Zero Punctuation: SOMA

[1981]

I just finished it myself. I liked it a lot more than I thought I would.

Spoiler

In the sense that you seem quite certain of your assertion that the game was actually about false realities and how easily the mind can be tricked into accepting them. That's...not really what the game is about at all. In fact there's even two bits of the game that directly contradict that assertion: the part where you have to try and get the security cipher from the dude by running him through simulated realities. Almost every time he ends up completely rejecting the reality and figuring out that it's fake. Then there's the bit where you get grabbed by the monster and stuck up into the wall...you're treated to a scene of Simon back in his apartment with his girlfriend and Simon out-right rejects that scene and wakes up to pry himself off the wall.

I don't think it was about false realities, but they did fail to explain why the people who were trapped in broken robot bodies seemed unaware of their fate. We humans rely heavily on our senses. Simon's suit even made breathing noises. Could claim that it's the parts of our brain that process this information that need it, not our consciousness. I'd claim that they can't be separated. Thinking about it, it would've made more sense if only the minds who were basically put in potatoes would've gone insane.

So Simon stayed sane because there was a dead body inside his suit? I wouldn't use the word sound to describe a decaying human body. Just like the monster thing, it didn't make a whole lot of sense. Feel free to explain.

Another thing that made no sense was that those people had developed a highly advanced AI, but didn't have matter replicators or renewable food sources. They didn't even have the good sense to bring harpoons to the bottom of the sea.

The reason they discourage looking at monsters is likely that, ironically, the AI is barely sophisticated enough to walk in a circle. A modder once said that the pathing in Amnesia: The Dark Descent is linear at best and unpredictable at worst. Luckily there weren't too many of those encounters.