darkwood and you met the wolf man at his Camp before the first night arrived you'd go through the exact same dialogue and nothing would change except when you went through the first

night again in the morning you wouldn't be greeted by The wolf man but instead the man who saved you after the doctor the traitor a man roughly my size is standing before me I can barely make out his disturbingly familiar features through the matte visor of his helmet the massive helmet is covered with an old sack and seems to be an integral part of the unnaturally pale body I remember him he's the one who rescued me from the doctor's house the man reaches out to me with his black hand it's covered in Charcoal there's something

written on his worn Woolen glove we need to stick together brother his lips are moving but all sounds are drowned inside the helmet he shrugs then takes the huge sack off his back and drops it on the ground revealing its contents only known as the traitor he's one of the most important characters of the story despite the fact that he never says a single word to the protagonist apart from the scribblings on his arm you can tell by his Introduction text he has much more selfless intentions Than The Wolf Man his mask makes anything he

says to be inaudible but compromised with writing messages on his arm with charcoal you can't gossip with the traiter but you can show him one specific item the picture of the road home he wipes his left glove on his pants takes out the charcoal from his pocket and starts scribbling when he finishes he lifts his dirty hand all roads lead deeper into The woods clearly warning you of what's next to come that you'll have to crawl through hell to escape the woods this is someone with experience someone who's survived here for a while as kind

as the traitor seems he's not running a charity you'll still need to give him items to earn reputation to gain access to his stock most likely so he himself can survive the woods at night the trader will greet you every single morning after you met The Wolf Man Either by surviving the first night or by finding The Wolf Man first before the first night comes with the added bonus of earning 100 reputation from him for every night you successfully survive even giving you unique dialogue for doing so as I approach him the man drops a

sack from his bag to the floor with a visible relief I notice a smile on his face through the matte visor of his helmet the man nods in greeting keep in mind the wolf man never gives you Reputation for surviving the night however if you die during the night and spawn at the next day you won't earn any reputation from him and get a different greeting the man takes a step in my direction and Pats me on the shoulder he's obviously someone that cares deeply about your safety but unfortunately by giving free handouts you're not

going to learn how to survive the forest if you're both planning to survive the forest the first thing you need to learn Is selflessness won't get anyone anywhere much like the Wolfman at the Trader's inventory will be restocked with the same items every day he has a much larger inventory than the Wolfman but he's lacking crucial items like the toolbx needed to upgrade your workbench he can sell you various items that are great for surviving each Excursion into the woods like for example a flashlight I've mentioned how great the lantern is as a light source

but the flashlight for Me is a personal favorite it's pretty expensive at 200 rep but after the watch it's a must it will shine a bright cone wherever the protagonist is looking which can help with dimly lit areas but also has the hidden bonus of revealing more shiny stones that you can find in the world most of these you'll actually walk over and not even notice but the refracted light of the flashlight will give it a unique glint so you can pick them up and get even more reputation the Main downside is they run out

of energy very quickly and have to be refilled with 9vt batteries which can be bought from either the Wolfman or the trader or you can find them in the world on random corpses the thing is 9 volts can be pretty expensive to buy and pretty rare to find I say this as I'm sitting on 209 volts while recording this another downside is you can't use weapons when holding the flashlight meaning it leaves you open to attack if you don't have a Secondary Light Source on you the trader will also sell you basic items like nails

boards gasoline but you know you're like 30 minutes into the video you know how all that works by now he'll also sell you more advanced but very expensive consumables like the pills pills here one will increase your endurance so you can quickly explore before the stamina drain kicks in now to be fair this is pretty useless for how expensive it is and also don't tell Anyone that I told you this but if you run on the beaten paths around the dry Meadow it'll actually half your stamina drain and these paths will usually lead you to

major points of interest like other houses and key locations but if you find some you can sell them for a Whole 30 rep he also has healing pills these are actually great if you're about to die but honestly with the Panic that comes with the game by the time you realize you need to heal you're probably Already dead but they do have the added bonus of being quick to use instantly removing any poison that you might be getting from walking on shrooms but again like the endurance pills it's better to sell these whenever you find

them he can also sell you wire which can be used to make [Music] lockpicks as there are many chests randomly located around the map that are locked and you need a lock pick to pry Them open it's always good to keep a set of lock picks on you because the chests always have mid to high range loot he can even sell you items to use in the cooker like the glowing mushrooms you can only find yourself during random night events further proof that he's so adjusted to life here the trader is able to actually scavenge

at night yeah it is both him and the wolf man can sell you a red chicken egg seemingly corrupted by the forest it glows a bright red color Look at this little fill out on it and can be used in the cooker both Traders giving you a daily resource of XP if you have the reputation to trade with them moving on to the more advanced items the trader will also sell components to craft guns which is something you won't be lucky enough to experience until the mid to late game he'll sell weapon parts bolt handles

handgun frames long barrels tubular magazines shotgun shells small Caliber Magazines and medium caliber Bullets all of these look incredibly tempting to buy but keep in mind they're only as useful as your workbenches so if you don't have it upgraded you can't make any of these weapons but let's say you greased the game and you got a toolbox from The Wolfman you can now make the the single shot pistol Molotov and Lantern now the single shot pistol is a complete scam it's the first firearm you'll be able to craft which will trick you into thinking you've

just Unlocked easy mode despite the fact it costs two rare scrap metal and the even more rare or expensive metal pipe the problem is it's not a single shot pistol but a single use pistol you might be tricked into thinking that you can buy bullets from the trader and this is the ammo to reload the pistol but nope you stupid once you fire it it'll break and can't be repaired this is a last Resort weapon that you should only use when you're facing an enemy that you know is Going to kill you at close range

also when taking aim like all firearms it actually takes a few seconds for the protagonist to adjust his sights to narrow the cone of vision which in turn will narrow your vision of anything coming at your peripherals but let's say you somehow got another toolbox another one and now your workbench is level four you can make the shovel homemade shotgun and Pistol and this is where the game really changes the shovel is a direct Upgrade from the plank nails and is a must it has more durability does more damage and has a lot more reach

me how does he do it again it's like let see this about this and yes this is yet another game where the shovel becomes your main combat Workhorse No Game Dev can resist the sweet pull of the shovel the problem is it's incredibly hard to get in the early game without being a sweat the shovel blade can be bought from Traders For 450 reputation which to say the least is very expensive it's actually actually the highest price on any base Trader item in the entire game other crazy important items like fabric used for inventory upgrades

also cost this amount meaning you have to actively make a choice between getting an important upgrade or a new weapon versus selling it to buy stuff that you really need at the moment to make the shovel you'll also need tape now good luck finding That because it is incredibly rare loot but the Traders do sell it for about 40 rip now my bank account hurts but the hardest item to get hold of at the minute is the staff to put the shovel together you usually won't find this until the next biome where enemies start to

attack you with sticks the same guys in the dry Meadow that would always run away from you now remember how I said how useless the single shot pistol is it is but if you're able to get hold of one Find someone with a large stick in The Meadows and creep up on them and then one tap them with the pistol you can now get hold of their staff excellent work 47 once you make the shovel it is absolutely gamebreaking in early stages as you'll be able to two tap or even one tap early enemies it

functions the same as the board with nails having two attacks a charge and a jab but the charge swing has a much larger radius than the board with nails meaning you Won't even have to go into an enemy's range to hit them with it and because the workbench is level four you're able to give it two upgrades out the possible four either less stamina consumption more damage more durability or much more durability the latter costing a whole new shovel head to upgrade but it's totally worth it my pick is to save for another shovel head

to get that 70% more durability as opposed to 30% with just the metal pipe and to also pick more Damage which will'll sharpen the head of the shovel with stones to give it more of an edge finally Stones do have a use apart from throwing them at rabbits also the durability upgrades do stack so if you value saving resources on fixing rather than damage that's always an option there's also another early game secret which I'm only telling you about remember that bunker early on that we needed the key for if you enter the bunker for

the very first time with The shovel before the cave-in you can dig a certain spot that gets blocked off after the chase sequence it'll waste the shovels durability but it will reveal a corpse holding some amazing loot like a long barrel and a tubular magazine take that Trader I'll keep my reputation thank you very much the only problem is with a much more advanced melee weapon you'll need much more advanced resources to maintain it you'll still need wooden planks like maintaining the board with Nails but now the nails have been replaced with scrap metal which

can only be found by trading your own reputation or disarming a finite amount of bear traps in the world even with the massively upgraded durability you'll always have to keep a high stock of scrap metal to be able to repair it next on the workbench is the homemade shotgun and Pistol the homemade shotgun is the cheaper alternative not requiring Advanced weapon parts but just four Scrap metal and two metal pipes that being said the pipes are still incredibly rare loot and expensive like I said earlier but if you manage to make one you'll have the

first firearm there is useless after firing a shot for [ __ ] sake but don't worry guys the devs were actually lying here the homemade shotgun can actually fire a whole two shots before turning into dust in your hands does that make it worth it no it'll definitely kill anything Chasing you and if you panic and miss a shot you can rely on the second Barrel to finish finish the job but even then it's always better to save your ammo for better shotguns later and scrap metal to repair the shovel and pipes to upgrade it

because you can't upgrade firearms in this game only melee weapons the final unlock on this tier of workbench is the pistol now this isn't easy to make even if you use the Shel exploit to get some expensive weapon parts for free you'll Still need that handgun frame which is pretty expensive wrap it all up together with some duct tape and finally you have the first firearm in the game that won't actually break after being Barely Used and in typical Darkwood fashion the fully crafted pistol is actually worth less than the individual parts to make it

I hate this game thankfully the good news the pistol never breaks its durability being replaced with an ammo counter it slowly degrades the more Shots you fire and holds eight rounds a magazine it uses small Caliber Magazines that you can find sometimes in the world with the trader and Wolfman always having a single clip that you can buy at the start of each day it also has the lowest damage output of any firearm in the game but with the guarantee that it'll never break that being said much like cry when you reload the gun before

using all the bullets you'll dump the mag on the floor wasting any spare Bullets you have so you'll always have to make the active choice of wasting a few precious bullets so you can guarantee you'll have a full magazine for the next fight true and through Darkwood will always be a melee Focus game if anything it's a little bit similar to another game I covered years ago Condemned criminal Origins in that game you would get ammo but it would always be incredibly scarce only holding a certain amount of bullets in each clip You need to

always treat Firearms like they're invaluable because if you go around spraying and praying you're going to run out incredibly quickly the Virgin pistol abuser and the Chad shovel user you might have also noticed that the trader is selling the parts to make an axe the same one the doctor used in the prologue this would seem like the best thing to do but is a giant scam because you actually won't be able to make the axe at the workbench until Much much later into the game and I do mean much later so hold off on buying

it for now you might remember earlier I mentioned how you can get a letter delivered to you as an invitation to a celebration you can reach the location where it takes place anytime but the door will always be locked with a code that's randomly generated on the letter this is totally optional and it isn't needed to progress the story you can completely ignore it but the side Content is some of the best of what Darkwood has to offer after accepting the invitation and going inside you'll see a lone woman in a bride outfit dancing one

of the first passive humans we've seen apart from the trader and the wolf man there's no way to talk to her though so I interacted with a woman the only way I know how or I'll be honest you kind pissing me off of the dancing a little [Music] Bit oh okay that was kind of funny going inside you can see what's left of a wedding with candles on tables and another bride quickly running away from you probably unrelated to what I did 5 seconds ago after vaulting over a broken window you can get into the

main room barely lit with flickering lights you can hear a banging noise investigating you can see a man slamming his head repeatedly on the Table we've been waiting for you behind the man is an open door with more Brides dancing around you asking to dance with them you can choose to kill or ignore them it doesn't change anything because when you return into the main room the man is gone and you can see a lamp quickly move letting you Know that there's someone behind the door where [Music] B waiting for you dance with me I

feel that Darkwood is designed in such a way that once you take damage unless you know how to quickly counter or run away Panic sets in with purposely violent screen shakes and red filters until you're pretty much dead anyway Yeah body you're Choke by the body blocked by the [ __ ] lamp by the way by the lamp prop blocked that's why the opening text on the loading screen tells you to be patient like the trader said when you shown him the road home all roads lead deeper into the woods but you're allowed to spend

as much time as you want in the dry Meadow before progressing you might even notice some different night events for staying here so long like how a creature you've never Seen before will spawn near The Hideout at night but when you go up to it it'll scream and disappear only to leave behind an object [Music] called huh this could be cooked in the oven for Essence but more importantly in the game's files it's called piscal which is Polish for chick if you manage to fill up the needle a second time you'll have one of the

first Dream sequences in the game the heavy Psychoactive substances you've been injecting into your arms to make yourself stronger will translate into your dreams mostly because anything you find that can be cooked has now been tainted with the forest or is a direct creation from it so these dreams are almost like the forest is trying to communicate with you and the first one you wake up with a military flashlight an incredibly powerful flashlight that even the trader Doesn't have access to you'll run through the underground tunnels again towards the same locked bunker door but this

is different I can hear a faint voice throughout the howling wind it sounds familiar it seems to be coming through the keyhole someone is calling me looking through the keyhole instead of a faint light it's completely blocked by some kind of growth that beckens you forward go going to look back at that [ __ ] cringe that was me the door will then swing open with the environment changing into a vast swamp area a massive change from the dry Meadow your only guide here are shiny stones that refract off the military flashlight you can loot

each one individually like that James Woods bit and Family Guy ooh Shiny Stone ooh Shiny Stone ooh shiny stone or you can keep pressing forward eventually you'll come across what looks Like an indoor lamp switching it on will replace the swamp with seemingly hundreds of human bodies walking over the bodies the lamp will begin to glow and returning back to it you'll see a giant fetus turning the light off again will transport you back into the swamp with another Trail to follow which leads you to a bed giving you the prompt to lie down if

you do the dream will end but now you'll have a Shiny Stone in your Pocket so maybe through your connection to the forest the dreams do have some kind of interaction in the real world if you go to investigate the bunker door after this dream it'll still be locked though you still need the key from the doctor dreams are numerous throughout the game either through leveling up or Story related and they usually have a win and a fail state if you do everything you're meant To in the dream you'll be rewarded with something like loot

or an option being given to you that was previously locked failing or dying in a dream won't kill you in the real world but you'll miss out on lots of side content like how in the first Dream if you deviate from the path or take too long you'll be chased by floor Gore until it kills you waking up and you'll have no shiny stone to trade at this point you're probably settled in the dry Meadow and you really Can stay here for as long as you want the knights won't increase in difficulty but the game

will slowly push you towards moving on to the next area firstly if you've cleaned out an entire biome of its loot they'll never respawn apart from animals only drop meat which is worth next to nothing to a Trader by staying in the dry Meadows you're actually starting to eat into your resources whether that's boarding up Windows repairing weapons or buying Items from a Trader to restuck So eventually you'll be forced to move on to get access to the next biomes Loop pool the only real regenerating resource is the 100 rep you get from a Trader

but it's not really enough to work with on top of that the hideouts in advanced areas actually offer you more reputation with the trader for surviving them meaning you'll get access to more of their stock before own them something the main reason why you might want to Stay is to grind out cookable items to level up your skills but like the Trader's reputation the oven actually scales depending on what area you're in the next biome over where the wolf man wanted to meet you has a hideout with an efficiency four times higher than the dry

Meadows oven So eventually you want to get going to the next area even though like the trader said all roads just lead deeper into the woods once you're ready to get going You'll see two choke points on your map to get out of the dry Meadow the first like I mentioned before is blocked by an iron door but trying the other one you'll come across a huge Thicket of dense trees moving past them you come to a house infested with large bugs if you're quick enough you can kill some of them and loot their shells

which will be important later there's also an infestation of worms in the house a writhing fleshy mass that will hurt you Once you touch it you can take the damage but you also won't be able to Sprint through them and you should save as much health as you can the only similar thing I can compare it to is in System Shock 2 another great game that I will do a video on at some point I promise can't keep getting away with it you can go go into one of the bathrooms and find this pile of

worms it literally is just a gift but standing on them will actually damage you to get rid of the Worms you'll need fire you can whack them with a torch leave a trail of gasoline with a match or throw a Molotov to burn them all past the worms is another iron door with a code but next to it is a strange growth something is floating inside the skin looks to be quite thin maybe I could puncture it or pierce it with something the loot inside the growth is an embryo there's only a few of these

placed across the whole game in scripted Locations but they have a lot of uses they can be sold to a Trader cooked in an oven for a huge chunk of XP but most importantly if you're playing on hard mode where you have a finite number of lives you can eat the embryo to give you an extra life an extra try to survive the forest exploring the rest of the house you're attacked in the dark by one of the first human enemies wielding a huge stick they're called savages savages savages they can't be reason and We'll

keep attacking you until you put them down not saying anything apart from the occasional grunt or shout but by Game ending one you can looted staff which you can use to finish the shovel if again you weren't able to catch any running away in the dry Meadow inside a container next to the Savage you'll be able to find a note to the door the code is 3333 it can't get any easier remember it I'm not opening that door after dark Anymore I went to get some gasoline from the pig shed I'll be back after dark

after after using the code obviously left for someone else you can get access to the Silent Forest but before you can do that there's the corpse of a man you can search giving you some shotgun shells and a map which shows you the location of The Hideout in the area but also another location but then you quickly realize the man's actually not dead but sleeping and despite that he'll Still talk to you hey there friend in the last hideout look for an exit beneath the floor for now it sounds like nonsense but it will make

sense much [Music] later the first thing you want to do is set up base at the Silent Forest Hideout once you reach it you'll notice the layout is very different instead of a couple of rooms it's a much larger Building having a total of seven rooms which gives you more options but also more ways for enemies to get inside and reach you the building is in a much worse State than the dry Meadow Hideout having huge parts of the wool blown out that can't be repaired you'll need to manually switch on the oven here to

start pumping gas around the house and get that added night protection and you can only have one Switched on at any time so for now the dry Meadow Hideout Has gone dark the Silent Forest Hideout and all future hideouts function mostly the same having a cooker generator and wood chipper one problem you might find is dragging all the loot you found between the two hideouts this can waste an entire day or even more if you've hoarded everything you found having to drag it back and forth because of your small inventory but thankfully the devs did

think ahead with this investigating The workbench you might notice there it will be the same level to the previous workbench you upgraded this thankfully applies to all future hideouts inside it you'll find a single item a bell a rusty bike Bell someone has attached a note to it opening the note is a small message that reads like an advertisement ringing the bell you'll get the notification that something is happening and eventually a new character will spawn Outside The Hideout a man on a bike hey There boss man I'll be honest to you boss I'm real

thirsty you see if you could share a refreshing beverage with a weird traveler I'd make it worth your while boss ashes to ashes dust to dust when life's a [ __ ] boozes a must he doesn't act like a Trader the only option you can do is show him an item like most characters you can show him a picture of the road home the beautiful Road Mr Boss Man long and straight you'll find only Twisted paths in these Parts Mister the man waves his hands sloppily almost losing his balance let me tell you something Mister

Good liquor straightens out all the bars every single one of them the other item you can show him is a bottle of alcohol if you have any I not a good vintage a bottle of day keeps the monsters away to your help boss if you want boss I can bring you junk from the other out this option trades the bottle of alcohol and in return he'll he'll travel to any Previous Hideout and bring all the items you've stored in your workbench if you choose not to you can just shake your head and he takes the

booze anyway have your way boss man thanks for the booze if you can't leave the woods drink up all the booze you might want to kill him for this but believe me it is not worth it because he has no Loot and now you've lost the only way to quickly move your gear from each Hideout after he takes off and a couple of in-game hours pass You'll have a package delivered in front of your workbench so now you can Bard up any Windows you need set your traps refuel your generator wood chipper basically doing the

exact same thing all over again hooray you know what to be fair with every video essay I do vas's words just become more and more accurate I tell you what the definition of insanity is [Music] insanity the solent forest is everything You've already learned from the dry Meadow but more difficult the trees are more numerous making navigation harder there are new locations along with making already existing locations more difficult mushroom Fields will now be in most biomes giving you access to cookable mushrooms but now mushroom men have a chance of sprouting from the ground and

start chasing you making navigation incredibly difficult this is also the first biome where you'll start To see bug nests there's only one but in the middle is another coveted embryo to give you an extra life on hard mode corpses were dotted around the dry Meadow and they were a pretty reliable way to get loot with minimal risk but now going ahead some of these corpses as soon as you interact with them will explode poisoning you the only Telltale sign that a corpse is Tainted is every 10 seconds or so it'll slightly shift around and we

usually have unusual Growths around it the best thing to do with these bodies is to ignore them entirely or throw rocks at them so you don't forget about them and run over them later let's just get back to him oh for [ __ ] sake and for some reason shooting them does absolutely nothing this is what you get [ __ ] camping what dragon what what I will waste a bullet on you Happily I give up bro this is where the enemies also become much more vicious you're not you when you're hungry the Rottweilers of

the dry Meadows have been mostly replaced with huge dogs mutated by the plague so now they have much more health and deal more damage they attack in mostly the same way and if you kill one instead of dropping normal meat they'll drop odd meat that you can cook further proof how the for change is whatever stays there too long the second Are the Savages we've already experienced one attacking us in the Gateway between biomes but now they're working groups they seem to be humans so affected by the forest that they've been reduced to a tribal

nature covering themselves in mud and twigs resembling a wendo from the Great Plains folklore no not not wendon this isn't an iceberg video first type will attack you with just his fists not too much of a problem because your melee weapon usually has More reach but again they'll always work in group groups the next is the same kind of savage that attacked us in the house they have huge staffs that have insane range they'll swap between a long slam of the staff which leaves them open for attacks but also a swinging motion like you with

the shovel they can also randomly follow up their swing with another swing so you should never get too greedy with these guys and only get close when you know they're on cool down Also these guys will always drop their stick on death so while it was kind of rare to find one in the dry Meadow starting from the Solem Forest you'll basically be drowning in them the final Savage will throw rocks at you pretend that was a rock and even though this doesn't do a lot of damage they'll purposely be placed at the back of

a group to basically poke you from a distance and just be an overall nuisance And unlike most stealth games where rocks are used to distract enemies while you sneak past these are exclusively used to poke you from a distance the Rocks themselves don't do a lot of damage but they'll usually do it to suppress you as the stones can interrupt your charged attacks while their friends move in to deal the actual damage they should be your priority because they have the least amount of health and usually die in one to two swings all of This

combined with the low visibility during the night they make a formidable pack that you'll need to prepare for either by setting up traps or camping open Windows because it takes them the same time to Vault through one like most wildlife in Darkwood they act as a group friendly to each other but will be hostile to others and vice versa so occasionally you'll see them get into fights with dogs usually losing apart from this one clip I found of a single Savage somehow Downing an entire elk MRE that being said they can still accidentally attack each

other like this one time they threw a rock at their mate of course oh he hit his mate that's hilarious to compensate the harder Knights against the packs of savages is this Hideout surviving a knight in the Silent Forest now grants you 150 Trader rep letting you buy more useful items to help defend yourself for the next night also interacting with the trader the First time after you make it to this Hideout he'll try to communicate with you more the man stands before me motionless I can only see my own faint reflection in the semi-transparent

visor of his helmet suddenly he starts to move quicker as if looking for something in his pockets he takes out a piece of charcoal and starts writing on his palm there's no way out of here brother he shows me what is written then wipes it with his sleeve and continues scribbling We're stuck with each other after making sure I've read the second sentence the man takes out a full tank of gasoline from his sack he places it on the floor next to me he's warning you that there's no way out but we know for sure

that the bunker door is an exit all we need is to get that key what most players will likely do by now is try to reach the wolfman's second Camp he marked for you near the beginning of the game before you talk to him you might see two crates Behind him locked with a code this code is randomly generated and can't be found anywhere in the game so if you want to open them you either have to Brute Force the combination or worm your way into the game files to find it inside the first one

you can find some ammo for all kinds of weapons pretty useful if you already have a firearm meanwhile inside the second one you find the average American's weapon Locker complete with parts for melee weapons two shotguns and Assault rifle and two guns that you cannot otherwise obtain in game the submachine gun and the pellet gun the submachine gun is pretty strong having decent damage and rate of fire being especially good at dispatching large numbers of low Health enemies but still holding its own against higher Health targets it uses light mags similar to the pistol though

here one light mag is worth 20 bullets instead of the measly eight and the pellet gun is absolutely Worthless really I have nothing to say here just sell it back to The Wolf Man immediately I'm really not surprised it got turned into cook content apparently these used to be in the game's early builds but got replaced by the single shot pistol despite that I was actually able to find BB gun ammo despite not having any use again Darkwood moment opening these crates will easily break the games Flow so on a first playr you should Probably

just leave them but again like I said you basically have to run like a brute force to be able to even open these once you finally interact with the wolf man he'll be glad to see that you've made it but again never drops his condescending tone I'll be damned I barely believe my beautiful eyes you made it I need to admit you're quite a resourceful piece of meat the wolf Smiles revealing a row of sharp teeth time to get to the specifics follow the Path located in the edge of the Silent Forest you'll get to

a village where you'll find a hag who reeks of chickens talk to her maybe you'll learn something something interesting this will lead to the protagonist making a note of the conversation in his journal but be on your guard comrade don't let her deceive you with that kind face of hers the selfish [ __ ] is keeping something that does not belong to her behind the locked door in her house something I'm after Bring me the key to that door and I will tell you where to find the thing you lost is it fair comrade a

key for a key good now take off get to work the wolf has asked me to bring him the key to the locked room in the house of the hag that reeks of chickens in exchange for this favor he will help me retrieve my key a key for a key seems quite fair I shall find the hag in the village in the edge of the Silent Forest the wolf man wants you to reach another Part of the map an area that isn't marked in the three regions but before doing that you might want to visit

the other location that was on the sleeping man's body heading to the area you'll see it's a scrap yard that's been converted into a home for someone this place looks like a scrap metal Warehouse the walls are covered with fungus and spiderwebs it's very stuffy in here I smell Rosen Rosen is a type of resin obtained from Pines it's used as Varnishing ceiling waxes and glues so whoever's been here has been working on putting something together inside one of the containers you can find a postcard with the portrait of a man with the caption 1961

the sky is dark and the earth is blue the man in the photo is the real life Soviet pilot and cosmina Yuri Gagarin 1961 is the date where he performed his first piloted space flight he was the first man to go into space and died with his co-pilot Vladimir Cogan this was during routine training where the aircraft ran out of fuel and crashed you'll also notice whoever lived here was frequently experimenting with metal Parts there's a tractor inside one of the warehouses which is usually a good source of loot but it's been mostly stripped clean

this is once a tractor now it's a hollow Rusty body all of its useful mechanical Parts have been scavenged thankfully they had no interest in gasoline in the tractor Which you can loose and smell nearby a heavy smell of gasoline fills the air you can also find a blueprint in a container which shows crude drawings of a rocket ship and various vehicle parts lastly inside the house is a metal door which is locked but you trying the handle gets the attention of whoever's inside who's there I'm not coming out until that Beast luring in my

garage is gone what the voice is talking about is a lone dog lurking around the scrapyard So sadly the vegan run of the game ends here no oh killing the dog the door will be unlocked and you can meet a new character called Patric oops I didn't hear you come in the boys eyes wandering around the room I found this Wiggly metal thing yesterday it was laying there in the grass I don't like grass it's so slippery and it tickles your feet rather than grass I would prefer these metal wigglies yes I would wrap myself

in them like like in a spacit the Metal antennas in his wiry hat suddenly start vibrating do you do you have any metal wigglies petre which is basically polish for Peter is an Ecentric [Music] Builder like most of the inhabitants of Darkwood he's abnormal but you pretty much have to be to survive here his obsession with technology is apparent with his metal hat and half a dozen wrist watches on his hand you can start off by showing him various items but his Brain is so scrambled he doesn't really make much sense of them you can

show him a photo of the road home which he also agrees like the trader isn't the way out you w't be able to make it home via this road you should build a rocket you can even show him the postcard with the space pilot which you took from him but he'll have no idea and just think it's another copy oh I have one too it's such a beautiful photograph you can show him the crude picture of the blueprints he Obviously Drew himself these are the blueprints for my space rocket almost ready I broke down a

whole tractor to build it but I'm missing several parts several very important parts for example a shiny little mirror and this rectangular box with wires and the boy suddenly becomes lost in thought if only I had more tractors I would definitely go into space you can also show him the chick that you got from killing the Man attacking you in the prologue I had one Just like this I melted it into a perfect little ball shaped like the moon I melt everything plastic into moons Petri suddenly becomes excited and have you seen my vehicle it's

ready well almost ready just a couple of parts missing I will need to find them and I will have to repair the casing the one from the spring that fell off recently when I was entering the cockpit I hit my head and it well fell off he fell off I thought I was flying but it was just That the lights turned off you can also gossip with petre where his obsession with space is even more obvious I haven't slept a wink today the whole night I thought about that large metal cover from the tractor it's

such a be beautiful cover ideal cover no doubts about that I mean almost because I would need to bend it a bit with a screwdriver and it it would Shield me from the space dust that is Petri suddenly becomes sad space dust space dust is everywhere I Like to watch the stars at night sometimes you can see these bright blinking spots those are spaceships and Rockets obviously the sky is awfully boring during the day no stars no ships no Rockets nothing only these white smoke tra I saw one yesterday over there far above the Treetops

dad used to say they were planes but such long planes it would be crazy to fly them this interaction would lead the protagonist into making another entry in his journal Now I've heard everything I've met a boy named patri he told me he's building a rocket but he's missing some parts from what I've understood he's constructing a rocket from parts of a broken tractor it's absurd but I think I may help him now while looting around Darkwood you might have noticed that some cars and tractors have various parts in them that have no value and

they can't be used in crafting well patri no association to petre in the yellow Killing show it's just gas you got to sleep once you to bring them to him to complete his rocket ship there are six possible items you can bring to him to help him the most common one being a large battery a hybrid rocket engine wow this will fit perfectly in my rocket have you seen it have you seen my rocket it's almost as pretty as gagarin's well almost I just need to find some parts and it will be completely ready would

you like to bring Them to me the other parts I would then fly to space and to the moon and to Mars and Jupiter and to the sun I mean I would land at night the boy suddenly looks into my eyes look for old tractors you'll find the missing pieces for my rocket in them a fan belt which he calls hold door frame stabilizer ATT trctor Tire space Rocket Chassis an old exhaust pipe carbon dioxide exhaust system a rear viiew mirror Advanced information display and a steering wheel trajectory Guidance system each of these are useless

items but when you give them to him you'll actually get 100 rep which is an amazing way to get access to his inventory for basically no cost he doesn't have any different stock to the trader and the Wolfman apart from a map of the Old Woods which he will Mark two locations in the final biome of the map which can be really useful later on as it tells you exactly where The Hideout is along with another key location after Bringing him four of these six items he'll tell you that he has enough to build his

rocket ship yay finally I have everything I need go on your way now go now please I need to install these parts in my beautiful rocket and then we off I go I will wave to you when I'm on my way to where no man has been before after which he'll give you two weapon parts which are incredibly valuable but more importantly the welder which so far is the only way to upgrade your workbench To the next tier after which you'll need pliers which you can't find until much later so you're essentially locked onto this

tier for the foreseeable future it's not all bad though level five of the workbench gives you access to three new items firstly the light armor despite it being called light armor it's some of the only protection you'll find across the whole game it can't be found or bought but now it can be crafted with common rags and bug shells which is why I said earlier it's important to kill any bugs that you see and work at home in your community honestly overall though it's not that great it reduces any damage You Take by around 20%

Which is pretty negligible and it'll also break after around 6 to seven hits and it can't be repaired also worst of all you actually have to have it equipped in your hot bar to be of any use which could mean swapping out something much more Important like a healing item or light source next up is the sickle I'll be honest I never really used this weapon it has quicker attacks than most meleia weapons and can do this cool double hit which looks like a Dark Souls weapon stance you also back step when you perform any

quick attack gaining distance from your target the reason why I think it's useless in my opinion is because you've already learned the ropes of enemy combat that being to wait for Them to attack and then hit them back but the sickle changes that as it actually can't interrupt enemy attacks also on top of that it can't be upgraded only repaired so it's not a great weapon to invest into the best use for it is to break down doors because it probably has the lowest durability cost in the whole game but then again you probably have

the shovel by now which can twap most wooden doors my little friend if it was throwable like the knife it' have more Use but yeah it's it's pretty mid the last weapon on this tree is the most important the single shot shotgun like the pistol it is incredibly expensive to make with more precious weapon parts and a long barrel but if you've been watching this video like a guide you probably have both of those by now the weapon parts from patri and the long barrel from the bunker tunnels add some duct tape and now you

have a reliable shotgun you can take with you For the rest of the game and like the pistol will never break like the name implies you can only fire it once before having to reload but the reliability of the gun is absolutely worth it being able to One Tap most enemies up close dude you're not even coming close to me here the only problem is now funing a reliable amount of shotgun ammo with Traders usually only sparing a single shell each day you can find it as loot but again like a lot of Things it's

incredibly rare usually inside homes or locked crates definitely save all the ammo you can going forward because the game will only get harder from here now this sounds like a great way to end Petri story you gave the delusional polish man a bunch of random tractor parts and now he thinks he's going into space well there is another outcome to this Quest if you talked to patri and then shown any of the items to the wolf man he has another idea you've Gathered some junk to show me you Excel yourself meat you're not telling me

you're Gathering junk for that nutcase what's his name puffer patrek oh meat meat you must have a lot of free time on your hands if you're keeping yourself occupied with such nonsense the wolf suddenly stops remains silent for a moment and his eyes open up in a split second and he continues hold on a second I have this Absol [ __ ] lutely brilliant iant idea give me that piece Of junk for a moment here you're given the option to agree to give him it or reject him if you shake your head you'll back out

the dialogue and you'll still be able to help Petri but meat there's no one better at tinkering with junk like that in the whole wide Woods I just wanted to take a peak before you deliver it to [ __ ] but if you Nodge your head the quest will be permanently changed the wolf turns his back to me and starts tinkering with the part from Petri after A moment he hands it back to me now it'll work like it should thanks to my Di DIY ability as I managed to increase the kick on this baby

by 200% want us to help his neighbor right meet run to poter and give it to him just don't forget to wave him goodbye before his flight you can then give Petri the rigged vehicle part to which you'll be thankful for not noticing it's been tampered with the quest will play out the same with him leaving but will Have a very different conclusion when you next see him I know it's easy to compare everything to Dark Souls I'm pretty sure I do it five times a video but quests here really do function in a similar

way it's not always apparent that there are different outcomes to finding a solution and the most part all you can do is say yes or no to conversations and sometimes the results aren't actually what you're expecting either being given a huge reward or Nothing at all nothing at all most importantly pretty much any single action you do will autosave the game so there's no way to save scum if you've made a choice you regret it because there's only one save file for each playthrough we'll come back to patre and his rocket later because for now

he's been removed from the story exploring more of the Silent Forest you might come across various tank wreckages these are Soviet t26 Light tanks which were used in the second world war but now they're broken down and not of used to anyone usually being protected by Savages despite that there can be great loot for ammo and anything else the military here left behind one corpse next to a tank will even have a single shot pistol meaning whoever was here was also known to improvise with homemade weapons you can also find a layer of savages with

more ritual shapes being drawn into the dirt And chewed out trees trees that they've probably been eating you can find the graves of savages here with the protagonist saying upon examination a body of some Savage lies in this hole you can find a cross in the layer a crucifix of Jesus covered in mud and Twigs if anything more resembling one of the totems from The Blair Witch franchise Savages in this cave will be passive and run away for the protagonist apart from one covering himself in dirt He'll pay no attention to you too occupied with

burying himself alive you can kill him but there's no reward as he doesn't drop any loot funnily enough the devs refer to the Savage is in the game files as rednecks venturing further you might stumble upon a giant hole it has no purpose apart from being a location on the map you can use to navigate but it also reveals what's really under the surface of the forest a massive Underground network of roots assuming these roots are also spread everywhere under the forest they can explain its rapid expansion and why you can't just cut trees down

the problem obviously lies much deeper one of the Final locations you can visit is a small cottage usually nestled on one of the borders of the Silent Forest it's been partially absorbed by the forest but you can still navigate through a tunnel formed out of tree roots you'll notice a Door a jar and going inside to loot you'll actually be attacked by one of the few humans left in Darkwood [ __ ] thief get off my property this is one of the more morally gray moments in the game because from this man's perspective he's had

an intruder break into his house and steal his property he's really just defending his land much like how you do every night when people try to break into your your house thankfully I know exactly how the stand your ground Law works you going to you're going to stop chasing me all right I'm gone I'm gone I'm gone I'm gone I'm gone I'm off your property now surely leave it surely leave it stop 360 unlucky if you loot the rest of his house you'll find a key on a corpse which you can use to unlock a

crate back at your hideout giving you access to some decent loot going back onto the wolfman's advice and going into the village you'll find the entrance at one Of the borders of the Silent Forest where the grass is slowly replaced with a concrete road almost resembling the photo of the road home trees have been knocked down and upon examining one of the last few standing you can see a gutted Pig tied to the tree The Village has a few different features to the rest of the game there's no map to navigate and time freeze is

an effect until you go back to the Silent Forest so you're free to explore here with no worries About the night calling the first thing that will probably grab your attention is a shrine at the entrance to the Village investigating it you'll see a Shiny Stone has been pressed into the mud covered head this was originally a statue of St Mary Mother of Jesus but it's been covered in mud and twigs much like what the tribals have done to themselves you have the option to leave it or to carefully remove the stone giving you another

shiny stone for Trading if you head to the right you come to a heavily barricaded house with a door that's locked on the other side it's impossible to enter without removing whatever's blocking the entrance from the inside so you'll have to leave it for now going left you'll see a crop field and going inside you can see for the first time someone who isn't a Trader who's not actually aggressive to the player despite that they're still pretty standoffish who are You get away from me you'll even get the message the villagers turn their heads away

from me I don't think I'm welcome here this is one of the last hold outs in the woods a few dozen or so villagers that haven't fully succumbed to the plague they're acting territorial because that's really the only way to survive in the woods they won't trust any random that shows up to not steal their crop when they turn around most of the villagers are still incredibly Traumatized despite still holding on to a safe haven like how if you cross a wooden bridge you'll come to a house that's been completely destroyed with only the bare

foundations left with a single woman Inside sat in the chair motionless the woman stares at the ground with a dead look searching a chest next to her you can find a small plastic doll that's been heavily burned missing an eye only when you go to leave does she say a single thing to the Protagonist kill the P meanwhile other people in the village seem to be thriving probably because they've disconnected entirely just to cope like this woman repeatedly washing her clothes in the dirty River our Woods are so beautiful this time of year you'll see

more desperate villagers banging on the door of people's homes demanding food because there isn't much left where's my meat I should get 2 kilos of meat for this Month antech won't save you this time you hear me give me the [ __ ] meat you can also get the first mention of the doctor from the prologue here with a vill Viller briefly mentioning him if he ever tries to come back [ __ ] quag doctor searching the bonfire you'll find a burned doctor's bag so it's apparent that he was a doctor from this Village before

cutting loose and isolating himself deeper in the woods you can go inside the house Where the woman was demanding her ration of meat but only the lobby is open with the main part of the House locked this seems to be the mayor's House of the village what now get the [ __ ] away from my home there is no more meat the s is starving she gives no pigs get r at antic looose there's a visible basement opening and even though it's locked you can hear what's most likely antech down in the basement many of

the villagers are sat On their own talking complete nonsense I hear you I see you between the trees more south of the village there's a huge Silo that's locked you can pick the lock or Smash down the door with your beloved shovel to see coal and Ash and there's even some Brick Oven used to bake bread after breaking down another door there's a room full of a dozen or so human bodies almost like the bread ovens have been doubled up as a crematorium even more worrying breaking down a door Connected to the bodies will get

you into someone's house this man doesn't push you away like the other Villages and doesn't even mind that you've broken into his home the house is clean and well organized uh first for any interior in this game who the hell are you and then when you go to take any of his property he responds with ah help yourself whatever you fancy but don't tell anyone about it inside his cupboards are unique items jars filled With an unknown minced meat and a singular bone going to a wardrobe and picking the lock you can find some normal

loot but also another story item a meat grinder if I chop you up in a meat grinder there's a theory that this villager especially with how he wants to maintain his secrecy with you has probably turned to cannibalism using recently deceased bodies and cooking them in the bread oven to uses food as the village is currently going through a Famine although this might not be true because the bone you find in the cupboard is also the same bone you can find on a cow's carcass as the doctor in the prologue but it's still horrifying to

think of the possibility that these people have had to turn to cannibalism just to survive in the forest you can even consume the jar of meat if you want to which gives you a huge health regen boost but would you really want to take that chance of potentially throwing away What's left of your Humanity you know after you've gun down the guy that was just simply protecting his home 5 minutes ago a lot of the Village Homes are boarded up blocked with wardrobes and various Furniture but if you push past you can get inside to

loot them but inside you'll see incredibly sick villagers sounding more like the monsters that you'd hear in the forest at night while others mumbling about trees trees trees Humming beautyfully one of them curled up in the corner shaking seemingly with an open top on his head nearby is a note left by the doctor solution for removing intestinal parasites pour the petroleum over the the nuts at propolis put away for a couple of days drink one tablespoonful per day you can tell it's a note from him because apart from the instructions this is the exact same

notepad you picked up as the doctor in The prologue obviously it's done this person no good the doctor and probably no one here actually understands how the plague works why it only targets specific people or progresses faster in some people than others another person can be found bedbound inside their home he said it needs to be done it will happen well he said I don't understand next to them is another useless instruction from the doctor burn a mix of herbs in the oven Lage chamomile nettle keep the patient warm twice a day 1 tblspoon of

sauerkraut Juice by the mouth now it's pretty obvious the doctor had no idea how to treat the plague so he came up with random remedies Hoping to either distract the villagers put them into such a comos state that they didn't even know they were dying or just complete Placebo effects it's really obvious he was only doing this to delay The Village turning against him for not finding a Cure in the back of the same house you can find a charred corpse bound to a chain in the back room maybe one of the villagers took the

instructions of staying warm too literally they could have also been burning herbs in the oven and accidentally cooked themselves alive originally I tried to not attack any of the villagers because I thought like any other open world game they would all turn hostile on me and I'd be beaten to death or it would lock me out of a huge Chunk of the game but for the most part any villager that you bision or gun down the rest really don't seem seem to care probably because they just see it as one less mouth to feed the

final house you can explore is home to a dozen or so chickens and also home to the chicken lady the only NPC in the entire Village that you can actually properly converse with the old lady Squints at me her eyes full of Suspicion she hugs her chickens possessively better keep them hands off Me hens you bloody scoundrel the old lady puts one of the hens to her ear mumbling under her breath after a moment she calms down I've seen me share things lived through too many a war but nothing like this Lord be my witness

this a cursed Place ain't a place for men eat a place for hens she's someone who's seen conflicts and the death and destruction they bring with them in person she still managed to survive remember Poland's regions were basically one huge Battleground during both of the world wars and there's a good chance that the chicken lady is old enough to have lived through both of them but even that hasn't prepared her or anyone for this plague spreading through the forest this is the woman The Wolf Man told you not to trust but then again can you

really trust the wolf man all right let me rephrase that if you weren't a disgusting degenerate Fair would you still believe him funnily enough the Chicken lady also has unique dialogue If instead of using the door you jump through an open window which you're probably accustomed to in the forest the chicken lady isn't a Trader but has some of the most detailed dialogue out of all the NPCs in Darkwood giving more context to the Village while also being a main player in the quest to get out of the forest like most characters you can show

her the road home oh I remember remember this place I do it's been 6 years since I've been there last this road used to lead to the other Village you could also take it to get to the city not that far from here you won't get there now these devilish trees have overgrown everything this is the most descriptive response we've had for the photo yet but even she says that the road is overgrown and it's of no use to anyone so that also means the trader was right with all the roads leading deeper into the

woods another really important item you can show her Is the plastic chick you picked up in the prologue which she has a very unique reaction to Hell's Bells where did you get it where did you find it the old lady seems Disturbed the hens fall silent I can feel the tension in the air holy mother it's your next Little Hen a gift from me my little brother a couple of days ago he got mad I told him stay you're not one of the brainy fellas you know nothing but he wouldn't listen and off he went

to that other fella here Take this he went to see this fell see him he never came back the lady shoves a crumpled photo in my hand the woman trembles violently the hand on her shoulder struggles to maintain balance you're all I have my little sisters yanek isn't a name we've heard before but if he was given a plastic hen by the chicken lady as a gift we can presume that the man we beat to death while defending ourselves in the intro was bianic with her even saying that he Wasn't the smartest like how you

couldn't reason with him in the prologue saying that he went off with the other fellow and investigating the crumpled photo she's talking about we can see a group of people the damage to the photo makes most of the people unrecognizable apart from the man sat on the bed smoking a cigarette the doctor the old lady who lives with chickens told me the plastic chick belongs to her brother who went missing a few days ago she gave me A photo of the person she saw him last with it's the local doctor I recognize the [ __

