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The Sounds of Nightmares episode 1 analysis: Who Works The Workers?

Move over Spooky Month, the professor's got a new hyperfixation!!!

So let's talk about Noone's friend and why I think they're RK.

We know that the Ferryman was at the Stone Giant at the time of Noone's "visit" and the Tall Woman only seems interested in keeping other adults captive. At the end of the dream one of the tall woman's chains grabs the friends legs (like RK's shackle) and she, having no reason to imprison him, would hand him to the Ferryman (Had he not been there RK would probably be put a jar from the room the Ferryman was checking.

Now onto the Workers!

I think they're anti-nomes. They're movement being like a group but also like individuals fits the spread of black mold (which would line up with their pitch black appearance). The fungus connection is made stronger by their behaviour being closer to violent nomes rather than shadow kids o glitching remains.

What is the Stone Giant?

It's a clock... In all seriousness it's a ring shaped prison with a massive clock tower in the middle of a massive snowy field. The key to understanding it's function comes from the photo in Otto's office being an astrolabe and the Tall Woman wanting "something" from inside Noone, something I believe to be a negative emotion that powers the woman's chains. The same emotion farmed from the prisoners +, likely in an effort to keep the workers working and the clock running.

My thought on Otto and Noone will come after my analysis of the bathhouse, since a lot of that will (possibly) involve theories by @queen0fm0nsterz .

Hate to break it to you but they're not "distancing" from anything, Dave Mervik, the man in charge of the lore for the first two games, said in an interview that they had a lore bible that explained why everything is the way it is, LN is not and never has been a "make what you will of it" type of game in terms of lore. The return of dialogue does not change that, the podcast is in effect the same as hearing someone describe a level from the games.(the biggest change being the episode written by SuperHorrorBro having dialogue for the monsters)

Also, Tarsier used "The Nowhere" as a name for the LN world in item listings for LN2 in all languages, with the N always capitalized, it's not something new.

And on last thing: LN3 looks to be the least cohesive or grounded story and setting in the franchise up to this point, and considering we've seen so little, it wouldn't surprise me if this game answers less questions than any prior installment, instead, setting up for even more future content.

I super excited and know Supermassive will do Tarsier and the fanbase proud!

My initial thoughts on what we've seen from Little Nightmares III so far:

okay, first of all-

ohmygodohmygod it's happening this is the best day of my life I'm eternally grateful we get more of this oh my god I'm so happy-

okay, with that out of the way, I have more in depth thoughts. My overall feelings on the reveal are incredibly positive, but with the caveat that this is still visibly missing some elements from the initial LN formula. This isn't to say that this will be bad in comparison, just different, and I feel it's worth it to put a spotlight on that.

The most obvious example of a change in philosophy is the inclusion of multiplayer. To be totally honest, I was actually worried about the idea of them including multiplayer, because the idea seems to stand against the linear artistic experience that the series is recognized for, but the way they've pitched the multiplayer does sound pretty unobstructive, so I'll bite my tongue on that. I do think it has a risk of making the experience less cohesive though. It's clear that the decision was inspired by LN2, but that undersells the amount of individuality that six has in that game. You can't recreate the volatile emotions of your interactions with her if there wasn't the moments where she's not there with you, and you can't have the scripted moments where she acts of her own accord to serve the narrative, if she was meant to serve the dual purpose of being a vessel for another player. idk, I suppose we'll see.

The other visible element that branches out from the original philosophy is the very clear push towards grounded, overt storytelling. Little nightmares from the beginning has presented it's story in a very deliberately vague way. Typically, it pushes the story beats through implication, and let's your brain fill in the gaps to get the intended story beats alongside some lingering uncertainty of the conclusion you've come to. it's not a game that is meant to be explained (contrary to what some youtube videos might tell you lol. the truth of little nightmares story is, explicitly, what you personally take away from it. some people view six as sympathetic, some people view her as purely heartless, and neither conclusion is wrong (please don't fight about it ; ;)

anyway, point is... this new entry is distancing itself from that element that's been inherently baked in until this point. like in the initial development of the first game, they removed all references to real world language, there is deliberately no spoken language in the series. the only exception so far, out of every piece of media in the series, has been the comics, which were cancelled and decanonized (though those characters still exist in that universe somewhere, in my heart ; ;) and the press release material, which has been the backbone of all explicitly stated Little Nightmares facts. we wouldn't even have character names if it weren't for that stuff, there are no names stated in any of those games!

with that said, and while it is cool as hell that they exist... making the new announcement of additional story media in this universe be through audio drama is a bit of an odd choice, isn't it? like... inherently? with this in mind? Like I'm over the moon with excitement, I'm not complaining, but the change in philosophy is pretty visible, right?

also, speaking of the universe, another example of the shift to more overt and clear storytelling is that they've officially given the setting a name. this isn't strictly new, we have "The Maw" "The Nest" (still canon in my heart ; ;) "The Pale City" and the new game, in turn, has "The Necropolis"

and yet, another name in the marketing has been "the Nowhere," a name that has been exclusively described with language implying we are already familiar with it, e.g. "welcome back to the Nowhere" and "are you ready to return to the Nowhere?"

This name has never been used in any previous media, as far as I know, but I think it's pretty clear that the underlying implication is that "The Nowhere" refers to the entirety of the LN universe.

not to sound like a broken record, but... my reaction remains a simultaneous "this is cool as hell" and "this was made with a very different philosophy in mind."

I predict that LN2 will have a much more cohesive story, grounded in a specific and defined setting. We've lost the ambiguity present in the series' identity, but that could lead to some cool things in the future.

overall? I'm extremely excited and incredibly optimistic, but do think that we should go into this new experience with the understanding that it might be a different one. There is visibly a new team working on this one, and while they may not have put as much focus into the subtleties of this franchise's identity, they are very clearly trying to stay true to the overall identity. you can tell in the art style, it's borderline perfect, and it's very clear that the people working on this knew how important stuff like that was to this game, and to us. This won't be the same experience that Tarsier would have made, but Tarsier was content to not make any more of this experience, so a new direction is far from blasphemous. I'm overjoyed that we're getting this new experience, with all it's little differences, and I can't wait to see what they do.

(also, to anyone who's curious about the design philosophy of the original game, I highly recommend this presentation. I feel like not enough people have seen this, and it's so interesting)

The title "Little Nightmares" finally makes sense!

If, as the ending of episode 3 of TSOI implies, the human world is supplemental to to the Nowhere, then the fact that it cherishes qualities associated with kids (curiosity, honesty, playfulness), which the Nowhere punishes at every turn would make the human world, other worlds like it and their inhabitants the Nowhere's "little nightmares".