History VideoGame / Inside2016

* SpiritualSuccessor: To {{Videogame/Limbo}}. It's ''possibly'' more than that, though, given certain shared elements in both games.
** Both feature burrowing white worm parasites that control minds, in this game infesting pigs and forcing one to be hostile to you. Humans parasitized by the worms of ''Limbo'' have a lurching gait not unlike the limping march of remote bodies.
** The weather machine in ''Limbo'' activates with a distant flash and a powerful rumble, not unlike the shockwaves generated by the wave room in this game.
** The bizarre "ceiling water" segments in ''Inside'' evoke the antigravity technology in ''Limbo.''
** Creator/DevolverDigital's ''VideoGame/{{Carrion}}'' seems to be an EvilCounterpart to the finale of ''Inside''.

* SceneryPorn: See SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome below. The vignettes in this game really justify the six year development time. Much like Limbo, critics have described the world and its environment as "beautifully bleak"; in other words, the game fleshes out how bleak settings have their own beauty to appreciate.

* TheUnreveal: [[spoiler:The player never learns many things about the world of the game, making it that much more frightening. Why are the adults showing their children the zombie mindslaves? Are they citizens paying for them? Why are the citizens wearing masks but the scientists aren't? Who or what is controlling the spotlights? What is that cabled spinal dart they shoot out for? What does the shockwave zone even do and why is it there? Is it all part of an elaborate barrier keeping the scientists away from some outside threat? Or is it to keep something inside? Was it the mind control worms that killed the farm animals, or something else? Is that why citizens outside the lab wear masks? Where does the boy originate from? Do we really ever get outside?]] There's more to ponder on the [=YMMV=] tab under AlternateCharacterInterpretation.

* LightIsNotGood: At several points in the game the objective is to avoid light sources, whether they're the flashlights of your pursuers or the spotlights cast by some sort of automated security system.

* AmbiguousSituation: A whole lot worse to figure out this time too- unlike ''Limbo'', which was almost entirely symbolic, it appears that ''INSIDE'' does hold some answers to its most confusing questions. [[spoiler: It's widely accepted that the bonus ending basically tells the player that the boy is under the mind control, but this creates a lot more questions- if he is, why can he emote so effectively and pass for a real human perfectly? And who is controlling him? [[MetaFiction Is it you]]?]]

** References to Playdead's previous game ''Limbo'' are very easy to miss. A silhouette of that game's boy is hidden in the first fern seen on the title screen. That boy's head is also on in-game coffee mugs. ''Limbo''[='=]s elevator and magnet boxes fall off a table that the Huddle lands on during the endgame sequence.

* AmbiguousEnding: After a long, terrifying and painful journey attempting to escape to safety, you ultimately end up [[spoiler:as a fleshy husk motionless on a beach (apparently) just outside the facility. It's unclear whether you survived, whether you really escaped, or whether it was the correct way to deal with the MindControl.]]

** If the boy really was [[spoiler: a remote body the entire time, like the ones the scientists were controlling, does that mean the part where you take control of the horrible blob thing and supposedly escape the facility is actually just [[AllAccordingToPlan another part of the experimental process?]]]]
** The boy's motive for going to the facility is unclear. Does he get forced into it on his attempt to escape? Does he nobly want to stop the facility of his own free will? Or is he [[spoiler:mind-controlled by the Huddle telling him to free it?]]

* BittersweetEnding: A common interpretation of the secret ending is that [[spoiler:the boy finally disabled the thing causing potential MindControl, but in the process, disabled himself.]]

* ColorCodedForYourConvenience: The mind control helmets all emit a stale shade of yellow. [[spoiler: The parasitic worms that are found burrowed into the pigs (and control one into attacking you) are the same colour. The mysterious Orbs hidden throughout the game emit a light of the same colour, and the cabling that hints at an Orb's nearby location is also that same yellow.]]

* {{Dystopia}}: The whole game takes place inside an utterly massive complex built upon the ruins of a much older, dilapidated city. People are enslaved en masse, and used as either fodder for experiments on weird, otherworldly MindControl technology or slave labor using helmets that command them telepathically. Parts of the city have no clear purpose and are unnecessarily huge, and seem to go on forever. People in white masks appear to be in control of herding the captured slaves, and these notably include children. At the end of the game, you enter what appears to be the newest part of the city, and get in on the conspiracy mentioned above. [[spoiler: You hijack a massive fusion of several people together into something that looks straight out of ''Franchise/SilentHill'' before going on a rampage. Whatever the ball of flesh was made for is never completely explained, but considering the plugs you pull off of it look identical to mind control helmets, it's possible it was controlling all the "active" slaves you saw towards the beginning of the game.]]