] you can also show this photo to petre before completing his quest with him beautiful but I see Gagarin in it I have never seen a photo without Gagarin in it before Gagarin was this astronaut a man who flew to the Stars I'll reach the Stars too one day Gagarin the astronaut I mentioned earlier he was obsessed over it's of little help but showing it's the wolf man he recognizes Him instantly well well I know this Quack a non- entity a third rate Witch Doctor useless [ __ ] clunker but he still managed to screw

you over with that key a comrade this at least proves The Wolf Man is isn't lying about knowing you've lost your key and knows who's taken it for a Doctor Who's failed his entire Village though it's not like anyone on the outside managed to create a cure for the Darkwood plague either so it's more like he was put into an Unwinable situation rather than failing on his own ability he's still incredibly resourceful I think it's genius how the game briefly gives you control of the character you're unknowingly going to be chasing for most of the

game apart from the items you can also gossip with the chicken lady poor Hanusa has lost her mind her fell knocked her up with this Abomination even the mongrels tucked their tails and yelped when they saw it I tell you they burned her fellow with a Shack and took the horror somewhere everyone got the Jitters little her wonder the old lady Smiles kindly bearing her three yellow teeth it was a long time ago but you remember it still My Little Hen don't you the chicken lady is probably talking about the lone woman we saw sat

in the only burned house in the village losing her family and home because she gave birth to a monster probably because the villagers thought that she was cursed or something in the Center of the village is a well that's been boarded over you can repair the well and repel down with a chain this is the only use for the chain in the entire game petrek and Wolfman will sell it to you but you can also get one by pulling it off a burnt body near the doctor's know earlier once inside the well you'll quickly realize

it's a sprawling network of tunnels with loads of mushrooms to harvest for the cooker M yeah nice big genopis except you'll quickly realize that you're not alone there's something else down here it'll occasionally attack you before running off and if you manage to kill it you'll see it's a small human body that's been split in half with its upper half transform formed into a huge jaw looting its body you'll find a small doll the same doll you found in the chest of the burned house although this one is undamaged this is hanuka's child The creature

that was so monstrous the villagers cast it down into the well and erased where it came from so nothing like it could ever be created [Music] again it obviously hasn't done much good though because some of the villages we've seen on the surface are already starting to transform into the same creatures you might remember upon leaving the area with husa she'll quietly Mumble to kill the pig the Chicken lady gives a bit more context to what that is thank the Lord for our s poor thing seems sickly but she has more life in her than

the lot of us if you ask me only thanks to her we got something to put in the pot these days if you travel back into the Silent Forest you might stumble upon a pig shed actually it'll be kind of surprising if you didn't considering it's the largest location in the Silent Forest looks like no one else will Enlighten you listen The inhabitants of our lovely Village hold many many Secrets Treasures they do not wish to share with anyone those selfish deceitful wretches they think they're Superior because they have human gos they treat us like

lepers but you know what [ __ ] them we're buddies aren't we and them they deserve to be punished meat the wolf moves closer to me hear that squealing it's one of their secrets the wolf grins listening to the distant sound with great relish find that pig Shed meat make that squealing stop and the treasure will be yours it's a heavily guarded and fortified location only having a couple of ways inside but when you do enter it unlike the village you'll be instantly attacked by villagers trying to defend whatever's inside who in the flying [

__ ] goes there I'll rip your head off again the villagers obviously don't trust you but earlier in the village you couldn't really do much harm to them apart from Straight up murdering them all obviously but here the stakes are higher than two or three people being clubbed to death some of them will drop a pitch fork when killed a weapon that has much more reach than the shovel but less damage having a jabbing attack that can actually get stuck in walls if you're not careful forcing you to pull it out you can repair it

and upgrade it much like the shovel but honestly like the sickle I never really used [Music] it going deeper into the barn you'll see a dozen pigs obvious ly the main food source for The Villages hence why they were so aggressive when an outsider came near real food is scarce in the woods most animals and plants have been mutated beyond all recognition inside you can find a Polish communist flyer showing a woman taking care of some pigs yummy yummy slap with the caption improve the prosperity of villages for The prosperity of cities the pigs here

were obviously used as food for the cities before the woods cut them off from civilization another villager attending to the pigs will spot you and say get out of here you [ __ ] freak I War you the last villager defending their food will shout at you don't come any closer after dealing with them you can find what the villagers are protecting a gigantic pig called the so you can see it's been heavily mutated By the plague growing to an enormous size with legs branching off into sharp spikes which it will use to attack you

if you get too close this is what the village has been using to feed off with the sew producing pigs that the villagers would eat it explains why so many of the villagers are becoming visibly infected eating tainted meat being produced by the SE with harvested meat in containers being the same Essence that you can use in the cooker And pigs eating other corpses you might remember the mayor of the village saying the so isn't giving birth to any new pigs and that's why the village is starving if you go around the side of the

barn near the pig shed you'll see a cut cable and investigating the lever next to it you can see the villagers are using some sort of short burst of electricity to stun the SE and Harvest and feed it without killing it if you go back to the village and kill husa on her Corpse you'll find a knife and a cable she was the one who cut the caes probably to get back at the village for throwing away her child and killing her husband she did it while a pig farmer was tending to the sew when

the electrical charge stopped there was nothing to stop it from killing him if you manage to get past the sew which is incredibly hard without wearing light armor and heal spamming you can quickly loot the corpse next to it and get a Note left by the pig farmer it's time for my Piggies to go to bed the great big mother piggy has said so I will count them first to see if all my Piggies come back to me one little piggy two little piggies three little piggies you'll also notice the letter has two numbers on

the edge of the paper you can find the other half by going back into the village and searching near the mayor's house what a joyous day we shall meet again today I hope she'll enjoy What I've prepared for her she hasn't had much of an appetite lately but it's okay we have our ways around that don't we she must eat Rich meals I've dug out something delicious for her today my queen only I can be close to her no one else no one no one else will get close to you anymore you need to eat

everything I've brought you today if you're manly I shall show you something I've Found in the woods this letter hints that the pig farmer has been digging up human bodies of dead villagers to feed the SE which might be the reason why the meat it produces is Tainted as most of the corpses in the forest end up infected did even if they died from you know natural causes why' you give me this [ __ ] thing I thought it was Airsoft it might also hint that the farmer himself was going insane calling a Mutated Pig

his Queen similarly how Discord admins call men their kittens hug you while rubbing you against my huge sweaty moves with the complete code you can now use it to open a crate in the barn which will give you a picture of the farmer before his demise with the so but if you killed husa or bought a cable from P Trek you can repair the cable to the Village you won't get a reward for it but the chicken lady will comment on it people say some fella Fixed that machine in our pigger changed them cables or

some such maybe he's the same fell that cut it his conscience surely got to him it won't bring our s's Guardian to life he was the only one daed enough not to get vets when feeding our s but Lord Only Knows wait till they get hungry and 10 fillers will come to take his place the machine is working so we just need a new volunteer by fixing the cable we might have just given the village a chance to survive whether That's saving them or just prolonging the inevitable is a whole different matter The Wolf Man

will also catch wind that you fix the cable and comment on it I've heard someone took pity on the poor villagers and fixed the cables in the pig shed some good Soul an angel of sorts probably crawled out of the ground people like that haven't been seen in these parts for a long time the the wolf pierces me with his look and grins a string of saliva lands on his whole Riddled jacket dear meat the wolf puts his pore on me I feel his claws puncturing my skin if the cables are fixed then be so

kind as to move your [ __ ] ass and finish the job you just need to tweak the machine a little bit in order to silence the unbearable whining of that pathetic se you can do that much can't you going back to the fuse box after fixing the wiring the description has changed various cables sced from the contraption some of them Run through the door to the outside there is a lever and a red button on the panel the motion range of the lever is limited by a provisionally attached plate a note is glued to

the casing reading the note it gives instructions to any villagers in the area set the voltage using the level the lock is set to a voltage that paralyzes the s for a moment around 15 seconds procedure the lever operator positions it in the middle the feeder gives it a sound Signal the operator then pushes the button and the feeder feeds the S repeat until the feeding is complete remember the S is our common good do not remove the lock without the functioning cable to stun the sew the villagers were unable to feed it so that's

why she was starving and not outputting any more offspring no one could you can Stone the SE with the intended voltage which will do pretty much Nothing but you're also given the option to break open the lock on the lever giving you the ability to hit the max voltage hitting it you can hear the SE wailing in pain as smoke rises above the barn this is the most effective and easiest way to kill it you can do it through normal means but ammo is expensive and does very little damage to the sew while Molotov cocktails

also barely tickle it returning to the wolf man he's Incredibly happy to hear the SE is dead Bravo meat no more squeals suddenly the wolf slaps me on the cheek I can [ __ ] hear the pitiful sobs of old wretches and the pleas of peasants begging their beloved Forest to bring back to so's life poor [ __ ] have no idea I'll be the only one to hear their cries the wolf bursts into laughter this is music to my ears meat their Lamentations make me calm finally I'll be able to sleep soundly I'll bet

they'll attempt to Break through the wall of trees G what a shame I can't breathe in their desperation up close meat just one more thing say hello for me when you're in the village send them my greetings the wolf checks his pocket his poor trembling with excitement he takes out some item and throws it on the ground here he'll then reward you with a single hot bar upgrade a very small benefit to how much you [ __ ] yourself for the rest of the Game although this is the only way to get more than six

hot bar slots so it's up to you if condemning a whole village to starvation is worth it to get a seventh inventory slot you know what actually don't don't answer that question killing the SE was never needed to progress the main story you might have thought it' help because of how nonlinear the quests are in this game but it was only to make the wolf man happy and with the so Dead the game will Change drastically Upon returning to your hideout you'll see a bloody circle of pigh heads on the floor kindly letting you know

that the villagers know where your base is when you next return to the Village you'll see the corpse of the SE with villagers praying for it to come back to life to feed them the villagers are in an even worse State than when you first saw them villagers know that without the SE there is no other steady food supply apart from a Few potatoes or resorting to cannibalism we're never going to make it these Woods have no end they'll definitely all starve and die investigating a newly open path you can see one villager trying his

hardest to make some kind of dent in the woods shipping away at the trees with his axe my hands are killing me sashik it's your turn now he's made some progress but the network of trees probably stretches on for miles and any progress He's made will quickly grow back killing him you can loot an axe head which you can use later before leaving the village you'll get someone calling out to you hey you the village leader wants to have a word with you he's waiting inside you're now finally granted access into the mayor's house it's

empty but you can investigate the cellar this place is cold and smells of raw meat eventually you'll see the town's leader through a small crack in the Wall come here for a Second it's him he's the one who killed ouro unleash antic antech is the same person hinted at earlier as being Unleashed on the villagers that were asking for more rations of pig meat it's a monster similar to the child in the well but an adult version and hooked up to a long chain it shows the hypocrisy of the village how they' cast an infected

child into a well but weaponized an even more dangerous adult plague carrier to use as An enforcer despite it having no capacity to be reasoned with after you dispatch it the other villagers will attack you that is if you didn't get a cheap hit the crack in the wall beforehand you can get some rare Loop like a welder and Shane you can still speak to the chicken lady apparently unaware of what you've done but just grieving for the SE someone killed a wonderful Pig the only s in the village what now where are we going

to get the Meat I won't let them butcher me hens even if they come for me I won't let them because this is totally optional you make the active choice to make the game harder for yourself and doom the entire V you could see it as quickly putting an end to their prolonged suffering as them eating the meat would surely have slowly infected them all anyway but was it really your decision to make on top of that only some of the villagers seemed to be affected by the Plague so there was a chance that if

you didn't kill the SE they might have had a chance at surviving this Choice weirdly mirrors the first choice in the game whether you should have put the dog out of its suffering or leave it to maybe recover back then the choice to end its torture was a fairly murky one and now you you've done it to a whole village full of people and these guys won't go out as quick as a single hit with an axe back In the pig shared near the fuse box to stun or kill the se you can find a

broken mirror on the floor this is the only time we see him up close in game barely visible through the broken glass wearing a straw hat scarf covering most of his face but what skin you can see is gray in color you've been heavily affected by the plague either through exposure from injecting Essence to level up or staying in the forest too long there's only one line of Dialogue you are one ugly bastard I guess you got what you deserved this line lines up with how earlier on the Wolfman called you repulsive and how the

villagers look away at you calling you a freak when they see you the animation shows the protagonist clutching his hands disgusted with his appearance there aren't any more lines of dialogue at least the musician had the idea to cover up his face so no one could see it oh wait no I I haven't I haven't talked About him yet pretend you didn't hear that I don't know why but this interaction reminded me if anything of disco in that game there's a mirror in the starting area which lets you look at yourself and actually gives your

character a portrait to replace the blank slate you start off with you can even change your expression if you pass a very difficult skill check it's too late like an image on just like in Darkwood this mirror causes self-reflection in the protagonist although that entire game is about realizing who you are so it isn't really surprising but let's rewind a bit and say you didn't kill the SE yet or even talk to the chicken lady because again there is so much more side content in in this game which can be incredibly easy to miss if

you're only focusing on the main story if you've been Scavenging the silent Fires for supplies you might have Got enough Essence to level up your skill tree again the next tier will give you access to a range of new perks acid blood Third Eye Runner and the negative perks poison vulnerability and fearful like I said earlier each tier you can choose two positive perks but you're forced to pick a single negative perk after that the entire tier is locked out and you move on to the next one firstly the positives acid blood which sounds amazing

is honestly God awful it turns Your blood acidic like an alien xenomorph so whenever you take damage you'll drop a small pool of blood that will actually damage enemies that touch it now enemies do take some damage but it is incredibly small and also the acid pool will vanish after a couple of seconds it never stun locks enemies either and with blocking not being a feature in dark wood it's pretty hard to hold enemies in place to get them to sustain enough damage for it to be Worthwhile also keep in mind you'll have to take

damage to spill any blood in the first place so if an enemy is that close any acid blood will be pointless because they'll probably already be getting another hit in and finish you off before the blood can do some real damage next up is third eye an active ability that for 60 seconds you'll be able to see everything around you removing the narrow Vision cone that you're used to this reveals everything both Loot and Enemies sneaking up on you if not for the limited time of 60 seconds this would be completely gamebreaking it's amazing how

easy Darkwood is when you actually have the hindsight of being able to see everything around you usually when you take damage your character will get knocked around in turn messing up your vision and if you try to run away you'll only have the audio cues of where the enemy is unless you want to risk some of your momentum To get a proper look third eye removes all of that is a great way to survive parts of the night where you'll have to Camp multiple corners but don't want to keep switching between them Runner is the

final positive perk another active one giving you unlimited Sprint for 20 seconds it sounds like a short time and it really is but it can get you out of really bad situations like making it to The Hideout before nightfall or Cutting Loose from an enemy that you just can't Be and you've wasted all your stamina trying to kill anytime you open up the menu to use an active skill the game will also slow down giving you the time to activate the skill and get out without getting stun locked mid menu so those are the good

ones now for the bad ones poison vulnerability is pretty bad which means it's good because it's bad cuz it's a negative perk I think it'll change the protagonist's body so he'll be more susceptible to any poison damage So what would have been an inconvenience stepping on a mushroom could now end up killing you okay okay I'm losing Health very quickly no it was a bit it was a bit it was a bit please don't die for [ __ ] sake and it will make the rest of the game harder because as you progress to new

areas these mushrooms only become more numerous thankfully like I said earlier you can make antidotes or take pills to counteract that fearful is somehow even worse it'll make the Protagonist more anxious whenever you take damage your K of vision will become incredibly narrow for a few seconds which can be a complete run killer especially if you're trying to keep TS on multiple enemies you can counteract this with third eye but that can only be used once a day while fearful will kick in whenever you take damage injecting enough Essence you'll probably pass out and have

another dream this one's very different as you're somewhere far far Away from the forest you'll wake up in an apartment playing the same calming music you hear whenever you survive a night at The Hideout there'll be a woman next to you telling you to turn off the light so she can get more sleep from here you can explore the rest of the apartment going into the living room you can turn on a black and white TV set yay stars are falling from the sky they twinkle first and then they fall straight into your Paws but

floppy bear these are not Stars it's snow what are you talking about these are shirely stars I can see you can walk around the rest of the house to see it's just a normal polish apartment with a kitchen cooker and bathroom this kind of living space would probably cost around 2 million in today housing market you can search the cupboards for normal household items you can never find in game like detergent spray cans scissors and even fresh pears Surprisingly missing is the bottle of spirit that's at least 70% alcohol which is pretty much present in

every single polish household I guess that stash is just hidden away pretty well looking outside you can see sidewalks and other apartments it's amazing how something so normal seems so alien in this game eventually though the facade will stop the music ends and all the lights in the apartment go out with a knocking on the door when you go to answer you'll see The man who's knocking is you the protagonist before waking up again in The Hideout there's also a secret ending to this dream if you answer the door but never look at the protagonist

you can shimmy past him and walk down the corridor opening another apartment door and walk down a corridor filled with chairs and valuable shiny stones reaching the end you'll see another TV set Teddy drop ear shouldn't be here the dream will end and You'll wake up again in The Hideout Teddy drop ear was a Polish stopmotion children's animated show which ran from 1975 to 1987 and as we know from examining various magazines in the real world the current year is 1987 by now you might feel ready enough to explore the rest of the map and

head towards the third and final area the old Woods you can access the old Woods as soon as you reach the Silent Forest there's no Quest or items you need to get to the next Area the devs knew you tried this so placed its most common enemy on the bridge waiting for you this is the chomer you've seen them before either chasing you in the underground the wedding or in the well but the silent woods are the Cher's hunting grounds unlike most other enemies they won't wait for you to leave but will instead attack you

on site they're humans that have been infected with the plague so severely their entire Upper torso has been transformed into a giant jaw filled with teeth an obvious reference to the 1982 film The thing it actually came out a couple of years before the game is set that film featured a scene where one of the characters heads split in half to form a jaw similar to what you see here some of them will start out sleeping waking up if you get too close but the majority of them will be roaming around this biome they have

nearly as Much health as you do and their rapid attacks can easily kill any player the main reason they're so terrifying is because they still show some level of Intelligence being the only enemy so far to dodge away from your attacks the same way you do so baiting them into attacking and hitting them like you deal damage to pretty much every other monster in the woods might not work here you can always rely on guns but again these are rare and ammo is expensive if You kill one with a melee weapon instead of dying it'll

split in half with its torso dragging itself towards you they drop odd meat when killed which you can use again in the cooker but resource Wise It's usually best to avoid them entirely thankfully though because they're carnivores you can actually bait them with meat to distract them if you really want to go into the old Woods the first priority should be to get to the biomes first Hideout and set up a base There this location is even larger than the Silent Forest Hideout and is vastly different from any previous ones instead of being a cottage

or a large house this is a sprawling complex and is the most difficult place to survive out of all three regions this is probably where the majority of the military was organized before being separated you can even find a letter of desertion in one of the drawers inside you can also find a gentleman's magazine again with the Current Year's issue the devs really want you to know what year this game takes place in despite this probably being a military Outpost it's been picked clean with no firearms or ammo left over unless you get lucky searching

a container the base itself is in a really bad state with even more cracked walls giving Invaders an easy way in and very few walls to actually barricade there's still the standard wood chipper Welter repair workbench and Generator Though it seems like there used to be two of them powering The Hideout one being completely destroyed by the time you arrive turning it on you'll notice the lights are actually fixed to the walls so you can't move any of them around apart from a single lamp because you're deeper in the woods the knights are much harder

to survive I mentioned earlier the Traer giving you more reputation for each Hideout you stay at the Old Woods give you 200 reputation at Night double the first Hideout and for a good reason from the infected dogs Savages and shoers trying to break in most nights which can easily sandwich you if you aren't careful as soon as you step outside the base at night you'll lose night protection so the unkillable floor G will start chasing you while the other two hideouts gave you at least the option to stay Within the grass Gardens in this Hideout

you'll be forced inside all night giving you less options to Escape a bad situation even the corridors you'll be fighting in and now much more narrow barely letting you move around and making dodging enemies near impossible also now there's even more night events black fog can form on top of you which will drain your health and give you a gas deu for inhaling dangerous Essence a Red Orb can spawn inside your base Waring around your hideout Illuminating the area much like a flare which seems to be a benefit Giving you more vision you'll Chase it

thinking it's something beneficial like how mushroom growths would work at night but looking directly at the source you'll be given the pain debuff damaging you whenever you maintain eye contact with the icon being a melted face you'll also encounter a brand new enemy one that you could have seen back in the Silent Forest although it's much more common here you'll hear a large number of crows overhead and after that nothing Until you hear slow heavy footsteps closing in on you they look like large humanoid birds with a bone head they won't damage you but looking

at them they'll begin to scream and if you don't look away or if they're able to touch you or if you're stupid enough to attack or shoot one it'll spread its wings andm a scream so loud it'll kill all the power in your hideout for a short while they'll die on the spot vaporizing into Ash but from the body will crawl out Five Offspring speeding on the floor towards you they're not too hard to deal with on their own but in the Old Woods you'll never be attacked by just one enemy at a time making

this the perfect opportunity for other enemies to get the drop on you this is the banshee and is one of the reasons why surviving a night at the Old Woods is so difficult you can never kill a Banshee without spawning its Offspring if you set up any preventatives like fire or bear traps It'll simply Glide over them if you're forced to piss up a Banshee you can quickly throw a Molotov onto its body hoping it kills The Offspring before they can attack you the banshee and its babies never have any loot on them another indicator

that you should always stay away from them unless you have to engage I've seen people on the wiki say the best course of action is just to look away and stare at a wall hoping the Banshee will will leave them alone yeah Try and apply that same logic to the rabid dogs and Chompers that trying to break in as well interestingly the Banshee can't actually break barhe heads by itself meaning if you bunker yourself in one of the rooms the Banshee won't actually be able to get in although again the Banshee will probably never attack

alone and all the other night creatures have no issue breaking through wooden boards all of this might make you want to go back to the Silent Forest for The nights instead which to be fair is a viable option that is if you want to spend half the day walking to where you need to go at least the old Woods hideout compensates with the oven being much more efficient than the previous one letting you inject even more polish crack for Less mushrooms if you manage to survive the night and get a hefty reputation Boost from the

trader you might want to stock up on some ammo and go exploring the area the plentiful Chompers aside there are some unique locations here not found anywhere else but first give me that bug Nest I need an extra life talking to the trader after your first night here will have some unique dialogue visibly struggling a man drops the sack from his back and bends in half as if out of breath he shakes the dust off his clothes then rolls up the sleeve of his seemingly too small jacket I see some words written on his forearm

the forest wants to devour You you're heading straight into its jaws he's again warning you against progressing through the woods stop right there but you can't stay in the forest forever you have to get out you can see that the old Woods are suffering much more infection than the previous areas coming across roots of trees looking sickly with mushrooms growing on them there's also the remains of a previous Hideout completely covered in Gray growths even having an oven wor Workbench table saw for wood none of these can be used but strangely enough resembles the very

first Hideout we had back in the dry Meadow there's also a road which has been overgrown by trees but was at one point used as a checkpoint to get people in and out probably set up by the military before the plague became so rampant railway tracks dot these parts of the woods as it was probably used for shipping supplies from the village into the Cities but the tracks have been so deformed by the woods there of no use to anyone not surprising considering one of the events when surviving the night a huge earthquake Shak the

entire Forest following the Rail lines you might come across a topple train car there could be some useful supplies in here but the door is locked and we need a code to get inside this part of the woods looks like it was always rural even before the pandemic with you being able to stumble Upon a hunter's house in its terrible State like most homes in the game it is heavily guarded by plague infected dogs and champers both of which won't attack each other almost as if if anything suffering with the plague has an implicit understanding

of who to attack if you manage to clear out the numerous enemies here it is a great place to find ammunition for your shotgun and Pistol no that's a lot of ammunition you can see whoever lived here loved hunting With seemingly dozens of bear traps scattered all across the house and a huge pile of snare traps all stacked on top of each other rans sacking the place you can find some important loot like a photo the hunter had taken of a dog feasting on a corpse with how sparse the trees are here this was probably

in the early days before the infection first hit the area you can also find an empty trophy rack the the head removed with only the wood being Left with some gray hairs still stuck onto the wood this has to be some pretty huge game like an elk or wolf lastly you can find a corpse covered in Roots in the house searching the body you can find a simple silver wedding ring this has no significance and can be sold to any Trader for some extra reputation one of the last places you can find which was marked

on your map already if you bought the map from P Trek in the Silent Forest is a huge Church the front of the church is collapsed but going inside you'd see what would normally hold the congregation behind the altar is a door leading to a Cellar that's locked with a code to learn the code you'll need to collect more items from the oven to level up your character if you find enough mushrooms odd meat from infected dogs and Chompers or buy cooka bles from Traders like the delicious Red egg you'll be able to get into

tier three of The skill tree which will give you three positive perks and two negative perks careful step is a passive perk that grants you a single instance to ignore the effects of a trap for each day this includes bear traps poisonous mushrooms or infected bodies that you interact with I feel this perk is mostly useless because by now you'll be aware of the hazards that the Darkwood has and you'll be able to avoid them as best as you can Oh you nearly had me you nearly had me there you nearly had me there you

thought I was going to interact with you eh you you thought oh I can disarm what that being said the old Woods do have some pretty crafty bear traps that are purposely hidden among the grass appetite is the next one much like the Savages of the woods you'll grow a taste for wood and eating it will heal you now this sounds great but unfortunately it's mostly useless Because it provides one of the worst healing factors in the entire game and even if you're in an excess of wood you'll always want some to use for barricades

or to fix your trusty shovel I tried eating some to save myself from dying and believe me it it it does not work wood wood wood I ate the wood please please I ate the [ __ ] wood I ate the wood I ate the wood collect wood collect wood I ate the wood I ate the wood I ate the wood Please oh my God oh my God it's going to be so close it's so close it's so close it's so close it's so close it's so close please please please please please please please [

__ ] sake yeah and then it disappears as soon as I die yep okay funnily enough this skill is actually a reference to what some of the Polish did in World War II when food was so scarce they actually had to marinate wood and eat it the only worthwhile perk on this tree is Scream giving the protagonist Once a day the ability to emit such a terrifying shout it'll scare away most enemies around him now this is great if you're being attacked by enemies from different angles your scream will make them flee away from your

line of sight but they'll still be hostile if they see you again afterwards this is the single best get out of jail card in the entire game the only enemy it won't scare off is the Banshee because of course it doesn't [ __ ] you Banshee the two Negative perks are either weak lungs or weakness these are both horrendous you'll notice with each tier as the skills get better the negative perks also become more effective at hindering your playthrough firstly weak lungs do not ever pick this skill because you are screwing yourself for the rest

of the game because of it you'll be watching that stamina bar 90% of the time because if it empties completely you'll have to wait double The time until it begins to regenerate that doesn't sound too bad but like I said you'll be anxiously watching the bar to make sure you've set your limit and while you do you probably end up walking into bear traps exploding corpses or enemies you're essentially capping off your stamina meter because you know that you're never able to fully empty it because if you do you'll be punished for it oh [

__ ] personally it's something I'd Prefer to not be fix setting over the other negative skill is weakness this is also stamina related by injecting the essence the protagonist will become frailer so when his stamina is low he'll deal less damage in combat this will only kick in when you drop below the last pip of stamina so it isn't anywhere near as bad as weak lungs both of these though are horrendous perks but this is definitely the lesser of two evils mostly because you'll be Primarily using it to charge up attacks to time hits on

enemies that will use up very little stamina not the quick Jabs that use up massive stamina and are kind of unreliable anyway and if you're in a situation where you had to run away and had to hit another enemy when you're out of stamina you're probably dead anyway after filling up the syringe with Essence and picking whatever Pok you choose you'll fall into a deep sleep further infusing yourself with the Forest you're trying so hard to escape you'll find yourself deep in the Woods running through the protagonist will say the smell of grass and trees

the Earth bends under my footsteps the sky swells pleasantly after some time you'll come across an open grave giving you the option to lie inside it it doesn't seem too comfortable I'm not sure if you hesitate a voice will call out to you oh I wasn't expecting this you look Tired come lie with me peill the soil the trees hum so calmly they sing so beautifully can you hear it crows will fly by distracting you and when you look back the talking corpse will disappear after a few moments a chomper coated in Ash will attack

you next to the Grave is a shovel that was used to dig it here you're given two options to lie in the grave and accept the dream or To defy it and kill the chomper attacking you while it keeps mocking you can you hear it can you hear the song your life literally is as valuable as a summer ant if you're killed by the choer you'll wake up as if nothing happened but if you manage to kill the chomer the dream will end and when you wake up you'll have a shovel blade in your inventory

crucial to upgrading the shovel that you already have if you choose to lie in the Grave you'll wake up with an insect in your inventory a cockroach that you can cook in the oven for Essence injecting even more of the forest into your arm you'll have another dream where you wake up in front of the church moving past the destroyed Bell you'll encounter a man telling you to stand in line as you approach the alter you can see what he meant as a line of people appear behind you shouting at you for skipping the queue

[ __ ] get a fat [ __ ] it looks Like they're all lined up to go into the trap door behind the altar which seems to be covered in some sort of Shadow and is locked with a code there's an open room next to it with a broken wall that you can go through here you can find a talking corpse you have no voice nor free will but do not frat you are in good hands I see it in his eyes when he looks down upon me it mentioned a he possibly implying that there

is a God of this Forest somewhere the driving force behind the forest's expansion Examining The Corpse gives you the description a completely ordinary dead man with a smile on his face there's no joke to be made here but honestly there's so many talking corpses in this game we should basically be accustomed to this by now to actually progress the dream you have to take the log pick from the chest near the trap door and open the room opposite to the one that leads Outside there's a wardrobe with an axe and an item called The Strange

box though you'll definitely be focusing more on the axe as once you loot both items a black Chomper will spawn in the main hall and start chasing you down it keeps repeating the lines a red seesaw a white dress a black box for my girls a red seesaw a white dress a black box for my girls here you're given a choice on what to do you can either avoid the chomper break open one the windows yink A lockpick from a corpse and open the church gate or you can try to fight dying to the chomer

has the exact same result if you ran away so realistically you want to take the chance killing the chomper you can find a medallion on its corpse it depicts a distorted photo of two young girls with the trapo code scratched into the bottom of the picture going back to the main area and opening the trapo ends the dream now this stream has a big Influence on the real world once you wake up whatever ending you got you wake up with the strange box in your inventory if you ran away upon waking up you'll see the

wolf man standing next to you meat what's with the big eyes scared bad dream you can trade with him normally but you can now also show him the strange box oh it's one of these an interesting find meat guess now you want to know what's inside eh somewhere in The part of the Old Woods lies a place where you'll find a key to this box well meat I would be careful if I were you trust me you don't want to open it by yourself bring me the key and don't try to be a wise guy

you won't know what to do with it but if you fought the Champa and open the trapo his dialogue changes just so slightly you look tired meat busy night and when you show him the box he says this and this what is this junk and what Am I supposed to do with it bite it until it opens your brain must be rotting if you think I'll break my fangs for this [ __ ] but you you still want to know what's inside right somewhere in the part of the Old Woods lies a place where you'll

find the key to this box but I doubt you'll be able to sort it out come to me maybe I'll even give you something for this junk if you died or ran away from the dream The Wolf Man considers you a coward talking down to You I have for wise guy but if you chose to fight your way out he treats you with a little bit more respect just to get angry at you immediately after probably because you now seem like more of a threat cutting your own path into the forest instead of assimilating into

it but this isn't all that changes inside the forest if you come back to the church after running away in the dream you'll meet a Madman maybe even the same one who told you to stand in Line back in the dream he keeps repeating phrases similar to what the black Champa was saying in that dream talking about giving candles and flowers to his little girls when you approach him he'll instead tell you to go below the floor where you belong he'll also tell you the combination for the trapo so you can go inside and if

you kill him he'll drop The Medallion the exact same one that you would get if you killed the chomper In that dream although the faces aren't distorted anymore if you ended the dream by killing the chomper and going into the trapo you'll find a corpse cut in half in the middle of the church also containing the medallion with the code to open the basement with the madman now abs naturally now you probably want to go into the basement but please for your own sake do not go down there unprepared there's a reason why the dream

Ended as soon as you went into the Basement and how the dream ended has easily the biggest divider in what comes next if you kill the black chomer the basement is now filled with huge dogs an enemy that you should be used to killing by now except now there's an entire pack trying to kill you at once in an incredibly closed space by the way that's the good outcome if you died or ran away in the dream the dogs are replaced with red Chompers which as you probably know now are extremely Dangerous and like I

said earlier the basement is incredibly cramped The Cellar itself looks like it was used as a hiding space for survivors with corpses lying in makeshift beds everywhere this is probably what everyone was lining up to do during the dream they were trying to get into the basement to use it as a safe house although clearly this didn't store the infection for too long as inside there isn't a single Survivor and if you Didn't open the trapo in the dream the corpses are now being converted into red champers they start out dormant similar to that one

you saw on the bridge and even in the village but if you attack them or invade their personal space they'll start to Agro also there's a single functioning radio down here do not do not touch the radio I I'm being serious do do not do it that is unless you kill the black Chomper because when you touch the [Music] radio you'll actually spawn a dog that has something very important in its inventory that being the Twisted key and if you go back and show it to the wolf man this happens give it to me the

wolf snatches the box and key from my hands with things like that you need to be careful meat this may be a trap muttering under his breath he attempts to open the box after a while the lid Gently slides open and the Wolf Peaks inside carefully squinting his eyes he also looks at the contents in silence then lifts his gaze at me is this a [ __ ] joke are you some sort of [ __ ] clown or something the wolf takes out a few crumpled pieces of paper from the box and throws them in

my face as they fall to the ground I notice a Shiny Stone among them some [ __ ] scribbles I'm warning you meat do not dare waste my time again this gives you Another valuable Shiny Stone along with a child's drawings by now you've probably noticed that the entire quest line if you can call it that surrounding the church is focused mostly around a family with both the black chum ER and the madman mentioning gifts to give to his little girls presumably the daughters in the locket the details were mostly fuzzy up to now but

the child drawing basically explains everything the first drawing depicts the entire Family back at their house this includes the father two little girls and a dog it looks like this picture is supposed to be from a time before the forest expanded into the area with it just being a nice happy family scene how awesome although the next drawing might already start some alarms in your head as it shows the family dog eating a red mushroom considering we've been using mushrooms like these as a way to attune ourselves to the forest you can probably Guess what

that might do to a dog the dog is already dead by the next drawing with it being drawn 6 fet under its name is also given here B which is a pretty common pet name in Poland and also a Albanian pastry I'm not really sure about the law implications of this one besides dying the dog does actually contribute a bit more to the story as in the same drawing we see the father bleeding from an open wound probably due to the dog biting him This could also point that the dog didn't die from the infection

but rather was put down after attacking its owner the aggression being reminiscent of the dogs we've been fighting throughout the game the next drawing shows the father dismantling the dogghouse presumably to build the red seesaw the girls are playing on this of course calls back to the dialogue from the black Chomper in the church dream where it talks about giving a red seaa to its girls but but If you've been paying attention while Scavenging through the dry Meadow you might remember the burnt House's location which features both a red seesaw and a destroyed dogghouse you

can also find the white dress the black chumper talks about in a safe hidden under the furniture pretty much confirming that this is where the family lived the house is even filled with hostile dogs probably referencing how the whole thing started with a dog but Just in case you weren't all that convinced yet the next drawing literally shows the house being burnt down and the family running away it's followed by a picture of the line of people we saw in the church dream featuring a figure who we might know as someone dressed in a medical

coat as well as a boy holding a violin who might be referencing a character I'm going to mention soon this drawing explains the connection the family had with the church and why both The Twisted key and the strange box could be found here they tried to hide in the basement to weit out the plague ravaging above again like so many others here unfortunately as we know hiding in the basement really didn't help the last drawing shows two children hugging each other with corpses lying behind them probably in the process of turning into red Chompers that

we encounter in the game strangely the father seems to actually not be with them I'm sure if he Was he would have been marked instead of just blending into the wall of bodies but there is something that could explain this back at the burnt house you can find a note presumably from the father I know they're there I can hear them laughing they're behind the wall of trees I can't get through by myself the the trees go back too fast this suggests that he might have left left his daughters in the basement to keep them

safe and gone back to his house he Probably knew he was infected from the dog bite by now so in a way he was protecting them from himself after returning back home he clearly wanted to go back and find them but I doubt that was his own choice he's hearing voices in this note so it's more than likely he was starting to go insane from the plague I think it's safe to say that the madman we find in the church is the father considering we can find The Medallion on his body and he's very Clearly

infected as when you kill the black choer in the dream the corpse you find in the church much later looks like a mutated chomer this entire plotline is completely depressing but it's a good study of how the plague actually affected normal people living in the region even though the story is told through a couple of lines of dialogue in crude drawings it does a really good job at communicating how horrible being here was this kind of Storytelling really Makes Darkwood special it feels very human despite the eldrich horrors we've seen all over the forest look

