The Complete Lore of Afterimage

[@AfterimageTheGame]

Thank you for your incredible work! We never thought that someone would make such a deep and detailed video about the lore of our game. What really impressed us was the obvious effort and the sheer passion you filled into this video. We could not describe how thrilled and grateful we felt, during and after this 2-hour re-journey to Engardin. Thank you again, from the bottom to our hearts🥰

[@godzillafinez4370]

And thank YOU for making such an incredible game!

[@indiexplorergames]

Ahhhh I was hoping you guys would see it! You did such an amazing job with this game, and I sincerely hope this video will encourage more people to experience it for themselves ☺

[@N1ceDreamsz]

Thank you guys for this amazing game. Probably my favourite metroidvania ever. This game deserves so much more attention!

[@reesewitty3341]

when is the sequel releasing. WHEENNN!!!!!

[@OverOmni]

@@reesewitty3341 8379 AD

[@aardbei54]

One of the things I love about Afterimage is that in the lore, the world of Engardin has this divide between Beings created by Luca who have a hard-coded set of instructions and humans, who have no powers but have free will. And the game itself will often repeat this. The Goliaths with their Heart, the Anemo Scions being mindless unless directly connected with Atmous, Samsare who cannot intervene with Engardin "unless compelled", the Sun Crows in general... But then, many of the key events that happen during Afterimage's story happen because of soulless members of the Ode, who are nothing more than puppets controlled by Guider. In the storyline of the Town of the Exiled, Auss and Patt start out on opposite sides, yet both end up practically forced down the path of sacrificing themselves to Eseus. There's Ethan, who starts out trying to investigate what happens, to disprove the Heavenly Voices, and ends up losing his soul just the same. And there's (red) Renee, who is stated to be "paranoid" and mistrusting, but is so frightened of being powerless that she obeys Guider without question. There's Nicole who *must* find her master, disregarding her own safety along with everything else outside her master's wants. And then there's Loss, a Scion of Anemo, who reflects on his actions and decides *no more*. There's, melded with a Hemi-Goliath, who resists its urge to devour everything around her because *that's not who she wants to be*. There's Atmous, who wants to help the creation of the one who hurt her, on the potential instrument of Atmous' own destruction *because that instrument is just a child*. There's Ifree, who, when given the option to become what he always was, what he was always *meant to be*, chooses to stay as he is, sacrificing his Heart and risking his life so Agus and Aqil can have a second chance. And Samsare, who chooses at last to directly intervene so she can save this world of hers and the beings that inhabit it. There's the Sun Crow we meet in the story, who goes against everything that he's supposed to do just because he wants to see his home one last time. I love how choice is such a significant theme in this game (as mentioned again by Alice/Luca in her quest), but how it's not just limited to the human characters. Luca may have intended for the elemental beings to merely support and guide Engardin and its peoples, but they end up becoming much more than that, evolving alongside of (what little is left of) humanity into something better. And I think that is also an important aspect of the game's message. Hope. Hope that the remaining Goliaths can help restore Engardin. Hope that the races of Pyro and humanity can do better, this time. Hope that Nicole can be rebuilt at the last Arteefex. Hope that some day, Rosalia can return to gaze upon the sea of souls again. Hope that, as the game states in one of its achievements, Tomorrow Will Be Longer.

[@bucktae]

This is really great that someone made a lore video about this game. This is really good game with an interesting world building it just sad people can’t appreciate it because they don’t like reading the descriptions and books in the game. I really loved reading everything in the game to learn more about the world.

[@TMind109]

True but I always feel like i don't have time to read so unless I'm super invested in a topic i won't read it but rather try having fun. The game is gorgeous and demands the attention it deserves its also really fun. In reality I experience like only 60% of the game since for some reason its hard for me to comprehend the lore of the game in some places.

[@Bl4ckeye01]

Man this game is so underrated that its unfair

[@METro_KJ]

As much as I enjoyed your Signalis breakdown, the best part of seeing it was ensuring that this video would cross my feed. Afterimage quickly became one of my absolute favorite games this year and probably of all time purely off the experience of playing it and going through the world on my own. Despite my adoration for playing it, I had absolutely no idea what was going on in the lore and narrative. I've recommended it to some friends with the caveat that "it's more of a gameplay game than a story one" and now I feel a bit silly. I really appreciate you bringing everything together in a very easily digestible and compelling manner. You've taken a magical game and erased the one thing that I felt held it back. Now I can love it more than ever.