* EverythingTryingToKillYou: To the point where you're nervous around a flock of chicks. Luckily they're harmless. [[spoiler: You still have to blow the poor buggers through a grain vacuum to solve a puzzle, however. They do, at least, survive going through that.]]

** [[spoiler:The 'normal' ending: the massive blob of flesh you've become breaks out of the facility and tumbles all the way down a mountain slope, coming to rest in a shaft of light on a beach - which may or may not be a real place. Cue credits.]]

* GuideDangIt: Accessing the hidden ending. [[spoiler:Once all the Orbs are deactivated, the light on the billboard denoting the 2nd Orb stays on. If you remember that Orb's below the cornfield underneath a trap door that blends into the Earth, congratulations on making it that far. However, there's a 3-point lever control to open the door in that bunker. The solution to the 14-lever push combination is a musical melody, and it's played by the reel-to-reel cassette beside the 5th Orb, the one that unlocks the Obscure Foundations achievement.]]

* HopeSpot: [[spoiler:You climb up a chain out of a flooded area, heading for a catwalk bathed in the first rays of ''sunlight'' you've seen all game . . . and then the chain slips, and you fall back down into the water, where the StringyHairedGhostGirl seizes you to give you the "upgrade" that will eventually lead you to the Huddle. You won't see the sun again until the very end, and then you have been subsumed by a mass of flesh.]]

* InMediasRes: Implied at the beginning in a way more prominent than ''Limbo'', where rather than [[GoodMorningCrono a boy slowly waking up in a forest]], this boy runs onto the screen from the side, starting gameplay almost immediately after the game boots up. Like everything else in the game, any immediate questions about what he's doing there and where he came from [[AmbiguousSituation are never made fully obvious]].

** [[spoiler:...the hidden ending, in which the boy disconnects the power to a mind control helmet connected to a computer rig and immediately slumps over like the rest of the zombies. This ending is only unlocked by deactivating all of the Orbs in the game, which glow the same yellow as the mind control helmets. It's possible that the Huddle was to be a HiveMind that controlled all of the working slaves and that the Orbs are signal boosters, it's just that the technology wasn't perfected yet, which is why the Huddle's inputs are not turned on. If the boy ''is'' actually another zombie, it's still unclear whether his escape with the Huddle in the standard ending is to be considered a success for himself or another "free will" variable that the company will edge out with more testing.]]

** There's an enormous room containing something continuously emitting shockwaves powerful enough to shatter concrete and turn the boy into a red mist. You never find out what's causing this.

* PeopleFarms: While most of the controlled humans appear to be regular people who've been converted en masse into PeoplePuppets, [[spoiler:you later see that the organization behind the project seems to be experimenting with bodies grown from scratch, apparently incubating in huge pools of water. These bodies--unlike the ones you've been using previously--are obviously deformed and misshapen, but obey you just the same.]] There are also [[spoiler:the capsule-like objects in the forest at the start. Since the masked men seem to "harvest" people and transport them via trucks to the city as well as the boy starting from there, it might be an actual People Farm.]]

* ShoutOut: A possible one lies at the entrance to the city: the boy will pass a sign on top of a building big enough for three letters. The R is laying down beside the sign, the C is still attached in the far right position, and the E is hidden below, beside an Orb. This spells out {{Film/REC}}.

* TheUnreveal: [[spoiler:The player never learns many things about the world of the game, making it that much more frightening. What happened to all of the farm animals? Why are the adults showing their children the zombie mindslaves? Are they citizens paying for them? Why are the citizens wearing masks but the office workers aren't? Who or what is controlling the spotlights? What is that cabled spinal dart they shoot out for? Do we really ever get outside?]] There's more to ponder on the [=YMMV=] tab under AlternateCharacterInterpretation.

** During [[spoiler: your rampage as the blob of bodies, you smash into a doorway, revealing what may be a CorruptCorporateExecutive, scared shitless, against a window. Behind said window is a very, very, very long fall.]] Pretty easy to guess what that means.
** Finally, [[spoiler: while smashing open a wall, the blob that is you falls through, revealing the outside world. You fall, rolling down a hill, before coming to rest in the single bit of sunlight in the entire game.]] Roll credits.

* TwistEnding: More like a ''wild veer off the road'' ending. You will '''NOT''' see it coming. [[spoiler:Suffice it to say it appears that the main character's goal was to disable the giant blob by pulling off mind-control helmets plugged on to it, but he gets absorbed into it, and through it, goes on a rampage, destroying the facility -- and a man who looks suspiciously like a CorruptCorporateExecutive, the only intentional death in the game. The game also shifts from a tonally bleak cinematic platformer into a [[BlackHumor comedic]], almost [Creator/BennyHill Benny Hill-esque]] rampage.]] Oh, and to top it all off, [[spoiler: the game has ANOTHER ending that implies the boy to be just another mind controlled human, and that YOU were the one controlling him.]]