I get it okay like so many horror games you pick up the audio log and it goes oh the monsters are coming a and it cuts the static but this is a completely optional plotline that we really didn't even have to interact with and it's communicated in a much more organic way interestingly enough the child's drawings used to be accessible in a completely different way In previous versions of the game back at the church outside the dream you can find a burnt piece of paper with a Bible passage inside the Bible the passage in question

was Psalm 91: 3-6 and while it might sound weird to get so specific this was actually quite important at the top of the piece of paper you can see a mirrored website address Darkwood game.com going to the website you can see a code lock similar to the ones you Could find in the game on various storage containers and doors now if you input the numbers of the Bible passage 9136 you'll shown the same pictures we've been going through this is a pretty good puzzle with a nice LW reward but I can totally see why the

drawings would Chang to be entirely accessible in game it definitely grounds the story better instead of you know needing a Bible scholar to solve an ARG coming back to the church itself in the same Room where you got the strange box in the dream you can find the electronic game upon inspecting it you can see a game console with two characters resembling wolves this item seems to be based on a russian-made single game console where one of the games apparently involved a wolf stealing eggs while trying to not drop what he's already collected so technically

this game has still more games than the PS5 by way oh yeah another Slavic game where You can find the exact same handheld is in harat which is like this really cool original Doom Boomer shooter in that you can also find a handheld game but in Hara you can actually play it it's an unlicensed clone of egg which was a title in Nintendo's Game and Watch line have you seen this he's got sunglasses on the wolf in both iterations wasn't actually in gaming watch but was based on a Soviet Russian cartoon called just you wait

the cartoon itself Was about a wolf trying to eat a rabbit so so basically Tom and Jerry but for uh gnik the handheld game is another item you can show The Wolfman which prompts this uh pretty funny dialogue what the [ __ ] is this do you think this is funny are you mocking me do I look like a joke to you Daddy chill you're given a choice to either shake your head or nod shaking your head has him get angry at you and he tells you to never mock him again while nodding Reveals a

more humorous side you're a brave piece of meat and what's more important one with a sense of humor where did you find this one an electronic game eh about a wolf stealing chicken eggs good one I have a soft spot for games how about you I can give you something in exchange meat what would you say to uh surprise eh if you Nodge now he'll take the console off you but in return you get a fully functioning pistol which to be fair is a pretty good Tradeit you can also show the game to peer Trek

and get a free 100 rep with him if you agree that the wolf will go to space when he collects the chicken eggs and give him the game but honestly the pistol itself is already worth twice that much rep not even counting the cost of items normally needed to craft it now all what I've been talking about so far is side content yes I know I spent this time on words words words and I haven't even Really progressed the main story anyway let's take a step back and return to when we first met the chicken

lady After exiting dialogue with her but she'll notice that somebody's watching you both holy mother this creep again May the devil take him and his blasted violin the old lady turns red and starts to scream devil [ __ ] your mother get away from me house leaving the chicken lady's house you can see someone hide underneath a Tractor before pulling a violin towards them talking to them introduces you to another major NPC the musician it's not my fault I I know it doesn't sound too great my violin it's it's it's a bit broken I I

wouldn't play anymore sorry um sir have you been in that Hut the chicken L's Hut you're not afraid of her you're you're brave and H have you seen her the the pretty lady she she's the most beautiful lady in the world I watched her through the cracks In the window she she changes when I watch her g g gets more beautiful I play for her I want her to be happy because she doesn't seem to be the chicken lady locked her in that room she she keeps her there she envies her she won't allow anyone

to see her even me she knows very well that during the last kupala night I I I fished out that pretty ladies wrath from the river yes sir the the chicken lady knows what it means oh yes I will become the pretty lady's husband we will Walk hand in hand sir I will play for her Mister sir I tried to release her but the chicken lady She chased me off she she always does I also looked for the second key at Mr Jans but now he's disappeared I don't know how to get into his house

Kapa Knights or not kapali being a major folk holiday with Eastern slabs basically their equivalent of Swedish Midsummer Midsummer Sweden [Music] lunch at this point you can totally Ignore his ramblings and walk away Mis sir a skinny little hand emerges from beneath the tractor and grabs me by the anle please don't go Mr Sir you're are my only hope please don't be afraid of CH chicken lady he seems desperate for you to help him but you can leave and never interact with him again I understand I'm sorry dull thuds can be heard from under the

tractor as if someone was bashing their head against the ground stupid Stupid stupid now I will never find this key well maybe near the well near the well where I so Mr Jan Mr Jen will have the key him mentioning a key the same key you've been looking for might pique your interest so you can talk to him again and agree to hear him out so kind so very kind you are just like him my daddy but my papa has changed Mister just like my mommy they will not listen to me they won't hear how

sad I am sir oh oh but am I not boring you sir please Don't go please hear me out don't go nervous grunting can be heard from underneath the tractor perhaps you could help me this is where the game diverges into two paths because both the musician and the Wolfman wants what's behind the chicken lady's door investigating the door you can hear raspy breathing but not much else only called the pretty lady by the musician the boy just wants to play music for her but the wolf man's intentions are much less obvious h both Of

them want you to find a key to a locked door and bring it to them so they can get to whatever's inside lastly he'll mark on your map where he resides please please find the key good sir to the pretty lady's room the the chicken lady has it well Mr Jen also has it I saw him recently near the well he used to play with me we threw rocks into the well and looked into our Reflections while making silly faces daddy used to say not to do it else my face will stay That way now

the water in the well is always hazy it shows these weird images the well is here in the v Village maybe you will find him there he used to hang around it often he stared into the well as if looking for something or someone I must hide now hide from the chicken lady I will go to that place where they used to keep all the Grain in the part of the Silent Forest will you bring me the key if you find it I promise to repay you somehow Me and the pretty lady with all this

said however the wolf man knows exactly what you want a key for a key but the musician is just promising a general reward so you'll have to weigh up which character you want to give the key to and that is if you can even find it the musician has a camp much Like The Wolf Man in The Silent Forest there's a collapse Silo which will have a Bambino gramophone hook looked up to some speakers playing mozar piano conero Number 19 in F major on repeat here you can speak to the musician he's not a Traer

but now you can see his entire body a frail child heavily affected by the plague his skin hardened like tree bark with his mouth twitching and drool falling from his mouth here you can show them some items you've collected like the picture of the road home Mommy once T me about this road she said people used to travel it they would leave their houses and walk It during the night I was scared of this story I was afraid mommy would go out to and leave me behind you can also show him the picture of the

Doctor Who he instantly recognizes this is our doctor yes he is just as Brave and good as you are he helped me he is helping all of us he gave me this beautiful mask so I could be healed of my afflictions maybe you could have one too maybe the doctor would make a mask like this for you I could ask him about it further going to Show the doctor had no idea how to combat the plague by making masks to hide people's afflictions but also saying he could ask the doctor despite him leaving the village

and this hints that he does actually still have contact with him so giving him the key might actually prove useful after all he'll also comment on the sew in the pig shed that the villagers have been feeding off have you you heard about the SE the villagers keep this SE in the nearby Pig Shed they call it the mother of all pigs they say it's beautiful but I've never seen it they don't allow me near her they CH chase me off they always chase me off the little musician drops his gaze maybe you would be

able to see her Mister if you managed to get inside maybe you could make a wee piece of meat for me I've never eaten Pig and I've heard it's very tasty would you take some for me if you killed the so like I mentioned earlier sadly he'll be able to Relate to it from appearance I saw the villagers dragging a cart with a dead so the one they called the mother of all pigs it wasn't as beautiful as they said nowhere near the pretty lady the boy drops his G and that piggy it was a

bit similar to me the boy sniffles and rubs his mask with his deformed hand the villagers have been crying after her a lot I saw them trying to cut through the wall of trees do you think it's even possible Mister mommy told me once that the woods are never were ending and there's nothing on the other side to get the key you need to go back into the well where you killed huskar's child navigating to the end you can climb a rope to get inside another house in the village this is the only way inside

as the front door is heavily barricaded searching the house you can find numerous chicken eggs a collection of plastic chickens and a dog tag dated To 1918 with the surname mulski this could be Yan's house indicated by what was said by the musician upon turning him down after searching a wardrobe you can find a key covered in chicken feces the key both the musician and the Wolf Man want to open the back room in the chicken lady's house now if your curiosity is peaked enough you can actually open the door for yourself and see what's

inside you'll find some pretty exceptional loots like a military Flashlight a direct upgrade to the normal flashlight having around 50% more brightness but the tradeoff being it burns through batteries twice as fast still though it's an amazing piece of Kit comrade perish but more importantly you'll see something under a bed sheet writhing around in pain searching it you can loot the fabric for yourself for crafting which reveals the Monstrous person the Chicken lady was trying to hide cover me please this is the pretty lady the musician was referring to a bloated mutated woman with hands

and legs bound and tied how anyone could find this woman pretty is clearly the result of huffing Soviet gray paint there's also a silver wedding ring you can find in the bedding next to her with the key in hand you have the option to give it to either the Wolfman or the musician you can only give the key to one of them as they'll Take it off you and use it to visit the pretty lady this is also where the game majorly diverges into two different paths the wolf man's is the most straightforward he'll give

you the location of The ductor Hideout straight away as I produced the key the wolf's pupils widen with excitement well meat I didn't think you could succeed I'm impressed time for your reward you'll find that quack Thief here but he locked himself away from in the world and he Won't let anyone in so I don't know if this information will be of any use to you mey what the [ __ ] are you looking at I promise that I tell you where to find him and I did did I tell you you'll be able to

get there that's something else isn't it the wolf bursts out with laughter now get out of my sight meat I have important business to attend to if you're interested in continuing our wonderful relationship look for me in the edge of the Old Woods I predict a Tasty future together the wolf sinks his hands into the deep pockets of his coat here deliver this to that insane old [ __ ] as a way of saying thank you for her beautiful sister the wolf throws the head of a chicken under my feet as I lift my gaze

I realize that the wolf is gone you can take the chicken head to the chicken lady and show it to her and this does absolutely nothing except terrifier Jesus Almighty my little darling what have they done to you this Is a bad sign Mister a bad sign what will happen now wolf man is using you as a messenger to let her know that her sister isn't safe anymore one thing you'll notice when you side with the wolf man in a lot of quests you'll actually be completing the game a lot more quicker except with the

instance of killing the so but in that situation you did have the choice to just leave the so completely alone because there's no Karma system or warning message saying Uh-oh you did a bad thing to or Kenny will remember this what's your name sir my name is the these what sir these it's really up to you to side with someone so malicious to escape the woods faster because the wolf man has no intention to leave why would he he's using you as a tool to spread misery onto others you can even kill the chicken lady

outright which gets you no extra reward apart from the wolf man's Satisfaction you've killed her you've killed the hag that Rak of chickens my dearest meat finally I will be able to Wolf down as much poultry as I wish if you gave him the key he'll tell you where to find the Doctor's house and adds that if you want to continue your wonderful relationship you can find him in the Old Woods if you go looking for him in the edge of the map he specified you'll eventually stumble upon an old barn filled with dogs making

your way Through the pack you'll find the wolf covered in blood and smelling absolutely foul interacting with him now has him act like the average Furry Convention attendee if you see him shoot him in public with him jumping up at you and licking your face comrade the greeting sounds like an angry growl the wolf makes a quick leap bouncing against me with his swollen belly that's going to me like my response video flashbacks oh Jesus well To be honest I'd pick you up hug you while to be he puts his paws on my shoulders he

aaci justly licks my face what a gift have you given me I notice fresh blood stains on his fur and feel streaks of his saliva dripping onto my coat he leans towards me as if he wanted to say something to my ear you can now either push him away or do nothing if you're a normal person and don't want to have your personal space invaded by you know an anthropomorphic wolf covered in Blood you would probably push him away the wolf takes two steps back I can only see a row of filthy sharp teeth underneath

his hood well look at this ladies and gentlemen he's apparently addressing these stuffed human corpses sitting by the walls this carcass thinks he's better than you this rotten pile of meat must be delusional the wolf turns towards me adjusting his coat are you pretending to be human or are you just cracking jokes I'll help you recover Your stupid key I'll take you back to the doctor's house I'm sure you'll find some Clues on how to reach his current Hideout while there you two will have a little chat you'll get back what you've lost and then

nothing will keep you from getting the [ __ ] out of my part of the woods do you hear me meat you will pack your bags dive into that stinking hole of yours and diss a [ __ ] pier and are we going comrade this option has Wolfman reward you with a hunting rifle pretty Decent long range gun you won't be able to obtain otherwise for quite some time however as we already know in Darkwood the reasonable choices always make the game harder on you choosing to do nothing instead we'll have him do this the

wolf squeezes my arms and starts licking my face once from the left side once from the right side comrade meat his breath stinks of rot what would I ever do without you you're not such a worthless piece of carcass as you look Thanks to you I feel fulfilled I got my girl my sweet little lady back hard to believe the same blood flows through the veins of the [ __ ] who reeks of chickens suddenly the wolf sends me back with a powerful push and reaches into his coat pocket some object hits the floor here

no need to thank me now since that part of the deal is behind us I'll help you recover your stupid key I will take you back to the doctor's house I'm sure you'll find some Clues on how to reach His current Hideout while there this does tie into the wolf man's instructions apart from the dev just trolling you it's pretty obvious that the wolf man wants complete and total dominance over you and if you abide by his rules he basically ends up treating you like a pet rejecting his hug is a massive Act of Disobedience

when you do that it shows that you still have some Independence and you're not entirely his lap dog entirely but if we choose to Push the WF away you get nothing one single dialogue option just [ __ ] you over from getting a gun worth 400 rep which is as we know a certified Darkwood moment also how the [ __ ] did he keep a hunting rifle in his pocket but on the other hand what's wrong with following him granted basically every Quest he sent us son was to spread misery onto anyone still alive in

the forest but he has rewarded us every time submitting to him did make the journey out the woods Easier and in the end is that all that really matters it might be demeaning to become his servant but dignity doesn't really matter when you're a half corpse stuck inside a forest intent on killing everything inside before you even find The Wolf Man in the previous room you can see the pretty lady now a half eaten corpse this was the wolf man's end goal and seemingly something he was obsessing about for a long time evidenced by how

happy he is saying he's finally Fulfilled we're not sure where this Obsession comes from but unfortunately it looks like we won't be getting any answers anytime soon as this is pretty much your last interaction with him the wolf man will also give you the option of taking you to the doctor's house pretty useful since walking there can easily take multiple in-game hours depending on how lucky you are with the random placement if you choose not to go with the wolf and instead leave his barn Yourself you can go to the other side where you came

from and find a wooden door you can't open it without a key but it's wooden meaning your shovel can make quick work of it turns out you could have just done that from the beginning instead of farting your way through the Exel bully rescue shelter [ __ ] you Foo and finally after that you can go to the doctor's house the first thing you'll notice when you Arrive is the area seems to have been flooded somewhat with only the road in the middle being dry ground thankfully the time here is frozen much like back in

the village fun fact going into this area can actually cause the in-game timer to have an aneurism and set the time back to some random value apparently the time it resets to is depending on what time it is when you first visited the area you can even exploit this for infinite days if that Time happens to be early morning surely wouldn't do that would you you're not you're not a cheater following the road your first encounter a collapse Shack it looks like half of it assumingly fell off a cliff one that was probably created by

the forest's roots expanding on the ground inside you can find a locked wooden door again easy work for your shovel there's a corpse inside the room holding an axe and an odd Stone now you might remember how I called the axe Craft to scam well I'll let you in on on just a little secret you won't actually be able to craft it for quite some time even after visiting the doctor's house and most playthroughs will end up taking you here anyway so you can get a free axe instead of wasting 450 on a trade and

waiting 20 hours again absolutely Peak game design there's also the Odd Stone worth 60 rep not to be confused with the shiny stone we've been seeing everywhere it Looks like a plate of oatmeal in the current version it has absolutely no use it's just a barter item however in Old Alpha versions this item was actually used to make potions items you could use to permanently increase either your health or your stamina now this would have made the game easier which I'm sure the devs would not have wanted so I'm not surprised at all that they

were removed from the game especially considering how important the Health and stamina bottlenecks are for gameplay instead being replaced with the essence abilities which not only force you to pick a negative perk but also give you more interesting options than just a stat boost what happened to the potions You' be able to craft from odd Stones they were a thing I think in the early Alpha versions right random world where you started at the the center and you could use those potions to level up your health and stamina they were Removed in favor of skills

that improve those stats but I don't remember why just because of balancing issues I I think the map constructions changed to biomes and we figure out that it will be better to also place the items that are making uh you know that are like developing your character also it's going to be better yeah because the essence is like the main leveling up system now so I guess that just kind of became outdated Yeah moving on you can find a fortified building with even a trap set up in the only entryway when you go inside you

can see it's actually something like a field Hospital probably set up by the doctor trying to find a cure for the plague most beds are either empty or have a corpse on them hey everyone some of the corpse is even missing body parts although one patient if you want to call them that seems to still be alive where's the Doctor where Daddy went out and left angry and hungry he was I'm hungry too can't move head is exploding and if I move I'll burst myself but just because he survived the doctor's experiments doesn't mean he

isn't completely insane he's still mumbles to himself and Jitters around frequently he's probably undergoing the same mutation that happened to people that we saw in the church basement or even back in the village to back this up He also mentions that his head feels like it's bursting which is exactly what happens when a human finally turns into a red Chomper their head splits open you have the option to kill him here and if anything unlike the dark at the beginning of the game this really is a mercy kill if you don't he'll probably turn into

a red chomer there's no reward he doesn't come back later there's no secret Easter egg item but yeah you're just putting someone out of their misery He even calls out to you to do it when going back the other way possibly still locid enough to know what's coming he also tells you to take his broken house on his corpse you can find the rusty key so if you didn't break down the door in the collapse Shack earlier now you can open it normally the last building is the doctor's actual house looking similar to how it

was in the prologue you can open the chest Outside just to find that it's actually a freezer full of ice and body parts probably Parts the doctor was experimenting on and in case you're wondering uh yes you can eat the ice and it even gives you a small endurance boost and no you can't eat the body parts Darkwood can stand for a lot of things but cannibalism is not one of them well at least not yet anyway before you enter the house the interior outside your field of vision looks exactly like It did back in

the prologue probably because the protagonist remembers it looking like that but when you enter the house and actually get to Gaze on it properly you'll see it's been even more ravaged the surgical table is flipped the cages are knocked over and even the carpet is a complete mess peed up my [ __ ] rug there's also a lot of mushroom growths clearly the building has been abandoned for quite some time now you can explore the same areas you Could back in the prologue even the hatch in the interrogation room has new items there's even another

Odd Stone in the same place that we got the table leg from there's also a photo of what looks like a Savage lying on the table it has an inscription on it with the date 12th of June 19 1985 meaning it must have been taken around 2 years before the protagonist was stranded here in a side room you can also find a moonshine Distillery this is probably why there's So much alcohol to be found around Darkwood we know that the doctor ran away from the village but who's to say that you know he hasn't been

brewing his own alcohol to sell with Traders just to get by using the money made from it as fuel for his generators in the room where yanic was locked in the prologue you can find a dead body with the protagonist even remarking that he remembers him upon inspection the main importance of this House is the hatch located in the main room you couldn't see it before because the carpet was covering it now it's rolled up as if someone has accessed it recently by the way in case you're wondering you can't actually interact with the rug

on repeat playthroughs because that would break the entire pacing of this game and you basically be skipping 90% of chapter 1 but when you interact with it now you realize it's code locked now I got a little bit Worried here thinking I have helped or hindered so many people within the three forest biomes and this is what I get uh a [ __ ] code well thankfully you can actually find The Code by following the lines scratched into the floor as there are numbers scratched along them on the vertices some numbers can actually be seen

when not looking at them and your character probably remembers them from before but now they're covered with sludge or debris the last number is Covered by a cabinet but once you move it you can finally open the hatch inside you can first find a toy resembling a small rocket your first instinct might be to take it to petrick but you actually can't do anything with it currently despite its value of a 50 no Trader will actually buy it from you mate can I borrow you a pen I've looked everywhere and this item really has no

use it's like the BB gun pellets I feel it's something that was meant to be in The game and had a use and the devs just couldn't find a use for it or maybe it's just flavor text the next two items are pretty self-explanatory one of them is a note with a code to a train cart door written on it the other one is a map that marks the train wreck location if you haven't discovered it yet you can probably already guess what's inside but for now let's get back to the Musicians path now if

you ignore The Wolf Man entirely You can actually give the key to the musician yes you're amazing Mister sir thank you the boy shuffles his legs he's visibly excited but also seems uncomfortable sir now I have the key but don't have the courage she's too beautiful my pretty lady just look at this violin Mister she will laugh at me and it is her I always play for one of the strings securing his mask falls off together with his ear the boy reattaches it as if nothing happened but maybe my Mom has this beautiful violin I

would ask her to borrow it to me but she's too angry with me could you please convince her to borrow it to me I'll give you a cart with drawings for her to apologize when she gets it she will surely stop being angry and she will borrow us the violin it's behind the cupboard my mommy always hides it there please Mister bring me this violin you're not afraid of anything anyway there's nothing to be scared of you will find my parents house In the part of the Old Woods if you come back with my my

mom's violin I will try to get you an appointment with the doctor because you look pretty sickly I will be waiting for you near the old church in the part of Old Woods now unlike The Wolf Man the musician won't directly tell you where the doctor is instead he'll just reward you with a chestnut doll that's entirely pointless you can't trade it it doesn't do anything I guess it just looks kind of Cute to get the doctor's location you'll have to do a second request for him which is to travel to his parents' house and

retrieve a violin marked This creepy house on the map you'll see it's a badly damaged house like most other places in Darkwood but inside you'll find a half dead man pale withered skin Hollow eyes teeth black as night he looks Dead all right but he's still moving anything he says to the player is incredibly hard to Understand inside one of the chests you can find a chestnut man similar to the doll he gave you so this is definitely his house inside the bathroom you can find a woman sat in a tub half dead just like

the man she's been lying in this water for quite a while the protagonist will also remark that the floor around the Wardrobe is heavily scratched someone must have moved it frequently now I know this is a little bit obvious kind of like getting a hint come up on The top left of the screen but you know some people some people need a bit of guidance in these games oh [ __ ] you dude [ __ ] this are you [ __ ] me dragon it across you'll see an opening with the violin taking it you'll

hear something from the woman sat on the tubodi ignoring her request when you try to leave the musician's parents will turn into Chompers who could now you could argue that their infection accelerated due to Aggression because from their perspective someone really has just broken into their house and stolen their valuables but regard regardless of that escaping you return to the musician gee you did it this is my mom's violin so beautiful was she happy about the drawing is she feeling well the kid stares at the violin with baited breath now I can play my pretty

lady a visit I will play her a serenade will you visit me at my parents' house Mister if they Borrowed you the vi ly they surely aren't angry with me anymore ah I almost forgot we have an appointment with the doctor he was happy to learn about a new patient I taught him about you he's inside the train wreck in the edge of the old woods now this should be a good ending for him I mean you know we helped him get his violin but the next day if you do visit his house you'll see

his body being molded out by his parents probably probably still fueled by the Blind Rage of you robbing their house stay out of my territory after finishing off the parents you can take the violin off his body although it's useless as it can't be sold you can probably use it as the first of many reminders that everyone you encounter ends up worse but if you take the musician's advice you can actually leave the picture he gave you with his mom which will thankfully stop them turning when you take the violin probably distracted by one of

the Last happy memories they had of their child but again if you return the next day they would have already to comes the plague and as Chompers again eating their son here's a protein tip eat your fresh born the drawing the musician gives you is a song Piece with a character made out of leaves it was probably just enough of a reminder to pacify them but not actually reverse the infection the only outcome to save the musician is if you kill the parents at Their house before bringing the violin if you return to the house

the next day you'll see him standing outside with Graves that he's dug for his parents unable to understand that you saved his life why did you kill them the boy silently stares at the ground beneath his feet he clutches the violin in his hands please go away for this path this is the last time you'll ever see the musician ironically him mourning his parents or being killed by them is a Much better outcome to what happens if you don't help him but I'll get into that later now on top of the two choices to give

the key to the wolf man or the musician to get to the doctor there's also the third outcome now if you go back to to the Village you can actually kill the pretty lady but if you do this uh this locks you out of either of the paths making you have to pick up the pieces for yourself why did you kill them the boy Silently stares at the ground beneath his feet he clutches the violin in his hands please go away when you kill her you can loot The Blood Stained Shaw from her body and

show it to the wolf man who also isn't very pleased what's this we had a deal comrade you were supposed to bring me the key not use it and try to [ __ ] about with something that doesn't belong to you I should kill you you know Blood for Blood but you caught me on a good day meat you can still make up for It kill the hag who reeks of chickens too and the reward will be yours he'll want you to kill the chicken lady in return for the doctor's location but before you do

if you're feeling extra evil you can actually show her the Blood Stained Shaw oh lordy lordy the lady crosses herself three times my sister where did you find it it's all that Godless quack's fault devil brought him all he did was prescribe this in that scribble this no good Dil To Hell With them papers this is confirmation the pretty lady was actually the chicken lady's sister she throws a crumpled piece of paper at you and it's another note from the doctor smoth growths with a sterilized washed in spirits knife drink plenty of water do not

under any circumstances untie the legs or hands in case of emergency the path to my home is in the edge of the Old Woods this is the only way to progress the story if you killed the pretty lady instead of giving Either the Wolfman or the musician the key if you instead killed the chicken lady as well returning to the wolf man he won't reward you with anything but at least now you have the option to trade with him again the old hag is dead you've been a good dog what's that boy you want a

reward better [ __ ] off as quick as you can interestingly if you aren't completely honest with the wolf man and don't show him the bloodstained shaw before killing The chicken lady he'll get even more mad and flip you off what have you done we had a deal meat you were supposed to bring me the key not use it and try to [ __ ] about with something that doesn't belong to you [ __ ] off this instant or I swear you regret it the murder path has you follow the same steps as the Wolfman

except with the added benefit of both major characters now completely despising you instead of just one finally you arrive at the train wreck But depending on your choices the sequence will play out very differently if you went down the musician's path to set up an appointment the car door will already be unlocked going inside the door will be immediately locked behind you and the room will be flooded with gas you'll eventually succumb and when you wake up the doctor is there to greet you with both of you being in the exact same place you were

in the prologue the doctor doesn't try tried to hide his Amusement the boy accidentally set you up the doctor doesn't try to hide his Amusement he mentioned you'd like to make an appointment as you can see I found you just in time unfortunately you won't be able to thank him for it his face suddenly stiffens I've waited for you you rotten dog you're a rare breed here your kind visits us whenever you please you hide behind the trees who watch us from a distance and then disappear I can feel the doctor's cold hand grab me

by the jaw twisting my inert head so he can look me straight into my eyes luckily for me something went wrong your companions have left you and you couldn't handle the woods I'm not wrong am I you had your taste of local life eh did you enjoy it do you want more he takes a full syringe out of his pocket I'll show you more now apart from the trader we haven't met a single friendly character in the entire game well one That isn't completely insane but the way the doctor talks to us it does hint

that we were with another group of people but we got stranded and isolated from them and also the fact that when we reach one of the hideouts we treat it like it's our base it really does show that we some kind of authority figure maybe even military the game resumes with us now playing as the doctor again with the protagonist knocked out on the ground obviously this is another dream sequence Because the doctor injected us with something to make us more compliant in telling us where the bunker is keep in mind he has the key

already he only needs to know where the bunker is to use it where's running through the train car you'll see moments of the doctor's life before he fled the village visions of the plague spreading across Villages even one of the first cases of a woman in beds in agony um she was feeling well this Morning in another room you'll see the same woman slowly transforming into the pretty lady with the locals having no idea how to treat her fetch the doctor my brues are not working we're still playing as the protagonist sedated but due to

whatever we were jabbed with and also the seemingly mystical properties of the forest we're seeing the doctor's trauma through our own eyes even when he had to cut his losses and escape the village where the hell do you think You're going you haven't done anything for her yet you can interact with the Doctor's Medical bag which gives you the last treatment that he gave for the pretty lady I tied up her hands and legs and gave her a stive so that she doesn't hurt anymore that's all I can do for her now it's obvious the

doctor wasn't a hack or lazy he just had no idea how to treat the plague so he'd prescrib people bizarre concoctions in order to usually either put them to sleep or as a placebo While he was working on something that might actually be a treatment obviously that never happened and he realized that his head was on The Chopping Block because the village blamed him so he slipped out get you [ __ ] charlatan you're completely useless the pretty lady might have even been patient zero for the village but you'll quickly see other villagers become infected

begging the doctor for help while he tries to leave It hurts help do something save save us doctor I beg you eventually the doctor will find the protagonist again focusing his attention on dulling out his trauma to form his interrogation I feel as if my head is about to explode under the pressure of the train cars walls hello can you hear me I know you can hear me [ __ ] I barely recognized the Doctor's blurry image in the dark you wish this would end right you'd like to get out of here maybe now you'll

understand how it feels to be locked away surrounded by deformed rotting bodies among the cries of those pathetic villagers how was I supposed to help them how first they They begged for help now I have to [ __ ] hide from them the doctor falls silent it feels like whole hours are passing by can you hear it it's the walls they're talking to me my Girl is talking to me she's calling me I know she's waiting for me I must go back to her she's so close his voice breaks down I want to go back

home much like the protagonist the doctor is having hallucinations the bed wall you might remember in the first Hideout the man sat on the bed wanting to go home to escape the nightmare the pain becomes unbearable show me where to find the exit from this accursed place his silhouette slowly blurs away show me Where where is it where we placed into another dream sequence this time playing as the protagonist again the outcome of this dream though has huge implications for the rest of the game and if you don't like the outcome get ready to edit

your save file because like I said earlier this game Autos saves more than Dark Souls you'll be out of your own body as you still see the doctor interrogating your unconscious body where is the exit Where is it the doctor will eventually turn into a chomper and start chasing you alongside other Chompers I like to imagine right now that you're running through the protagonist's mind with the area slowly changing into hideouts that you've been camping in throughout the game if the Chompers managed to catch up to you and kill you the dream ends with you

mumbling the location of the bunker to the doctor 308 Negra a Royal Lane Albuquerque New Mexico I barely have the strength to open my eyes I see a blurred silhouette standing above me you can be proud of yourself little rat you've just done your first Good Deed completely unintentionally I'm completely paralyzed I can only follow the doctor After exiting the train car with my weary gaze only after he disappears behind the trees I realize I revealed the location to the underground entrance to him this time the poison is too strong I'm losing Consciousness when you

come to the doctor is gone and now he knows the location of the bunker heading to the bunker yourself you'll see the door has been left open with him leaving signs on the floor to let villagers know that there is a way out of the forest as much as he was a bastard to you and he really was he's trying to show at Le least one act of kindness to the village that he tried to help complete side note but if that happens he'll even take the items You can normally find at the underground entrance

specifically the cigarettes very in character considering his dialog box always features him holding a smoke in his hand if you somehow manage to survive the dream and by its sheer willpower overcome the doctor's drugs which gets you an achievement by the way if that's motivation you'll wake up mid interrogation which really surprises the doctor what that's impossible don't come hear me the dark D will run away in Sheer Panic that someone could overcome such a high sedative eventually falling over and crawling to the end of the train car but now the rols are reversed he's

the one who's trapped the doctor is lying under the train car's wall his face is covered in sweat the stench of alcohol fills the air he covers his face with his hands I beg you this key is my only chance I see the panic in his eyes help me escape this place oh kill me now you you're given two options the first Is to kill the doctor for all the pain he's put you through you saw from his perspective that he genuinely wasn't an evil person he just had no idea how to help a dying

Village and he had to escape before he was killed but despite that he did still put you through an immense amount of Agony and for that he does deserve to die but it doesn't matter you need that key please no you gun him down or bludging him to death and finally get the bunker 21 key To signify how important it is it's worth a whopping 1,500 rep or on the other hand you could show some compassion and despite everything he's done to you tell him the location of the underground entrance just keep in mind when

you tried to help the musician and how that ended I take out the map and show the doctor the location of the abandoned house with the hidden underground entrance the doctor stares at the map for a while without lifting His gaze to meet mine the same map you've spent hours marking various locations all across the game the wolf camps the bug nests logging areas mushroom Fields broken tractors burned houses hideouts realizing After all you've been through you've chose to spare his life and he really only has two words to say to you thank you he

removes his dirty glasses with a trembled hand and freezes probably realizing that in most other cases the Protagonist would have chose the other option I will wait for you there and better take the essential things with you looks like returning here will be impossible if you instead went to the doctor's house and got the code to the cart you can completely avoid the dream sequence and Ambush him skipping directly to this conversation what what are you doing here don't come near me he'll now be in the exact same position as if you beat him in

the dream you put In if you besided with the musician now you might notice by taking the musician path or the quote unquote good boy path in the game you actively make the game harder for yourself it takes longer to complete the game and the Wolfman paths they're a lot more direct they're a lot more quicker you have to go through insane Leaps and Bounds just to keep the pretty lady alive but you could deliver a straight to the wolf man who eats her and that's it it's all said and done but If you go

down the musician's path which does take longer because not only do you need to get the pretty lady you also need to bring back his violin The Wolf Man is going to be pissed at you for the rest of the game so you're being punished for not taking a more selfish path you're now given the same choices with the musician either kill him or show him the entrance to the bunker now despite what I'm hinting at saying that good Cho ches punish you if you show the Doctor the bunker location he really does cooperate with

you there's no huge betrayal for you know taking Leg good choice he really does just come along with you and even unlocks the door for you again he's really not a monster he's just out for his own Survival just like you and now at least you have someone keeping you company maybe he can even help you along the way but before you leave you probably should prepare for the journey like the doctor says Returning here will be impossible but surely that won't matter right I mean bunker 21 is the exit like that's near the end

of the game yep to anyone that's got this far in the video just have a look at the uh the little red bar that YouTube has yep we we we're not done also looking through the train car now you can find a torn photo of a woman holding a child considering where we find it it's probably related to the doctor somehow it might even be his Family but this is the point of no return the doctor wasn't lying once you go past the bunker there is no coming back so it's best to gather all your

important resources which is punishing for playing that have spent time Gathering everything they need to fortify and secure hideouts especially because of how limited your inventory space is compared to the workbench stockpile my personal suggestion bring any guns and ammo with you and don't Forget crafting materials because it is so easy to make the mistake of not bringing the basics and if you don't have any space for healing items uh unlucky it might also be worth staying one more night at the dry Meadow to buy some more ammo from the trader if you do so

he'll have one more message for you the man grabs my arm and pulls me closer a strong smell of mushrooms asales my nostrils the old sack covering his body slides down revealing his chest covered In horrid growths it is fused with a porous helmet pulsating to the rhythm of his breath I'm starting to feel dizzy without loosening his grip the man raises his left arm bringing his forearm to my face it's pale as paper and reads do not open the door let's stick together however much the traitor is helped us to stay is a death

sentence and all the effort for getting this key would have gone completely to waste finally you arrive at the bunker door if You gave the doctor the location he'll be there waiting for you still clutching onto a cigarette are we going immediately as you go through the door the Walls Start trembling another earthquake the doctor doesn't wait for you and runs ahead almost consumed with the obsession of trying to escape the woods as you go along the tunnel becomes more and more overgrown clearly the forest has even reached here trying to keep everyone inside all

along the Corridor you can find giant roots with your character commenting that this white sludge is draining from them and being pushed out along the main tunnel by an invisible force the tunnel eventually ends with it being collapsed the protagonist comments that this is a fresh fall it's possible that it was caused by the earthquake way back when you first went underground as the more recent ones didn't really feel strong enough to collapse an entire portion of A reinforced Corridor I managed to walk a few good kilometers through the underground tunnels but further passage is

blocked by growing Roots despite this I feel that I'm closer to my destination the there's also another Corridor splitting off but the way is locked with armored doors and you don't have the key the doctor if he's still with you will also comment something I think someone's still moving there under the rubble upon interacting with the rubble you get this Weird cross and the following interaction the tunnel has collapsed recently the reinforced steel protruding from the debris has not been covered with rust yet when i gaze into the tunnel I notice a silhouette of a

man on the ground suddenly The Man snaps to life as if woken from a deep Slumber who go there I hear a faint unnaturally distorted male voice are you are you one of them the man attempts to get up but fails I can see him desperately flailing His limbs around it's as if his back has been glued to the ground no please as I approach him he shuffles his legs nervously as if trying to retreat into the collapse tunnel I I didn't do anything I beg you I just wanted to pass to get back to

my family the tree has blocked the only way out the only path home a huge talking tree I begged it to let me pass but it wouldn't listen I could not understand what it was saying to me so we came he the man props Himself up on his elbows with a huge effort he tries to straighten his body but something is firmly holding him down by the back and neck I I can't I can't get up the man drops onto the rubble and goes silent he clenches his fists my head hurts the man places his

hand on his forehead and feels a strange Dent above his left brow he freezes what what is this he carefully inserts his index finger into the hole his eyelid Twitches my stone I hear a sound as if an Eggshell cracking the forehead bends under his hand The Stranger pushes another finger into the hole a thick goo spews from the wound I can hear his skull cracking my little St the man slowly removes his finger from the hole in his head a colorless ooze is dripping from them he's holding something a round object that's why he

swings his left hand and throws the object at me a small irregular ball bounces off my arm and lands at my feet there this is what put To sleep his head lifelessly drops to the concrete floor of the destroyed tunnel and goes still you pick up the bullet the man just pulled out both it and the cross are soft I could understand the wooden cross since wood can rot into mush but a fragmented bullet something isn't right here but we don't have anything else to go on at the moment the man also mentioned something about

a tree blocking the road home which the protagonist takes note of in His journal while in the underground passage I Met A peculiar man he acted strangely laboring about a talking tree which emerged on a path to some house in the village I need to investigate it it seems like this part of the tunnel did lead outside but we can't use it now that it's collapsed also worth noting if you spare the doctor he'll actually run away when you end the conversation with the man probably thinking that he can do better on his own rather

than relying on You which to be fair is his loss I've got a pistol a shotgun a lot of molotovs some explosives and he probably has a pack of cigarettes although that being said it would be a cool concept if you were surviving the night with the doctor you know like both of you teaming up to fight against the enemies that attack but I just don't think the game was designed around that suddenly I hear the bang of the metal floor followed by a sound of scraping footsteps it's the Doctor your character even makes a

note of it in his journal writing how the doctor would have just been dead weight the doctor has escaped so be it it would only be a hindrance anyway there's a corpse right by the door holding a torch right on mushrooms and a rusted iron cowbell the cowbell doesn't have any inscriptions or anything so there's not really any information to to go on but my game theory is it belonged to a door guard that had been using it to Signal People in the main tunnel to open the door as this area was clearly some kind

of importance to an outsider group or it could just be an SCP 513 reference actually yeah scratch that it's literally the SCP as You Follow the doctor's footsteps it looks like this Corridor is less of a tunnel and more of a cave with its walls being irregular and made out of roots even having people embedded in them who try to speak to you as you move past them I just want to to Pass return to my family this entire area is flooded with deep water walking through it you get slowed down considerably you can Sprint

but it barely makes you any faster and uses up pretty much all your stamina in seconds trust me you really really want to save your stamina for water as you first start seeing splashes and shadows of things below the surface progressing through the cave you can find locked crates but unless you bought lockpicks With you you won't actually be able to loot them the loot inside is pretty standard pills maybe even a lamp or bug shells finally you'll reach a narrow passageway where the thing luring in the water reveals itself it looks like some kind

of mutated alligator or crocodile though neither surprisingly are native to Poland so it's fair to assume that it's another mutation caused by the forest it starts approaching you but instead of attacking it repeats the same Phrases the people in the walls did I just wanted to pass before slinking back into the water afterwards you come into a chamber with the corridor blocked with some sort of growth these are part of a new game mechanic and serve as a sort of basic puzzle having the large eye on the ground in your line of sight will cause

it to retract and close also retracting the growth blocking the way allowing you to progress but that means once you go past the growth you won't be able to Make eye contact with the initial one so after this you really can't go back in the Next Room you can find a body with a Shiny Stone tied to a wooden cross it looks very similar to the weird cross from earlier though the weird crust seemed like a distorted version of this one examining the body gives you this a dried body of some man Only Skin and