[@Actionfigure_fit]

I also loved playing the game but after 40 plus hours I still have no idea what was going on

[@Resolute89]

Nice job. The last bit about Alice really rocked my world lol

[@david_mysterium2317]

Same I did not see that coming

[@theguitargod12]

Same! I always thought her ending lines were odd with more data needs to be extracted. I just thought she was gathering data from people who ate her food lol

[@brianstark4]

Indeed, did not see that coming. Though I'm more inclined to think Luca just left a small piece of herself behind to watch humanity, rather than being her true self. It makes much more sense with the line talking about her return. No need to return if you never left after all.

[@nether0701]

I was just thinking about someone to come up with Afterimage's lore and now you came up. Great job, Bro👍🏻😉

[@Yoxlos]

I randomly stumbled upon your work but I'm loving it. You have a great voice and inflection.

[@Zellrei]

Amazing video, you did an incredible job putting this all together. I finished the game a few days ago and I felt there was a tons of things I missed or didn't understand, then I found your video !

[@shay-la-vie]

This was beautiful! I'm so glad I subscribed after finding the Signalis video, you're making great stuff!

[@TheBlaringBlue]

My goodness, this video should win an award. Multiple of them, in fact. I am staggered by the amount of thought, time, attention to detail, effort and excellent work that went into this video. The patience and dedication to go back and capture every lore deposit on the map, as well as highlight text in yellow is just incredible. Seriously, I don't think I could sing your praises enough if I rambled on in this comment for hours - I'm really amazed and impressed. I'm also thankful! Afterimage was a game that definitely captured me and intrigued me. I wanted to go deeper, but was a little put off by the game's length, requirement of a NG+ (which I didn't even know told the story from a new perspective...) and the translation and localization issues. I knew the game's lore was complex and told in a Souls-like manner, which I'm more than fine with, but the typos and incoherent dialogue put me off beyond the point of diving in, unfortunately. I knew there was SOMETHING great here, but could not bring myself to invest the time to dig it up. I'm so glad you did and this video is so valuable to the Afterimage community and fandom. I'll be sure to share it anytime it comes up in conversation.

[@SeferAngeloEspiritus]

Just started to play this game and I'm fell in love with it..... Good lore, metroidvania gameplay, calming music.....

[@ctl91]

Fantastic breakdown. This is one of those games where the lore just seems to spiral endlessly - huge props to the devs for putting so much love into it too.

[@aquaadmindoggo3958]

This was amazing, you did a great job, and I certainly wasn’t expecting a video essay on this game.

[@Brocknoth]

As someone who recently finished the game's proper ending I just want to say thank you for this video. I felt like I either wasn't paying attention enough or maybe something got lost in translation but the story of the game just never clicked with me until now. Such a beautiful game.

[@SheepShade]

Thanks so much for this. I gave up on understanding the plot halfway through, and when I looked on YT your video (posted2 hours ago) was there... So I enjoyed the voice acting but skipped through journals and just went with it. Great to have context for this amazing game. :)

[@Gorgod69]

I thought I came away from the game with a reasonable picture of the main story, but boy, I barely even scratched the surface of it. Thank you for this video, it must have been a monumental task putting everything together. I do wonder if certain things would've been more clear in the original script and if they got mangled in translation, but I imagine doing a translation check would be its own massive undertaking. By the way, I saw a number of scenes throughout that I didn't recognise, like the areas at 2:36:13 and 2:37:16, were those from the Trial of Soul mode? Did that have any extra lore to it?

[@indiexplorergames]

Sorry, somehow missed this one! Yes, those shots are arenas from the Trial of Soul mode. It doesn't have much in the way of new lore, and isn't even connected to the base game directly - you can only access it from the main menu. That said, you do get access to ALL weapons in the game whether you've discovered them or not, and some of those item descriptions (like the Sword of the Hermit) had important lore that I used for this video.

[@TpaulHomdrom]

This is an incredible feat, phenomenally detailed, expertly edited, wonderful production value, and a really tremendous job taking fascinating, complex lore in a story that is structured in a way to make that lore and story quite challenging to parse (which only makes it more fascinating, I love stories like this, but it certainly doesn't make your job easy). Love your videos, and this just took all your work an amazing step further. I had this game on my wishlist all year and just bought it today. Partly because it's on sale... but mostly because the first ten minutes of this video had me hooked. And even though I've watched the whole thing, I'm the kind of person who gets more out of stories from experiencing them over and over, so spoilers don't hurt my experience. I am so excited to dig into this game on my own, and to rewatch this video again when I'm done and further deepen my appreciation for this fascinating, beautiful world and story.

