Observation Ending Explained

Observation ending explained seems important, as the game's closing is anything but easy to understand. Here's what we got.

Observation Ending Explained

Over the course of the game, players take on the role of the International Space Station (ISS)'s A.I., S.A.M., as its tasked with helping Dr. Emma Fisher to find crew members that have have gone missing. S.A.M receives a mysterious message early in the game's story: "Bring Her," followed by unknown symbols.

Things only get weirder from there, eventually culminating in a scene in which Dr. Fisher wakes up on a strange version of Earth. As Dr. Fisher explores, she finds other crashed space stations and crew members, including a dead version of herself.

The ending indicates that all the crashed ships and alternate crew members are from other timelines in which similar series of events took place. The game has followed Dr. Fisher and S.A.M. through the first timeline in which any of the crew survives the crash, and this new Earth is a kind of nexus for all the disparate timelines.

Dr. Fisher and S.A.M meet the mysterious hexagon that has appeared throughout the game. It is likely the source of the message both received over the course of the game, and after solving a brief puzzle the two are whisked up into the air.

When the game fades back in, Dr. Fisher and S.A.M. appear to have merged into one being, which then starts spreading darkness across the world before the "Bring Her" message appears one last time.

What exactly this ending means is ambiguous. The message "Bring Her" is previously given to both S.A.M. and Dr. Fisher, which could mean either that neither one is the "Her" in question, or that both are a single entity in the eyes of the alien force.

That the message appears again even after the two have merged, however, indicates that there is another "Her" that the alien force desires.

The powers that S.A.M. and Dr. Fisher exhibit in the ending are also hard to explain, but are likely the result of some confluence of human and A.I. mixing plus the influence of the alien force.

Unfortunately for the truly lost out there, there are no concrete answers on what the ending means. Maybe if developer No Code makes a sequel we'll be offered more clarity. For now, the game remains open to interpretation.

Photo courtesy of No Code/Devolver Digital