Bones covered in Roots they are surprisingly well preserved there's a small hole in his forehead I'd say he's Been lying here for more than 2 years now if the body's been lying there for around 2 years that means there was a restriction set in this area around the same time and also keep in mind the bullet hole in his head there was someone that had a bullet hole in their head much earlier this is the end of the tunnel there's stairs leading to the surface and just maybe an exit outside the woods now you should

know by now and by Checking the length of this video nothing is ever that simple in the forest you come out inside another building and this area is the swamp this was actually foreshadowed by one of the first dreams in the game when you open the bunker door and said dream you saw a half flooded area with a path of shiny stones which shows that these dreams aren't really dreams some of them are actually premonitions so it's clear that you're not out of the woods yet Frankly this place seems even more diseased than the old

Woods were the entire area around you is flooded with only some strips of dry land in between the deep water you'll quickly realize the building you woke up in is yet another Hideout complete with an oven workbench and even a compressor something we haven't seen in previous hideouts or at all in the game apparently it's used to fill oxygen tanks but not only do you not have any On you apart from some rusted ones lying next to the generator the machine itself is also broken so I guess you won't be able to pretend you're playing

Iron long for a little while still beautifully also one thing to mention here if you thought you were smart and you took the bike Bell thinking you could get the drunk guy to bring all your stuff with you you've actually just tricked yourself out of an entire inventory slot I mean honestly like what did you expect The poor guy to like troll through the mud and water to get here look I'm sure you were given him pure moonshine but there is not enough moonshine to cover that much of the forest and on top of that

as well the hatch you came through actually sealed itself behind you I finally got out of the tunnels the hatch sealed itself shut behind me I'm now at the swamp in an abandoned hideout in the room right next to where you wake up you're introduced to a new mechanic The black substance or black shell as the note next to it calls it is covering a crate that you probably want to open especially if you bought no crafting supplies with you from chapter 1 but to burn it away you'll need a light source that note I

mentioned earlier points to it in case you can't figure it out I can only decipher individual words shell black goo light this can be a lantern or flashlight and since you're usually carrying around one of those anyway it Shouldn't be too much of an issue for now unless you're like me and throw an entire Molotov cocktail at the crate you know because Molotov is fire fire is light fire should be a light source but it actually doesn't do anything this mechanic also spices up the game in ways that I'll talk about later compared to the

hideouts that you're used to by now this one is huge it's split off across three major buildings all of them comparable to sizes in the dry Meadow Hideout it also looks way more worn down even more than the old Woods hideout with walls missing parts basically everywhere entire collapse sections and one of the buildings even seems to have been burnt down leaving only the front wall and wood saw outside intact it's ruined so badly the piping from your oven doesn't even reach out there so you can't use it as a shelter during the night but

all that being said still the most desirable property in Birmingham £10,000 a month take it or leave it another difference is that you can once again touch a little bit of grass without immediately getting floor G as the oven's range seems to extend a little bit further than in the Old Woods you can even see the gas tube spreading out onto the grass between the buildings and and believe me those small paths will be your bread and butter at night time especially since you get some gas tanks and explosive barrels already set Up to help

the defense most likely left over from whoever was stationed here before now on top of that as well there's also the usual stuff you can find in most buildings in this game movable lamps as well as fixed ones wardrobes with basic supplies even a stash beneath one but this one has some shotgun shells pills and a note with a photo of signs this note was probably wrote by The Outsiders and they were probably trying to make sense of all the Notes and scribblings the Savages have been leaving around Darkwood there are even some photos showing

possible intersection points but they were never really solved with the only addition being scribblings of a Madman though we know that there has to be something more to them as the first time we encountered them in the dry Meadow they caused us to have vivid hallucinations maybe this is a way of communication between the Savages and the forest itself that we Just can't understand like how the native Polish language is completely incomprehensible to anyone without unmedicated schizophrenia I'm not joking like I've been trying to pronounce polish stuff in this video I I just can't do

it why do they have like the letter c and Zed in like every word if you choose the musician path and failed the train wreck dream sequence you can also find some tobacco inside a bag on the bed as well as an extinguished Campfire with a book inside it it looks like the same book you could find in the Doctor's house back in the prologue despite it being heavily burnt you can still make out some words like how at the top of each page it says vid Casa meaning medical knowledge in Polish collecting this book

will also Mark the cottage near the junkyard on your map but there's one more place in your hide out affected by the path you take back in chapter 1 in the same building as Your workbench you can find a metal door in most playthroughs this door stays closed pretty much forever as there's no special key or code to open it however if you took the Wolfman path and on top of that killed the SE this door will open one night revealing someone we've met earlier sat down in the corner [Music] something is lurking in the

shadows I'm sorry from Beneath The Mask you can hear a horribly distorted Resounding voice of a child very sorry I I didn't know you were living here the figure tries to turn its head but its enormous neck makes this task impossible to complete I didn't want to to disturb you mister I just wanted to hide I don't know this part of the woods everything here is different and the we hot here seemed so cozy and safe please let me stay please don't chase me off I've got nowhere to go the villagers don't allow me to

live in the camp I promise I won't Play anymore I'll be quiet you can cover me with something if you don't want to look look at me please just let me stay he appears to be heavily mutated much more than before he looks like he's struggling to stay alive constantly shivering and breathing heavily he hasn't gone feral like the Chompers but it's obvious that the forest has heavily mutated him gossiping with him reveals why he's here someone killed her Village so the Mother of all pigs the villagers cried after her a lot they said there

must be food on the other side they cut through the trees with their axes they barely managed to the trees kept growing back I followed them but they didn't let me stay in their Camp the boy adjusts the cracked mask with his overgrown hand I wanted to go back home but a huge Hall appeared where the page used to be when the ground shakes holes like these sometimes appear the villagers say it's The wood being angry I've run to the swamps and that's how I found your home it's a very beautiful house much more beautiful

than the villagers Camp they sleep on rocks I think it's some kind of an Old Quarry this Camp can be found in the edge of the swamp now this is a really really bad thing because the only reason they're ever in the Quarry in Chapter 2 is as if you wiped out their only food source in chapter 1 so they're coming here with a Vengeance now honestly it's pretty impressive that they managed to cut their way out of the village especially in that huge dense Thicket of trees if you remember all the way back in

chapter 1 they were you know stretching on for kilometers trying to get through and basically everything would just grow back he'll also talk a bit about himself recently I've grown quite a bit my mom always used to say that I need to be big and strong to help out in the field the Boy tries to hug his frail knees for this disproportionately massive torso but I I I don't want to be big anymore it's very hard being big you need to be so so strong to even walk now my violin is too small for me

this references his current extremely mutated State I think this is something that we kind of knew was going to happen but seeing him deteriorate like this in front of us is is just depressing this is why I said earlier the outcome of him burying his Parents or being killed by them it really was a mercy because they'd still be able to go to the village and at least live off the meat from the se he might still end up like this but he wouldn't be on his own again this seems like another outcome from you

trying to cut Corners to beat the game faster when you come back to see him the next day you'll find that the room he's staying in actually damages you for staying inside now there's not really any law Reason behind this if anything it's probably to prevent people from locking themselves behind a metal door and cheesing ing every single night because much like you enemies can't break through metal doors although that would be a terrifying thought after a few days when you talk to him he'll offer you a gift I I have something for you mister

the boy picks an enormous rat corpse from the ground and dangles it by its tail huge one isn't it I called it this Night for you I saw it sneaking by the wall I played dead the best way I can play dead and it's this this Mouse I mean she jumped on my hand it started nibbling on my finger I quickly clasped my hand and bit through its neck I I always do that that's way they stop running corners of the boy's mouth turn up in a grotesque smile exposing rows of overgrown teeth which even

his mask couldn't hide mice mice are good better than bark and these funny black B Here taste it you'll you'll like it you can either accept this generous offering which makes the musician happy when when I catch more I'll give them to you and he does actually do that talking to him again a couple days later and he'll give you another rat I have a delicious wee Mouse for you I caught it this night here you go this rat is actually pretty useful as well you can eat it to recover some HP or cook it

in the stove for more essence which goes to show that even the Rats are heavily infected alternatively you can lose out on it and refuse his gift which just you know makes him a little bit sad you [ __ ] the boy quickly glances at the rat's blood soak corpse and freees but they are so tasty I thought you like them I'm I'm sorry the boy drops the rat to the floor then hugs his knees and Falls silent I feel the way the dialogue is wrote here you are purposely made to feel like a piece

of [ __ ] for refusing a bloody rat corpse one day you can also find him playing with a pingpong ball the musician hums and bounces a small pingpong ball against the wall he probably found it amongst the junk suddenly he notices me oh it's you the ball bounces off his deformed hand and lands between my feet you can either give the ball back or take it for yourself but come on you're a monster but you're not that much of a monster surely if you aren't a horrible Piece of [ __ ] you'll be rewarded

with yet another rat how generous after a few more days he'll mention being hungry the boy leans over the violin lying next to his overgrown left hand he plucks one of the strings with his right hand clumsily trying to keep the Rhythm I'm sorry for asking but do you maybe have something to eat the boy stop strumming he carefully sets the violin down between his knees and holds the neck in his hand I'm a wee bit hungry and if you had Something anything you can now show him some food items like bread or eggs but

also things that you You' been using to dose yourself with Essence such as odd meat or mushrooms giving him pretty much anything edible he'll say this oh thank you mister you're so kind but I don't have anything nothing I can give you the boy leans over his left side and reaches for something with his right hand I hear the sound of torn fabric he passes me a piece of rope which was part of his Tattered clothing it's it's a kind of rope you can do a lot of things with a rope you can do a

knot tie it or hang your laundry on it he gives you a rope in case you still needed to craft any inventory upgrades that you missed what happens with the musician next is entirely depending and what food you gave him if it was regular human food he'll stay in the room and continue to keep you company throughout chapter 2 however if you gave him any Food that was affected by the forest which is most things you'll come back the next day and find transformed even worse at this point he looks like something I'd commission being

so fat he actually pushes out of the room he's clearly mutated even further the essence from the food accelerating the process at break neck Pace you can't interact with him anymore and once he's in this state after one more day he'll disappear entirely it's unknown what happens to Him then we can't find a bloated corpse Outside The Hideout or anywhere he's gone the room still damages you after he leaves in case you were wondering no exploiting the game for you maggot maggot another interesting thing is that if you killed the se but also killed all

the villagers that were cutting down the trees the musician won't actually appear in Chapter 2 most likely because the villagers weren't able to find a way out of the forest because you know you Killed them all it's really impressive how the devs thought of pretty much every individual outcome exploring The Hideout further one of the paths between the buildings lies a corpse holding a knife some flares and a note the map is outdated it must have been prepared around 2 years ago the woods have changed considerably since then moreover it's so ragged it's barely readable

however I think I can make out the position of the cottage Near the junkyard and the village with that tree also important to mention is the map is about as old as the corpse we found right before the tunnel exit possibly meaning that this entire area got restricted and evacuated around that time the actual note reads this day 1 1315 hours the compressor is broken so is the lock on the trap door leading to the underground had to use a blowtorch [ __ ] moisture day two 1200 hours we took 45 photos of the tree

from The observation point in the vicinity of 3C it grew twice its size in a month really quick even for the local standards day two 15 20 hours I'm slowly running out of oxygen I've sent two men to search the nearby junkyard maybe we won't have to go back for spare parts for the compressor watch out for the cottage near the junkyard someone could be living there day two 18 12 hours at least 10 Locals lurking between the trees how do they know about us we won't be able to gather our equipment in time the

risk of getting detected is too high need to Evac this note basically lays out the progression for you for once in Darkwood the game is actually going easy on you and telling you straight up on what to do it explains why the village was marked with a tree as this tree is clearly more special than the others Growing at a way faster rate they also don't outright call it a tree rather putting it in quotation marks which could be a reference to what the man in the tunnel said about the Talking Tree blocking the path

and not letting him pass there's even an explanation for why we can't open the hatch and go back to the dry Meadow apparently moisture damage is still the biggest structural Hazard even in a plague infested Forest also another big thing in that note Actually mentions locals lurking between the trees that being the reason for the evacuation but one thing you quickly learn about the swamp is that you will rarely be dealing with any regular Savages anymore though they do appear here and there along with you know huge dogs I have had it with these mother

dogs you'll mostly be dealing with things much more dangerous than a Rabbid human after spending the first day Gathering your bearings in the new Hideout you'll probably end up having to survive the night without doing too much exploring the nights in the swamp are much more Dynamic with night events being much more common the game even giving you the Shadows trait even if you never injected the essence do just to make sure you know you're not missing out on all the fun apart from the night events you might be used to by now there actually

are a couple specific to this Hideout at Some point during the night your lights May shut out completely aside from One Singular lamp after which the unused radio in the oven room will actually start speaking to you at first the words it repeats are garbled but soon you'll be able to make out what it's trying to say come back to us inspecting the radio after the event will have the protagonist say this it's covered in a thick layer of dust it looks like no one's used it for a long Time but it smells of warm

plastic and burnt wires the enemy attacks here are also much more frequent like I said before the enemies in the swamp are much more tricky than the ones you've been dealing with not only will you be dealing with the forest's much more mutated Creations but the enemies can now spawn covered with black substance which makes them completely invulnerable to damage until you burn them off with light this might not seem like much of a Big deal but it can take ages for the substance to burn away even with the military flashlight exposing you to attacks

that you can't even Stone nor respond to that is unless you're a true Lantern pilled Chad as for some reason the humble Lantern can actually burn away substance almost immediately on top of that it doesn't even need to be pulled out and it covers a 360° radius if anything these combat encounters remind me of a game I played years ago Called the thing which is like a direct sequel to the film The Original film that was good not the shitty sequel although in that game it worked in the reverse you'd actually use ballistic weapons to

lower an enemy's health and then have to finish them with fire where here you're doing the opposite you're using fire to actually break away their shield and then being able to do damage to them I mean I could have just said this is Alan Wake because It basically is Alan Wake but no [ __ ] you I wanted to use the niche game there are some upsides The Hideout offers though like I mentioned the entire safe area is actually much bigger letting you dodge and avoid enemies a little bit easier you might have also noticed

the giant growth in the middle of one of the paths looking at it will trigger a red light almost looking like a flare just outside the main compx this can really help with Night Fights Being able to let you see enemies approaching before they start breaking down your barricades I mean it's not like it changes anything for me to be fair I just camp in the corner the whole time like it's round four on Siege to be fair this Hideout really isn't the worst for surviving the night I'm going to die on this hill I

really think the old Woods was the worst Hideout to survive in because there was so many corridors and it was incredibly cramped but here Having a bit of breathing room to dodge with these Square spaces it makes combat much easier once you survive the nights you'll be able to meet your new daily Traders the three they completely replace the trader appearing each morning during the time stop and giving you 250 rep for surviving a night just like the trader the three will never talk to you outright instead using body language to communicate the three visitors

stare at me in silence as if Waiting for my move I can only hear the heavy breathing of the tallest figure holding a giant bag as the tallest figure opens the bag the room is filled with an intense smell of mushrooms apparently they wish to give me something they offer a huge stock of items once again of course including that delicious Red egg can I offer you a nice egg in this try time Honestly by now you probably don't have any use for Essence items as you probably would have Maxed out your dosage even before

entering the swamp but if somehow you still need to cook the oven in the swamp is even more efficient meaning you'll probably get to max level with just a few mushrooms on the topic of cooking there's still a couple more perks you can get with the next dose the negative perks you can choose to hand cap yourself with this time our weak regeneration and shaky hands weak regeneration is not the worst and all it Really does is slow down the race at which items heal you but it doesn't change the duration of the healing effect

meaning you're getting half the turtle healing this sounds really bad on paper Until you realize that most healing items in The Game Restore much more Health than your health bar has like the slowest and cheapest form of healing the bandage heals 170 HP in total with your standard health sitting at 100 HP with the perk it's still Healing at 85 HP which should almost always be enough to be fair using a pill will still fully almost heal you in 3 seconds full health if you pick this perk all you really need to do is play

the game a little bit more slower slower than you've already been playing the slow game shaky hands meanwhile absolutely sucks it lowers your accuracy immensely making it so you can't really shoot anything over 5 m without wasting half a MAG so what positive perks can you get if the negative perks are so bad well actually these ones for a change are pretty decent adrenaline is very situational doubling your melee damage output when you're very low on health risking dying to one shot but having so much damage you can also basically one shot everything else it

incentivizes risk rewards so like a glass Cannon build in Dark Souls but it's not really something you should play around with Unless you're confident in that kind of build another positive perk is Vitality this one is a straight up stat buff giving you a little bit more more Health to fall back on it gives you around 25 more health and that's about it yeah it doesn't seem that great but it's just a very consistently decent perk the last positive perk is chameleon which once per day lets you become invisible as long as you stand still

it lets you avoid an encounter if you're unprepared For one especially at night because you can pop it and then just Tab out and watch your favorite react Andy streamer on the other monitor as the game basically plays itself I didn't really get too much use out of it myself but it could definitely be a lifesaver where did you get get the idea for like the essence abilities because that's probably like the closest thing to an actual like leveling system in the game we always like the idea that we have Skills that have to be

offset with some negative skills and we did that with leveling where you have those mutations uh at first uh it was like this way to introduce new mechanics like uh for the shadows in chapter one there were much more skills which you could have because the game was like a road like so each build you would have many different skills but then we have to cut them uh by by a long uh lot also they are kind of weird because when we had this Rog Like approach we didn't care that they will break the game

so much because we thought about okay this game plan going to take shorter period of time and then you will make another another build and you will not choose the same silly uh skill that's why they are like maybe a little bit weird sometimes yeah my favorite SK skill I think is when you have um the ability to drop a part of your body like a finger and then you can see it on the map it's like a map marker Oh that's right yeah you can't show them any items or gossip they'll just stand there

and stare at you unless you trade with them but this isn't the only thing that happens after the first night exploring Around The Hideout you can come across a body of someone you know now surprisingly the protagonist doesn't seem to recognize him only saying body of a man and the head has been severed but it's obvious to us who it is it's the traitor and he's probably Followed us from the chapter one environment into chapter 2 but the swamp was too hostile for him overwhelmed him and killed him you can take his severed head which

is seemingly fused with the helmet and see that someone has scratched the word quser or liar in English on the helmet's visor maybe the murder was personal after all but the biggest reveal comes with the other two items on his body the key to the underground and a weird book seeing that He had the key with the number 21 on him all along is very surprising considering how long we've spent searching for ours thinking it's the only one but once you pick it up you'll realize it's distorted with what looks like growths inside the metal

its value is also just one rip the best I can do is one pointing at the fact that this is more than likely a cheap fake and probably wouldn't actually work on the door alternatively this could also mean that it's worthless Since we can't get back there anyway meanwhile the weird book book looks exactly like our Journal even the bookmarks are there except all the pages are overgrown with mushrooms the three and the new traders to the swamp biome and they arrive the same morning that the trader is found dead which does make most people

think that they killed the trader off to replace him but to be Devil's Advocate the three never seem to be hostile to anyone much like the Trader if you try to attack them you'll be knocked unconscious and then wake up with them disappearing but they'll still do trade with you the very next day and also on top of that as well apart from the timing there's no indication that the trader or the three ever met or even knew that the other party existed a theory I find more likely is that tragically the protagonist is the

one that killed the trader we know from before that he Frequently hallucinates and dreams you know affecting things in the real world it could also be the devs wanting to leave this more ambiguous instead of you know feeding you the absolute answers on a silver platter as for calling the trader a liar this could be a reference to how the trader would tell us that the no way out of the forest and by making progress we've proven him wrong but at the same time he never told us there's no way out of the forest he

said all Roads lead deeper into the forest which could be implying you need to go deeper to get out which is exactly what we're doing and who knows maybe this slight nudge towards Freedom it could have driven the protagonist to kill him in an Essence fueled rage also the Trader's head is cleanly decapitated it wasn't messy and the rest of his body has been completely left alone making it pretty unlikely to have been done by any kind of wild animal or you know whatever Forest creatures inhabit the swamp God left me unfinished by looking at

the map it is absolutely enormous but the first thing you probably should do is head off for the village like the note suggests even though the map is randomly generated The Village will usually spawn somewhere close to your hideout making it your natural first destination in contrast to the Village back in the Silent Forest this one isn't a separate Zone with time stopped but you probably Wish it was and you had infinite time here because this place is massive and can easily take you multiple in-game days to fully explore the first thing that will probably

draw your attention upon entry is the pile of bodies lying on the side of the path approaching it we can see something crawling out this is another diag estic introduction to the next Swamp exclusive enemy unless you've already met them at night of Course this is the human spider presented as a weird combination of body parts walking on Multi limbs it has a regular swipe attack but also one of the few ranged enemies in the game being able to throw its spare appendages to damage you sometimes even throwing entire torsos instead when that happens you

better focus on killing that torso quickly as it's about to replicate into another spider this happens so fast that you can actually easily be overrun if You're not paying attention another important thing to mention is that spiders actually move much faster when outside your cone of vision together with the ability to duplicate means that they should be a priority Target in pretty much every single combat scenario aside from scripted encounters they can be found pretty much anywhere in the swamp just roaming around basically filling a similar role to the Rock Savages although scaled up in

difficulty To make the region feel so much more hostile I mean to be fair what do you think is more scary a man throwing rocks at you or man throwing his arm at you I've just reminded myself of medieval now on the PS1 God that was such a good game after dealing with the spider you can proceed to the Village taking the path opposite to the pile of bodies here you'll come across yet another Village shrine but if you let the doctor follow You into the swamp he'll also be here allowing for a semiwarm reunion

you again what do you want from me want to put me in front of a firing squad for desertion the doctor snorts ironically hiding his irritation I'm not going anywhere with you I'm too close I can hear her just as if she was standing beside me my little with shaking hands he reaches for the cigarette butt between his yellow teeth I'm sure someone is waiting for you too he spits Out the rest of the tobacco he won't appear here if you failed the train rck dream as in that scenario you'll still enemies you can also

show him the photo of the road home why are you showing this to me you better tell me how to get there now this line did lead me with a bit of whiplash because we have been showing the photo of the road home to every character and probably not realizing that they also would probably like to go home to leave the Darkwood it Really does come across that un Al we're kind of rubbing everyone's noses in it I mean for example with the doctor if he knew where the road home was we never would have

interacted with him most of the events in this game never would have even happened he would have just ran off you can talk to him further as well to hear some more Exposition I used to come here to treat people I pulled out kids milk teeth delivered babies and then came the diseases I'd never even heard Of I was the only doctor in the area you cut us off from the outside world first you then the woods no help from anyone last time I came here was three or four years ago then the trees blocked

the path this is one of the villages the doctor used to work in probably why he even made a stop here in the first place this dialogue also confirms that the entire area was quarantined when the plague started probably being the only reason why the People inside were forced to stay instead of being evacuated you can talk to him further to get some more subtle pointers on interesting locations around the region some of the flooded areas hide underwater passages recently I fell into this underwater Den in the the edge of the swamp I have no

idea where it leads I'm a shitty diver I've seen a similar one in the edge of the swamp talking to him for the last time we'll have him explain his game theory To you as well as one of the hardest lines in the entire game I've realized something it came to me when we were walking through the tunnels you're like a disease you and your kind it was that hard that I actually put it in the intro of the video the doctor takes a steep back as if he was afraid of me at the same

time a Sinister smile appears on his face you don't belong to this land you wen't here when the forest was born you're a splinter a foreign body a Vagabond and then the forest and everything else here these are the antibodies even the morons from the village raging white blood cells in an infected bloodstream that's the reason you hide from us the doctor is visibly pleased with himself and his theory his hands are no longer trembling he produces a handrolled cigarette and lights it logical isn't it now it is pretty logical what he's saying but in

reality the plague infected Poland first So if anything we're the immune system so it's pretty obvious the doctor has been completely brainwashed by darkwoods colonizer program this dialogue along with the one that mentioned the quarantine also confirms that at least the doctor thinks we're part of this outside organization coming in and out of the woods I mean it does make sense we did have the bunker 21 key after all and we knew where the underground entrance was none of the natives seem to Have one or even know about the tunnels so it's only logical that

they're exclusive to these Outsiders we finally have at least some solid clue about our backstory but still definitely nowhere near the full picture apart from yapping the doctor will actually let you trade yeah remember how I told you letting him live is going to actually benefit you more than just law for the low low price of absolutely nothing he will give you 100 rep to trade with him possibly a Reward for taking him with you here has three items in his stock though an embryo weapon parts and another random crafting ingredient like tape a bolt

handle or a long barrel each one of these costs 100 rip effectively meaning that you can get one of them for free but the thing is you can only get one because you won't accept anything to trade with you so once you pick an item you'll actually be locked out of picking the other two the doctor obviously not Wanting any of the various tools of survival that he would have cherished in chapter 1 out of all the items you'll probably want the embryo the weapon parts are incredibly valuable for crafting or being sold but embryos

have that unique property on hard mode of giving you an extra life so like I said much earlier if you were to die and it'd be a game over instead you just respawn dropping your equipment exactly like normal difficulty on top of that as well They can also be cooked for a huge chunk of essence and Sal to Traders although less than the weapon parts after speaking to him once the doctor will leave the village the next day presumably to wander the swamp in search for his daughter who's apparently been calling to him he's mentioned

her before when you try to talk to him in the train wreck and unfortunately it's probably a sign of the insanity that the forest drives everyone mad and it's setting in In the same clearing as the doctor is the village Shrine that I mentioned before once again it looks like a standard Catholic shrine of St Mary holding baby Jesus although it seems like this one's been defaced by something trying to eat at it as there's bite marks on the wooden figure this is probably the work of the local Savages as even back in chapter 1

you can find them eating away at tree trunks this being a holy figure really doesn't seem To bother them further along the path you you can find a backpack containing some expensive Fabric and a map which marks the holes location this place is very important for getting around in the swamp and I'll get to while later following the path deeper into the village you'll first stumble upon some houses with barricaded Windows one of them has a chest with some random items inside but the other one is much more interesting instead of breaching in you Can

instead go around and through a destroyed part of the house as you approach the wooden door to enter the barricaded room you'll hear a voice calling from inside I've heard him to open the door you either need to breach it or use a lockpick going inside you realize there's another small bedroom deeper in where the voice was coming from the floor in the room that you've entered has some kind of fungus growing from it and what looks like spores being Dispensed into the air getting closer to the bedroom will cause the voice to talk more

every day I can hear him more clearly you don't believe me once you enter you realize that there isn't actually a person there just a skeleton lying on a bed with a torch on its body going back outside you might start to hear growling in the distance walking up and around the destroyed Carriage will reveal the source another red chomer but this time Covered in a black substance now this fight can really take you by surprise since the chomper wanders around the area instead of you know just standing there waiting for a shovel indentation in

its head and once again the black substance that I mentioned earlier gives it some initial invincibility so it's allowed to get some cheap hits after dealing with the chomer you'll pass some burnt houses with a generator stood up against a wall activating it causes the Light fixtures to turn on around you only for it to die around 2 seconds later there's nothing of note inside the houses but once you go through you'll find a surprisingly well preserved dog house and a well approaching the dogghouse will spawn a huge dog inside and have it lunge at

you but at this point it really shouldn't be too much of a challenge especially with how equipped You Are by now again you are equipped right like you you did bring the stuff From chapter one God I hope you did or you're absolutely [ __ ] now thankfully unlike the well in the chapter one Village you can't actually descend into this one so you're not going to be fighting any you know mutated children there's also a locked house here which you can either waste a lockpick on or open in the more unconventional ax way the

word Zer or thieves is written all over the floor and there's a bunch of good loot in the wardrobe right next to The entrance on top of that there's a shelf containing the photo of three boys again with the word thieves scratched over it going back outside the foot path you followed is pretty much non-existent now instead being replaced by roots and trees growing out of the ground to get deeper into the village you're going to have to breach through buildings and try to get around the blockades that the forest has put up walking through

the gap between the roots you can gain Access to two more buildings the closer one has a really important item for progression hidden on a dead body the pliers with this you can finally upgrade your workbench that's right you can now make the axe the same one the doctor used in the prologue it's incredibly expensive to make because of the ax blade that is unless you killed the SE in the village and then you can just steal it from this guy who's trying to chop down a tree or again like I said Earlier you could

have just taken the doctor's axe if you explored his house in chapter one but it really does beg the question why is a blade and a stick locked behind more upgrades than a gun now the axe is the last and strongest melee weapon in the entire game it has the exact same upgrade path as the shovel having more durability doing more damage and having less stamina cost but the main difference is it has a hugely different attack pattern with the shovel You do a wide swing but with the axe it is a single downward shock

that does a lot more damage but at the cost of having to be a a lot more precise I'll be honest I played through like 80% of the game with the shovel and it was doing me fine so I kind of just dropped the axe and stayed with the shovel anyway good enough the other unlocked crafting recipe is the exploding Barrel the same one you'd find in the very first hideout in the lock chest these Are pretty good to actually have set up at your hideout at critical choke points as you can trade one piece

of scrap metal and a bit of gasoline plus a single bullet to activate the barrel to dispatch an entire group of enemies even better if you throw piece of meat you can actually bait enemies towards it and remember this Hideout is huge meaning that you can bait even more enemies into barrels to save ammo and health if placed properly the barrels can be an Amazing panic button when you're getting overrun this isn't the cruelty Squad video and I'm not making another tier list but these would probably go an S tier aside from the pliers there's

a wardrobe next to a window of few to loot approaching it we'll have the protagonists look out the window they can see the crown of a huge tree through the small window under the ceiling inside the Wardrobe is some more fabric to sell but also a lottery ticket which If anything reminds me of uh that guy in full Out New Vegas yeah you know that guy go like who won the lottery I did this ticket is supposed to be a setup for a puzzle to unlock the crate in the Next Room except like I I'll

be honest look I I've spent like way too long sucking this game off but this puzzle if you want to even call it that is really unintuitive and it's just kind of [ __ ] if you're playing the game without any kind of Wiki open it's Actually so bad that someone actually put a note on the wiki itself saying unrecombined now there's a lot of numbers selected on the ticket so it's not like you just take a quick glance and you get the code NOP instead you have to check only the single numbered columns and

only use the selected numbers from those giving you 2531 thing is it sounds simple right but there's basically no indication on how this is supposed to be solved maybe Aside from the fact that there's like five single numbered columns and only four are used people stumbling on this they're going to think that they're going to need another lottery ticket now despite the puzzle being really really mid the reward is actually worth it inside the crate you you can find eight shotgun shells two long barrels both worth 225 rep and a metal pipe the game is

basically screaming at you to make the double barrowed shotgun here though For that you'll still need another workbench upgrade going through the window you'll find some campfires one of them still lit it looks like there might actually be some human presence here after all inside a small baded room in the next building is seemingly the last human alive in the entire Village who are you entering dialogue you can see that he's an incredibly old man in a makeshift wooden wheelchair his clothes being incredibly overgrown with branches And Roots but despite looking similar to a Savage

he's completely coherent what he bloody you're alive the old man extends his hand blindly trying to reach me oh you're not from around there eh you cannot be all them Lads are dead it's only me me and he finally finds my arm and grabs it for a moment he clutches my hand in silence then I hear him mumbling under his breath don't have enough in me only this this chair bloody hell his gaze stopped somewhere under The Leaky Barn ceiling what the old man suddenly jumps up what are you saying I feel his long fingernails

digging into my hand the tree ain't no [ __ ] tree there it looks like a tree yeah but those faces why know and buckers every single one of them so close and so fake they're not real they're not from time to time I thank God I went blind I don't have to look at him the old man lets go of my hand to lean against the broken back of the chair he sigh with relief it Disgusts me it [ __ ] disgusts me this buggery this [ __ ] scum all the time I have

to listen to his pathetic blabber complaining all the time as as if I was supposed to believe it's human then it's me zacha yeah right he suddenly reaches towards me with both hands almost falling out from the chair he grabs onto my sleeve and I feel all of his weight on me you lad you've got your hands and legs strong arms I beg you get rid of that filth from our village can't bear Another day of that Abomination wailing and sobbing I want to die in peace [ __ ] hell I want to die in

peace PE listen to me I thought about it for a long time I've had a lot of time to think for [ __ ] sake his eyes widen his pupils are milky white I can feel him climbing my coat you need to find the basement Jessie's basement I remember it it's right next to the tree the tree is too large so if you can't reach it from the top you going to try from the bottom Find the basement when there we surely you'll find the tree's roots the bloody thing must have Roots that's where they

are destroy them pull them drag them twist the [ __ ] out of them or you find a way hey I know you will the old man slides down my coat straight into his destroyed wheelchair for a moment he searches for his Stone which he uses to prop himself up against the muddy floor of the barn thank you you thank You this is the last survivor of the village and you're probably wondering where is everyone else well if you go past him you will see a monstrous tree that grows so high it is actually almost

touching the top down camera we've been using the entirety of the game and this tree is blocking the Final Exit to basically finish the game it's the final last roadblock the tree itself is an amalgamation of dozens of people from the village even including some of the Livestock like cows when examining the tree the protagonist will remark that the tree is gigantic its bark stays in constant motion it swells up and collapses into itself as if breathing I see human silhouette growing out of the tree trunk they're also moving as if gesturing in slow motion

dozens of mouths repeat their lines simultaneously creating a uniform noisy murmur much like the other character art this is animated and seeing all the people People trapped inside the tree opening and closing their mouths it's terrifying between the bows I catch a man's gaze it's fixed on me his body similarly to the other beings seems to form an integral part of the tree his limbs are nared and his face is grotesquely deformed he's the only one to acknowledge my presence his hand slowly raises pointing to something on the horizon above the roofs of the destroyed

Village the man's lips are Moving but the ghastly murmur of the other voices drowns out his words you're now given various options you can kick the tree hoping the voices will go silent I kick the tree trunk with all my strength breaking a branch sticking out from between the roots it hurts I hear a silent voice coming from beneath my feet it's the face of a man who has groan into the root he's completely covered in bark his lips barely stick above the mud and his raised arms resemble branches One of them is broken in

the elbow the stump bleeds a white gooey substance instead of seeping down it slowly flows upward forming a new arm now the funny thing is about Darkwood with how unforgiving the entire game is most people I seen play through this game either streaming or let's plays they purposely chose to not pick this option thinking it would punish them maybe it would kill them and because obviously the game Auto saves like every 5 seconds Or after every stray cuff the character does they would probably think that they're going to be locked out of actual content or

punished for it but in reality all it does is just show that the tree is completely unkillable also keep in mind when you pick this option the white substance that oozes out of it is the exact same white substance we saw when Crossing bunker 21 you can throw molotovs and line up as many explosive barrels as you want but you'll never be Able to damage the tree but now you're given another option to try to climb the tree which from looking at what it's done to the rest of the village probably isn't a good idea

but nevertheless you can still try the bark is slimy and soft its creases move away from my shoes and hands I feel the arms that protrude from The Roots sugging at my clothes I'm not sure if they want to drag me down or pull me closer I barely break free from their grasp climbing up is out of the Question the final option is to try to focus on the lips of the only person in the tree that was making any kind of eye contact with us even though the figure speaks sluggishly it's too high for

me to read its lips properly I think one of the words is Radio there's nothing else to do with the tree here but exiting and re-entering dialogue will give some different text about various people stuck inside the tree I noticed a little smiling face of a girl gazing at me from Behind a cluster of sleeping heads oblivious to the chaos around her she studies me with curiosity just next to her a massive man calmly hums some Melody the lullabi drowns in the overwhelming noise surrounding the tree it seems that amongst all the chaos people have

made their peace with the tree examining a second time you'll see an argument break out I knock your head you see that [ __ ] I am barely able to make out any conversations and squabbles From the horrible noise of the tree bow you took everything from us the shouts come from an old man only the tip of his head and one of his arms stick out from between the tightly crowded bodies you stole it thieves May the dogs piss in your face right next to him a woman's head wobbling from side to side repeats

we were hungry we were hungry another figure hiding its face under an enormous root lets out a chilling shriek quiet [ __ ] Quiet leave us in PE shut up he is interrupted by a man next to him his intestines hanging out from his stomach it was AR coming good it was meant for all of us you stole it however all of this is optional you don't actually have to go to the tree and you know get all immersed in the story or how horrific everything is you really can just remove the barricade probably the

only thing keeping the [ __ ] alive and just straight up leave he'll call you out Though but you know we're out on our own Survival not to keep talking to trees until curfew although if if you do that and play like a complete bastard you'll be immediately punished because as soon as you go outside and turn to leave the mushrooms right in front of you will rise up and become Mushroom Men now I mentioned these guys back in chapter 1 but before they could only spawn in specific mushroom fields that got marked on your

map but now in the swamp they Can randomly pop up from pretty much any mushroom patch they're basically a walking explosive Barrel now these guys are pretty reasonable to deal with in a 1 V one scenario because all they really do is Chase you while laughing like a madman until they get too close close and explode or if they run out of time and they blow up anyway even if they manage to close the gap the explosion does actually take a while so you can usually get away or you could just shoot Them before they

even get close if you manage to get caught in the blast though their damage is insane they're not really a threat on their own but more if they gang up on you with other actual enemies more on that actually the Mushroom Men can actually be blocked by other enemies and they will damage them so funnily enough you can actually bait them into clearing whatever's chasing you if you actually want to keep your ammo one more important landmark in the Village is a house that basically serves as your shortcut to get in and out of the

village you couldn't enter it before because Rubble was blocking one of the metal doors but coming from this side you can clear it and open the way but if you chose to stick around the area around the tree can actually be pretty rewarding there's a small shack with a metal door right next to it and going inside you can find a hatch likely one of the entrances to the basement that The [ __ ] mentioned unfortunately though the hatch seems to be an accessible that or it's like a Skyrim match the lockpick the hatch leading

to the basement is blocked from the inside the the marks on it suggest someone tried to break it open there's also a broken shovel lying right next to the hatch probably used to try and breach it you can pick up the shovel blade which is pretty useful actually if you haven't upgraded your shovel yet or if you just Want to sell it for the rep next to it there's a wardrobe with you know your typical loot but also a fat notebook almost completely filled with notes it's an inventory of the entire Village and the notes

suddenly end on August 1983 1983 August 21st shazak is dead we're down to 26 - 6 potatoes - half a loaf of bread - 2 L of gasoline plus one potato shx now this shows some pretty important things about the village first of all there were 27 people that lived Here including someone called Jose their food situation was really scarce they were rationing out potatoes and even at one point picked up a stray dog not a thought behind those ears not a [ __ ] thought probably the same huge dog that we found inside the

house so that goes to show that even though most of the village was turned into a giant monstrosity of a tree they never actually chose to eat the dog you can also show this food inventory to the [ __ ] all sorts of things used to happen in our village sometimes a mug got punched for some silly thing a faint smile appears in the man's face but we always stick together when the time came we had to until the younger came as the younger divided us I sometimes he The Echoes of those times in the

trees moans that [ __ ] monstrosity won't let me forget on the other side from the blocked hatch you find a house with a trap door that actually works going Inside you'll see how deep The Roots have really penetrated into the Earth Here moving through the tunnel you can stumble onto a corridor splitting off from the main path it leads to a small room with a glare inside glares are sources of red light that will actually damage you if you stare at them not to be confused with the growth that creates a red light now

encountering these things in the swamp can actually be pretty scary because they do a lot of Damage and they can be very you know visually distracting but for them to do damage you need to make eye contact so if you just basically moon walk towards them it's not really too much of a problem there's also a corpse in the corner holding a small magazine and a pistol I don't think I really have to explain what this indicates but going back to the main tunnel the walls will start talking to you who's there what do you

want leave there's an entrance in The water here approaching it the protagonist will say that my feet are slowly sinking in the soft quaggy floor quaggy is a word by the way I had to Google it before reading this apparently Polish people know more about English than the English person I can barely move as if something was holding me by my ankles you can try to swim through the hole but it's no use the water is dark and cloudy the corridor seems very long I'll probably run out of oxygen I Won't be able to swim

through the passage without an oxygen tank talking to the old man he was right about the tree you might remember he mentioned finding a basement next to the talking tree that has a weak spot there is a trap door but without an oxygen tank you're drown trying to make it to the other side remember there is a compressor back at The Hideout but it needs parts to be fixed and also you don't have an oxygen canister thankfully The [ __ ] he has a solution the basement is flooded eh am I right dogs bollocks everything

is [ __ ] flooded he turns around as if looking for something hey what oh yes yes elephants of [ __ ] plunkers ever seen elephants matey yeah we have these elephants here you see they live here in the P the swamp their heart is in the thicket in the flooded Forest since the Woods trapped us here they keep to themselves they don't fancy us bloody elephants they have these oxygen tank tanks lots of them tanks and if the basement is flooded you could use an oxygen tank eh now if the man in the tunnel

is to be trusted then burning down the tree is your best means of escaping I mean he was clearly telling the truth about a talking tree existing so it's not too hard to believe that the exit and a way Out is directly behind it but before we can do that we need an oxygen canister first before that you can also show the [ __ ] the photo of the three boys upon seeing the photo the [ __ ] cringes with disgust these Ruffians eh sons of a thief there were seven of them the mother took

the four youngest ones when the hunger struck the other three stayed with the father they were weak and sickly one day father got into his head that they were getting smaller rations Cuz we've written them off his hands start to tremble so he went with a group of people to Rob us of our food in the ey they broke into the basement didn't end well the [ __ ] goes silent The Lads threw them out of the village I don't know what happened to them after that people used to say they wander the woods with

the Savages looking for their place he gives me back the photo I can still hear the cries of that Thief all the bloody time three boys wandering the Wasteland does sound familiar but we'll come back to that later aside from the items found in the village you can also show him the road home just like pretty much every other NPC the old man grabs the photograph feels it and then takes out a small glass object from his pocket and puts it to his eye the road the road home what a load of bollocks The Road

to Madness is what it is this sounds very disheartening considering the man is basically the person closest to where The road home might be and yet he doesn't believe in it himself you can also gossip with him to get some backstory on who he is and what actually happened here what you going on a again the old man leans towards me scowling the wheelchair with the war took me legs and those wankers burn my house and me pigs but it was years after the war they said it was to fight the disease so they said

my zacha the disease took her from me all I Have is this wheelchair this l and the [ __ ] is a war veteran probably from World War II considering the time frame it's insane to imagine surviving one of the bloodiest conflicts in human history just to be left to rot in an all consuming Forest this dialogue also confirms that the various burnt houses we found throughout the chapters were burnt by an outside group possibly the one we're Associated with to fight the spread of infection there's also one more Exposition on what happened to the