[@indiexplorergames]

So glad to hear it! I hope you have a wonderful experience with the game!

[@MetroidvaniaGuru]

You’re doing God’s work. I appreciate this.

[@keysersoze9652]

glad to have you back dude I thought you gave up, please don't, your content is gold

[@indiexplorergames]

Thank you so much! I have plenty of content planned for 2024, and my release schedule will be far more consistent than it was this year 😅

[@larcek.giglamesh]

small correction at 1:35:58, which is actual the western exit :D

[@NowImGonnaStarve]

So thorough and informative!

[@Arcental]

I feel like Luca is an AI trying to find purpose.. When full of memories, their allocated memory chunk is full so they get moved to an archive which happens to be up in space as stars.. Maybe Luca's master would be an engineer?

[@phee4174]

thanks for making this video! it’s neat seeing all of Afterimage’s lore laid out like this, and a decent portion of the connections I wouldn’t’ve ever drawn out myself with the scattershot way I read/encountered the lore while playing and my imprecise memory.

[@theguitargod12]

My first playthrough of this game was 45 hours long. The world and gameplay was so much fun to explore. On my second playthrough I decided to pay a little more attention to the story and item descriptions. I am surprised on how much I was able to piece together and how much of that really clicked with your thoughts as well. The only few things I missed were the importance of the tablet, Renee possibly not being from this world, and your Alice theory lol. Great video!

[@iRemilia]

thank you for this video. i just finished my 100% run today and had some questions which you all managed to answer. i got the ifree endings first and was especially confused at renee's sudden change of character, because i assumed the endings are more or less just alternate paths that happen at around the same time. when you said that the ifree endings take place after the red renee ending it suddenly made a lot more sense. i also like how the goliaths actually have different dialogues depending on the order you fight them in - i found aqil first, so seeing him say something different in the video is a nice touch.

[@indiexplorergames]

Oh, interesting! It didn't occur to me that you could fight Aquil first, but that makes sense. I saved the Field of Pyro for last since it took way too long for me to figure out that the torches were controlling the barriers 😅

[@miguelalmeida3442]

What a Great GREAT vídeo I just finish the game and came here to sort all of the story pieces that I missed and I am glad to found your vídeo approaching all of the lore I appreciate your fantastic work

[@juliaconnelly7799]

Playing through the game I was obsessed with how gorgeous it was and the classic metroidvania feel. Towards the end I was feeling very lost in all the information the game provides in different ways, like you mention in the video. Then I found this video and I'm even more obesessed with this game and this world. Thank you so so much for making this!! It makes the experience so much richer. I wanted to ask about the time discrepencies you discovered with Red Renee and the other A-name I can't remember. How they have memories of the labs being active or something. Do you think it's possible Renee was split into resonances before the Razing? Like maybe as part of Eseus' plotting and experimenting? And somehow without Aros and Owl knowing? Or would that contradict source material? Thanks!! PS. Yes the Alice thing also blows my mind

[@indiexplorergames]

That's a good question! I tried looking at it from every angle and just couldn't find a satisfying way to explain how Renee's soul could have been split previously - there isn't any solid in-game evidence to support that, and Aros' note about Renee's memories being scattered by the Razing is pretty good evidence against it. However, there are admittedly still a lot of unknowns about Resonants in general - aside from world-ending events, what else could cause a soul to split like that? Clearly it has happened before if Aros knew about it, and I think it's certainly possible Eseus was experimenting with the phenomenon in some way. As a side note, I think it's significant that neither Red Renee nor Avisia directly talk about the Razing, as this implies they didn't experience it.