** The boy's motive for going to the facility is unclear. Does he get forced into it on his attempt to escape. Does he nobly want to stop the facility of his own free will? Or is he [[spoiler:mind-controlled by the Huddle telling him to free it?]]

* BarbieDollAnatomy: The underwater StringyHairedGhostGirl doesn't seem to have genitalia. [[spoiler:...and apparently neither does your character.]]

* ChekhovsBoomerang: The puzzle in the city where you [[NestedOwnership control a body that controls a body]]. [[spoiler:It gets used again later, making you think that that was it. And then you find the secret ending where you come to realize that YOU had been controlled like that the entire time.]]
* ChekhovsGun: If some interactive object is simple enough to feel like pointless busywork (for example, flipping an obvious switch before you can proceed), it's either because you haven't figured out why it's really there yet or it's teaching you something you need to remember later.

* CrateExpectations: Just like ''Limbo'', if you see a crate, don't even bother skipping over it because it's part of a puzzle.

* DeliberatelyMonochrome: Averted. Unlike its predecessor, the game utilizes a color palette, which is easiest to see when objects and characters are standing in light (or simply are light sources). However, the colors are very desaturated to help maintain the game's oppressive atmosphere.

* {{Dystopia}}: The whole game takes place inside an utterly massive complex built upon the ruins of a much older, dilapadated city. People are enslaved en masse, and used as either fodder for experiments on weird, otherworldly MindControl technology or slave labor using helmets that command them telepathically. Parts of the city have no clear purpose and are unnecessarily huge, and seem to go on forever. People in white masks appear to be in control of herding the captured slaves, and these notably include children. At the end of the game, you enter what appears to be the newest part of the city, and get in on the conspiracy mentioned above. [[spoiler: You hijack a massive fusion of several people together into something that looks straight out of ''Franchise/SilentHill'' before going on a rampage. Whatever the ball of flesh was made for is never completely explained, but considering the plugs you pull off of it look identical to mind control helmets, it's possible it was controlling all the "active" slaves you saw towards the beginning of the game.]]

* EldritchLocation: The lab, or office building, or whatever it is that you are running/jumping/swimming through ''makes no logical sense''. You can descend what appears to be hundreds of feet underwater, only travel straight along and emerge on dry land. The facility is utterly massive and also completely nonsensical in its application as well. What appear to be working train stations sit above a completely destroyed factory for instance, and there's no clear objective as to what the shockwave room is even for. [[spoiler: And then, after descending what feels like thousands of feet underground, when The Blob you become a part of breaks through the final wall, where do you end up? ''Outside. Tumbling '''down''' a mountain no less.'' There is some evidence that your final location may still be, well, inside the base- particularly a diorama glimpsed during your final rampage that matches your final position.]]
* EscapedFromTheLab: Your character appears to be doing the inverse of this. [[spoiler:Played straight (though success ambiguous) once you join with the Huddle.]]
* EternalEngine: One level appears to take place in a factory. At one point your character confronts some form of generator rhythmically emitting shock waves powerful enough to ''blow you off the screen''.

* EverythingTryingToKillYou: To the point where you're nervous around a flock of chicks. Luckily they're harmless. [[spoiler: You still have to blow the poor buggers through a grain vac to solve a puzzle, however. They do, at least, survive going through that.]]

** In addition, when you use the chicks to fling onto a crate above to get it down, the chicks fall and one of them stays on the floor, apparently dead. [[spoiler: Just like one of the bodies as part of having to get through a door. Instead of mind-controlling it, you have to drag it onto a platform with the bodies you control to activate the door release]].

* HumansAreBastards: Seemingly one of the themes of the game: The facility the boy ventures through is a vast and almost otherworldly place filled with horrific and unnatural experiments and projects, but at the end of the day it's run by simple humans - some engage in casual small-talk together, some bring their kids to work, and none of them see anything wrong with the things they do on the job or hunting down an intruder like the protagonist.

* MindControl: The game seems to take place in a world where some sort of Mind Control technology is being tested on humans. The humans are seemingly dead bodies that you can use as [[RemoteBody remote bodies]]. [[spoiler:The technology is based off of the parasitic worms found by the boy in the farm. Both endings reveal that the MindControl might be more extensive than the helmets you find controlling the worker bodies:]]
** [[spoiler:In the standard ending, inactive mind control helmets are connected to the Huddle, the fleshmass in the giant sphere. We don't see them power on, but their purpose could be inferred in...]]