Village it used to be different here first the woods changed trees started sprouting up everywhere we were cut off then the water flooded our Fields people went crazy out of hunger they fought over food once again he brings up The Village's hunger for the cause of why died out you might wonder how he managed to survive if there's nothing to eat Well in a backpack next to him you can actually find a couple of fish considering how much water there is it's not surprising that there'd be fish around and yep wait you can [ __

] fish how the did I not know that I put how many hours have I put in this game I have 90 hours on Darkwood and I did not even know you can catch fish until now thankfully unlike other games with a fishing mechanic there's only one kind of fish And catching them doesn't require you know inhuman reaction times what that's like a frame the fish themselves aren't really anything special you can eat them for an endurance boost or cook them in the oven for Essence but again it's still a really nice touch I was

going to give this game like a 9 out of 10 but it's got to go straight to a 10 simply because you can catch fish when earlier builds of the game the [ __ ] would actually give you a quest to fix his Wheelchair so you know he could move around with some dignity the quest itself though isn't in the game any longer and you can't find the wheels anywhere but the dialogue surprisingly is still there when you try to gossip with him if you come across some wheels two little wheels so that I can

fix my chair maybe you will benefit from it as well apart from Cut content he's also got more to say about the tree years ago when the eyes were good people used to Pass through it they would leave their ruts and go there where that damn Tree Grows they would often leave at night so that no one could see them they went into the deep dark woods never came back some of them would say they're going home but most of them were silent I don't know the land's changed the trees have cut us off from

the rest of the world but home for me has always been here and that monstrous moaning Abomination grew out of the ground it Blocked the passage and that's that no one has managed to pass through since then maybe people found some other place maybe they died at the swamps just like us this is huge as it's basically confirmation that behind the tree really is the road home so maybe following the [ __ ] Quest was actually rewarding after all after after you finally finish talking to the average British man after hitting the age of 26

you can continue to explore further Into the village there's another room with campfires as well as some Rubble you can clear off if you have a shovel with you which opens up a passage deeper into the flooded houses following the flooded Corridor you'll eventually be taken to a house with again thieves being carved onto the floor that is unless you get jump scared by the Mushroom Man right at the entrance and you know die immediately there's no items here the only thing I've note Aside from the carvings is a completely IND destructible barricade placed on

the window I originally found it a bit stupid you know you can't destroy a barricade cuz it's made of wood not metal but you know let's just say it's special uh dark wood but you can bypass the barricade by you know walking around it unfortunately the only interesting reward you'll get is a map pointing to a burnt Cottage location which spoiler you actually Won't even be able to access for quite a while I know I'm saying that a lot but this Village acts as a hub to give you loads of different quests and areas to

explore going back to the campfires in the next house over you can find a destroyed painting it looks like another defaced religious object following the trend with the destroyed shrines and muddy crosses this painting actually exists in the real world it's called the black madon oh my God it's called the black Madonna of chest toova it's actually pretty common to find it in Christian polish homes so no surprise to see one here it's probably been dirtied by Savages trying to make an idol of whatever they're worshiping there's a couple more houses around around but they're

mostly just here to loot and with a couple of enemies sprinkled around so you don't really forget that you know you're playing a survival horror game and not a Visual novel the only other interesting place left is a house with a floral doorm but it's locked behind a metal door that you don't have the key for leaving the village you can see that as small as that marking was on your map the area to explore was huge chapter 2's swamp biome is around the same size as the entirety of chapter 1's three main areas combined

and it's also dotted with various new locations now I talked about this earlier but because it's a swamp a Lot of the map consists of deep water that obviously slows your movement and drains your stamina incredibly quickly that's bad and you want to avoid the water that's why the devs put all the high-end loots like mushrooms in locked chests right in the middle of them thankfully you can never drown in this water because it's waste high but if you venture too deep you might encounter this chapter's new enemy the swamper you might remember first seeing

one in the Tunnels between chapter now why is it called the swamper uh probably because it lives in a swamp the one thing about this game as amazing as the enemy designers uh the names aren't very unique the Swampers are humans who have been mutated but living in the water for so long has made them look almost like crocodiles they're a nightmare to fight in the water because they'll pounce at you and also hide making them impossible to hit Thankfully they do give themselves away with ripples on the surface so when you see one you

know to either steer clear or bait them onto land for a more fair fight on land they'll swipe at you with their claws or throw up bile that if you touch it will lock you in place to give them some incredibly cheap hits this works in a very similar way to the chain trap that you might have used back in earlier hideouts another Enemy new to this biome is the centipede mostly Living underground but appearing from Holes they've dug around the map it looks more human than the swamper if you can call it that but

acts even more bizarre whatever parasite has infected this human has entirely replaced its head it has a quick pincer attack which can quickly stun lock you charge towards you with two pinces coming out of its chest and it can also borrow underground and quickly catch up to players trying to escape if you try to deal with it at Range it'll counter that by borrowing underground and popping up elsewhere usually behind you and after you kill it notice how I said kill it in quotation marks that's because the parasite will detach itself from the body quickly

retreating underground leaving the human body behind thankfully to compensate with enemies being much harder this chapter is also much more lenient with giving you ammo for firearms so it's basically the opposite of chapter one With you now using guns as a primary and melee as your backup obviously you'll still run out of ammo pretty quickly even if you bought your stockpile from chapter 1 so really it's always best to avoid these encounters altogether there are loads of small locations dotted around the swamp if you want to stock up on supplies to help you survive the

nights Savages like I said are much less common probably because they're basically prey here compared to the more Vicious Wildlife but also because the swamp doesn't have any regular animals like rabbits or elk that they could eat causing a lot of them to probably die from starvation I guess they went off eating the trees that being said you can find one last Camp which is marked by a huge bonfire there's loads of loot to be found in the middle of the fire but you'll have to carefully shimmy into the middle of it because out of

all the afflictions I've mentioned in the game Fire damage is probably one of the worst you can also find a welder here which is useless to us now because the workbench is already so leveled up but you can sell it for a little bit of influence there's also a lot of ruins around the swamp you know as would be expected for an abandoned Wasteland these can sometimes have strong enemies like Chompers or even a Bane in one case there's even a house with six I repeat six sleeping Chompers inside and a huge Dog because of

course this is the one house where you really really don't want to fire a gun inside if you do choose to risk it there's a ton of valuable items like Fabrics military flashlights and even ammo but it's probably less ammo than what you used trying to get to it meanwhile the house for the Banshee has another set of pliers so you can further upgrade your workbench once you do you can craft two more weapons firstly the Double barel shotgun functionally it's exactly the same as the single shot shotgun but now you get two shots see

this This Is My Boomstick but also a double barreled shotgun in a horror game that is really cool thankfully I do want to confirm as well that the double barreled shotgun has a really satisfying noise when you fire it because a lot of games they just don't seem to make shotguns sound Cool and of course the hunting rifle which I mentioned way back at the end of The Wolfman path which he gives to you if you pick the correct dialogue option if you either messed up the conversation or you didn't take his path you can

now craft one now as much as I like the hunting rifle and I really do I really just prefer using the pistol or the shotgun the hunting rifle is really weird because it's an accurate gun and basically works as the single shot Shotgun having to reload after every single round it does a lot more damage but at the same time if you're not one tapping a single enemy you're a little bit screwed and you'll probably have to rely on a backup weapon also as well so many encounters in Darkwood are incredibly long ranges so if

you see an enemy at the corner of your screen that you could probably take out only with the hunting rifle you might as well just ignore them anyway and save the ammo I Think the only reason why you should use it is probably because by now you have a lot of high caliber ammo lying around and you probably don't want to sell it and if you're wondering yes you you can technically do a 360 no scope because the hunting rifle has no scope oh my [ __ ] god some more small locations you can stumble

upon a various Mark SES drawn by Savages unlike the dry Meadow markings you can find more than just lines on the ground as there'll Usually be a corpse nearby someone has placed some white mushrooms around the body the two largest ones have been carefully inserted Into the Dead Man's eye sockets hundreds of dead insects lie scattered around the body but they didn't just die here someone has carefully prepared this scene a giant dead centipede has been placed on the Dead Man's face along his nose the body is completely overgrown with roots a dead lizard protrudes

from The Corpse's Mouth judging from these stuffed cheeks and neck more of them can be found in the throat these descriptions might sound somewhat familiar because each of these corpses actually represents the new enemies in this biome the mushroom corpse is the mushroom man the man with the insects is the centipede and the man with the lizard in his mouth is the swamper there's even a pile of butcher dead bodies that you can find representing the human spider and since We know the markings come from Savages it seems like they're worshiping these Abominations if not

indirectly creating them possibly some kind of ritual to commune with the forest you can also step into one of these markings just like back in the dry Meadows and again you'll start hallucinating though now you won't see the bunker door instead some sort of structure made of metal beams we're not sure yet what this might be referencing but if we're Hallucinating then it's probably going to be important aside from cool law locations most of the smaller locations are generally just out to get you some places will feature dense clusters of trees you know reminding you

that you're still in a forest if you didn't know that already if you explore these clusters you'll probably find some items as well as some red Chompers or even worse chain traps lying between the trees and you're most likely going to Miss them another location you can find is the holes which should already be marked on your map when you found them in the village the holes will usually be very far away from your hideout but they're definitely worth the trick approaching them for the first time you'll see the doctor digging in the ground looking

much more rugged with sticks and muds now glued to his head and his hand twitching wildly but still holding that cigarette this land hides More secrets than your little [ __ ] rat brain is capable of understanding the doctor digs through the mud I think he's looking for something deep underground there's a current of electricity [ __ ] electricity he starts flailing his arms wildly throwing pieces of mud everywhere around him and it flows underground from tree to tree the doctor suddenly freezes is staring at me with his arms midair and it Powers everything it

connects it all if I had a Light bulb if I just screwed it into one of these branches it would light up I bet it [ __ ] would he bends over a small hole in the mud and continues digging maybe this is where you're hiding maybe this is the way he's obsessing over this new found Theory we can't really confirm it ourselves because you know we never get a light bulb and we can't really unscrew any of the light fixtures but I don't think that's the point it's to prove that Unfortunately he's going insane

just like the rest of the locals you can still trade with him here to get some items for free and also gossip with Poland's most sane resident I haven't slept a wink in in many days I don't think this is good for me I hear this voice all the time can you hear it a Heavenly voice the doctor stares right into my eyes mud drips from his face he hasn't blinked in over a minute no you don't why would you you don't know her He steps towards me and lowers his voice I'm a bit fed

up with her a bit little tiny bit she must know I'm heading her way I'm I'm doing everything I can I don't eat I don't sleep I search under every Rock under every [ __ ] Bush she must understand it she must give me some time some little time off tell her this will you he could be talking about the voice of his daughter as he's mentioned hearing her before so it's pretty obvious that the forest is slowly Starting to reclaim him he's losing his sanity he's not completely insane yet because he is aware of

you know certain basic requirements like lack of sleep isn't a good thing but for the most part he just really isn't the same person anymore the doctor is lost in his thoughts a cigarette sticks out of his mud covered mouth using what remains of his shoe he draws lines on the ground they seem to intersect in completely random places I'm waiting for he doesn't Stop drawing he moves away a bit and makes a wide Arc with his heel the doctor flicks his cigarette into the dirt stumps on it and then drags it along the ground

ground creating the last straight line you [ __ ] drawing was never my forte he's now drawing intersecting circles on the ground just like the Savages did it might be obvious to say now but the doctor is slowly turning into a Savage even going so far as to glue sticks onto his head like the Antlers that many of them use it's not surprising I mean he was already desperate before coming to the swamp and since the forest clearly has much more influence here he simply couldn't resist its pull but that being said you can still

G sit with him one more time can you hear the trees sing they're calling us they're showing us the way they're showing us the way at the same blocking it I can't understand it he kicks the stone are they trying to tell us Something are they trying to put us to a test I don't know maybe they're lost too and don't know what to do he shakes his head dispirited and goes silent after a long pause he turns towards me his glasses are so dirty I can barely see the eyes hiding underneath I see you

haven't regained your speech you need to find another doctor he still remembers who he was but now his mind is more occupied listening to the trees than healing anyone there's no way to help Him snap out of it so we're stuck watching someone we got to know you know fairly well to the point that we basically saw life through his eyes now devolve into a raving madman the line he says though talking about speech is actually really interesting because if youve paid close attention to the dialogue throughout the game we actually haven't spoke to a

single person we've kind of just heard them ramble and maybe we'll get the option to nod or Shake our Head but that's pretty much it any dialogue we get from the actual protagonist is either thoughts in his own head with dialogue at the bottom of the screen or journal entries we actually haven't said a proper word the entire game after you finish with the doctor you can actually check the location out walking into the house you might be confused why I said the place is so critical for progression I mean there's barely anything here just

some Holes in the ground but there's apparently someone sitting in one of them with what the protagonist describes as a mud encrusted man with a long beard we can't talk to him or interact in any way but he'll always be there just watching the real importance of this place lies in the largest hole you can actually enter it which spits you back out and you'll Hideout as well as permanently opening up an entrance that you can come and go whenever you want This is the only means of fast travel in Chapter 2 similar to how

you could fast travel from the village back to your hideout in chapter 1 and this fast travel is really needed because like I've said multiple times the swamp is enor enormous once you come back through the hole to explore the rest of the building you'll see a large wormlike creature jumping between the holes this is a tunneler the thing responsible for digging the holes he seems territorial Even straight up screaming at you but despite that he won't actually ever attack you probably for the best because he just seems like a centipede on steroids aside from

the little guy you can find a crate here with yet another set of pliers so now you can finally upgrade your workbench to the final level now you're probably thinking what kind of gamebreaking weapon am I going to get now I've spent all this time collecting tool boxes welders pliers Hello everybody what is the game going to reward me with well uh apparently not much well firstly you get the pump action shotgun it functions pretty much exactly the same as all the other shotguns but instead of holding one or two rounds it can now hold

eight and the gas tank which is an explosive Barrel except it just farts as well thing is as well you could have just bought this from the trader back in the one or the three and it only costs 50 rep you know instead of having to spend precious scrap on a workbench the pump shotgun on the other hand is I mean it's pretty good eight rounds is insane but the thing is ammo is so scarce you probably won't ever have that much ammo to fill up the entire magazine now that the shortcut is unlocked it's

time to finally get that oxygen tank following the [ __ ] advice we head over to the elephant's cottage which he of course shown us the way to if you somehow Managed to forget about it completely the protagonist even made a journal in his entry to remind you the old man advised me to find the elephants and obtain an oxygen tank from them it will help me pass the flooded Cellar Corridor supposedly they live in the part of the swamp arriving there you'll have your third encounter with the doctor he now looks like a full-blown

Savage with the top of his head caked in mud and twigs placed on his forehead looking like Antlers if last time he was already gone beyond saving now he's pretty much devoid of all Humanity leaving only a blank shell of the human that he once was the doctor turned turns his mud covered head towards the Sun and freezes he then spreads his arms along his sides War a chunk of mud falls down from his exposed tongue he chews it slowly and swallows with satisfaction you can gossip with him as well just to find out how

bad he's really gotten the doctor Puts the muddy hand into his mouth grimaces and pulls out a yellow tooth he puts it into the pocket of his torn trousers the tooth falls through a hole he does not notice this the doctor begins staring at a nearby tree trunk paying no attention to the blood flowing between his lips the doctor glances at me his head tilt sideways lost in thought after a moment he extends his hand towards me as if wanting to grab me by the throat but stops halfway he Freezes slowly he bends down and

grabs a thick branch from the ground he starts biting the bark off it he swallows the bark with effort but also great satisfaction he places the stick among the other ones sticking out of his mud covered head this might point to the doctor still retaining at least some information before his transformation stopping himself from attacking us supposedly because he remembers that we did spare his life but Apart from that he really is just a regular Savage now eating bark off random branches despite all this he does make one coherent sentence the doctor approaches me I

can feel him embracing me I hear his horse breath and smell his odor I hear his whisper soon very soon soon not long from now he clearly has some sort of end goal so far it's been going back to his family but we have no indication that he's any closer to escaping the forest than we are and now He's fully succumbed to the plague it's more likely he's talking about something else entirely this is the last time we see him after this he disappears completely with his fate left uncertain although it's most likely he transforms

into a Savage completely it's also worth mentioning that the places we meet him aren't static but rather they depend on which major locations the player visits first so you could meet him in totally different locations or maybe never even Meet him at all going through to the elephant's house the first thing you'll notice is how many bear traps there are on the lawn seriously it looks like someone put cheat codes in or something like there should not be this many bear traps I don't even think you can get this many if you harvested every bit

of scrap in the entire game The Cottage is surrounded by a barricade made out of old furniture and Rusty barbed wire probably stolen from some fence whoever Lives here has obviously taken Security First but can you really blame them I I mean the the swamp biome is is pretty hard to survive in I don't even think it's an over reaction to place around 300 bear traps at your house there's also some growths around the perimeter to help you see it's a trap since walking through the grass blind will probably end up with you stepping on

a bear trap every 5 Seconds reaching the entrance you'll realize that once you're Inside you can't actually enter any of the rooms yet and someone behind the metal door will call out to you someone is behind the door can you hear it shh hey you what are you looking for here you're not from this godamn Village are you prove you're a good man fix our generator and I'll open the door it costs 10 metal scrap to do so which is pretty expensive but ironically if you actually go around and scrap pretty much all the bear

traps you'll have more than Enough so by fixing their generator you're taking out all their outside defenses but thankfully they don't really seem to notice all M I've got a bit of a game theory that when the devs created this house to show that the people inside were very defensive they set up bear traps everywhere but then later they probably put in the quest to fix the generator with said scrap metal you know just so you don't get a bunch of stuff for free again these devs like They they don't want to give away free

stuff believe me before entering you can also see that there's flowers spread around near the entrance to the cottage with the protagonist commenting that an intense smell of flowers fills the air once the generator is repaired the person inside thanks you you can come in Walking In you'll see that it's actually a group of people a parent and some kids these are the elephants and they're called that because of the gas masks They wear the air hoses looking like elephant trunks they're also dressed in full hazmat suits emphasizing how focused they are and protecting themselves

from the forest not even letting the air touch them which means they could be some of the last people in the forest to be completely unaffected by the plague the air is filled with a suffocating sweet odor of rot who are you the woman is wearing a heavy ruined coat her voice is suppressed by the Cracked gas mask she's wearing can't you speak did someone take away your voice two children hide behind the woman the younger one eyes me nervously cowering in fear the old one just stands there motionless you're not from around here I

would have recognized you we may keep to ourselves but I know everyone here I would never forget your mug the younger child pierces me with its eyes the steamed visor of his gas mask betrays his rapid breath your go looks like that Because of this fish air do you know I bet you can't speak because you didn't keep your mouth shut walking through the woods the trees and plains are simply beautiful here the bushes bloom gorgeously at this time of year but don't let the charm of this land deceive you the devil lurks between the

trees and he gets through your mouth and nose the older child's grasp on his mother's hand tightens he does not lift his gaze from one of the Hut's walls and you're Just going to stand there I know you want something you're leaper demon you are not getting anything from us I don't trust you you leaper Gob do you hear me I don't trust anyone who breathes this filthy air the woman stares at me intensely through the cracked mask did you take my Marin was it you who kidnapped him talk no that cannot be the woman

stares at the floor her greasy hair drops down on her mask it's impossible stupid child he went out and Never came back he was on about how his granny will take him mushrooming I have no idea where he I told him he cannot go outside I told him the devil will find him take off his mask take him away I would look for him but she lowers her head even more as if observing the dead flies stuck to to a coast you want my trust bring my M chin back my stupid M chin find him

and bring him home there's a key to his room you were spending a lot of time there recently maybe you'll Be able to find something there that will lead you to him now with all this talk of the devil it's pretty obvious that she's someone who's fiercely religious which is incredibly common in rural parts of Poland you can even gossip with her about this apart from these two here and Marin there was one more boy of mine my precious darling a blessed child the woman rests her hands on the oxygen tank of the children standing

beside her his love fills our Tanks with clean air for this we are forever grateful to him for the Clean Air for the oxygen tanks with those beautiful masks and a book in which the devil has revealed His True Image along with his evil plan my son took it away from the trees with his own hands and brought it here to us she also mentions one of our kids that isn't in the cottage who is supposedly providing her with clean air now this could be interpreted in a lot of ways she could Be talking about

another pressor the same one that we have back at the base that needs repairing but the way she talks in such a heavy religious tone she could genuinely be talking about like the second coming of Jesus or something or on top of that as well she could slowly be succumbing to the insanity which usually happens if you've been in the forest too long so even though these characters are covered in gas masks and they're trying to keep the plague at Bay It's obviously still not working coming back to the dialogue you can show the mother

the photo of the road home I remember this road the wood devoured it about 3 years ago it used to lead to our village I walked at school the road home my road home just more confirmation that we're on the right track to finally getting out of the woods you can gossip with them some more to hear one of the children starts saying a rhyme the youngest child hidden behind the woman's Back until now finally finds the courage to make a small step towards me one little bear ate a bowl of soup a faint voice

can be heard then another beer came and quiet the woman smacks the boy on the back of the head the punch is so hard the hood of his rubber cloak lands on the mask fiser not now not in front of the stranger for some reason the mother thinks this nursery rhyme is important enough to stop her child from telling us even using you know Traditional polish parenting techniques to shut it up this could mean that it might contain some sort of message that the mother doesn't want us to figure out but there's no indication of

what it could be without hearing the full rhyme the mother can also talk to you about these Savages visiting her home which is probably the same reason for the barricade and the multitude of bear traps you're just like these lunatics who roam around the woods searching for God knows what there used to be more of them yes most of them starve to death I remember when they appeared not far from here must have been around 2 years ago around two dozen of them they were led by these three weirdos dressed in old rags they set

up camp in the marsh there between the trees they watched our house Star right into my windows Oddities I thought they wanted to kidnap my children or harm them in some way but when the night fell I lost sight of them There was no one there in the morning three weirdos dressed in rags does does sound familiar you can even show her the photo of the three boys the woman takes the photo and freezes no I don't know who that is unfortunately she doesn't recognize them there's also some conditional dialogue here if you chose to

give the key to the musician but failed the train wreck dream she'll talk about the doctor I remember one loitering around here he used to be a Doctor he would come to the Village to treat people now he looks like an Unholy pig face smothered in [ __ ] dressed in rags the devilish disease finally gets to everyone you better watch out or you'll lose your mind too you lift towards the part of the swamp it looks like the doctor is turning into a Savage whether you took him along with you or told him the

bunker location by failing the dream the mother will also point out as where you can find him but that's Something I'll get to later you can also get some more gossip about another character something exploded in the part of the swamp made the ground tremble devil knows what it was I see you're curious investigate it if you have a death wish I think it happen in junkyard we haven't yet seen an enemy able to cause an explosion this loud and we haven't seen any evidence of the forest you know spontaneously combusting so maybe there's someone

sane enough to be Able to craft explosives at the junkyard it seems necessary to head there anyway since we do need parts for the compressor like the note back at The Hideout suggested but this if anything just makes things more interesting we already have the cage near the junkyard marked on our map from the note back in The Hideout but if we didn't find it at least the mother points Us in the general direction of where the junkyard could be now first of all we have to Gain the mother's trust and the only way we

can do that is by finding her child marck you can first visit his room using the key that she gave you inside you'll find some of his drawings depicting mushrooms as well as people with mushrooms on their heads instead of hair I'm pretty sure if anything my stream chat would make me believe that this is a reference to my haircut there's a p of clothes you can search with a single oddl looking mushroom inside I think There might be some emphasis on the kid going somewhere related to mushrooms I don't know maybe the devs are

just trying to point us somewhere lastly there's a doorm in the corner which the kid apparently used used as a bed once you fold it you can find a map underneath which the protagonist will talk about in his journal I Found A Primitive map in the masked family's cottage one of the kids must have drawn it it's very inaccurate almost scrolled Looks like the kid wanted to indicate some place using it I've circled the area where that place should be on my map it's too primitive to make out exactly where the place is marked but

now you can at least narrow down your search to an area that you can use on your map the logical step now would be to go searching through the circled area though if you explored the swamp a bit more beforehand you might actually connect the dots to where marck might be Confirm now it fits neatly in the circle the mushroom Glade with all the mentions of mushrooms this is definitely what the clues have been referring to this area is filled with poisonous mushrooms walking through it safely is incredibly hard especially as well when you can

just have a mushroom man pop up and force you to try and Dodge and weave in between what are pretty much landmines there is something you can do to mitigate this but it will require Finding and visiting a different place entirely the Great Lake it's less of a lake and more an area that's been flooded harder than the rest of the swamp covered with deep water apart from some small patches of dry land and a single bigger island in the center it even has its own weather system being showered in a continuous rainstorm which clouds

the sun only lighting up the surroundings with the occasional lightning strike a light source is Pretty much necessary here otherwise your line of sight is limited to a pathetically small circle my name is Alan Wick although that being said using a flashlight might be a bad idea because the lake is also full of sleeping red Chompers covered in Black substance shining a flashlight on them does wake them up while using the lantern thankfully doesn't once again I I have no idea why but the lantern is just so good even late game the champers can Also

be worken up with any noise including running and gunshots so both of these are basically off limits here you can however use melee weapons with no issue so a good Strat is to surprisingly approach this like a stealth game slowly walking up to the Chompers taking the substance off of the Lantern and unlocking them with the axe before they can react doing this you can pretty much easily clear the lake but this place is so huge it's probably the Largest area in the entire game and covered in deep water using this method is safe but

it will probably take you multiple days to clear it all out so you can also try and run straight through and surprisingly this strap isn't even half bad as the Chompers thankfully are slower than you while in water and the thing we're looking for here is located on the island in the middle of the lake so there's no need to actually completely explore the place after the First thing you see when entering the island is multiple sleep sleeping Chompers surrounding some sort of snout attacking it will cause it to shrivel up into the ground and

end the storm letting you see and hear normally unfortunately this will also wake up all the Chompers next to you so it's probably better to take care of them beforehand if you don't want to get swarmed the lake becomes much easier to get around and explore the main island Has a building with some high valuable Parts like ammo and the item that we actually came here for the rubber boots now these boots you get are a lifesaver for going back into the mushroom Glade mostly because you can now step on poisoned mushrooms open infected corpses

and you won't take any damage I mean if you open an exploded infected corpse you'll take the initial explosion damage but it is so minute that you'll basically have to do it multiple times Before you even need to heal anyway walking on mushrooms and opening corpses doesn't even decrease the durability but stepping on the worms does so that's something to keep in mind because these can never be repaired with the boots exploring the Glade becomes trivial as most of the danger comes from the mushroom patches like most locations in the swamp this area is huge

although mostly empty most of the Glade is just gigantic mushroom growths acting like Trees that block your way even the protagonist commenting an intense sweet smell of mushrooms fills the air even the ground is a darker gray rather than the green grass we've been walking on throughout the swamp there's actually so many mushroom spores in the air that you might even experience hallucinations while walking around seeing figures of villagers passing by just to disappear there's not much to see in the Glade there's a puzzle building you can solve For some pretty good loot as well

as a group of gray figures Frozen in place which you can examine doing so gives you rough scraps of conversation not even properly synchronized between the figures it doesn't even seem like they're talking to you it's more like their puppets each repeating their part of the conversation even talking to each other the first group talks about some people breaking in and locking themselves in a basement what is Happening they lock themselves in a basement get food yes [ __ ] it is all common good this is probably refer referring to what happened in the swamp

village where the thief led a group of people to Rob The Village's food stores thinking he had children and were written off to starve these figures seem to somehow be related to The Villages but clearly they aren't actually human more like crude imprints of people that died out long ago they're just Echoes Now the second group doesn't even mention the incident instead they talk about The Outsiders although this conversation is so disorganized it's hard to even properly align their dialogue in the night I saw them with guns you didn't see [ __ ] no one

from the village goes there they were not from the village where were they from since the relocation no one from the outside was here that is what I said this further shows that this military group Had a presence in the region at some point sending Expeditions here but unfortunately this dialogue doesn't point to where it might be the main thing to find here will usually be in the middle of the Glade there's a shrine here looking like one from the swamp Village although not chomped up by Savages this time but rather over over grown with

mushrooms behind you you can find a house with a destroyed doorm next to the Front door you probably don't want to enter through the door though as the floor Beyond is booby trapped with enough poisonous mushrooms to overdose the entire Savage population of the forest instantly even if you have the boots the explosive damage alone can force you to waste a pill or bandage besides there's a large window in one of the side walls that you can actually use without having your lower body blown off [Music] This house is overgrown much like the rest of

the Glade everything inside the cottage is covered with mushrooms the floor even though it looks like it's made of wood bends under my feet a white colorless goo seeps from the ceiling and walls there's another mention of that white substance again but the kid will looking for is nowhere to be seen in the last room there's a Shelf with some random loot as well as a key there's also a container but it's code locked so We can't open it for now but in the corner next to a metal door we can find the mushroom granny

seemingly the only inhabitant of the house the elephant mother mentioned maren going to his granny so she might know where he is an old woman sits in a weathered rocking chair her sleep is deep and peaceful a handful of ripe mushrooms grows out from beneath her thick hair just like the house we find her in she's covered in mushrooms when we find her she's asleep Meaning we can pick some of the mushrooms from her head which I'm sure you know she wouldn't mind sharing the floor of the Hut is soft as a sponge my footsteps

are almost noisess the woman's sleep is too deep for a to hear anything I reach out for the most prominent mushroom and delicately pull its stem it easily detaches from the old lady's pale head you can go even further and take another one the urge is strong I reached for another bigger mushroom it Looks so tasty it resists a bit when I try to pull it out but I finally managed to do it and if you're feeling extra Brave you can take another one now I reached for an exceptionally shapely specimen growing from the very

top of her skull but it resists firmly despite the sudden jerk the old lady is still asleep you can put some more Force into it if you really really want that mushroom the mushroom shows resistance but after a moment I pull it out Together with a piece of the woman's skull her head drops to her chest and the slimy contents of her skull start to ooze through the opening at this point the only Next Step you can take is to eat the old lady I slowly bite into the woman's body her nose is soft and

juicy I don't feel a single cartilage or bone only the delicious sweet taste of delicate mushrooms a white Goose seeps from her body and flows down my coat I cannot contain myself I must eat a Hole so yes if you're wondering you can just eat the entire person hole that you just met now this is very in character for the protagonist who's been injecting himself with mushrooms the entire game but still only the most deranged of devs could put in an option like this and I mean you know they're polish so it all checks out

it's funny as well because another game that I covered cruy Squad did actually have a feature where you Could cannibalize people but the dev Villa was actually so surprised that people would take that option and you could only get that option if you played terribly at the game to the point you were on the lowest difficulty but here you're just given the option outright who on the team had an obsession with cannibalism because that is a very common theme throughout the game I wouldn't say common I I recollect that there's this mushroom granny which you

Can who you can eat but she's human being she's a mushroom right there's no cannibalism here that sounds like a bit of a cope to be fair like she she's made it a mushrooms it's fine there's also the jars with human meat in the village that's fair uh but I don't I feel like I'm in like an OJ Simpson case like that's fair I mean maybe I killed her but I will say Arthur he's not here so whatever he's the one who upset with yes also if you're wondering you can stop Trying to Vore her

at any point and go back to a more Humane approach by you know just waking you're up instead the old lady slowly opens her eyes for a moment she stares into space with an absent gaze finally she becomes aware of my presence wait you're not her empty eyes now take on a more questioning expression I didn't expect any guests she throws a nervous look at the door on her right then gazes around the mushroom infested house she relaxes A bit I suppose you won't tell me what you want and you want something something since you're

standing here in front of me right you can either do nothing or Point your finger at the metal door though whichever option you choose the granny will still dismiss you it's the door to my chamber there's nothing that would interest you there the old lady Puffs her cigarette come back when you remember what it is you want from me to get her to even talk to You you'll have to tell her what you want except you can't talk but thankfully you can show her items like all the characters before you can show her the photo

of the Rose the old lady examines the photo her thoughts wander far away I remember cars driving along this road and then they closed it they set up a fence and a gate both the fence and the gate got devoured by the woods eventually I think that's how it was once again talking about how the area Was quarantined closed off from the world before the forest could even encircle it completely all just to prevent it from spreading you can also show her the photo of the three boys the woman takes the photo into her hands

lovely boys all they have left is their father she must have seen them before but there's not much confirmation here that she was related to them more than just knowing their family to get the mushroom Granny to understand what you mean you'll have to show her the drawings from what you got in the kids' room back in the swamp Cottage unless like me you forgot to do that then you'll have to trick all the way there and Back Again wasting an entire day just to fetch a piece of paper you can show her the drawings

now but what happens next depends in entirely on the choices you made back in chapter 1 again like I've said so many times choices you make Earlier on in the game will have huge consequences later on you might remember talking to the musician in your hideout and him talking about the villagers coming down to the swamp as a last resort after you killed the SE their only food source this affects the granny since as you might already know if you cannibalized her earlier she's made out of tasty mushrooms and now a horde of starved villagers

is camping out nearby yes you're his father or Brother he came here a few days ago he was very nervous he hid in the corner and stayed there for what must have been the whole day he relaxed in the end I think he likes it here I like when he's around too he enjoys drawing although his drawings are not very childlike the woman casts a nervous look at the small window overgrown with mushrooms this Forest is not a place for children no old people it's a place for the likes of you I saw some villagers

through the Window yesterday they were hiding right there the woman raises her hand with great effort pointing to an unspecified place with her trembling finger they were hiding but I have a Keen Eye despite my years I saw their Hungry Hollow eyes I know what's on their mind they want to devour me me and and my house at first I thought you were one of them but you seem like you can control your um appetite get rid of these hungry Madmen the old woman lowers Her voice to a silent murmur do a good deed son

and get rid of them I don't know where they live but you're young and strong you will manage I'm sure you'll find some Clues near my house make them go away and the child will be safe I will let him return home so now we've got confirmation that Mar is in fact here the only problem now is we need to deal with all the hungry hungry Villages going outside the house you can go around looking for the clues that she Mentioned there's a lot of footprints around but those alone won't be enough to track them

all the way back to their Camp as Unfortunately they usually end up with dead ends in these swamps deep water instead but by following the footsteps you can find some items that can point you in their direction there's a pack of cigarettes inside a bag and you can even find a corpse of one of the villages your character even comments that he looks very skinny showing how Starved they must be you can find a blood stain Rock on the corpse no doubt the murder weapon you can show both of these items to the granny yes

it's a stone you can probably find some good ones here because of the Quarry nearby but the woods have surely devoured it by now it was in the part of the swamp and why are you showing me this a torn empty pack of cigarettes bring me a fresh one next time the woman examines The drawing on the packaging is it our Quarry ah yes it's the one located in the part of the swamp both items will point you towards the Quarry which was also mentioned by the musician when you talk to him about the village

this is where the villagers have set up camp and if you want to complete the Granny's quest You'll have to find and take care of the rest of the villages multi as you can expect the Quarry is built into a rock wall there's Less trees here instead your way will most often be blocked by stone walls and columns there's some campfires wood piles and sacks of rocks on the way into the main area this is a great way to get small rocks because even though they're basically worthless you might need them for upgrades to your

shovel or Axe and surprisingly small stones are very rare in Chapter 2 approaching the area we'll have the villagers immediately telling you to get out we don't want you here [ __ ] off you hear me the way forward is full of traps the villagers probably knew you were in the area and tried securing themselves there's also a gutted Pig right at the entrance reminiscent of the gutted Pig on the road to the Silent Forest Village all the way back in chapter 1 moving between the Rocks you can also listen in on some of the

villages conversations divine retribution I'm telling you come on shik just as we managed to break through Our way back gets blocked we're going to starve here shut your trap already stoik told me that they found something in the woods said it would keep everyone fed if only our s was still alive that [ __ ] will pay I'm telling you approaching them they'll instantly attack you but to be fair you are here to kill them and you are the only reason they're even here because you killed their main food source so it's not really an

unreasonable reaction one more Thing you might find while exploring the area is that the villagers still have potatoes my life it's SP meaning they do have at least some kind of rationing system going on probably the only reason that they managed to survive so long and make it here but living off potatoes alone is impossible so it's really not surprising the villagers have turned to cannibalism before heading into the main area you can take a small detour to see The deforested path the villagers have carved out to get here and just like the musicians said

before there's now a gigantic Hol separating the swamp from the Silent Forest making it impossible to pass and for you to go back there's also so an unfortunate villager still trapped on the other side shouting at you who are you what are you doing here he's trying to alert the others to your presence but no one's there to hear him hey he's here if you want you can put Him out of his misery help I mean he's doomed to die on that small patch of land anyway as the forest is already grown way back when

passing through the main entrance you might notice a huge Boulder hanging over the passage held up by a couple of logs once you enter the the camp you'll see that some villagers are lying down curled into the fetal position they're infected so even if somehow there was a reliable food source In the swamp these guys really wouldn't have had a chance to make it the more healthy villagers are gathered around campfires and once they spot you they'll grab their pitchforks and try to murder you for condemning them if you want the villagers to leave the

mushroom granny alone you'll have to kill all the healthy ones in the camp the sick ones will definitely die soon anyway they can't really endanger the granny alternatively you can go back to the Entrance and and if you look at these logs holding up this Boulder they look pretty flimsy so a couple of strikes with your Axe and The Rock will come tumbling down blocking the entrance to the Quarry and sealing off the villagers in a stone tomb forever you might also want to make sure that you run outside the quar before the boulder drops

this is something even your character will comment about when he's breaking the supports the boulder Might fall down any minute now I must be careful not to trap myself in the Quarry however if you managed to somehow avoid every single attempt The Debs made to you know warn you to not stay in the Quarry when you knock out the platform I mean look at this even if you knock it it actually takes a couple of seconds to fall but y if you're on the other side then congratulations you have now just soft locked yourself there's

no way to get out legitimately because you can't Turn the good on yourself like in Desy so you'll have to reload a save and lose a bit of progress thankfully I think the devs did accommodate people that were this stupid to ignore all the warnings because even though the game Autos saves every 5 Seconds it doesn't actually save when you knock out the platform that is unless on the hardest difficulty then you're probably going to have to save scum even though the boulder is much easier and it feels cleaner because you Technically don't get any

blood on your hands it feels much worse than just killing them outright death by starvation is incredibly painful not to mention leaving them with the infected villagers which are slowly transforming into red champers the villagers will die either way but honestly again it probably is better to mercy kill them because if you don't they'll slowly starve to death turning against each other and then Fade Away into nothing but incredibly slowly coming back to the granny she'll have the reward waiting the old lady Smiles revealing her white toothless gums she leans in her armchair and grabs

me by my hand heartily I feel a white goo seeping from her hand smelling of mushrooms you're a good man Sunny the woman produces a small key from under her skirt oh God I don't want that bro what the hell here take the boy to his family he will probably be safer there and come Back tomorrow I'll give you a beautiful gift for the trouble she'll now give you a key to the next room talking to her later she'll even give you a gift hello I barely see her smile through the cigarette smoke I made

this for you here you go the woman grabs a thick Woolen sweater from behind the chair and gives it to me winter is coming may it serve you well the reward you get is the sweater which is the single best piece of of armor in the game mostly because The only other armor you get is the light armor just just don't ask how this thing can block entire choer attacks it doesn't make sense but I don't care its description States it prevents bleeding and although that status effect isn't actually in the game apparently remnants of

it can still be found in the game files so it could have just been a mechanic at some point in development the sweater is slightly better at blocking damage than the light armor but Once it wears down it's impossible to repair or to get another still it's a nice reward to get on top of the key that you actually you know need to progress the game the key she pulled from under her skirt Jesus Christ but completing the quest isn't the only way to get the key you could just eat it yourself like you could

when she was sleeping earlier although doing it now will make an already [ __ ] up concept even more disgusting I lean towards the Old lady the sweet fragrance of mushrooms overwhelms me I have to eat her what are you doing leave me be go away I bite into her body the mushroom juice squirts onto my face and clothes I feel the woman's feeble hands trying to push me away but they're too weak and my Hunger is too great she kicks about only slightly when I bite into her face I swallow one chunk of her

sweet body after another unable to stop myself from devouring her hole in fact the Protagonist's craving to eat her is actually so strong the option to do it shows up basically every time you make a choice in her conversation You've Been Changed by the forest so much that you can barely stop yourself from cannibalizing someone just to say to your hunger for Essence either eating the granny or just shoveling her to death you'll be able to loot her corpse and for the key that lets you progress like you normally would surprisingly There is actually another

option if you wait a few days you can just tell her that you took care of the villagers even if you didn't this by the way makes you an irredeemable liar and permanently sets you on the high chaos path she'll still give you the key like if you did a quest but lying didn't solve the Villager problem so when you come back the next day you'll find her and even parts of her house eaten by the hunger crazed villagers also making it Impossible to get your hands on the sweater which was to be fair kind

of mid anyway so all that that entire Quest all the outcomes just to get a single key or to be fair you could have just exterminated the entire Silent Forest Village along with the SE since in that case no one would then be able to show up in the Quarry and threaten the granny this skips the quest completely and hasard just give you the key outright although unfortunately no sweater the Old lady takes the drawing squinting her eyes a wide toothless smile appears on her face that's why you came here the woman looks at the