[@aardbei54]

Late comment, but I only just finished Afterimage myself. When I went back to the Institute beneath Holy Grounds after NG+ I interpreted Eseus' memories and notes, especially her mentioning 42's merging with the Cloudworm as requiring the "creation of a separate, pure soul" and referring to a white-haired woman as "my child", as 42 possibly being a part of the original Renee's (The Heart's) soul. The way I saw it then, extraction of 42's "pure soul" would have further splintered "The Heart" into Ree, Renee, Avisia, and the fragments. Ree and 42 would have been sisters, of a sort, which I thought explained why 42 seemed to look up to Ree when encountering her in the Sea of Souls (as well as the Resonance in the beginning of the game, but I forgot 42 just kinda had a memory crystal with her at the time) In hindsight, this could also be another explanation for Ree's destiny not being engraved on the Tablet, as her original destiny was averted by Eseus when she split "The Heart's" soul. On the othet hand, this 'Renee could be an interdimentional traveler' theory is really interesting, too

[@joshuarobinson1689]

I was way too smooth brained to pick up on this in my playthru. Thanks for all the hard work, this was incredible

[@meyes1098]

I honestly did not know that the endings follow after each other in that way, which is why the last quarter of the game was VERY confusing for me. I thought that each ending is completely separate and independent of the others, so it made no sense to me why the gate to negredo tower would be open after doing "new game plus" (terrible name for it, to be honest xD). This clears up so much!

[@huydo7609]

Thank you for making such amazing detailed explanation on this game.

[@d00mnoodle24]

I picked up some of this, but it's stretched over such a long game that i started forgetting aspects. Nice video puttting it all together

[@highlordgrim4671]

Amazing video, 10/10.... I loved the lore of this game, and your theories all makes perfect sense for me! a lot of my prior theories that I had were also shut down... I have a question tho, at 1:15:10 -ish, you mentioned "5 years" as the prep time for the armies of pyro... can you tell me why?

[@indiexplorergames]

It's kind of a lot to explain, so I decided to add a link to that section of my script in the video description above! Hopefully that will answer your question 😊

[@highlordgrim4671]

Thank you for the link, I just read it, I like your theory crafting. But time in this game is, as you mentioned, really annoying to keep track of... Especially when looking at the "age" of the "humans". I wanna share a bit of my theory here regarding my reasoning to thatL "humans" are in-fact, very non-human (as you also mentioned in your video), they are built from wells, likely do not breed, and most importantly (for me), when they die, they form wanderers. This made me theorize that the "human" body is not made of flesh and bones as you'd expect, but might be some sort of sculpture created in the wells, hence the 'stony' form of the wanderers, would also explain why the "humans" appear ageless across the game (and the quote you mentioned between Owl and Stanley "68 years, seven months, and nine days"). I REALLY loved this game, and I really enjoyed its lore, I also really loved you theories about the lore, they are really compelling and make perfect sense! Thank you for your effort in sharing your this 2+hrs video, must've been a great effort making!

[@indiexplorergames]

@@highlordgrim4671 That explanation works for me! I hadn't really thought of it from the "tabernacle of clay" angle, which is surprising since I played Moonscars not all too long ago haha

[@metroidvanias]

Great work, Dude!

[@harmonizing_spellian]

I feel like I played through this game and thought it was beautiful. But didn't quite fully appreciate how beautiful it was until I watched through this video.

[@encendrel]