Leaky ceiling of the mushroom infested house then Squints her eyes I thought you're like this Wolf the end of her cigarette lights up and a puff of blue smoke comes out of her nose from that children's tail the one who wanted to eat the granny she opens her eyes and glances at the locked chamber room a few days ago a child appeared Here a boy he thinks I'm his granny the old lady stopped for a second trying to remember something Grandma he was very nervous he kept repeating a rhyme over and over again he hid

in the corner and sat there for what must have been the whole day I think he relaxed in the end he seems to like it here he draws I think he likes to draw but his drawings are not very childlike the old lady smiles again I really really like having him Around his parents are still alive right are you his father brother he's in the other room here the key I will let him go if he wishes to go with you I do like the fake out when she mentions the wolf like she's about to

tell us more about The Wolf Man the devs even made it so the next bit of dialogue actually takes a second to appear to you know keep you in suspense it's basically taking advantage of the player looking for a connection to everything and I love that Whichever path you took you'll now be able to meet the boy maren now you could have a nice conversation with him and bring him back to his mother or you could do what I did and shoot him in the head immediately I didn't know I didn't know I didn't know

you could kill the kid I didn't know apart from the voices in my head telling me that he was some kind of spy uh I genuinely had no idea that shooting a child in the head would actually kill Them mostly because I've only played Bethesda games where the kids are completely immune to any kind of damage needless to say if you do this you are completely and utterly [ __ ] there is another oxygen tank you can get apart from completing the main quest and you know taking the kid to the elephant family which is

what you're meant to do but that also requires talking to marck which is kind of hard to do when his skull has an additional hole inside It the only way to progress now is just to kill the rest of the elephants which turns out you could have just done from the beginning and skipped their entire quest line that's one thing I love about this game no matter what choice you take there's still always another way to complete a quest that is unless you lock yourself in the Quarry idiot for now let's just assume you didn't

exercise your Second Amendment right the second you spotted The kid when you come in you can first find some of his drawings on the floor depicting the elephants and some sort of monster looking into the house possibly a manifestation of the things his mother had warned him so much about approaching him though he's not very talkative the boy is standing under a wall overgrown with enormous mushrooms he's visibly scared his Lush mop of hair veils a Restless wide open pair of eyes the kid is Whispering as if reciting something Under his breath the boy cowers

and presses his back against the soft wall which starts to ooze a white goo you can kneel and extend your arm towards The Boy The Boy Is terrified slowly he slumps down from the wall to the ground curling into a ball the murmur turns into a loud recitation one little bear ate a bowl of soup then another bear came and there were two four little to beers b a sudden pow Along Came the fif and took a little bow now you can put Him on your back and carry him to the elephants when I take

the boy into my arms he starts screaming reciting the rhyme over and over one little beer ate a bowl of soup then another beer came and there were two four little bears made a sudden pow Along Came the fifth and I took a little bow this is going to be a long journey important thing to mention here if you killed the mushroom granny to get the key instead of completing the quest you'll get a bit More d L as you leave as we PCH the remains of the old lady the boy stops reciting I feel

his hands tightly clutching my coat granny as I cross the cottage's threshold I can hear him sobbing quietly you brought back my child the woman leans towards the boy Marchant where have you been the boy stares at the ground in silence come here marck walks towards the woman nervously plucking at his old torn sweater look at You where's your mask and the gas tank from your gracious brother his love protects us it fills our lungs with clean air and this is how you thank him young man your childish behavior has made him very very angry

now we all have to apologize to him for your stupidity the two kids standing behind the mother Flinch the woman grabs the boy's hand and disappears in the hallway after a while she comes back with an oxygen tank take it it's a tank for you it will Protect you from this devilish air the devil's breath and other evils lurking in this foul place it's the only thing I have and the only thing I can give you the tank is a little rusty but it seems intact on the side I can see some unintelligible scribblings the

valve opens with Little Resistance but I don't hear a hiss of air it's empty do not open the valve without need you will only waste the Clean Air she pushes my hand away from the valve and closes it Hastily may it serve you well you finally get the oxygen tank you need funnily enough even though the mother claims the tank is full telling you not to waste any clean air inside the tank is actually completely empty your character even comments on it mid conversation this could mean that the elephants are actually breathing in the same

air as everyone else meaning they're just as infected as everyone in the swamp despite the gas masks and Protective gear once you bring the kid back he'll be locked in his room for the rest of the game probably his punishment for disobeying his mother I mean it doesn't matter for us though we've still got the oxygen tank and with that we're one step closer to Escaping The Forest the other oxygen tank I mentioned earlier can be obtained by solving a riddle for a code the riddling question being the rhyme that maren constantly repeats with the

protagonist even making A note in his journal about it in case you forgot it the boy kept reciting this rhyme one little bear ate a bowl of soup then another bear came and there were two four little bears made a sudden pow Along Came the fifth and took a little bow you might remember this back from the elephant's dialogue as the mother kept one of her children from repeating this rhyme to us the fact that she reacted so strongly to a stranger possibly hearing is clue enough that it Might be important and now we finally

have the entire phrase if you look at the completed rhyme you'll notice it actually has a sequence of four numbers corresponding to how many bears there are 1 2 4 five this clearly makes a code but where's it used while looking around the area you might spot a trail of flowers coming out of the cottage the same flowers you could see spilling out next to the entrance following them will lead you to a small shed approaching it You can find a rusted Barrow there are some blurred traces inside the Barrow looks like recently dried blood

next the Barrow is what looks like a freshly dug grave this actually isn't the only one in the swamp as you can find similar ones all across the map you can even use the shovel to dig them up which will usually get you some random loot this grave is different from the ones you'll find Outside though as looking through it you can find a body holding an Underground key to Bunker 21 whoever died here must have also been a member of your organization if they had that key maybe you even knew them before you were

stranded here unfortunately the key is basically useless now we can't go back to the dry Meadow anymore even the description says so key to Tunnel 21 another one I don't think it's going to be of any use I I got the keys now besides we're so close to leaving the forest if we really chose to go back now We'd basically be undoing all the progress we've made so far whoever dug this grave probably used the Barrow to transport the body so despite the obvious connection to the elephants it could have been anyone and there's nothing

else pointing to them being murderers seeing as the blood stains on the Barrow are recent the person buried here could have came here with you the time frame fits and we haven't seen any other Outsiders coming in after us looks Like we were the only ones to make it after all going into the shed your character will comment about the flowers the floor is covered with flowers of various colors some are fresh the rest must have been lying here for some time they're clearly important to the elephants but there's not a lot of indication as

to why one thing the usage of flowers and gas masks reminded me of was the plague doctor masks in real life which were worn during the black plague Epidemic its beak likee design was actually made to hold herbs like lavender and flowers to be put in to filter out the bad air known as miasma the belief at the time was that diseases including the plague were caused by breathing in miasma emanating from the bodies of the infected the herbs were supposed to counter the bad air and while the filter didn't actually do anything to stop

the spread of the plague the suit itself did provide Pretty decent protection from the easiest forms of transmission cuffed up bodily fluids and infected fleas the elephants are pretty clearly inspired by the plague doctor aesthetic with the huge gas masks they earn them the nickname and their obsession with bad air causing infection and now even the flowers used in stuffing and the plague masks being everywhere there's a shelf here but nothing of note inside just random loot the more interesting bits Are actually inside the Next Room locked behind a metal door that you need the

code for using the code from Master next rhyme will actually unlock the door and let you enter but the first thing the protagonist notices is an awful smell the air is dreadfully rancid and stuffy the heavy sweet smell of the flowers mixes with a stench of rot next to the entrance there's a crate and believe me it makes solving that riddle very very worth it inside you can find some Extremely precious loot like a bolt handle long barrel and a tubular magazine as well as two weapon parts this is well over 1,000 rep in total

and it's insane loot for a single container to have there's also one more item here a map pointing to a location called the radio tower going further inside the shed you'll find a book on the table telling you more about the tower the pages are glued together creating a rotting chunk of paper on the bottom of The note it reads radio tower door 21 12: p.m. wchi trakowski stal Masuk zalinski at the top I can only make out the words devil horns orar this causes your character to make a note of it in his journal

I found an old journal in the elephant's Cottage looks like it was written by one of ours one of the notes mentions a radio tower and some downward passage might be worth investigating according to the notes the radio tower is located in the edge of the swamp now This is huge because it does 100% confirm that we're of an outsider group and there's also another way to get past the tree without having to destroy it although at this point it really is just easier to destroy the tree because we're doing the [ __ ] a

favor and also there are other areas we can get access to with the repaired oxygen tank on the other side of the room from the old Journal you can find the source of the rancid smell there's a corpse lying in a Bathtub with oxygen tanks all around as well as flies circling above a decaying corpse probably of a young boy looting the corpse you can get an oxygen tank this is this is basically the game's fail safe in casee you glitched out and lost it or you know killed the kid before talking to his mother

like uh some people this body probably belongs to the elephant's fourth child the one that the mother basically rred as a God for providing them with clean air he's Been dead for a while though locked in a shed to rot the flowers spread around everywhere were probably bought here to fight the smell and it looks like the elephants only really came here to refill empty oxygen tanks it's really nice to know that in Poland they use dead children's rotting corpses as air compressors although they probably don't breathe that air you can't actually fill an oxygen

tank with just free flowing gas even if it comes from a decaying Corpse the pressure just won't allow you to suck enough air out to breathe that's why we need a functional compressor to fill and use ours the more likely theory is that the air tanks aren't actually used properly by the elephants as plugging in a tank with uncompressed air into a sealed gas mask would probably just cause you to choke and suffocate notice how that would only happen in a sealed gas mask most likely their equipment is actually compromised and Worn down by constant

use in the fire but the elephants believe that this works and there's no option to confront them about that but in reality there isn't actually anything protecting them from the forest's air anymore if anything they're just as vulnerable as us if not more so after being exposed to the aforementioned corpse I like how the more I go on about this plot point the less and less chance this video has of actually gaining any monetization at all Back at the mushroom Glade in Granny's house you could find a key called the key on a key ring

with the description a colorless key it feels soft to touch there's a drawing of three flowers etched on the key ring the flower etchings are actually something you might link to one of the houses in the swamp Village there's a house right behind the shrine which features a doormat with a flower pattern there's a metal door inside though preventing you From entering unless you have this key opening the metal door your character will comment about the inside Roots entwine the Cage's interior all the way up to the ceiling in the first room you can also

find a bed you can already notice a striking resemblance to mushroom Granny's Cottage the room layout is exactly the same the bed is in the same position as well if you weren't convinced yet though the next room contains the obvious giveaway a fallen Over rocking chair looking just like the one we found the mushroom granny in it's pretty much confirmed that this used to be her house but why did she move to the Glade instead and why is the house there such a close copy of this one aside from you know all the mushrooms there's

some more loot to find here though somewhat hidden if you remember the layout of the house from the Glade there was a stash in the place where the table is in the house and sure enough after you move the Table you can find and open the container thankfully this one isn't actually Cod locked now inside there's some decent loot like a lantern and a Shiny Stone but what's important are a bunch of paintings they're all dated with the oldest one being from 1972 and the latest 1979 it looks like granny used to be an avid

painter in the past looking through the paintings most of them are just paintings of flowers with nothing of note except for two one Painting called light from 1975 depicting what looks like a comet or a meteor and her last painting from 79 which looks like another painting of flowers but unfinished and uncolored alternatively it could be depicting the white mushrooms that we find growing everywhere but those don't grow nearly as high as the painting would suggest so I kind of doubt it that painting of a comet definitely stands out more being unrelated to any Flora

unlike all of her Other paintings another reason why this painting is so special is if you take the date from it 1975 and use it as a code you can actually open the container in the mushroom Glade house although despite that the only items you'll find inside are mushrooms which I mean to be fair is pretty fitting seeing as the house just looks like an entire mushroom fied version of the one in the village but this pretty much ties both locations together even more you know in case you Weren't sure about the connection yet but

unfortunately as of yet we're still not really sure what the painting is meant to represent next to the rocking chair there's also a shelf you can loose inside you can find a photo of a family depicting an older woman probably the granny without the mushrooms alongside a younger woman and a child there's also a date in the corner 1970 this photo is very very important as you you can show it to pretty much all the characters Connected in the village first off you can show it to the granny my child she went into the woods

and never came back I look for her but my legs don't work how they used to you can also show this photo to the [ __ ] the [ __ ] pulls the photo closer to his face poor woman he points to the old woman in the photograph she was left alone when her daughter lost it entirely and ran off into the woods with her kids the old lady was devastated oh to know what Became of her the lads would say that even with her legs not working properly she crawled into the woods looking for

her daughter that was around the time when our Fields were getting flooded even a healthy strong lad would have a hell of a task getting through all the water not to mention an old woman who could barely move this is really weird the granny just said that she would have gone after her daughter if she could implying that in the end she decided Against it but the [ __ ] is talking about it like it's already happened there's no way she could have survived a trip like this and yet we find her very very far

away from the village in a weird squishy house again we're one step closer to understanding everything but nothing is actually concrete yet there's one more person you can show this photo to the elephant mother that was a long time ago a long long time ago the woman silently hands me back the photo this Confirms that she was in fact the young woman in the picture going after the dialogue as well as previous gossip we can actually build a pretty decent history of this family going back to what the [ __ ] said when shown the

photo of the three boys we know the entire family was made out of the parents seven kids and we also now know of the grandmother at some point though after the plague enveloped pretty much the entire region The Village starts to Run out of food and this is when the starvation Begins the mother takes the four youngest kids and runs away to live in the swamp Cottage isolating herself from the world as much as possible going so far as to even wear a gas mask and even set up huge bar barricades just to separate her

children from the dangers of the forest the grandmother tries to follow her but whatever happens causes her to show up in the mushroom Glade as a mushroom human hybrid missing some of Her latest Memories the father and the remaining children go on to live in the house where we see the photo of the three boys after a while the father starts to believe that his family had been written off to die by the village and the rations they were getting just weren't enough for them to survive on as they were so low that even the

kids were getting sick he alongside a few others tried to steal the food by breaking into The Village's basement because of this The three boys are thrown out of the village like the [ __ ] mentions and they're said to be roaming the woods with the savages the father dies either killed by the villagers for stealing precious food or starving to death alongside the rest of the village after which all their voices are incorporated into the Talking Tree give us your lighter [ __ ] off man with a [ __ ] now being the only

Survivor so the three children that were thrown out of the Village ended up roaming with the Savages this is actually something the elephant mother said said in previous dialogue they're just like these lunatics who roam around the woods searching for God knows what there used to be more of them guess most of them starve to death I remember when they appeared not far from here must have been around 2 years ago around 2 dozen of them they were led by these three weirdos dressed in old rags they set up Camp in the marsh there between

the trees they watched our house stare right into my windows The Oddities I thought they wanted to kill kidnpped my children or harm them in some way or harm them in some way but when the night fell I lost sight of them there was no one there in the morning the three weirdos dressed in rags are most definitely her lost kids who tried to visit their mother she doesn't recognize them here or in the photo of the three boys but this is Probably either her repressing her memory or slowly going insane by being exposed to

the forest we've seen evidence of her Madness in the religious beliefs in the gas masks and the air provided by her dead child and although have no way to actually tell exactly when it started even her initial departure from the village could have been caused by her slowly going insane or just desperate now it's pretty obvious what I'm going to say here the Three boys that left the village are the same three people that trade with you at the beginning of every single day it's a little bit on the nose but now we do have

definitive confirmation of it the three even have the characteristic look of branches and ad hoc clothes we're used to seeing from the Savages although these guys are a little bit more dignified you know they're not covering themselves in mud naked yet there's even some more proof coming from the gossip Dialogue courtesy of the [ __ ] no one lives around here anymore everyone is dead only sometimes the man lowers his voice sometimes I hear footsteps they wake me up at night the sound of bare feet against the floor Bells sort of come out of nowhere

they move towards the trees then come back they pass me and fall silent they're like a nightmare a bloody nightmare be feet are a pretty big characteristic of the Savages meanwhile The bell sounds are most likely referring to the Bell that one of the three carries around their neck whenever they're nearby you can actually hear this Bell as part of the ambience there's the question of why they could be visiting the village but I think I've got a pretty reasonable explanation for it remember how I said that the Thief their father is part of the

chorus of the Talking Tree I'm a thief I'm not a grave robber even the [ __ ] outright says it I can still hear the cries of that Thief all the bloody time well I think it's not too much of a stretch to say that the three came here to see him even in this form it at least still reminds them of the father who tried so hard to keep them alive again the game is dropping so many hints about the true intentions of the forest and what happened to the people here but we still

don't quite yet have a complete Picture but I do like how if you take the time the game actually really does flesh out all the characters you come across so now we have the oxygen canisters unfortunately we can't just you know open them up and leave them to be filled with oxygen it needs to be compressed air so although we have one piece of the puzzle we still need to fix the air compressor so all we can do now is go back to The Hideout tuck ourselves in survive another night and then go out Exploring

or at least some of you can because Darkwood isn't yet done polishing you for pretty much every every single Choice you've made after a few days in the swamp even if you haven't been progressing the main quest coming back to your hideout you can find a note inside your workbench but even worse half of your inventory would not be missing where's half my [ __ ] gun you've just been robbed it's funny how many times throughout the game we've Broken into abandoned houses or sometimes houses with people even inside and just robed them blind but

now we've been robbed by none another than the wolf man you've tricked me meat you've ignored my request and this action has its price if you want to recover your things come to the Old Sawmill it can be found in the edge of the swamp don't think you can do whatever the [ __ ] you like it's my [ __ ] Forest once again you're being punished for trying to take The moral path of not helping the homicidal fur intent on spreading misery to pretty much every single person in the forest this encounter won't happen

if you sided with him in chapter 1 which is the easier thing to do or if you killed him but most players playing this for the first time probably won't do that because time and time again it's been proven that people will always choose the good path in video games unless they're you know purposely trying To do like a renegade or a negative Karma run and also most players probably wouldn't have predicted that he would have came back anyway that is unless you cheated and read the wiki which is an act so despicable I can't

stand for it the wolf man will take a lot of your items this can be crafting materials ammo even entire weapons and it really can shake the game up because if you're prepared now in the late game this could almost put you back to square one now Fortunately he only takes items from your workbench so anything you've kept on your person or you know left around the base maybe not in the workbench will be left intact but if you do want to get anything back you've left in the workbench you're going to have to go

to The Sawmill which he has graciously left you an invitation for The Sawmill itself is a huge structure but it only has one entrance right next to the train tracks where carts would bring in wood into the Sawmill there's a couple of log piles here in case she still need boards or nails but walking inside the Sawmill you can see the old Machinery now covered in puls roots in the corner is a metal door leading further inside In playthroughs where The Wolf Man doesn't show up for you in the swamp there's pretty much nothing here

to see if you get his invitation though the door is open and you can go inside the next room looks like a connector between the entrance And the next Hall and there's a corpse here you can examine a human corpse looks stuffed someone has hung a wooden board from its neck it reads assistant the corpse has no items on it but it has a huge inventory which will be pretty important soon going through the hall the lights will on as you enter the ambience here has a heavy breathing in the background possibly even the wheezing

of The Wolf Man hidden somewhere inside there's also a couple Of speakers hooked up to both sides of the room through one of which a voice starts talking to you meet you're lack of respect is appalling ignoring my request has a price know my generosity you stray I will let you take back everything you've taken without permission all you need to do is give me some quality entertainment before that happens however you'll need to hand all your belongings to my assistant I don't want you to spoil the fun with your Cheap tricks you'll now have

to go back to the body in the previous room and leave all of your weapons and gear fun fact though there actually used to be a glitch that would let you bypass this by dropping your items on the floor in the main room so if you left one completely pointless item on the corpse and then pick everything back up in the main room you'd actually be able to go through with this sequence making this fight pathetically easy unfortunately though While I was recording this glitch has actually been patched meaning you'll be forced to actually get

good at the game instead once you come back into the room after dropping off all your items The Wolf Man will talk to you some more excellent now pick up the gift I left for you the gift being a table leg which was the same weapon we used in the prologue a knife and two whole healing pills the deal is as follows you will now provide me with some quality Entertainment by fighting my brothers and in turn I will Entertain You by playing on this violin I found recently let's begin the speakers start relaying wolfman's

attempts at playing the violin and the first enemy start spawning in two huge dogs enemies that to be fair we've definitely got used to fighting by now even facing them with such little equipment really isn't too bad the main compromise you'll have to make is Getting closer to enemies because the table legs reach is much shorter than the shovel or fire axe we've been using by now I assume the Wolfman would have thrown more aggressive Wildlife at you like champers or human spiders but he probably can't tame them like he does the dogs after killing

the dogs the real fight begins The Wolf Man barges into the room screaming War me meat time to die he immediately begins firing at you this is the only time in the entire game That a firearm is actually Abed against you and you do not want to stand in that bullet spray fortunately the wolf man has no concept of ammo conservation so if you step behind one of the pillars he'll keep trying to war bang you like it's a match in CS go once he runs out of his magazine he'll drop his gun and instead

attack you by lunging at you with his claws his greatest tool against you is the pure Fear Factor of having this gigantic creature leaping at you While you're still trying to charge up and attack the Wolfman works like a giant dog but has a much shorter delay between attacks on top of that as well the lights will constantly flicker so you can't really see him winding up a lunge he can also follow up with a double punch which can be deadly as it can pretty much stun Lucky from attacking for a good while despite all

of this The Wolf Man still can't compare to the strength of a Polish Table leg This fight overall is actually pretty fair but because of the Frantic atmosphere this game creates it's very easy to panic and get greedy with hits who's a good boy who's a good boy I think that's one of the scariest things about this fight because if you [ __ ] up if you die that's it lot like there's no saves coming there's no way to go back instead you'll die and if you come back to the Sawmill you'll find a note

from The Wolf Man basically telling You that he's just going to keep all the items that he stole from you [ __ ] meat but don't worry he at least left you with a gift there's a key attached to the note which you can use to open a side room inside there's a gramophone on the ground as well as a violin both items that used to belong to the musician to be fair to even get the Wolfman to follow you here he most likely followed the musician's path and in that case he's probably dead anyway

So at least The Wolf Man didn't kill him probably just robbed his corpse now the gift I mentioned the protagonist will be reluctant to open it but once you do it's a piece of [ __ ] Wolfman basically shat in a box and gave it to you but if you're good at video games you might actually knock the wolf man down he'll be unable to move now as you can even take his assault rifle but he's still alive so you'll have to finish him off but even when he's about to die he'll Still keep up

that tough guy facade you hit like a woman after which he promptly dies you can loot his corpse to get the saw meal key as well as the wedding ring although this one isn't real it's a colorless [Music] imitation now if you can remember all the way back in chapter one that's where you can find the real rings one in the Hunter's cabin and one in the pretty lady's room so there is a law theory That the wolf man and the pretty lady were actually related hence the reason why he wants to eat her you

can now enter the back room of The Sawmill this is where the wolf man has been living as evidenced by a campfire stove and bloodied elk carcass the musicians violin and gramophone are also present here you can find all your stolen items in a crate in the corner of the room just make sure that you have enough space to take them all and the weapons You left before the fight apart from that there's nothing more for you in the Sawmill so you can head back to your hideout one good thing about being robbed by The

Wolf Man is if you manage to win The Sawmill fight you can actually get his assault rifle a gun that you pretty much couldn't obtain legitimately until now you might at first find it a little bit underwhelming it's locked in a three round Burst with every burst summing up to about half the damage of a shotgun shot the medium Caliber Magazines hold around 20 bullets so just under seven full bursts in fire $200 Custom Tool cartridges the magazines themselves are much more rare as you actually can't buy these from any traders in the game so

trying to laser High Health enemies with it pretty much comes down to you wasting an incredibly precious resource where the gun excels at though is crowd Control it's especially good against banshees as each bullet in the burst can take out a different banshe baby making it very ammo efficient for me though it'll never replace the shotgun no [ __ ] off but it's still a really good gun to keep in mind if you've got some spare medium mags I've even CP people say it functions as a direct upgrade to the pistol fulfilling the same role

the pistol does just with higher damage and more rate of fire now after killing the Wolfman you can take all of your items back but we're still left with the original objective to get the compressor thankfully from the note we found we know that there's a clue lying for us in the junkyard you'll even have the cage near the junkyard marked on your map both of these locations are right next to each other so you just need to explore around the cottage and find the junkyard although the cage itself is definitely worth exploring the note

you Found before mentions someone could be living here and technically it was right approaching the house through a corridor made out of roots you'll first see things that look like hybrids of snails and people they'll speak to you in a distorted chorus trying to finish each other's sentences but failing and repeating over each others instead who are you I'm here here me with those the fenil got me moving like a Clation figure when you get to the cottage itself you'll see a gigantic snail resting on top of its roof as you approach it'll retract into

its shell there's also an organic cord leading from the building that you can examine some kind of organic cords they're slowly pulsating they are surprisingly hard and durable you can't enter the cage itself because the snail's blocking it but you can actually talk to the snail by breaking down a vulnerable part On its shell and going inside who are you the snail speech is extremely slow slow and slurry he moves his jaw with great effort it looks like it's about to fall off his eyes sag from their sockets they dangle from side to side trying

to keep me in their sight why are you disturbing my for wor his right eye raises with great effort and Wobbles e your face what happened to you the snail's jaw Falls so low it almost detaches itself from the rest of the Body you scared me you barely was unble a human you should call me yourself suddenly I feel a subtle shiver beneath my feet the snail's body livens up Qui he that do you hear that voice the snail tucks his head inside his shell she calls to me can you hear it the snail Falls

silent for a longer moment the inside of the shell is almost completely silent she's calling me and I'm here trapped Mound the snails body suddenly leans forward the wooden construction of The cottage creaks under his huge bulk I barely keep my balance come be loose please I need to get out of here if you release me I will leave come back tomorrow and I won't be here anymore you can live in my home you like it you just need to cut me L us the snail Falls silent his enormous head slowly drops to the Shell

giant gleaming drops of mucus appear on his slimy skin you need still understand my predicament I'm not able to do anything by myself my legs are Numb I'm lying here but I can't feel my arms at all I do it lying in the sun gives me the strangest pleasure but it's time for me to go I have to like the other creatures outside the cottage the snail is more of a human snail hybrid similar to how the mushroom granny looked like a hybrid of a person and mushrooms his entire body looks like a snail but

he can talk normally thanks to a human skull and jaw embedded in its face it makes a man Hideous for some reason he still complains about the protagonist being barely human despite itself having almost no human features he even repeats this in some of his gossip dialogue you're so ugly I feel like P you barely assemble as human being if anything this reminded me of s you'd find various robots throughout the game who were convinced that they were human and you were the weird one now this huge snail is probably what the other snails were

Referring to when they said to cut him loose much like the doctor the snail can also hear distant calling probably again from the forest in fact if you think about it there is a voice calling to you as well in the swamp hideout night event even the radio keeps telling you to come back to us even all the way back in chapter 1 when interacting with the bunker door you could hear a voice saying come to me These could just be hallucinations but then why does everyone hear the same things the snail expands on this

more when you show him the photo of the road home everyone is going there it's the road home after all you might remember the cripples saying that a lot of people used to travel to the road where the talking tree grows the snail seems to confirm this although it's unclear why the voice would be calling him to the road which which supposedly leads out of The forest you can talk to him a bit more about his life story yesterday a few days ago a year I woke up in front of the house I thought I

was dreaming I took a step and I fell down I pass straight on the roof how did this happen can considering that snails can't physically take a step and that he was revolted by the protagonist's barely human appearance e it seems that the snail thinks itself to be human he could Just be a human mutated from the infection unknowingly fused with a snail or maybe just another one of the forest's Abominations that fortunately for you ended up being less violent this is even further shown by more of his gossip dialogue a beautiful clearing now everything's

C blood in water and I've lost my gum boooks do you have any gum boots on you obviously snails can't wear gum boots Due to a severe leg deficiency you know you can also show him your rubber boots if you manage to make it through the great lake g two teeth pop out of the snail's disfigured Open Jaw together with a thick goo flow down near my feet no they will be perfect for me he doesn't take them from you or anything he's just a gum boot connoisseur coming back to the actual Game all the

snail wants is to be free just do that and overnight he will be on his way and he'll never bother you again although at this point you've done enough errands so why not sit back relax and go catch some fish instead there's a path splitting off from this one leading to the cottage where you'll find a small pond going in it you can grab some fish for yourself finally a game with better fishing mechanics than Far Cry 5 Far Cry 5 was Very good for nailing the realism Jesus Christ I'm [ __ ] fishing but

if you actually want to make progress with the snail instead of immediately going out to find out how you can free him you can examine his belly the roof beneath the shell is completely destroyed the snail shell is also badly damaged maybe I'd be able to get inside the cottage through the skin on his belly it seems quite frail this is yet another quest with multiple Outcomes the selfish option would be to just cut through the snail it's a creation of the forest anyway it's not really human if the snail was once human he's obviously

Beyond saving this option is also a lot quicker since you don't actually have to find out how to free him and also wasting an entire night for the snail to move his fat ass off the roof move move although choosing this you'll be reminded by just how much of An [ __ ] you are by doing this to the snail leave me I won't fit inside I need to keep trying what why are you doing this the hole is still too small the entire shell even shakes with every strike just to remind you this is

the mean person choice you are a bad person for doing this although doing this won't lead you to one of the most useful pieces of loot in the area if you instead decide to help the snail you can follow that organic cord you could Examine earlier eventually you'll find a destroyed shed sitting behind the house there's a small puzzle here to access a blocked off area you basically have to go back to the snail hover your mouse over him until you find that he's been holding out a vaguely human hand if you interact with this

you can take the key and open the shed door drag the Wardrobe away and that's it although you might think to check the Wardrobe first inside is a note about the junkyard it shows You a map of the entire place which is invaluable but I'll explain why in a bit there's also a small drawing of a guy in a hazmat suit on the side possibly one of The Outsiders that or it's an among us to free the snail the humane way all you need to do is complete the puzzle and progress to the area behind

the shed it looks like a clearing of beautiful white grass with a weird cocoon-like growth in the middle you can break it using any weapon thus freeing the snail Talking to him he'll thank you and give you his house I feel free again when you return here tomorrow I won't be here anymore I will follow her voice you will be able to live here I promise he's now going to follow that voice which again if we looked at where the doctor ended up he's probably going to end up killing himself or going completely insane and

killing multiple people then himself before even arriving at the cottage you'll see the snail People along the path look like they've been crushed probably by the snail trying to fit its body through the small Corridor I wish that was me going inside to evaluate your new property you'll first notice there's a small flickering light in the Next Room over before you can enter it though there's a note you can pick up we have nothing to eat since the flood I've caught some snails and frogs better this than nothing also out of the cross words that

I found last Year at the junkyard the only thing that's left to do is keep writing this journal and listening to this strange radio in 2 days I'll visit the junkyard again maybe I'll find a tape recorder or something that'll let me record this weird signal I feel like there's some meaning hidden behind it I'm hungry I'm eating grass and whatever I can find in the water I've seen some strange men between the trees they're non locals they do not hide they were dressed in Strange clothes I was too far to take a better look

besides I'm alone and there were at least three of them maybe I'm delusional or maybe these old ruins aren't empty I found a blank tape and a broken tape recorder maybe I can fix it and do something with it I've also found some other useful things I've written them all down and left them for later I don't have the strength to wear them all on my back is it possible that the radio tower Emits this strange signal it's been a couple of years since it's turned over but no other signal reaches this place from outside

must be that Tower I need to take a break from this radio I I hear this voice everywhere it's strangely familiar can't get it out of my head there's another mention of that radio tower here looks like whoever lived here before it might have even been the snail himself before his mutation whoever it was was also hearing the voice and Seemed to think it was connected to the radio throughout the game we've seen the radio be used by whatever's behind the plague telling us to come to it and even showing up in the prologue as

the man with the radio dial for eyes there's a reference to that thing that keeps showing up in my YouTube shorts tab but I don't think I want to go there this could also mean that the radio tower has direct correlation to whatever is infecting the entire region Either that or it's just normal Polish radio there's also a mention of the three but that's really nothing out of the ordinary they seem to be running the Savages in this region so it's only natural that they' show up basically everywhere this snow also points out why all

the creatures around the cottage were hybrids of snails it seems like whoever lived here was suffering from Hunger so badly that they had to turn to eating snails and grass to survive it's Possible that the forest may have got inspired by it so to speak just like how it got inspired by the bodies of the Savages left in their marked circles next to the note is a crate that you can Loop for some Fabrics as well as a map marking the radio tower on your map in case you didn't get it in the elephant shed

it could be useful to visit the radio tower now but honestly we're so so close to getting out it's really not worth delaying anymore going into the Side room you'll realize the light you were seeing when you entered is actually an old radio connected to Roots a lot of Rusty radio equipment is strewn on the floor old recorders and destroyed tapes everything is covered in goo dripping from The Leaky ceiling there's another mention of that goo again you can actually see what it looks like outside on the cottage's roof although that might have been the

slime coming from the snail like the notes said the Previous inhabitant of the cottage was obsessed with the radio and what it said to him looking for the source of the voice drove him insane as in the end he never managed to do it you can just find him dead B in the corner of the room overgrown with roots and Vines just like the radio a dry corpse overgrown with small Roots as you turn to leave you once again start having visions and the radio starts speaking to you you are you her it's pretty much

Unintelligible but it sounds like someone asking either are you her or are you here leaving the cottage all that's left for you to do is to explore the junkyard as I said before it should be somewhere nearby so it really shouldn't take too long to find it that map you found back in the cottage will genuinely come in clutch though the junkyard itself is pretty large it's composed of well you know piles of junk some of this junk you can actually dig up for loose And this sounds great except digging a pile takes a fat

30% durability off your shovel and only one of these piles actually has the compressor parts that you need if you were to dig up all the piles of junk you'd probably waste at least a few days and a bunch of wooden scrap just to keep your shovel in maintenance thankfully to mitigate this a little bit there's actually a free shovel lying next to one of the piles apart from being a huge time sync it Really does put you at a disadvantage because you're basically using what probably is going to be your main melee weapon to

complete a quest leaving you open to the elements while you run back to base to go and repair it that is unless you want to waste a large chunk of ammo now the note you found actually contains the entire map of the junkyard with each pile marked with a letter and cataloged telling you what's inside so all you need to do is find the pile Marked as containing an old compressor and you set on top of that if you need any specific resources then know is a really good reference point so you can find pretty

much anything you need in the junkyard usually when you arrive here the place is going to be overrun with enemies forcing you to either waste a ton of ammo or beat them to death one by one especially if they're camping one of the junk piles that you want to dig up I say usually because depending on Your previous choices you can actually find an old character here you might remember the elephant mother talking about a loud crash she heard coming from the junkyard a while back once you reach the middle you'll finally realize what it

was and the music changes to a much sadder [Music] tone it's a crashed rocket with a steaming corpse inside of it this is p Trek or at least you know what's left of Him unsurprisingly his rocket never made it to space instead crashing into the junkyard and scaring all the enemies away this only happens if you agree to help him with the project and didn't agree to the wolfman's little trolling of riging a pipe bomb in one of the components if you did you won't find the rocket or patrix corpse anywhere as both have been

incinerated long before getting to the swamp it's kind of impressive that this little rocket even Made it off the ground to be honest so much so that it's something full Out New Vegas would shamelessly steal four years prior so what was the main inspiration behind Petri and his quest line um there's this song uh called P by this band called shanka which is a Polish band as you might have [Music] guess the song is like this monologue of this kid who lives in a junkyard and he's building a rocket and he's like Obsessed with space

and stuff and it's really trippy and it's pretty much we just took the song and placed it in in the game so uh yeah that's it inspiration yeah it's really song you can Loop both the wreckage and petrix corpse although the corpse only has some wire on him oh it could imply that he was trying to fix whatever was wrong with the rocket in his last moments but just couldn't cut it the wreckage however is a gold Mine of useful loot there's a welder pliers weapon parts even a long barrel there's also a big stack

of scrap you can use to repair items or set up bear traps back at The Hideout despite the junkyard being a gigantic location that's about everything there is to find but now after all that you finally have the compressor parts with the compressor finally finally fixed we can fill up some fresh oxygen tanks and use it to access areas in the game we never could Before so again it's it's basically like Doom you just get a key card to get another key card to get another key card but this really isn't the time to explore

you have one last thing you need to do to escape this horrible Place arriving back at the Village you can now enter the cellar and once you enter the water tunnel you're thrown into another dream sequence [Music] you'll wake up on the floor of the Basement it looks pretty well kept all the containers are locked shut and not even flooded too badly you can even examine a giant Barrel in the corner a huge Rusty Barrel judging by the smell it still contains a lot of good gasoline inside there's nothing more you can interact with the

only thing left to do is to move on through the door on the opposite side except once you cross the corridor Beyond it you end up in a room that Looks exactly the same you can't go back either as the door locks itself behind you you can only keep going deeper as you do the room will become more and more decrepit firstly you'll see a cow carcass lying on the floor possibly left there as part of The Village's food stores suddenly the light goes out and the door in the Next Room starts being broken down

by someone on the other side eventually they'll talk to you open but there's no one on the Other side you can keep moving through the next room and once you enter all the crates start opening by themselves in other words it's a crate jump scare arriving in the Next Room you'll see all the containers are now empty the cow carcass looks decayed and shriveled and there's now an opening in one of the walls of the room it looks like someone is trying to dig a tunnel although for Now there's barely a crack in the wall

the ambience also changes now you can hear banging sounds in the background like metal striking metal there's also an axe on the floor for you to pick up the Next Room shows more progress on the Dig most of the floor is now covered in dirt and the tunnel is somewhat longer with a backpack holding a torch laying at its entrance but it's still a dead End moving forward you won't actually see another copy of the room instead there's a staircase probably leading outside although it's blocked by a barricade made out of crates and wood a

makeshift barricade blocking the entrance to the basement someone or something is trying to break through from the other side hitting it once with the axe will cause a villager to spawn behind you and Shout at you what the hell do you think you're doing you'll Kill us all get back to digging once the Villager screams at you you can do what he says and go back to the tunnel entering it now you'll see the tunnel has extended significantly moving through it you'll start to see infected bodies only a couple at a time at first but

as you progress the entire room is covered with them the corridor is seemingly never ending so you might think to turn back and try different exit however once you turn around you'll Realize that the only thing behind you is a dead end trying to progress now you'll only find a wall at this point the floor Gore spawns and engulfs your screen until you can't see anymore waking you up from the dream alternatively you could have just attacked the barricade again causing him to scream and then transform into a black Chomper either killing it or dying

ends the dream with neither seemingly having any effect on the real world once You wake up you're in the real basement in contrast to the dream version this one is completely flooded with the neatly carved out corridors being replaced by winding tunnels overgrown with ro Roots there's a lot of dead ends as well as glares sprinkled around showing how hostile this area really is walking into the main room you'll see a cow carcass is now completely decayed leaving only a skeleton all the crates are still open but now they're covered In Roots you can search

them but despite their gigantic inventory they're all completely empty there's also a backpack on the ground with a single torch inside you can exit the room just like in the dream and arrive at the barricaded staircase although you can't actually break this barricade unlock the dream its layout suggests that this is actually the second staircase we could find back up top you can also enter a small tunnel leading off from the Corridor but there's not much to find a dead end carved out by the roots but there's also another tunnel the one that the villagers

locked in the basement try to dig themselves to get out this tunnel looks different it was carved out by people sloppily and hastily it's a miracle it still hasn't collapsed yet the further part of the tunnel is blocked by Rubble looking through a crack I can see giant pulsating roots maybe I can find a way to destroy them The corridor isn't wide enough to pass through but you can see the Beating Heart of the Talking Tree in the next chamber these are the trees Roots growing out the same tunnel we've seen the thieves dig that

was later filled with corpses it seems the Talking Tree consumed them while growing which is probably why it grew faster than the rest of the forest these corpses are also probably the ones we see inside the tree talking and arguing with each other You need to ignite The Roots but because the tunnel's blocked you can't just throw a match in it's not going to be as easy as that Fallout 3 Quest hello Grandma I need I need to sell your tevision looking around for something to help you'll stumble upon the fuel Barrel that was also

present in the dream interacting with it now instead puts you into a dialogue box the Barrel's valve is Rusty but it seems to be working Judging by the smell there's gasoline inside you're then given the option to open the valve I grabbed the valve and tried to turn it with all my strength it suddenly breaks gasoline slowly leaks out of the barrel it slowly flows down the tunnel you can see a small stream of gasoline leading down the tunnel after doing so the protagonist will comment the whole tunnel is flooded with gasoline I must be

careful there's only one thing left To do now you can use the torch you found and ignite the gasoline Trail it works amazingly well in fact the entire tree starts burning and you can hear its screams coming from above the fire is so intense that your entire vision is clouded by smoke and Blaze if anything you should probably get out the basement before you suffocate coming out on the surface you can see the overground part of the tree is completely a light and the screams Are even louder almost drowning out the crackling of flames unfortunately

even though we've done all we can we still can't go through yet the huge tree will not yield to the Flames so easily it tries to smother the fire with its roots it should all be over tomorrow there's even a note made about it in the journal I set the roots in the cellar on fire the fire consumed the Talking Tree in its entirety even now I can still hear it screaming seems Like the [ __ ] was right the tree is enormous and it will probably continue burning throughout the night I'll return here tomorrow

walking by the [ __ ] he'll call out to you come here now come although he doesn't have anything to say but rather watch the tree burn in Silence the [ __ ] blind eyes stare hypnotized at the huge flame consuming the tree it's as if the old man could see everything clearly now the orange fire illuminates his pale motionless Face so at this point it's probably best to go back to your hideout load up on everything you've got and get ready to leave because unlike chapter 1 to chapter 2 this will definitely probably definitely

be your final Journey so you need to stock up for it and only take the essentials starting the night you won't see any of the usual enemies you might think you got lucky that the forest is letting you off easy you know after all the Challenges and all the hardships you've gone through until at some point during the night the radio once again turns on at first it's just static but soon it starts speaking to you [Music] uh uh uh [Laughter] what [Applause] why why did you do It after the last line it breaks down

completely and sets itself on fire the blaze slowly grows consuming the floor around the radio and eventually the entire room but it doesn't spread any further than that instead one by one you start getting assaulted by burning creatures looking vague L like people but sometimes showing the split Chomper more instead of a head they're basically just a standard zombie and they're easy to deal with as basically any firearm or Melee ones shots them but as the night goes on their Onslaught ramps up eventually there's so many of them that you can't even reload in time

to defend yourself you'll have to try to evade them instead which is made even harder by the crowd coming at you from every direction and body blocking you just before you get completely overwhelmed you start to hear that refreshing song Q meaning Dawn is coming you survived just barely and now it's Time to get out you wake up to see that even though you survived the three aren't there to greet you this time obviously they weren't too keen on you burning down the tree and probably don't want to do business with you anymore going through

the village you'll see that the [ __ ] is gone and you get a new journal entry it worked only Ashes Remain of the tree I feel I'm approaching the end of my journey is it Possible where the tree Once stood is now a mess of burnt wood and roots with a huge smoke cloud hanging above you in the air the tree didn't quite turn to ashes but rather collapsed it's charred corpse leaving you a path a path finally leading outside the swamp once you step through the music changes and you reach a clearing there's

some buildings off to the side and even a well but there's nothing interesting to find here it's a couple of old houses just like the ruins Before there's a rock path in the middle of the clearing following it you'll eventually find a huge asphalt road a colorless goo seeps from the cracks of the asphalt as expected the forest has unfortunately consumed this road there's Roots sticking out of the asphalt but hopefully the way is still open following the road you'll see a backpack on the side as well as a road sign the backpack actually has

some torches inside but examining the sign your Protagonist will read the writing out the crossed out sign reads Darkwood oh oh oh my God they they said they said the name of the game they said the name of the game but also on top of that that means the entire region of the game is called Darkwood now I gave the devs a pass for their naming conventions before but this game is called Darkwood because it takes place in Darkwood I thought because the atmosphere was pretty bleak and dark and the plot has Heavy focus on

the trees the wood or because you know the game literally occurs 90% inside a dark Forest but apparently NOP the entire forest was just called Darkwood more on the name there is actually a real life Village in Poland called chanales which roughly translates into Darkwood so apparently there's a village called chanelas which translates into Darkwood um it's a coincidence we didn't know about the village before we started to make our Our game the name just kind of came up and we thought it was cool we needed a name cuz we made need a game Jump

game called Kevin Cosner Tatanka hunting Simulator 2013 you play as Kevin Cosner and you jump from Tatanka to Tatanka which bis bison yeah some game press took it they made some articles about it and we were already developing Darkwood and we thought that we have to have a name so they can also like mention about our new game and our studio so we choose Darkwood and acid with Studio at least since the sign is crossed out that means we're actually leaving Darkwood if you can move past the Whiplash you get from the in-game turtle drop

you'll see a gray body on the asphalt it looks like it's stuck in place similar to the villagers you could find back in the Glade but this time you can't even interact with it further ahead you'll see a lone survivor this is in fact the [ __ ] using the opening The tree being burnt down made to try and Escape himself but you have no option to help him just to progress further so yeah uh good luck hope it goes well for you moving further up we'll have the protagonist confirm what I'm sure you've been

thinking ever since we stepped foot on this road the road home there's more Frozen figures As you move forward regular people but also Savages there's so many that they actually crowd the road blocking it up And making it hard to pass through you walk until you see a truck in the middle of the asphalt and behind it a wall of trees the road is blocked after all thankfully though there is a side path there's even a road sign that you can examine 25 km to the nearest town going down the path you once again enter

a Thicket of trees although contrary to every time you've done this before this time it doesn't feel Sinister this time it feels like progress reaching the end Of the path you enter the epilog you're still in the forest but something has changed the dark oppressive Ambience the thunderstorms the violent creatures they've all disappeared and slowly very very slowly but surely the Forest is changing this is it eventually the trees become more and more sparse up until you find yourself looking at a regular electrical tower out in the open you're actually outside the woods and when

there's power There's people you can follow the electrical lines to find a town not a couple of ruined Cottages barely held together a real town made out of the ppr's finest concrete now because it is Poland there's that classic Soviet grayscale color range on pretty much every thing which in most games would be oppressive and Bleak but here it's surprisingly comforting compared to the sickly greens and Browns of the swamp there's a woman Feeding the birds on a bench and as you approach her the birds fly away and they're gone who's going to eat the

bread now there's even a small playground with a Sandbox and a carousel as well as a chalky outline used for Hopscotch despite barely anyone being around the place is still a stark contrast to the woods of the game it feels lived in like there were real people going about their day here in front of the huge apartment building There's a woman sitting on the bench my first floor neighbor and finally for the first time in the game your character actually speaks out loud good day good day to you now the normal seat in this dialogue

is astounding it seems like a normal exchange that you get in the opening of like a Bethesda game but the fact that we've spent like 10 to 20 hours inside the forest hunting surviving trading and then just to have this completely normal Exchange not with you know a furry or an insane man that wants to go to space just someone completely normal living in an apartment block it feels refreshing but also incredibly strange entering the building it really looks like a standard run-ofthe-mill Soviet block of flats upon entering your character will say this is my

staircase there's also a bike in the corner with the word ass written in Polish next to it because of course it does you can even examine it it's Been here since I can remember weird that no one ever tried to steal it there's an elevator but unsurprisingly it's out of order you can also go into one of the corridors to see a man on the ground probably passed out from one too many polish special 95% Spirits boss got you spear change the inclusion of the standard issue polish blackout drunkman really makes you feel like your

home here going upstairs you'll see a woman cleaning the floor pleased to see you Mister haven't seen you in a while you can inspect the flowers next to her they're still green even though I never see anyone tending to them them maybe they feed on discarded cigarette butts going in the corridor above you'll see some more tasteful polish graffiti and eventually you'll arrive at a door you have the key for your own apartment home sweet home after all you've gone through all you need to do now is just go to your Bed and rest you

can leave your coat on the Wardrobe next to the door but the bedroom door is locked so you'll have to find the key first you can go into the kitchen where you can find a note on the table and made you some soup heat it up next to the table is the St and it's really weird seeing this stove because there's no jars of protective substance or any pipes coming out of it it really is just a regular oven this is pretty much the first time in the game where We've seen a stove used for

actual normal food and mushrooms by the way I forgot about the mushrooms the old trusty gas stove there's still some soup in the pot you can turn on the stove and cook yourself some nice traditional polish soup I grabbed the largest dish from the closet under the sink and pour myself a bowl it's not much but it's enough I don't remember the last time I've eaten a home dinner upon which you'll receive a nice plate of rosol Polished chicken soup now I would like to say that when I saw this on stream I did say

some pretty horrible things about it is that what Polish food looks like bro damn that's rough you can see the grease cuz the bubbles on it that's premium rosol traditional polish soup that is a pot noodle how how how are you saying that's a delicacy that that's a that's that's a [ __ ] pot noodle with hot water that's a that's it that is the traditional polish delicacy right there Oh my God it looks so good look at that premium cut it just it just looks like a sad pastor but since I traveled over to

warsa and interviewed the devs of Darkwood I actually ended up trying it and I would actually like to officially retract my awful hurtful lies and confirm that it actually is pretty Peak I do actually kind of get the meme now about British food having absolutely no flavor and being just horrible after Obtaining the delicacy you can interact with some more appliances around the apartment like the bathtub I'm barely standing on my feet I'll take a bath tomorrow or the washing machine the franer washing machine I spent 2 Days in the queue to get it you

can even wash your hands in the sink probably should have done that before eating the soup to get the bedroom key you'll have to visit your living room inside you'll meet the best part of the entire game and what Your whole journey has been building up for your dog Su you can even pet him look at that so wholesome just ignore the fact that he uses the exact same model of the dogs that you beat death in chapter 1 you can examine and search the TV that back in the apartment dream played Teddy drop ear

a black and white Reuben a real luxury unfortunately it's broken inside there's a flashlight and a battery but it's not like you'll need those anymore the Wardrobe next to the TV has some Fabrics probably just blankets to put over the sofas although if you try and sleep on one of them the protagonist will refuse I'm very tired I'd prefer to lie down in a regular bed one thing to actually note here all of your inventory is now inaccessible so if you take anything from the Wardrobe you won't actually be able to use it this is

probably to stop people just pulling out their AK and gunning everyone down in the corner wardrobe is the key you need To finally enter the bedroom if there's nothing more in your mind then finally laying down and taking your long awaited rest it's my bed the white crumpled sheets look as if I've just woken up at last I feel my sore legs buckling underneath me my body becoming heavy and overwhelmingly lethargic it was a grueling Journey days of human torment cool side note here the game will actually track how many nights you spent in the

Darkwood showing it as basically A stat screen on here you can choose to go to sleep there's no one to stop you anymore you're home you're safe after all the suffering you've endured and definitely inflicted onto others you can [Music] rest a sedating warmth washes over me a warmth of security and happiness the camera pans out and that's it you've done it some text scrolling by talking about the fates of characters You left behind but other than that it really is the end of the game you escaped the forest you didn't get the answers you

wanted but at least you're out you're finally free but it feels like there's still more to be found it feels unsatisfying leaving the forest like this so many questions are left unanswered I know the protagonist is tired but why would he go straight to bed instead of I don't know contacting the authorities or someone to Let them know what's happening surely there's something deeper still left inside the woods going back all the way to your first meeting with the doctor in Chapter 2 he mentions some more water tunnels that he couldn't get through but if

you fix the compressor and filled up an oxygen tank you'll be able to access these areas following his directions you'll eventually stumble upon a water tunnel leading to a wreckage of a helicopter it must have been surveying The forest and crashed here though it's unclear if that was the forests doing or rather just an accident there are Roots growing all over the wreckage but to be fair there basically in every single environment we've been in and because how rapid the growth is you really can't tell if this crash was recent or months ago after the

side you can find a dead body presumably belonging to a soldier he's holding an assault rifle and a magazine for it although at this point In the game you probably won't get too much use out of it you can enter the crushed helicopter through a crack in its hole inside you'll see some more corpses one holding some common Loot and the other holding a photo a photo of the doctor it's torn in half but you might remember another photo that was torn in half all the way back in the train wreck back then we assumed

that it was the doctor's family and now we're probably right Combining the two torn photos together it definitely does match this helicopter might have even been one sent by the military to exfill the doctor because he was basically the only person in the region with any medical expertise and even though he didn't know how to treat the plague he definitely would have heavily studied it much more than any of the Outsiders one possible theory is that because the corpse is holding the photo It could be that it was actually his family in the helicopter that

went looking for him or she passed a photo onto a rescue team so they could recognize the doctor and pull him out again it's nothing concrete but it's still something to consider also an important thing to mention is that the helicopter has the Air Force checkerboard on it meaning it belonged to the Polish Air Force it might seem like a pretty insignificant detail but This pretty much confirms that the outsider group we've been talking about all this time was actually headed by the Polish government instead of being for example a private Splinter Group there's nothing

more to be found in the wreckage but there's still one more water tunnel to explore either by following the doctor's general directions again or by finding a map all the way back in the swamp Village you'll be able to find the burn Cottage it Always spawns near the village so it's pretty easy to find entering the tunnel you'll emerge right in front of three crosses the burned Cottage is even marked by three crosses on your map showing just how characteristic they are to this location inspecting them will'll have the protagonist read the inscription an old

simple wooden Cross covered in inscriptions I can still decipher one of them may you never know hunger again Getting out of the water will also cause him to comment some skeletons have been pushed out by the water and are now lying in the mud now this was probably the Old Village graveyard but it's been so washed up it's hard to even tell anymore apart from a couple of gravestones the inscription on the crosses could even be hinting at the hunger that destroyed the entire Village or even created the Talking Tree exploring the cottage you can

find two Photos one depicting a group of people walking on a road in the middle of the village while the other shows a helicopter flying over a burning building the helicopter looks similar to the wreckage but there's nothing really confirming this link once you pick up the first photo a human spider will spawn in the entrance room and attack you according to the wiki it's supposed to talk to you but in my run I just fed it a bookshot as soon as I saw it look I'll be honest there's enough dialogue in this game I

I don't need one of the enemies to give me a law dump about his wife but if you're interested the dialogue that it's supposed to say goes like this you've us burn our killing it you can get the key to the burned cottage since the human spider was holding the key it could mean that it used to be the previous inhabit Of this Cottage as human spiders look like amalgamations of dead bodies it could be possible that the forest actually uses the corpses from the graveyard to create them this spider specifically shows semblance of remembering

its past life talking about how it was condemned to stay in the forest this seems to be a really common theme with characters remembering or failing to remember past parts of their life that or this is the forest [ __ ] With us for the 20th time [ __ ] it's also interesting that when speaking to the protagonist it talks like we were responsible for burning down on the house we've heard before of The Outsiders burning down houses to slow the spread of infection so it does make sense it could even mean that the helicopter

in one of the photos was responsible for setting the fire if so then it explains how The Outsiders could burn all these buildings around the Forest without exposing themselves to the infection inside apart from these two locations there are no more underwater tunnels to visit but there is one more important place to check out that we haven't properly had time to explore since we were trying so desperately to get out the radio tower there were a couple of mentions before like if you entered the snail's Cottage and found the notes the protagonist even mentioned it

might still be emitting Signals in the journal not only that but the old journal from the elephant shed also hinted at a possible second exit as an alternative to Burning Down The Talking Tree even though we already found a way out this might at least show us some more of the areas surrounding the swamp first approaching the radio tower you might see a slimy Trail on the ground it looks like this is where the snail was led to by The Voice maybe the radio tower really is The Source it Would explain whether the forest can

speak to us through the radio back at The Hideout as well as these strange Transmissions described in the note I mentioned earlier before even going into the radio tower if you've stayed around the swamp for a long time and I mean a really really long time which from my experience took around 20 in-game days to spawn in you can find a small campsite near the entrance you can search the campfire to find some paper Scraps and there's a burnt map the map is unreadable I can see some kind of drawing in the corner is it

a combine no not the halflife combine a combine harvester there's also another note a torn page from a journal your Journal boredom the news was pure garbage as always I was only waiting for these Sports digest we won 2 to one I watched plaster shove it ptic before going to sleep boring life on leave in one week I will walk into the woods it will be my Sixth time this time we're going in from the West the trip will be exceptional long we're taking one of the longest tunnels it almost reaches to the last Zone

supposedly it's starting to give under the pressure of the roots but the job is urgent so [ __ ] safety I have no idea how any of this is kept Under Wraps are those poor saps unaware of the fact that we're taking trips under their feet maybe they like it here so much they don't really care I wouldn't be Surprised this is the first page of your Journal that the doctor ripped out when he found you and interrogated you it's worth mentioning that this Camp only appears if you got an appointment with a doctor she

and then failed the dream sequence it's basically an alternate path that doctor takes if he travels alone instead of teaming up with you reading through the journal page is a stark contrast to the notes we've been making all throughout The game at this point the protagonist would give anything to go back to the ever so boring life on leave it also seems like this expedition was deemed risky all the way from the start with even the protagonist acknowledging that the bunker tunnel was starting to give under the pressure of the roots whatever Mission we had

though was deemed more important though if it obviously stopped mattering after we got stranded here interestingly this note also shows The Outsider perspective on the people stuck living inside Darkwood the protagonists seemed to think that the people stuck here liked living in the forest thinking that they were unaware of The Outsiders walking beneath them this comment might also be why the doctor hates the protagonist so much after all he's been stuck here for years trying to escape and this random Outsider he found is snaring on him and the rest of the villagers that are suffering

all while He's failed to save any of them also another real life reference that show that the protagonist watched plus the shvy pnik that's actually a real life children's show that was released back in the'80s by looking at a couple of videos I guess it's just the Polish version of morph I mean they're both weird Orange characters made out of Play-Doh so kind of makes sense so this is the doctor's Camp if you need any more confirmation you can Even find his old camera in a sack next to the campfire the same camera you could

find in the prologue although now it's covered in mud we know from the elephant mom's dialogue that even in this path he's also slowly going insane so he probably mid Savage transformation hence the mud although he still seems to have some purpose setting up camp near the radio tower it could be the forest calling him here just like it did to the snail or Maybe he's looking for a way out of the forest just like the old shed Journal mentioned he's still sane enough to set up a proper Camp too even making a primitive bed

unfortunately though you can't find him here although looking at the burnt map you might see a clue as to where he might be that combine drawing is actually a location you can find inside the forest normally when you find it you won't even know that there's anything interesting here you won't even Get it marked on your map it looks like a solid wall of trees with a combined Harvester stuck inside but if you survive a few more days the protagonist will make a remark when you get close I can notice some kind of Passage Under

The Roots entwining the wreckage funnily enough if you paid attention to the map earlier it literally had the passage marked on it going through you find yourself in a small space between the trees and kept completely in the dark Thanks to the leaves blocking all light there's a ravine separating the path you came through from the rest of the space looking at the other side you can see the campfire and a familiar figure don't cry I'll be there soon I'm close I'm so very close don't cry to make your way over to his side you'll

have to cross a fallen log normally if you managed to find your way here by complete accident this area would be Crawling with banshees fortunately right now it looks like only the doctor is present so you won't be swarmed yet approaching the camp your character will identify the person on the ground I think it's the doctor getting any closer will have him wake up from his stuper and immediately recognize you it's you he crawls away a bit go away you hear me just to grab a branch and set it on fire waving it in front

of him like he's scaring off an animal leave me Alone she needs me he's despised you even before he went insane but now he's trying to protect the voice so getting any closer will'll have him lunge at you despite his demented State he's actually a pretty strong opponent having much faster attacks than a normal stick Savage he's gone into an enraged frenzy trying to kill us by any means necessary just to help that voice once you manage to hit him enough times he'll fall down with a leg wound and missing an arm and He'll start

crawling away but just because he's down doesn't mean he's dead because trying to get close to him he'll still keep trying to whack you with his staff instead of finishing him off you can check out the glowing spot near the campfire looking like a Shiny Stone examining it will have the doctor scream at you leave that alone it's a figurine made out of mud with a Shiny Stone inserted into its head which you can remove here you're given the option to Leave the doctor to rot away on his own but at this point you might

as well put him out of his misery looting his corpse afterwards gives you maybe the biggest LW dump in the entire game in the form of six pages of his notes written on the same notepad that we could find as the doctor in the prologue they start around the time the train wreck sequence happens with the first note being a direct followup the [ __ ] showed me the exit finally Entrance behind the Wardrobe I was there in the cottage this is where the voice was coming from I wasn't mistaken how could I have missed

it the tunnel those Village idiots would happily feed me to the woods but I still couldn't close those [ __ ] doors in the tunnels they've suffered enough unfortunately this means I'll also have to look out for the rat he will come after me that bastard I'm sure of it I should have killed him but he was lying In the cart helpless funnily enough the doctor seems to be marking his entries with titles similarly to how the protagonist does in his journal showing that despite his hatred for us the doctor is still picking up on

our behaviors this note also confirms that the voice speaking to the doctor was always present in some form only getting stronger and fully turning the doctor insane once he crossed into the swamp it seems like it was guiding him here all Along probably because whatever is behind the voice has much stronger influence here on the bottom of the page is a mutated insect with a note next to it with the doctor's attempts at identifying it as Rip parachromis vulgaris a real life species of seed bug honestly I have no idea about the implications of this

I have a feeling that the devs just wanted to include a cool bug that they found the next note was made around the time the doctor First entered the swamp the swamp I was hoping this damn stinking hole would lead me to the exit unfortunately the routs have been broken through the tunnel walls and blocked the passage however I feel I'm getting more closer I can hear her more clearly the rats hide out I searched the cottage I found some weird devices connected to the oven locals don't use such equipment rats must have made a

hideout out of it I'm sure of it apart from the oven I've also Found a broken compressor looks like they are using oxygen tank when traversing the woods I need to leave this house as soon as possible he's following the same sequence of events we did when we first arrived here there's nothing really interesting in this note aside from The Mention Of The Voice getting more clear once the doctor ends up in the swamp and his interaction with the oven it's kind of funny seeing the doctor found the only reason we can Survive at night

just to call it weird and leave aside from that you can also see some camera film attached to the note probably coming from the zenic camera we found muddied in his radio tower camp in the next note he's already starting to sound more deranged once again emphasizing the voices in his head Whispers Whispers in the radio Whispers In My Head louder than usual I feel I'm close now I've seen him he's back to his place I took a photo of the [ __ ] Village I remember this place vaguely I hav been here in ages

everything is flooded and overgrown but I remember the shrine and the Cottages used to come here to treat people a tree in this Village must have grown no later than 5 years ago when the forest blocked me from this place he's even drawing symbols on the page similar to the one Savages would mark everywhere this one feels like it's supposed to supplement the meeting we had with him in the Village in the other path the devs obviously just making sure we don't miss out on delicious tasty scrumptious law after this note the other ones are

basically just insane ramblings I can hear you cry but I don't know where it's coming from tell me where to go don't cry I'm close please don't cry I'm close are you behind the trees the fact that the voice is crying seems to give more strength to the theory that the doctor is hearing his daughter's voice trying To comfort her by saying that he's close it would make sense as he's been obsessed with getting back to his family for a long time the voice taking on this form would make it easier to manipulate him and

drive him insane the notes after this one probably happen around the time we would see his last transformation where the doctor becomes a full-blown Savage with sticks and mud covering most of the pages an old combine a cm is it here it's here I don't know the trees Are singing or maybe it's a cry is it coming from under the ground I think it's here this cry I know this cry he seems to think the voice is coming from here but apart from the Banshees there's nothing to be found the last note is completely covered

in what looks like an idol probably depicting the same thing that the shiny figurine did with the only visible writing being is it you is it you is it you this is written multiple times There's no deep lore analysis here he's just completely gone insane I don't even blame him if I had to survive this long in Poland I probably would have lost it too that wraps up pretty much the entirety of the doctor's Ark but later on we might see him for one final time coming back to the radio tower after closing off with

the doctor going through the corridor carved between the trees you'll end up right outside the towers building unfortunately it's never That easy and your path is blocked by a singular crate held up by a growth so unfortunately for you you're going to have to take the long way round oh boy I sure hope there's nothing dangerous inside following the path you'll first see some destroyed fencing and a corpse the fence has been torn to shreds there's an empty nest nearby probably belonging to whatever tore through that fence you can also see the overturned radio tower

here which you might Recognize way back from the Visions you had at the markings strewn across the map seems like you've been pointed here by the woods all along even the Talking Tree had one of the people mouth the word radio at you although back then it was basically impossible to connect it to the tower it's important to mention that just like all the other locations the game does a fantastic job setting the atmosphere here walking in and you'll immediately Start hearing the metal Tower creaking like it's about to collapse under its own weight this

small design Choice does an insane job of evoking a sense of Abandonment like the tower has outlived everyone around it on the other side of the tower you'll see what that Nest belonged to it's dozens of banshe babies what's worse is if you freed the snail you've made the game harder for yourself as you can see his broken shell lying past the Banshee Nest he probably tried To enter the radio tower like you're doing but ended up being sworn by banshees basically becoming the equivalent of a Polish KFC meal thankfully the Banshees won't attack you

immediately they're sleeping but any noise can wake them up meaning unless you want to get body blocked to death you might want to reconsider using firearms for now to be fair though they're not like the Chompers in the great lake so you can actually use your Flashlight here seriously you can just Spam it in their face and they just don't care an interesting thing you can pick up on is that the Banshees or their babies never seem to show up anywhere with natural light the only places we ever see them are night during specific events

when we do see them outside night events It's Always Somewhere obscured from sunlight which means if anything these creatures are nocturnal it's kind of telling that these things that avoid The sun are also triggered when you look directly at them it's almost like they never want to be seen looking past the Banshee Nest you'll realize that yep once again you are punished for trying to take the good moral choice because if you freed the snail not only he dies here anyway but now his shell is blocking the way forward so you'll have to try and

path around it instead of just taking the shortest path again we can still get inside the radio tower but We've made it a lot harder for ourselves although even the quote unquote short path is completely filled with Banshee nests moving through here without accidentally looking at a banshee and getting yourself swarmed is basically impossible because of how tight the corridors are combined with the entire area being enveloped in pretty much complete darkness meaning you can trigger a Banshee without even seeing her even better if you manage to brush Against a single bansy baby by complete

accident it will instantly wake up forcing you into a combat scenario where you'll probably bump into another one and then another one until you create a chain reaction where you end up waking up the entire bird population really the only saving grace is how little damage they do when they hit you so you can just pop an alcohol bandage and basically out heal most of the hits oh yeah and also like I said earlier the Molotov don't forget about the molotov again it's kind of funny how banshees seem to hate light and fire is one

of the best weapons against them after moving through the nests you'll have to enter one of the buildings to progress going inside like pretty much every single building in the entire game it's completely ruined having giant gaping holes in the roof and the aformentioned tower collapsing in on itself and of course being home To even more banshees I found an old overturned radio tower the civilian radio equipment still works strange that radio equipment he mentions can be found in the next room connected to a network of roots this basically proves that the forest has been

manipulating the radio waves as there's no way that these radios would still be working while everything around was destroyed being able to manipulate radio signals suggests a high level of intelligence in Whatever is behind the Darkwood but then again it did make an entire Forest just to [ __ ] with some villagers so you know nothing concrete there unfortunately there's no sign of an exit in the building but there is a journal to pick up right behind that small room with a Banshee that will jump scare you immediately as you open the door so even

if you stealthed your way through the entire map you've now given your exact coordinates to every single Banshee in The radio tower 100% completely Fair design actually you know what you know how I said at the beginning of the video like the game is so great for having no jump scares nah I take it all back anyway once you make it P you can find a crate with some ammo and an old cassette as well as a backpack with a note inside it we haven't slept again another mad man came here at night the second

one this month he jumped over the fence and tried To Ram the door with his head shot him in the ass of the tranquilizer and today we're going to transport him outside since that a cursed tree appeared in the village an increasing number of savages roam our hideouts how do they know about us they're psychos they could barely talk the villagers in our sector still have no clue what's going on it's been 10 years or so but when they lose it all they need to do is go out into the woods and put some mud

on their face and they Come sniffing Stefan told me that in the neighboring sector the Wild Ones appear mainly in the vicinity of their Hideout located near the tunnel entrance I don't think it's a coincidence this is a pretty big reveal as it confirms that there must be some form of intelligence behind the forest controlling the Savages and using the radios to communicate with us in fact we've seen this communication already in the signs they draw on the ground the Hallucinations we got when we stepped inside led us to these same places it led the

Savages in chapter 1 it was bunker 21 and in the swamp it was the radio tower this communication also seems to somehow be connected to the Talking Tree as its appearance seems to have made Savages more aware of the hideouts which also end up affecting us as we're stuck defending against them at night once you finish the reading material you can move on through the Rest of the building just to realize you have to again go outside into another [ __ ] Banshee Nest truly the bravest of video game design or you can actually take

an alternate path right before that [ __ ] jump scare Banshee there's an eye growth in the corner of the room activating it and backtracking to the open area before you enter the building a passage now opens in the middle of the collapsed Tower of course there's another Banshee as well but Sur Surprisingly this one isn't actually hostile it kind of sounds like it's crying standing over the corpse of one of its babies stop [ __ ] crying [ __ ] if anything it's one of the first humanizing moments of any of the forest's Creations

in the entire game which feels kind of weird considering they all look like they were created just to kill but again maybe there's something deeper here maybe they aren't all mindless Predators instead leading Actual albeit incredibly Twisted from our point of view normal lives I have to go to work continuing on the path will lead you to a small hidden area the first thing you see are more of the Savages drawings but instead of random circles this time it's a clear drawing of the bunker door it even looks kind of similar to the Visions we

had of the door back in chapter 1 so again this could be another inspiration from the forest it's kind of weird seeing it here Though considering no one in the swamp would even know about it if anything it feels like it was left here for you you were the one that was meant to find it I mean to be fair that door did mean so much to you is basically your only way to escape looking around you'll also see that this is where the base of the tower is and of course it's all entwined with

roots which is pretty much what caused it to collapse you can actually go under the tower here to find a small roofed Area with three Graves under it behind the graves there's a sack containing mushrooms and also a charcoal drawing of the bunker door and even another iron cowbell the same one that you could find back in the tunnels this of course is a call back to the three although although I'm not really sure why they have Graves prepared here it could be that they made them themselves as some sort of offering to the forest

which could also be a reference to the dream where we were Told to lay down in a grave it would also suggest that the three are aware of Bunker 21 they're probably the ones to make that drawing on the ground earlier I don't really see why it would interest them though as that door only leads deeper into the woods there's one more thing to find here behind the graves is another corpse consumed by Roots laying on top of these Savage ritual circles with bird corpses strewn on top of it just like the corpses and the

markings You could find in the rest of the swamp representing all of the different enemies but this one represents the Banshees it's also probably why their presence is so heavy here and considering that this area seems so heavily connected to the three it's possible that they were the ones responsible for this ritual so technically if their father wasn't A thieving [ __ ] we probably never would have had to fight a single Banshee now Instead of pathing back through the building and into that Banshee Nest you can take a shortcut right before the door to

the other part of the building building the first thing you'll notice is a mountain of corpses piling up against the wall presumably Savages drawn here just like it was said in the earlier note there's also one Savage still alive banging his head against the metal door killing him you can now approach it just to realize it's locked With a code that you don't have at this point you might expect another hourlong section where I talk about a side quest that ends up taking you halfway across the map for a single item but fortunately this time

we're actually spared by the protagonist I think I remember the code to this door 8684 thankfully like we've established the protagonist is an outsider and he still has some tricks up his sleeve this radio tower must have been secured by The Outsiders otherwise the protagonist wouldn't have known the code walking in you can see more heavily overgrown radio equipment but the interesting part is that there's another underground entrance here the entrance to the underground tunnels going inside you'll be thrown into a familiar environment feeling almost like a continuation of the Tel behind the bunker door

in fact going left you can see a blocked section the Further path of this tunnel is blocked by roots and Rubble which is likely the very same block we encountered back before we had to detour into the swamp there's also a crate next to the entrance you can unlock containing a military flashlight and a note 2215 hours two people came via the tunnels after The Hideout near Village 3C they were attacked 231 hours The Hideout near Village 3C has been compromised at least 12 locals have entered the Hideout Cellar mostly mud covered Savages three among

them were wearing unusual clothing weird Rags we lost one man the door to the tunnels has been shut and none of the locals managed to break through further we're getting ready for Evac 0130 hours Evac successful the door is locked with a code we're going home The Hideout mentioned is the one we've been staying at during our time in the swamp this explains why The Outsiders had to abandon the swamp entirely as their Hideout was being overrun by Savages and were seemingly aware of the tunnel entrance what's interesting is another mention of the three which

also explains that cowbell we found in the tunnel right behind the area restricted door this might also tie to that drawing of the bunker door we found in the area near the base of the tower the forest might have been influencing the three to try and open the bunker door effectively flooding the tunnels with the Savages From both areas now you might find it weird that the three were leading the attacks that ultimately caused the outsider evacuation since to us the player they've only been helpful acting as a Trader but you have to remember we've

become part of the forest ever since we injected ourselves with Essence for the first time and even if you didn't level up once in the entire game there's still a cannon event in the beginning of the game where the doctor Forces an injection onto you it might be possible that the three know this somehow after all they're clearly much smarter than regular savages the closing of the tunnel door was probably the reason why so many Savages piled up against the radio tower and stopped attacking The Hideout at night we already established that the forest communicates

with them haven't you figured out I don't speak your [ __ ] language once that door got closed and The area was locked off the radio tunnel entrance was the only other way out of the region in fact if the forest wanted to spread the plague further it would need to get access to this hatch locked behind a giant metal door I do want to give a quick shout out to this metal door though it managed to survive two entire years with no maintenance and literally hundreds of savages beating their heads against it practically saving

the world from the plague Possibly spreading even further so we're not the goat of Darkwood it's this door now you might ask why does the forest not just send a stronger enemy than a malnourished insane human is it stupid I mean surely a couple of chers would probably take care of that door easily well this could be a bit of a plot hole or we can assume that all the other creatures aren't under the forest's Direct Control the Savages are the closest thing to an actual human in the Game there's still some Consciousness inside them

meaning they could be influenced to do things even after going completely insane all the other enemies which seem to come directly from the forest or from infected corpses like for example Chompers act more like animals with no agency other than Instinct there is of course the Banshee which was actually showing some emotion but to be fair small bird wings they're not really going to do much against a metal door I Can't believe I've spent this section of the video just glazing a metal door there's also the issue of the protagonist knowing the code I did

mention earlier and while he could have been a part of that evacuation I think it's more likely that the code was given to operatives if they needed an emergency xfill point or maybe in case they ever needed to come back into the swamp again this might just be me coping but I like to think the devs had it all Thought out and this really does make sense coming back to the tunnels you can finally continue the journey you started all the way back in chapter 1 and just like how you were warned before opening the

bunker door the protagonist again remarks how there's no coming back this may be a oneway road yep I know last time I did that it was a tease for another chapter but please I promise I am not doing another fake out I really am trying to keep this video under 10 Hours eventually you'll end up in front of a metal door which will prompt the protagonist to make another note in the journal I found a Floodgate in the tunnel I'm afraid I will only have one shot of getting further down the passage I feel like

it will lead me to the right place you can't open The Floodgate unless you lock the door you just came through which means you have to effectively lock yourself in and hope that there really is an exit at the end Of the tunnel going through leads you to yet another door this one is blocked from the other side trying to take the side tunnel won't take you anywhere either as the only thing there is a gaping mole you can look inside it to get a piece of odd meat and after you walk away it speaks

to you now the last thing to try here is a metal lever overgrown with fungus to use it you have to get rid of the growths by hitting them with your shovel just like How you solved pretty much every other problem in the game but doing so causes the mushrooms to burst releasing SPS into the air and putting you into another dream sequence you wake up right where you got knocked unconscious but the tunnels seem different the lever is gone and the flood gate is locked shut behind you the door leading deeper in is still

barricaded but what used to be that dead End side tunnel now expands into a nicely paved walkway the only item you have now is a military flashlight which seems to run on the dream logic of infinite battery power but other than being able to see you're once again completely defenseless I can hear someone calling incomprehensibly from the depths of a [Music] corridor following the source of the voice you'll stumble into a larger Chamber with the words come to me scratched out in Polish on the ground there's also shiny stones on the ground one here and

one more in the following cave these Mark your Way Forward and trust me if you stray off this path you are going to get punished hard more writing on the floor the forest is calling you not seeing a Shiny Stone you might take the wrong Corridor you'll see a bed you might recognize just to hear a voice behind you are you lost a half Dead man with pale withered skin Hollow eyes and teeth black as night sounds very familiar hopefully it won't stay familiar for long more walking more walking more writing it all says the