Incredible work! I got the same broad strokes, but I stopped looking into the weapon and armor descriptions at some point and missed some pretty interesting details. Some things from my personal experience that I thought were neat are: when I started, the vibe was that all these disasters happened centuries ago, but you slowly come to realize that the Razing might as well have happened earlier that year. Also, I'd totally forgot about the whole deal with Auss by the time I learned that Luca had long since left the world and didn't make the connection that the God Auss was talking about couldn't have been Luca. Another thing that made things click for me is that, upon completing the NG+ episodes and returning to the main save, the quests for the first six endings are immediately completed, and you can view their conclusions in the log. If you choose to do so, it makes immediate sense what "happened" and in what order. So I don't think it's that convoluted once you have all the information. I do think it's possible for Eseus to have began her schemes without Levine or Aros' knowledge-when Aros speaks of the war, she never implies that she was complicit in it or even that she knew why it really happened, despite the fact that if she knew anything at all of Eseus' intentions, she'd have to have known the end result of Eseus' actions. And Eseus did have Karin-between the two of them and their positions, they could probably get a sufficient amount of manpower while not revealing the full truth to the others. One of the echoes in the sunken sanctum, that doesn't appear to be Eseus or Karin, embraces Eseus' plan to turn humanity into a hive mind or a pantheon of great spirits, but another from Eseus' perspective claims she has to 'find a good reason' to make humans go to war. It seems to me that they did co-opt some, while deliberately manipulating everyone else. Maybe unrealistic, but the writers' intention seems to be that Levine and Aros were in the dark regarding Eseus' true motives. Additionally, in Eseus' notes, she always seems to consider Levine and Aros to be near-equals in power if not philosophy. I wouldn't be surprised if she hid things from them specifically, believing them to be potential obstacles to her plans. When it comes to Ifree, I think that a lot of his retrospection has to do with the Soul Link. When it comes to the Ashen Canyon-it's probably not that he thinks trying to stop humanity was a mistake, especially since he had the guidance of the Heart to begin with-it seems more likely that he misinterpreted how humans would respond to it. With the perspective of Renee's soul, he sees that destroying the army there only gave them more reason to fight, rather than drawing the war to a close as he hoped. Perhaps with a better understanding of a human soul, he realized he made the wrong decision with that particular action. Other, little things, like how he likes grilled meat but not seafood, or his childish behavior, could be him adapting to a more human way of thinking as well. Finally, for the theory about Renee-to me, it seems unlikely that she's an outsider to the world-she was deeply connected to the Glyph of Rebirth since childhood, and the Glyphs are something that were adapted by Luca specifically for Engardin. Surely if she were an outsider, her gift would take a more alien form? With the information you presented, my theory would be that the Glyphs that composed the world didn't originally include the Glyph of Rebirth, or that it was stuck in the Sea of Souls-Renee would be brought into the physical world specifically to engrave it on Tablet. And there's an argument to be made that, since 'resurrection' and 'rebuilding' are considered fundamentally different, no other entity in the world appears to have the power to heal the body (other than the existence of healing potions). For the narrative, it could make sense for Samsare to want Renee to introduce the Glyph of Rebirth to the world, as the "body" of Engardin had suffered damage without a means of repair, with the completion of the Oath and third ending being that Engardin is finally capable of healing with Renee's glyph engraved into the Tablet. anyways when 42 told the Ear to 'stop talking in riddles' i was done with her

[@VoidMarshal11]

Absolutely fantastic! I adored this game so much and the story was very cryptic and this puts the entire story together. The open-ended parts of the world flower ending leave a possibility for more games within the world of Engardin.

[@N1ceDreamsz]

Damn over 2 1/2 hours! I'll definitely be watching all of this, there's so much lore in this game it's crazy, and theres surely stuff I don't fully understand. It's definitely one of my favourite games ever and the best Metroidvania I've ever played, it's massive and the attention to detail is ridiculous. I hope more people discover this game in time as it went under the radar.

[@austriantrader662]

I loved how this game played and the soundtrack. But the story was completely incomprehensible to me, so thanks for this.

[@whymnca9716]

Going to buy the game now so that I can enjoy this video to the fullest, de you back in a week

[@keysersoze9652]

Love your videos Not sure if this is already on your radar or not but I think a story analysis of Axiom Verge 1 and 2 would be great I can't find ones on youtube, especially for the second game thank you for all the great work here, sir keep in up

[@indiexplorergames]

Huge fan of those games, and I have considered it! Might happen at some point, we'll see 😊

[@zacrichards5031]

I know i commented before, but I'm rewatching it and you made a point about no one knowing when Renee was born, due to her rebirth gift. That's Luca, who was not on the tablet she found, could manipulate her essence and that of others, and Samsara only helps us. We are the afterimage, left by Luca, in her image to better the world eternally. We play a fragmented portion of this, but in order to be whole, we must set everything right. Luca is light, and Renee is her rebirth. God never left in this world, she just walks among mortals to fix what her creations broke. She tanked the first flood of the razing with only fragmentation. No one else could and she bypasses the rebirth system. In her complete form, she's Luca's daughter, if not the god herself. What better gift to your child, than the ability to never fail. You might struggle, and pain is part of the growth, but you will always be put back together. 42 can't bind your soul, it just takes longer for you to reform, and considering how far she takes Aros, to do just that, i think you can get the implications. That sigil in the Essential ending isn't new, it's not an assumed power, and this is when we get the writing that we were included on the Tablet. Luca, not knowing herself, but still doing her best to help, wrote her name on the tablet to forever be the anchor. She'll probably sink like a stone in the sea of souls but I'd be surprised if Jellyfish or Shenlong doesn't just go there and bring her back

[@schmenbie]