same come to me this time there's also a tree in the middle of the room with blooded fragments of cloth stuck to it taking the wrong path reminds you of life before Darkwood simple furniture from Your old apartment and a Madman in the corner telling you that that's not where you're going I think you've lost your way buddy boy more shiny Stones another split-off path but this time instead of your apartment it's just a large chamber what do you think you're doing here once again a voice calls out behind you got lost poor fella just

for another one to speak when you turn to face it instead of corpses or Mad Men These are villagers villagers who in some way you probably condemn to death instead of them disappearing peacefully you can hear a shrill scream in a tunnel at the end of the chamber turning around to run away you remember there's never just one enemy in the woods trying to evade the spiders you come across a familiar sight puddles of water forming right up until a large door you come out of Bunker 21 it was Never the way out you follow

the corridor but instead of leading to the surface you arrive Where it All Began the doctor's interrogation room the tunnel behind you turns into a wall but you already know what to do you walk into the big house Banshee scream outside the windows you won't be alone here for long just like you remember you need to go into the room behind the Wardrobe just to see yourself strapped to a surgery Table you won't give into the dark woods tricks not anymore you take the table leg from the crate your very first real weapon it feels

reassuring to be able to defend yourself right until you hear the growling outside the barricades preparing for combat is futile even with a weapon you basically stand no chance once again Running Away really is the better option a chomper breaks through the door Keeping yanic locked his corpse following behind this is your chance dodging attacks you make it through and jump out of the window you pass through the doctor's old Clinic the constant growling follows close you run until you reach a metal door it's stuck just when you think it's over the growling goes quiet

you push open the door with the table leg you exit into an area even more overgrown than what you've ever seen before the Forest pulsates around you beating almost like it has a heart you end up back at the bunker door maybe this time it'll be different the water is red with blood the shiny stones still guide your way but taking the wrong path you can pretty much always end being dead you retrace your steps you see the writings again calling you finally you reach another open [Music] chamber there's a Savage here praying to A

giant head in the roots it opens for a moment once again calling out to you you run into the mouth barely making it as it closes behind you forever the tight coridor between the roots leads to another door you open it and the music fades you made it you see the familiar grating of the tunnel you pick up a shovel and dig up all the rubble blocking your way you open the tunnel door and the dream [Music] ends you wake up in front of the lever the blockaded door is now wide open once again your

dreams have directly affected reality that lever you cleared only opens the floodgates behind you in case you wanted to leave which would be most firsttime playthroughs as like I said said that protagonist was not lying you really only had one shot like I said if you died in the dream the store will stay closed forever and you'd be forced To go back and burn the Talking Tree anyway this is why this alternate path is so hard to get because you basically have one chance at the very end of the game and if you want to

try again you basically have to load up a new save on Darkwood that or you could edit save files but don't do that [ __ ] coward but again that doesn't matter anymore you made it the tunnel is right in front of you reaching the end you see the number that's been following you the Entire game 21 21 you actually reach a sort of hub for the tunnel network with what looks like a service tunnel running through it you can reach tunnel 22 but although similarly to 21 it's full of collapses making it impassible fortunately

there's a ladder here to take you to the surface you emerge in the burnt remains of an old Hideout only the oven is still standing there's a backpack nearby where you can find a Note The Roots have made it impossible to dig further specialist tools will be needed if we are to go deeper observation the roots of individual trees intertwin to create bundles or braids with a thickness of 120 CM the ones we analyzed always grow towards the Northeast taking into account the results from the Dig s sites from other regions we can assume that

the bundles come together in sector zero we've accumulated about 5 lers of the Substance that flows through the roots as expected it has lost its shape-shifting abilities after being disconnected from the route or from the stream to be exact throughout the game we've been speculating about the mechanisms of the forest we've seen the white substance everywhere in the game and this note just put all of that into context you know how I said the doctor's notes were the biggest law dumps of the game while this note is much shorter it Contains massive confirmation of something

we've been suspecting for a long time the substance can shape shift all of dark Wood's Creations are in a sense clones Concepts imperfectly merged together and brought to life by the substance creating the Abominations we've been encountering all throughout the game you can see it as early as chapter 1 the very first example you could have found was a weird replica of the dry Meadow Hideout appearing in the Old Woods although back then you may not have even paid mind to it thinking it was just a random building the more obvious examples would be the

mushroom granny and her house in the Glade all of those being copies of a normal woman who who died in the swamp long ago fused with the mushrooms another copy is the man in the tunnel between the chapters he was the copy of a dead man we find in the swamp stairwell presumably a villager who tried to leave through the Tunnel just to be shot by The Outsiders there are many copies of that one man embedded into the walls of that tunnel talking to you as you walk past repeating the exact same dialogue these copies

are often made imperfect for the granny and the Man in the tunnel this manifested as a weird softness to any copied object or person but the imperfections can also be simple distortions like with the snail another copy this time of the man at the Junkyard Cottage fused with his last meal snails you can see that there are actually multiple copies of the snail as you approach the cottage all of them covered in the white substance but stuck in place as unfinished caricatures that can't even move interestingly these copies seem to come out much more accurately

when the forest doesn't actually focus on copying the person exactly after all all the swamp's enemies are fusions of humans and Various animals as seen in the Savages ritual markings but they're all devoid of any kind of identity they're faceless Predators out to kill you even if some seem to show emotion they still resemble animals much more than actual sentient human beings you can sometimes find some unfinished versions of enemies in the swamp possibly defected like the copies of the snail but even then there are way more proper working copies out there another important aspect

of the Substance is also the conscious that it gives the copies in the case of most characters it just gives them the originals memories like the snail believing that he's a person or the mushroom granny talking to us about memories of her original copies family but in some cases it can make the copy completely detached from the original instead keeping only some attachments but not full memories or personality one character that this pretty explicitly Happens to is The Wolf Man up to this point you might have not even thought he was a copy although there

were a couple of indicators despite him never talking about his past he has an insane obsession with the pretty lady never being fulfilled until he could you know consume her oh my but the big thing connecting them was the distorted wedding ring you could find on his corpse real rings could only be found in two places near the pretty lady but also In the Hunter's cabin on the Hunter's corpse which was completely overgrown in Roots the obvious connection to make is the hunter was in a relationship with a pretty lady but at some point was

killed probably with a gun considering the wolf man's jacket has a bullet hole in it the forest then merged him with the missing trophy a wolf head creating the furry that we came to know leaving him obsessed with the pretty lady and keeping his hunting mannerisms but Changing him into a creature whose hatred of humanity overcame any other attachment if anything the forest distorted him so much that when he was made a copy the biggest thing he wanted to hunt were other humans another copy you might remember is the trader him being fused with his

mask and covered with shrooms is a a pretty dead giveaway that he's a copy and by looking at the items he drops it becomes clear why he was so friendly towards us he's a copy Of us the protagonist he had both a copy of the journal and the bunker 21 key both slightly distorted as we discussed earlier I mean look even his death pose is exactly the same as ours it couldn't be any more on the nose even the Talking Tree which we thought was everyone absorbed in the village wasn't it was a copy we

already knew the imprints of the swamp villagers were embedded into the tree somehow you might even remember a piece of dialogue Where you kick the tree and some white gooey substance leaks out just for the piece you broke off to regrow immediately these regenerative properties are something we also see in the human spiders when they replicate by chucking torsos at you but this also confirms the origin of the talking tree and why it grew so much faster than the rest of the forest not only did it grow on the bodies of the villagers but the

substance merged them with the tree Creating this weird fusion and accelerating its growth all of this came from just one note by the way and there's still an entire area left here to explore looking around the area you came out in seems to be some sort of clearing within the forest there's even some sort of Farmland albe it flooded and broken up by huge bundles of roots in the middle you can see a scarecrow inspecting it further you see it's Dressed up in a hazmat suit for some reason going deeper in you can see that

this entire area has been deforested as evidence by the stumps left on the ground this is probably the work of The Outsiders who needed to clear a path to the tunnel entrance but there are still some trees left and going further you'll see a few bodies tied to them dressed in what looks like the same ha mat suits only one tree doesn't have a body on it instead there's some Blood Stained rope On the ground a ragged rope with traces of dried blood and a piece of hazmat suit glued to it whoever was tied here

must have been able to escape there's also a discarded protective boot that you can find a little bit further away you can also find another abandoned Hideout there's corpses everywhere some holding military gear some belonging to Savages with only rope in their inventory this Camp must have belonged to The Outsiders also evidenced by Sample jars and Machinery connected up to the trees with what looks like light bulbs on one of the trunks it really does look like the doctor might have been onto something with his electricity Theory after all step one insert light bulbs into

a tree step [Music] two going inside The Hideout you'll see more remnants of the campsite as well as the familiar oven unfortunately inspecting it you'll see it's completely Destroyed a destroyed oven the jar with the detective substance lies shattered on the ground there must have been a fight here a surprise attack judging by the you know half eaten sandwich on the table by now you might remember the very first journal entry you got I don't remember anything since the attack on our camp this is our camp this is where your entire story started the corpses

you found around here used to be your fellow soldiers that rope you found had Your blood on it you were left to die tied up to that tree just like them you escaped is unclear all that matters is that you somehow manag to outrun the Savages and in the end make it back here the entry also mentions changing your clothes somehow I'm wearing a coat so I must have changed my clothes on the way here that hazmat suit left on the Scarecrow and the protective boot used to belong to you you probably swap the clothes

to blend in with the population Better as the hazard suit was damaged and would be instantly recognized by villagers as sad as it might be to see your Camp destroyed and Mission failed you can still get out yourself and survive before doing so you can find one more note inside The Hideout in a black room the structure resembles a honeycomb the surface of particular cells varies from 80 to as many as 360 Square km the cells gradually divide into smaller ones it can be assumed that with time the Forest will achieve a homogeneous form trees

grow with remarkable regularity forming walls with the average thickness of 50 m the distances between trunks are never higher than 10 cm according to preliminary analysis only 15% of the total volume consists of actual trees although this figure is hard to verify this note seems to just be more research about the forest the interesting part is right at the end when he says only about 15% of the darkwoods forest is actually Made of real trees the rest is presumably just replicas made by the substance this is another huge reveal because it explains why the forest

could spread and grow so fast instead of just being you know Le spooky unexplained scary thing this is something I really like about Darkwood which I mentioned near the beginning of the video Everything ends up making sense as long as you spend the time to actually uncover it I totally get the aspect of Horror and suspense you know the thing you can't see is so scary because your mind has to you know make up the pictures insert the Batman quote here and you always fear what you don't understand I'm afraid you can also find a

couple more experimentation sites behind the camp all of them seemingly focused on hooking up electrodes to Roots this and the previous experiment would suggest that the outsiders must Have been suspecting that the substance could actually conduct electricity thinking about it now if the fars could manipulate electricity through its roots that could explain how seemingly broken radios would suddenly come to life or how lights in our Hideout would suddenly turn on and off again yet another horror Trope that happens in basically any spooky horror game but in Darkwood there's a legitimate reason explained behind it there's

nothing more to be Found in The Hideout the only thing left to do is to go further and Hope hopefully leave the forest for good there's a small building you can find with a barricade blocking the door removing the barricade lets you through just to spit you out on the road home the same road that if you burnt down the tree this is really weird because you might remember finding the journal page of the doctor ripped out in his camp near the radio tower and it mentioned This the trip will be exceptionally long we're taking

one of the longest tunnels it almost reaches to the last Zone this means that the camp must be very very deep in the forest so how is it possible that there's a convenient exit right here the forest should be at its most dangerous after all but for now that doesn't matter maybe it's just a coincidence before going to the epilog you can walk back on the foot path that would normally lead you here if you Burnt the Talking Tree obviously the tree is still standing and you'll see the three standing before it with their signature

Bell audible in the ambience the three are staring at the tree they pay no attention to me once again confirming their ties to the tree and the person it copied you can also approach the tree itself in the shadows I notice the pulsating vastness of the gigantic tree trunk in the distance above the roots I see the destroyed Roofs of the flooded Village the area is shrouded in almost complete silence you've spared us the voice is coming from between the dark bows but I can't see its owner this road will lead you home nothing will

stand in your way anymore and so like the main ending where you burnt down the tree you can go home we've managed to spare the tree but likely condemning the [ __ ] to death so so again even though this could be seen as the more moral option someone Still gets punished by your hand now everything ahead is pretty much the exact same as the original ending so I think it'd be a good idea now to start nitpicking things that just are wrong with it for example your Camp was supposed to be very deep in

the forest yet the nearest town is only 25 km away you even remember the trader telling you all roads lead deeper into the woods all the roads then you start to notice it you walk into town again the same things Play out the woman feeding the birds but you're neighbor doesn't even comment on your ghoulish appearance not to mention your scarecrow outfit what you thought was just normal polish background Ambience now starts to sound like screams and how can your character talk again the only way he was ever able to communicate was by nodding or

shaking his head the worms you used to find everywhere in the swamp cover the ground next to one of the trash cans the Buildings stretch on forever looking exactly the same if you choose to run up or down the map you'll notice that the buildings just start to repeat themselves every building is an exact copy you go inside and walk down to the basement you take a turn just to find mushrooms growing in one of the corridors the same ones you injected into yourself to attune more with the forest through the door next to it

you can see something moving you can only See bits through the bars but it looks like a chomper despite this you go deeper just like how you've done in the entire game every door is locked until you reach the last room it looks like a pantry having potatoes and even a nice jar of jam labeled zimic God I hope I said that right there's also a radio that you can switch on it mostly just plays weird variations of static but changing the frequency one too many times and it starts to emit the same Noise you

heard back with the swamp radios it starts talking to you after which all the lights go out you start going back and as you do hit a loud thumps like something is hitting a wooden box you should probably get out walking back to the ground floor you start feeling more tired something is drawing you back to your flat but that itch on the back of your head that feeling of unease it won't let go you start trying to open doors any doors Just to find some kind of side context predictably they're all closed but after

you walk back one of them opens slightly you're waking my kid a piss off mother yells at you you peek inside just to see the baby is actually a fetus lying on the ground the same fetus that we would have dreams of in Chapter 1 what is that is that fetus you start fearing the worst despite this you continue on to your apartment you go up the stairs and through the hallway but you notice some Cracks in the wall peeking through you can't make out anything at first but then your vision clears up and you

see a pulsating fleshy growth along with a legion of chompers the light gives out and the Monsters disappear but now you know that there's something definitely wrong but still the urge to go to sleep is incredibly strong but you manag to pass your apartment and continue down the hallway Until you realize that every door leads to your apartment you fight The compulsion to just give up and rest you move along the hallway until it devolves into a NeverEnding mess of roots you give in and go back to your apartment it seems like the same ending

is going to play out you take off your coat and you get to see your dog again you're happy but you know this isn't real you remember something you were told long ago way back when you thought bunker 21 would lead you out when you went to the Silent Forest a sleeper told You this hey there friend in the last hideout look for an exit beneath the floor back then it made no sense but finally you see it you drag away the furniture revealing bundles of roots infiltrating your home but this isn't enough they're growing

out of the floor panels to get rid of them you'll have to go deeper you can take off the rug and try to remove the flooring but you'll need tools for that you go to the kitchen and instead of cooking delicious Soup you check the cupboard and under the sink you find a screwdriver once again you go back into the living room you see that your dog has vanished the illusion is starting to shatter you start removing floorboards one by one you uncover pulsating Roots as the calming Ambience changes to that uncertain tone of the

night that you're so used to hearing you move onto the [Music] corridor you hear a heartbeat in the Background the network of roots spans your entire apartment and they all converge in your bedroom you enter and remove the floor inside they all lead to your bed this was always a trap you examine your bed but this time instead of sleeping you look closer fighting off sleepiness with difficulty I lean over the bed the Springs Creak noisily under the weight of my hand as I cast my glance on the light brown construction from plywood I notice

familiar features They are elongated and arched I can still smell the fresh sheets and the pleasant warmth of the quilt you look under the bed I feel a gentle draft coming from the dark gap between the bed and the floor you reach underneath my fingertips brush a thin layer of dust coldness moisture I'm touching something rough but my arm is too short to catch it I think I need to move the bed you drag the bed away to reveal a Hole in the ground you remove more flooring to be able to reach inside and finally

you can enter like any rust character you wake up completely naked lying on the floor made out of entwined Roots back inside the forest or more accurately underneath the forest you're surrounded by other people all of them naked and sleeping anytime you saw those huge open Ravines pulsating with roots that was the heart of the forest and now you're here it's Obvious that when you went to escape the forest you actually passed out and became asleep now I know you're all going to rush to the comments and say oh my god look he made another

all-in the head game but the difference is the events of this game did actually happen the only difference being when you actually left the dark wood and made it to the town the forest had a countermeasure and turned you into a sleeper dragging you to its Center even Though you're naked you can actually see the scarecrow outfit near your character so the game did happen it was just the Soviet block part that was a dream sequence you can go up and inspect any of the sleepers around you the man is fast asleep he's smiling he's

hugging his knees with skinny dirty arms a swarm of flies is covering a black soore on his back you can try to wake him up but it's no use the man doesn't react I'm unable to wake him from his Slumber you Can follow the trail of your own clothes back to the wall of the chamber the steep slope blocks the way ahead there are some tunnels at its base the whole area looks more like a crater than anything else you can examine a tunnel in the wall seemingly the one that got you through it's a

meter wide tunnel covered with a slimy membrane further inside I can see pulsating growths blocking the way ahead won't be able to pass through this way it looks like it Closed itself off behind you once you entered in fact you may remember this being foreshadowed in the dream back at the radio tower basement you literally go into a gigantic mouth that closes itself behind you to finish the dream you literally LED yourself into the mouth of the forest in hopes to get [Music] out dark wood has always gave you multiple ways to approach something but

here you have no choice except to go Deeper down into the chamber you can interact with with another sleeper this time a woman muttering through her sleep dirty clumped hair covers the woman's face she's murmuring in her sleep clutching a rag doll filled with straw now the moon has faded the Sleep sto over my do your eyes you can't wake her up as you move further in more and more Roots start emerging from from the ground they're so close to the surface you can feel them Just by walking I'm at the bottom of a huge

Valley I feel the dry Dusty Earth pulsating under my feet soon The Roots overtake completely there's no ground to speak of anymore both the walls and the floor are entirely made out of roots you see many more different figures lying on the ground their old weathered clothes lying discarded nearby its face is covered in mud and sticks it clutches a Shiny Stone in its hand right next to the figure you can find a shiny stone I That have accompanied you throughout your journey in the forest and have been great value to Traders but there's always

been something strange about them you could see that both Savages and villagers seem to hold them in high regard going so far as to worship them and put them into shrines and like I said Traders would give you a lot of rep for them seeing them here confirms that they are definitely somehow connected with the forest moving forward you can See a huge chamber splitting off from the path containing even more sleepers it hums something quietly in its sleep swaying to the rhythm of a simple Melody the figure speaks to someone in its sleep squeezing

an old man's photo in its hand the figure is talking in its sleep moving its hand as if caressing someone with affection probably the same way we'd caress our wife in one of the dreams this sleeping man looks like a skeleton coated in skin he smiles widely The emaciated figure sleeps soundly embracing the remains of a child the figure sleeps on a muddy ground resting its head on the chest of a skeleton next to it it clutches a muddy brass cross in both hands repeating some incomprehensible words in its sleep I hear a faint whisper

my little stashek sleep stashek sleep none of them can be woken up despite your best efforts even if you wanted to use force your entire Inventory has been stripped from you going back to the main path you walk alongside the root Walls and More sleepers there asleep they seem happy even though they're emaciated and dirty some of them lie Dead all of these people likely suffered fate similar to yours they were all drawn here in one way or another maybe they were trying to escape maybe just like the snail and the Savages they were called

here by the voice you can even remember the [ __ ] Back at the swamp Village talking about people walking on the road blocked by the talking tree this is probably where they were heading and probably why the Savages were also trying to enter the tunnels they were being called here but couldn't access the road home after the Talking Tree blocked it the ones that made it were deceived by comfortable dreams just like how the forest tried to do the same with you the other sleepers gave into the forest forced into a deep Sleep never

to wake up as they starve to death only to be consumed by the roots that surround them by the look of it you're the only character that's managed to resist to move further you have to walk across a trunk Bridging the Gap between the root platforms as you step on it you can look down into the canyon but there's no Dark Earth or rock at the bottom instead you see something moving fleshy growths are spread out all the way under the roots constantly pulsating You continue on soon you see a bright glow in the next

chamber a pleasant warmth washes over me once you enter you can see it Source a huge white ball seeping substance this is the heart of the forest this is the being I'm standing in front of an enormous being I feel an overwhelming soothing feeling of security and happiness the vast Valley at the bottom of which I stand curves upwards closing over my head the rust of distant trees turns into a single silent Murmur I feel I'm coming home to my flat to my room with a window and a bed something like a sound continuous and

low is coming my way in the depth of the pulsating space surrounding me I can see vague shapes their outline blurs and Fades away every time I try to focus on them suddenly the sound envelops me only to instantly disappear a moment later I can feel someone's presence far above me I'm drowning in an Illuminating pulsating whiteness I squeeze my eyes Shut but the vast brightness continues to Blind me the silent grunt grows stronger with every moment it stratifies into an unlimited number of abstract incomprehensible sounds only to combine into a distant wailing voice my

eyes fill it with tears my hands are trembling the everpresent whiteness blinds me it explodes with brightness once more and then starts vibrating suddenly I realize that the pleasant feeling of warmth has been replaced by Coldness the coldness of the void that surrounds me I feel a heat emanating from the being I sense my pulse slowing down a calmness I want to rest come back home to my bed I want to lie down to fall asleep I don't want to do it still my hand pushes the being away the warmth that was emanating from it

disappears replaced by piercing coldness the being is the heart of Darkwood all of its roots originate from it and spread out covering the entire region this is also What has been talking back to you all this time through the radio but also through your dreams looking back on them now they revealed a lot of the forest's nature even if we don't have the full context to understand it back then the final dream scene in the radio tower bunker especially revealed a lot more if you were paying attention that tree you could find with bloody scraps

attached to it was a reference to a tree that you were tied to and managed to escape every Time you strayed from the main path you would also find pieces of your apartment just to have someone tell you that you're lost the being was telling you that you're never really going back there and to be fair you were literally told this on day one by none other than a clone of yourself all roads only lead deeper into the woods if the trader knew this then it's likely you too knew it at some point but ever

since you're injected with Essence by the doctor you Were under the being's control to some extent bunker 21 the Talking Tree even the radio tower they will all bait for your desperation to get out the being led you into its trap like so many others and now even though you're awake you can't get out the tunnel you came in through closed behind you and the root walls are too steep to climb on your own exploring around the be chamber you can see some Savages are actually still awake bowing before the being worshiping It they're probably

so far gone that they didn't even need to be put to sleep you can also find a familiar face among the sleepers the doctor now in his full-blown Savage form weirdly enough though he's here even if you killed him which to be fair does bring into question is the entire game all in their head but I really doubt it because again you can find your character's clothes when you wake up here the events of the game did happen this could be just a Continuity error or more likely he was revived by the substance we already

know that the substance has insane life-altering properties like making your blood acidic or emitting such a scream that you'd scare all the local Wildlife so it wouldn't be too implausible to think the doctor was found dragged down here and then revive just so he could be another food source for the being going to an adjacent Corridor you can find another named Sleeper marching the man mumbles in his sleep he's emaciated and dirty but his face is radiant and calm he clutches a rusty object covered with old beads some weapon the man is talking in his

sleep these are only Snippets of sentences single words spoken gently and slowly it's hard to find any meaning in them you can try to push him to wake him up leave without opening his eyes the man clumsily waves his hand at me then Covers his head with it and freezes he's in a deep trance like the others but in instead of trying to wake him up you can try to take what he's desperately holding on to leave the man waves his hand again this time he grabs my arm without opening his eyes he turns his

head towards me I recognize him he's one of us masc is actually a name that appeared way back in the game back in the old Woods Hideout you could find a note about someone named masc going Insane and running off into the woods with a flamethrower you know what you need to do now you can try to snatch the weapon from mesc but he's obsessed with it leave can you find can hear me I won't let you take her the man clenches his teeth with the fury of a Maniac saliva flows from his mouth it's

hurting her you will tear her arms out but you have a purpose now you might not be able to leave but that doesn't mean you're just going to give up you need that Flamethrower don't leave her no so you punch masc and take it as you walk towards the being he calls out to you I beg of you give her to me he starts chasing you but he's so emaciated and starved he basically has no chance of catching up to you what are you doing give her back sleepers start waking up and calling out to

you the being knows what's about to happen but it can't stop you anymore what are you doing what are You doing leave alone but you've accepted did that already there was never a way out you fire the flamethrower the being immediately catches on fire it screams filling the chamber every sleeper around you starts waking up and rushes at you trying to stop you almost like the white blood cells dealing with a foreign body but it's too late the being's white shell Burns away revealing a fleshy Mass beneath it even Its appearance was most likely an

illusion as Everything Burns around you you look desperately for an exit but the option was never there you could never get out you were doomed from the start you make peace with yourself because at least now Darkwood will burn away alongside you a great fire consumed the woods for a couple of days gradually claiming many of its inhabitants The fire consumed the last Road leading to the heart of the woods this is the final true conclusion to one of my favorite games of all time yummers there's no Marvel post credit scene where it's like oh

oh look suddenly you suddenly you're alive and you got the the H of 100 good ending an ending like that wouldn't fit Darkwood you might remember me talking about how there's no good choices in the game the fate of the protagonist is one of those choices you Can't survive Darkwood no matter what you do what choices you make all roads lead to the same place you always die either turning into a sleeper and being slowly consumed by the tree or choosing to go out on your own terms and taking the infection with you and there's

definitely a certain hopelessness that comes with this realization one that no game could ever replicate for me since playing Darkwood like your choices despite being impactful could never Really help you the only difference they made is shaping the world that you leave behind after you finish the game you get some end cards talking about the fates of the characters you left behind mind these adapt to every major decision you've made throughout the game meaning that there are easily multiple Pages worth of variations as to what happens to them if I were to cover every single

one the video would probably get another Hour in runtime and holy [ __ ] this video is already way too long so I'll keep it brief and only talk about the most interesting ones generally going to sleep in your apartment and giving up to the being doesn't change much for the characters you are basically a passer by without being a big impact on the world that is of course your finger spped on accident I I promise it did I did not mean to shoot that child despite the fact that Darkwood has no clear good endings

this one called Bliss can be considered the worst one you end up being deceived by the being you waste away in a comfortable dream and overall you change nothing the woods keep stagnating but at least you got to breast I guess most characters just continue on living although some of them do end up getting some form of conclusion to their story if you follow the musician's path and then kill both both of his parents and The pretty lady he ends up moving in with the chicken lady who now tends to him like she used to

tend to her sister I mean to be fair that is a pretty wholesome ending as long as you skip over you know all the murder you had to do to get this alternatively if he comes with you to the swamp and you don't mutate him by feeding him shrooms he actually manages to find his way into the bunker tunnels the boy with the violin waited many weeks for the Stranger to return one day the trap door leading to the underground opened once again the little boy traveled through the tunnels and to his great despair he

had to leave his trusty Old Violin behind him a similar thing happens to Maren if you never interact with him he permanently moves in with the mushroom granny the granny even recovers some of her Originals memories and generally they probably get the happiest ending out of anyone in the game it also turns Out that bringing the child back to the elephant mother was a very blatant Bad Karma Choice since he just ends up being locked in the room forever and the granny just wastes away the game even confirms that the elephant mother was going insane

since starts hearing Mar's voice in the woods if you don't bring him back which as we already know is the being calling out to trap people in the valley if you leave the tree alive the [ __ ] goes insane which isn't really surprising considering he's got you know 20 schizophrenic polish Villages yapping above his head all day and interestingly enough you can also have a unique ending if you kill every single character in the game from then on Wooden Crosses covered with a coat and a hat started appearing in the woods they were usually

accompanied by three three black beakless dead crows the inhabitants of the woods believed these symbols Protected them from a scarecrow lurking between the trees silently taking the lives of everyone he encountered the other ending meanwhile affects every character in the game after all you destroy the forest by completely burning up the being this ending is kind of better since you do free everyone stuck in the Darkwood or more than likely kill them because in this ending 90% of all characters no matter how you interacted with them straight up die There's only a couple that actually

end up surviving in this ending if you didn't bring marck back he manages to run away to the swamp and survives the fire just to go back to his family who burnt down along with their Cottage Rick Grimes and The Walking Dead be like we're can all live together I live I live I live I live if you failed the train wreck dream the doctor will apparently survive somewhere deep in the woods he'll still obviously end up going Completely insane though so unfortunately he can truly never get a good ending if you take any other

path he'll burn along with the being since we can find in the chamber although that being said I swear there has to be some kind of bug because he somehow appears there every time even if he's killed in chapter 1 no matter what path you take with him the musician also survives if you didn't kill the se he manages to find the entrance to Bunker 21 and hides Out the fire inside and lastly The Wolf Man just disappears dis a [ __ ] appearer it's intentionally left unclear presumably so fairies wouldn't boycott the game if

he was killed off there's also the villagers from chapter 1 that survive if you spare the se but honestly who cares I'm not skipping a hot bar upgrade just to get the good ending there's also of course an ending line if you genocide everyone in the forest and the Vagabond from outside the Woods the monster in a scarecrow's disguise who due to reasons only known to himself killed everyone who crossed him even after the endings which honestly do wrap up the game pretty well there's one more thing that stays mostly unexplained the being we know

how it works in terms of substance and the forest it created but apart from that there's not really much said about it we kind of just you know set it on fire this is where we do a bit of a game Theory because even though there's loads of notes around the game like this is why the video is so long because I went into agonizing detail to find and explain every single bit of law there's not a single note or character that gives a bunch of Law and they've purposely kept it ambiguous you know I'd

love to meet a character that goes oh laau it came from Uranus the planet XD from Venus it seems like its existence is a secret even to The Outsiders but There's one item in the game that actually connects the being back to its Origins back in the swamp Village inside the original Granny's house we could find some paintings all of them were of flowers except for one which shows a white ball of light moving across the sky obviously this is all a bit of a game theory but it's very likely that this is a painting

of the being this would suggest that it's not a native part of our world but rather Extraterrestrial and it collided with the Earth the same year the painting is dated 19 1975 knowing this we can even speculate that the shiny stones could be shards of the being that split off when it impacted into the ground I do say speculate but this was literally confirmed by the devs in a Reddit AMA so yeah that wasn't even really a theory to begin with I kind of just stole it from Reddit funnily enough that pile of rubble you

dug into the first time when You went into bunker 21 was probably the closest you ever were to escaping that's because the bunker tunnel only leads deeper in so this cave was in fact the way back that collapsed under the pressure of the roots keep in mind as well the dream in your apartment there was a TV broadcast talking about stars falling from the sky and falling into the palm of your hand the same shiny stones that you'd pick up I believe when the being impacted into the planet it Did hit the forest of Darkwood

and because we know the main way it functions is by copying and replicating everything around it it assimilated the forest so only around 10 to 20% of the actual forest was real and then after the forest it moved on to replicating everything around the forest including the homes people and animals but during this assimilation something went wrong the closer you get to the center of the dark woods the more Corrupted everything is around it from stray dogs to big dogs to Chompers to human centipedes the being is an alien entity I mean that's pretty apparent

and like most animals it just wanted to survive it was making the forest even bigger it was seemingly bringing people back from the dead but these people probably never would have died if the being never landed on the Earth in the first place and on top of that as well an animal Needs food hence why it drew so many people to the center to turn them into sleepers giving them a blissful dream of their best fantasies but in exchange slowly killing them making them fall into a coma until they were basically just a shrived up

corpse with no energy left if anything it draws parallels to the Zone in the 2018 film Annihilation this ever expanding Zone that didn't have any malicious intent but still caused Mass death and Devastation to Everyone in inside it it couldn't be understood it was completely alien and if it went unchecked it would have definitely consumed most of the planet the reason why the plague affected people so differently is because it was an alien trying to understand how bodies worked maybe it was infecting them to weaken them so they'd be a better food source maybe the

only reason some turn into Chompers is because of a deep rooted hatred Especially within the villages and you can see many of them turning into Chompers mostly because there is a huge food shortage and some are even hinted to turning into cannibals just to survive if it really does want to beckon people closer to the center so they can be broken down and used as a food source why is getting to the center so difficult the talking tree for example directly blocks the way to get to the being but that is a creation of the

Being itself I don't think it's a malevolent entity with a huge grand plan I just think it's something that's confused and lost I don't even think it has the ability to have a conscience apart from just basic survival instincts all it really wants to do is feed and by putting people into a blissful trance in the process well that serves both parties most people that are called to the being aren't actually called by the Being itself but more a placeholder with the doctor it was his daughter and for many people in the game it's a

loved one that they haven't seen in a long time either because they died or got cut off from the woods the being itself is completely incapable of any kind of speech only being able to communicate through radios and most of the time it makes no sense and it's basic dialogue more like Echoes of people that it previously killed and assimilated almost As if it has no real free thought of its own and I think that's the point of the being it's not meant to be something that's understood it's simply an Invader in the planet that's

just doing its best to survive creating honey like comb structures and luring people to the center so it can feed off them the government knew about this for a while and thankfully they were able to cordon off the Darkwood so it didn't spread any further stop but it really does bring to Question what would happen if the being went un it would probably start replicating in organic structures as well we already saw that the hideouts were being replicated so it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to say that it would start replicating entire block

buildings and that might have actually happened if you weren't there to burn down the being and the entirety of the forest if anything it reminds me of the game prey that came out in 2017 spoiler Alert during that game you explored a space station while having to deal with this alien pathogen called the Typhon but you actually later found out that the Typhon were able to spread to Earth and pretty much contaminate the entire planet but to be fair in prey there was no polish man with a flamethrower so and with that the game is

pretty much done there's really nothing more to talk about I could sit here for hours just rambling on about the being and its true Intentions but again the devs have kept that purposely vague and I do stand by the theory that the being is not something malevolent it just wants to survive also while probably trying to understand the planet that it's inhabited one thing I do want to talk about more in the game is content while making this video I reached out to the devs regarding some technical stuff relating to the game one of those

things was getting access to the dev mode to Let us record footage Easier by easier I mean we wouldn't have to replay 7 hours of footage to get a single line of dialogue [ __ ] your mother the dev mode also lets you spawn any item in the entire game including a bunch that never made it to the final release some of these items I can totally understand why they were Cuts because they are just absolutely gamebreaking an interesting cut it is the noise law which is kind of an obvious mechanic for any survival Horror

with noise laws you'd be able to Precision Target where you want to bait an enemy you might ask why am I putting this completely normal item in the very obviously joke section well the item is unfinished and for some reason this is the placeholder sound it plays what's even better there's more variations of this sound like they genuinely went the extra mile for a fart joke this is exactly what I mean by Peak game Design to go with this you also get a fart pillow which would no doubt be the most broken item in the

game if it were added so I understand why they try to keep this amazing power contained there's also a kebab which instantly restores you to full health which is only fair considering acid wizard apparently lived off kebabs for a long time while working on Darkwood and to finish it off there's a straight up acid pill in the game get it because Acid wizard Studio this is not funny pyro death to inflation form I was really hesitant on taking this especially because in another game I covered cruelty Squad you could take pills and nine times out

of 10 it would just end up breaking the game in a really bad way like shrinking you down so you couldn't complete levels or flipping the world upside down so you got stuck in a single room but this pill gives you insane stat Buffs for an Amount of time that's not really long enough for me to bother measuring and also on top of that makes you die in one hit so if this was a legit item in the game I I imagine it was probably used as some kind of like glass Cannon speedrun there is

one more thing in the game that happens much earlier but I chose to ignore it until now back at the beginning when you started the game you might remember the option to tick something marked as Indiegogo content so this doesn't actually impact the game at all apart from putting an additional dream into the pool you'll wake up in a hallway and you can only go to a single Open Door walking in you can see a small apartment along with three desks and some sick multim monitor PC setups this is the Creator's office dream a recreation

of the acid wizard Studios office you can find a lot of pictures lying around Photos of the devs their families and lots of other people associated with darkwoods production random food items and what even looks like concept art as for the Indiegogo part of the dream there's a book you have to find to be able to exit the dream which serves as a thank you to all of Darkwood supporters it's a very cool way of thanking the community and it's interesting seeing the dev's office remade in their own game there's also a couple of funny

bits In the dream thanks to the protagonist commenting on what he sees like him not being able to recognize a modern electric stove because those didn't exist back in 1987 there's a lot of interesting stuff you can find here that would have me reading all the text out on screen but it's definitely worth checking out yourself more on the devs themselves they are genuinely great people I met up with them to interview Them for this video and there've been nothing but helpful with basically anything we asked about and you can still see their dedication to

Darkwood even though they have talked about lore a couple of times on various amas they never give out anything outright to preserve the mystery around the game this was also the case with our interview and also the reason why I Mark out everything law- wise as a theory rather than fact this air of mystery is Integral to dark Wood's atmosphere and unique feel and I can only respect the Developers for keeping it up after so many years so you might wonder what's next for them since Darkwood they've released another game soccer kids which is described

as a game about soccer made by people who suck at playing soccer you suck the game's in Early Access right now on Steam for free and it looks pretty good it's got a lot of good reviews when it came out but obviously There's no way I can sugarcoat it this is the furthest away from Darkwood you could ever get it's also set in '90s Poland Darkwood was obviously a huge success for acid wizard but also it took a huge toll on them as the project overtook their personal lives while they were working on it the

production process was like really really uous for us was long this was 5 years A lot of it was scrunch we made a lot of promises during our crowdfunding campaign and uh It was just too much for free guys to handle you know yeah finishing the project was for sure like the most stressful thing and uh pressure yeah we made so many promises after the campaign so it was hard to do it to fill everything yeah as good as we said it will be since releasing soccer kids they've gone on a Hiatus from game design

and honestly they definitely deserve a break they've made what can genuinely only be called a Masterpiece and I can only wish them well for the future and again I really want to thank the devs for both the help they provided with the video and for making such a unique and frankly insane game I really don't think this there's a single game out there that can replicate the experience of Darkwood so what would you think like the main Legacy of Darkwood is now cuz it's obviously been cemented as like a really successful game like I mean

there's so many video Essays talking about it people that have beat me to it but you know like what would you think is going to happen with the game going ahead that's a very hard question for me I don't know how to answer answer the Legacy part because I don't know I I think I'm not the right person to answer this it's up to other people to answer it like you said many people are like making video essays about it and it's like very cool for us to watch it that They are like spending their

time to analyze it and like they treat it with a much respect and it's very cool for us this game is a niche like Niche game everyone who wants to play it played it already but it all the time it's changing like the game is but more people are finding the game yeah and it's like very shocking it's really awesome to have these people who are like really fan of this game and they like making for example Wikipedia or Some additional stuff admins on the Wiki page of Darkwood they met there and they found a

relationship and uh they got married and she moved in from um the USA from the USA to Finland they got married of a Darkwood yeah that's lit it's a real it's a real story what happens to Darkwood is that uh I think we will uh continue developing the the world maybe not ourselves but with cooperation with some very talented people uh in other media what Darkwood Is unique is that it's a niche within a niche it's like a horror but it's also pixelated it's retro it's from a topo perspective and I think it's like one

of the first games which kind of utilize this perspective to have this effect so when a lot of people see it and you can see on the reviews on Steam and whatnot that people you know say that hey I saw this game I didn't believe that it could be so atmospheric and scary but then I tried it and indeed it's it's really [ __ ] scary so uh I would really like for other games to kind of uh maybe delve into it further because I don't think uh I think there's a lot more to say

uh a lot more things to be said in this perspective yeah [ __ ] that's everything [ __ ] so all in all that is Darkwood one of the best games I've ever experienced top down games just don't do it for me I I just think they're bedtime but a game like that has immersed me and just done such A fantastic job at keeping me engaged throughout I know there have been like a billion video essays on this game I swear there's like another one every single month it was so difficult to try to add

anything that other people didn't do because they did amazing jobs that's why I came out here in the middle of Sweden uh in the snow despite the fact that there is no snow in Darkwood whatsoever but yeah hope you enjoyed the video that's it Go by the game it's Really good PO is [Music] subscrib e [Music] [Music] oh [Music] [Applause] [Music]