_Afterimage_ has an _amazing_ story-a fact whose extent we admittedly did not quite understand until we finished watching this video. We had impressions of it in light of what we _could_ parse on our own from the game alone after one and a half playthroughs, but _Afterimage_ reaches levels of mindbending (in a good way!) well beyond any of our assumptions. As good a story as it presents, the quality of its _storytelling_ is perhaps subject in large part to a given person’s sensibilities on the subject. A given narrative need not be linearly or overtly told at all junctures to be “good”, but we could nonetheless understand complaints that _Afterimage_ “doesn’t make any sense” simply because its storytelling style is comprised equally of instances where The Great Mystery is intentionally kept as such for effect or suspense, and instances where dialogue is delivered in a way that implies a presumption of existing working knowledge on the part of the player or viewer. The awkwardness and inconsistent quality of the English localisation do not help things (we imagine that it is quite solid in Chinese). For our part, we are fine with all this-it _is_ a video game first, after all-but we must admit that, when recommending it to friends, we do often wave our hand and state that the story “doesn’t make any sense”. We don’t mean this literally, of course; we’re just not qualified to unpack it ourself! … Now, we don’t have to. 😍 Thank you so much for making this! We feel very fulfilled for having watched it and you have earned a very grateful sub as a result. 😭💜 We hope your channel gets bigger; you really deserve it. ✨ On a more personal note, we want to ask, for reasons beyond trends, conventions, or courtesies, but which we won’t outline here: what are your pronouns? o:

[@trooper8835]

Okay, if Alice is Luca. What does this make the other chefs whom she refers to as her brothers and sisters? Or what about her teacher? Is it possible that Luca is simply borrowing Alice’s body/form temporarily?

[@indiexplorergames]

So like I said at 27:34, I don't think "brothers and sisters" is meant to be taken literally, but rather is used to communicate the bond conjurors have with each other. As for whether Alice existed before Luca, or is simply Luca's bespoke mortal form, it's hard to say for sure - personally I lean towards the latter, but I think there's an argument to be made either way!

[@trooper8835]

@@indiexplorergames TBH, forgot the first statement.

[@warcatbattalion]

Its makes me mad that some people call the story nonsensical. Like, what so hard about it? This game has tons of exposition and if you ACTUALLY play until the end, everything makes sense, they literally explaind it to you. This game isnt even cryptic like Souls games where most of ythe stories are within item descriptions.

[@indiexplorergames]

Absolutely. I suspect a big reason for that is most people don't even finish it, and even fewer actually go for all ten endings 🙄

[@applemania6469]

this video is amazing! i’m glad i decided to buy and play this game definitely a hidden gem.

[@jj_1167]

Sugoi

[@jj_1167]

😿

[@Rekennnnn]

Didn't play the game, but the settings seems intriguing. Thanks for the analysis

[@danebramage04]

Just grabbed this half off on switch!!! I can't wait!!!

[@LeoFight]

This is impressive!

[@julitakamaki4386]

Thank you for this. I hope we get a sequel.

[@PervSlaya]

2:10:20 ifree you little shit made me sad for a second there.

[@meyes1098]

So a question here: Why would Samsare do Luca's bidding? The way it's explained, both Samsare and Luca seem to have existed way before the world of Engardin was crafted (which already existed before that, but was barren with only the tablet existing, which is unknown who created it, but it wasn't Luca). So based on this, Samsare should be a being more or less on Luca's level. Why would she just randomly submit to Luca?

[@indiexplorergames]

While Samsare does defer to Luca during your interactions with her, I don't think she "submitted" to Luca so much as made a deal with her, and got something in return. Her soulfield was transformed into a vast world of countless souls and a veritable wealth of memory, with Samsare and her cions having full jurisdiction over that realm. Perhaps this was all Samsare wanted in exchange for aiding Luca in her creation of Engardin, or maybe there were other conditions we just don't know about.

[@meyes1098]

@@indiexplorergames yeah that makes sense!

[@zacrichards5031]

I loved the video, but I was a little disappointed that you didn't look further into the themes of alchemy. The process to make the philosophers stone required three stages. Nigredo, the blackening stage, as mortal form is broken down. It's symbolic of entropy and returning to the formless chaos. Then there's Albedo, the whitening stage, where the impurities are removed before forming, this is symbolic of the spiritual being washed clean of the earthly. Lastly comes Rubedo, the reddening, where the perfected physical is reunited with the purified spiritual to form a gestalt creation. Now, there's a fourth step in that process that I'll bring up later because I think the name of the game comes from this concept, but I wanna focus on those three first. Dark, white, and red, just like the pieces of Renee (rebirth), and only once the pieces are unified and synthesized is Renee able to get her canon ending and guide the others to theirs. That stage that I left out is called citrinitas, the yellowing, and it's the stage in which lunar light, reflected light, is doused and solar light, inner light from the true source is brought onto the project. It's the idea that you are copying or just following a recipe, but an individual act of creation and insight. The true light returns to replace the glow it left, and I think that phrasing might sound a little familiar. Luca is represented in a lot of stuff with golden colors, and I think you might have missed the forest for the trees with this one. This yellow color only really matters in the process of alchemy and the main place we see this theme play is with Renee. A girl seemingly born with the ability to skip the cycle of death and rebirth to do so wherever the streams are. A girl who is the only one to coax a deal out of Samsara since the goddess. A girl who is strong enough to wield the goddess's sword. The same girl who has the true symbol of the power of creation of the world behind her. That menu with the golden branch is how Renee interacts with the world and grows stronger. It's the inside of her memory stone gaining experience, but she can't sink. What if Alice isn't Luca, but one of the programs left to collect data for observation. Alice talks a lot about siblings and what she learned from her master about how to live a good life. She speaks robotically almost, and seems like she's heading back to report soon. So I think Renee is just able to rebirth, but I'd a rebirth of Luca that is only lit by her own past reflection currently.

[@indiexplorergames]

Thank you for sharing this! And you're absolutely right, it would have been very interesting to go deeper into explaining this aspect of the story. Ultimately it just came down to length, the video was already so long and complicated by the point I was noticing this stuff (and taking so long to make) that I decided not to include it. At the time I was also toying with the idea of doing a follow up mini-series focusing on specific topics like this, but unfortunately that ended up not happening since I didn't think there would be much demand for them.

[@zacrichards5031]

​@@indiexplorergamesis love to see a mini series as I'm just now catching that whenever our Renee dodges or stacks, it's followed by a gold tracer. I think that Renee was her vessel, given the ability to come back at her will without crossing the sea of souls. Once the final boss ascends she mistakes our character for her daughter but instantly corrected this. We are Luca's daughter, her will to do better, in the same way a resonant is a sister. Luca built the world off herself, so, if people can fracture, she most certainly can too. So, a loving and true God, she cast off at least one post of herself to live independently, returning to the whole one full as it cannot pass on normally

[@meyes1098]

@@indiexplorergames A miniseries would be nice, focusing in depth on some of the niche things in the lore, like bosses lore, etc. But I think waiting for the DLC or sequel (if any of these ever happen) would be better, than to put time into such a series, only for a dlc/sequel to release 3 days later xD

[@surobyk]

Do you have any idea which games lore you are doing next? I have few tips that are interesting and at the same time could attract audience

[@RandomAnimeFighter]

Great video

[@justtestingmycurrentskills747]

2:33:08 Mind Blown

[@sion7651]

this makes me wonder why games like hollow knight get so famous and others not. afterimage is the only metroidvania i have played that manages to reach the heights of hollow knight but does not get the same recognition.

[@indiexplorergames]

For reals, I've been wondering the same thing. Even smaller games like The Last Faith have gotten way more coverage and buzz this past year, makes me wonder if a lot of it just comes down to luck.

[@sion7651]

@@indiexplorergames i guess marketing is a huge factor as well as artstyle. not sure the anime aesthetics speaks to a lot of people? i looked up the last faith! that looks good! IGN gave it an IGN out of 10... must be at least a 9 then^^

[@scottkathary8240]

You sir, are a gentleman and a scholar.

[@azwarrakitic3310]

Amazing ❤

[@fernandomalpica1870]

I have been thinking of gettin' a new game since finishing Ender Lilies and Aliens Dark Descent, maybe I'll pick this one or Lost Ruins.

[@joshuarobinson1689]

It's super fun. I've been having a blast with it.

[@fernandomalpica1870]

@@joshuarobinson1689 Thanks mate. I'll consider it more profoundly.

[@Moonlit_Melody]

@@fernandomalpica1870 I play both and would say Lost Ruins is cool but compared to Afterimage... it's just like piece of sand compared to a world biggest desert. Afterimage is a metroidvania for real metroidvania fans. It's enormously huge and sooo fun to explore. And art, and music...gosh. I just looove this game.

[@fernandomalpica1870]

@@Moonlit_Melody Thanks for the input, I'll take it into consideration, there's another game that's catching my eye in PS store, looks like a Castlevania kind of game, dark and bloody, we'll see.

[@pilgrimspromise1132]

Loving the game in the coolest thing about it is you got to shut out from the developer how cool is that

[@keysersoze9652]

everyone loves you here sir 221 likes vs 0 like 🔥 keep it up

[@phoenixking9029]

Wait, where did you find Loss friendly NPC version? I played through the entire game and only met Loss twice as boss fights, never had a chance to met his friendly version nor talked to him

[@indiexplorergames]

After you fight him the second time (Heart of Veins), you can find him at the bottom of the Grand Archives!

[@OverOmni]

I watched this entire video inside of Ultrakill. peak.

[@larcek.giglamesh]

just saw your Ender Lilies Lore and then this vid was recommended. honestly, while the gameplay was good in this game, the Lore never felt too fleshed out and the "endings" this game showcased simply left more riddles than answers for most of it. the convenient amnesia whenever necessary and the odd side-kick just felt like rather convenient choices the devs made up to reveal their potential impact as we go and they do play their part one way or another. i'm curious about this lore, and am about to start watching this video, but i doubt it will change my feelings i have about the game.

[@JJsiN84]

I just got done completing and obtaining every trophy in Ender Lily's. This game reminds me of it and it almost looks like the same layout. Was this from the same developers?

[@indiexplorergames]

Nope! Different studio, Aurogon Shanghai is based in China and Binary Haze is based in Japan. While there are some interesting similarities between the two, they play quite differently from each other both mechanically and narratively.

[@JJsiN84]

@@indiexplorergames Well I appreciate your work nonetheless, I decided to give this game a chance because of your video and I am very much enjoying it so far.

[@leemuita]

Amazing

[@DenuCat]

Only 256 views? No way!

[@TMind109]

I don't really have time for this but ill like the vid just incase i need help with a better explanation regarding the lore of one of my favorite games

[@charleswiltshire21]

me, came here after about 5 hours in the game ABSOLUTELY not understanding wtf is gking on in the game: watxhing 3 minutes. Me again:lets see how long is the video, 3 hours almost? hell no, i dont waste my life 3 hours on this, no thanks good sir

[@azuarc]

Just when I was thinking about what it would take to make a video like Mossbag's lore analysis for Hollow Knight, I check online and this has just gone up. Good, because I would have made a terrible video. I'm shocked this is 2 1/2 hours, though, so I'm gonna need to see how there's *that* much content.

[@azuarc]

*slow clap ovation* Damn, dude. This was an impressive compilation of extraneous facts from a game that does not do a very good of explaining itself in a coherent manner. The running criticism on Afterimage is that its story kinda sucks, but told this way, mostly everything fits together in a coherent fashion. I'll be honest; my previous comment was inspired by a replay of the game and the realization that I have no idea what's happening in this game but maybe the information is there. Playing a lot of Genshin Impact and following lore channels dedicated to that, I realized that with enough analysis, maybe something can be put together. I'm extremely grateful someone else took the time to puzzle it out on my behalf and retold it in a fashion that conveys all the meaning. Still a few things I might need to replay or rewatch to put together, but I can actually say this game's lore makes some degree of sense now.

[@SizemicKick177]

What is this based on? I dont have a problem with it i just want to verify that its correct and theres not baseless interpetations and conclusions. I see the developers thanks you but im still curious how you came to all this info, so please do tell.

[@indiexplorergames]

The vast majority of this information comes directly from the game itself - not sure if you watched the video yet, but I show my sources for every claim using in-game footage and explain how I arrived at that conclusion to begin with. When I do need to fill in a gap in the story, I use logical reasoning based on in-game evidence to suggest a possible answer. Of course, at the end of the day, this video IS simply my own personal interpretation and I don't claim for it to be 100% correct. You are welcome to disagree and have your own theories! 😊

[@Moonlit_Melody]

Oh yes that's what I was looking for LOL

[@Funkykun]

Thanks for the amazing video! This game has such great story and worldbuilding, but the storytelling and translation is not great.

[@neerkum5428]

Luca🤟😎

[@surobyk]

You deserve to be the equal of mossbag

[@Arcental]

kind of funny how out of order i played the story lool