* {{Minimalism}}: Just like ''{{VideoGame/Limbo}}'', there's no dialogue, exposition, the controls are uncomplicated and gameplay straightforward, which all serves to bolster the game's sense of atmosphere and mystery. There are slight differences in implementation -- in addition to there being slightly more color, where ''Limbo'' focuses extensively on [[WorldOfSymbolism symbolism and abstract metaphor]], ''INSIDE'' leans more towards [[AmbiguousSituation the literal mysteries]] of the {{dystopia}} the boy finds himself exploring. In addition, the characters, in particular the player character, do not even appear to have faces.
* MoodWhiplash: The game takes a rather drastic tonal shift when you find [[spoiler:The Huddle inside the sphere. The giant fleshy mass is at first repulsive, but the rampage that follows is cathartic and hilarious, albeit in a [[BlackComedy pitch black manner]].]]

* MusclesAreMeaningless: For a scrawny looking kid, the protagonist manages to go through a course of obstacles non-stop even the most athletic of people would be hard-pressed to finish even half of.

* TwistEnding: More like a ''wild veer off the road'' ending. You will '''NOT''' see it coming. [[spoiler:Suffice it to say it appears that the main character's goal was to disable the giant blob by pulling off mind-control helmets plugged on to it, but he gets absorbed into it, and through it, goes on a rampage, destroying the facility-and a man who looks suspiciously like a CorruptCorporateExecutive, the only intentional death in the game. The game also shifts from a tonally bleak cinematic platformer into a [[BlackHumor comedic]], almost Creator/BennyHill -esque rampage.]] Oh, and to top it all off, [[spoiler: the game has ANOTHER ending that implies the boy to be just another mind controlled human, and that YOU were the one controlling him.]]

* WouldHurtAChild: The Adults have no problem with loosing attack dogs or firing guns at a young boy.

* BewareOfViciousDog: Angry dogs are among the obstacles you must run away from. If you see or hear one, ''run the hell away'', because they are fast, persistent, and will kill and maul you. And since the player character is a defenseless little boy, you have no choice but to run away and avoid them.

''Inside'' (stylized ''INSIDE'') is a PuzzlePlatformer by Creator/{{Playdead}}, developers of ''VideoGame/{{Limbo}}''. Although its name wasn't revealed until E3 2014, the game was in development since 2010. It runs on the UsefulNotes/{{Unity}} engine. The game was released on June 29, 2016 for UsefulNotes/XboxOne, July 7, 2016 for Microsoft Windows, August 23, 2016 for UsefulNotes/PlayStation4, and June 28, 2018 for UsefulNotes/NintendoSwitch.

* BarbieDollAnatomy: The underwater StringyHairedGhostGirl doesn't seem to have genitalia.[[spoiler:..and apparently neither does your character.]]

* EleventhHourSuperpower: The game fakes you out twice by suddenly introducing what seems to be an endgame power, but it's actually only [[RuleOfThree the third one]] that you end the game with:
** Firstly, you hang from another mind control helmet, except this one [[spoiler:snaps off, letting you lead around a crew of bodies to lift you higher and move heavy objects]]. However, you lose this suddenly when [[spoiler:the helmet is blown off by an explosion]].
** In the underwater facilities, [[spoiler: the boy is dragged underwater and drowned by TheOphelia. As he goes down, he is latched to a cable that "upgrades" him so he can stay underwater indefinitely, and can control humans without the helmet.]] You keep this for the rest of the game.
** The game's final sequence [[spoiler: is as (the controller of) a lumbering mass of flesh that's strong enough to barge through walls and can't be killed by anything in-game.]]

* HumansAreBastards: Seemingly one of the themes of the game: The facility the boy ventures through is a vast and almost otherworldly place filled with horrific and unnatural experiments and projects, but at the end of the day it's run by simple humans - some engage in casual small-talk together, some bring their kids to work, and none of them see anything wrong with the things they do on the job or hunting down an intruder like the protagonist.

* CruelAndUnusualDeath: [[spoiler: Should you crush the CEO, he suffers the fate of being pushed out a window by a massive BodyOfBodies, falling a great height, screaming unnervingly loudly all the way down, and being reduced to nothing but a red splatter on the ground.]]

** Firstly, you hang from another mind control helmet, except this one [[spoiler:snaps off, letting you lead around a crew of bodies to lift you higher and move heavy objects]]. However, you lose this suddenly when [[spoiler:the helmet is blown off]].

* RunOrDie: Like ''Limbo'', the boy you control can occasionally fight back using his wits. But in a bit of RealityEnsues, and because the game takes place in a tightly controlled dystopian city instead of an anarchistic forest, he's given far fewer opportunities to do so. All it takes is one adult to catch him, and it's all over. Oh, and you have ''no'' time to hesitate; if something is chasing you, chances are you will make it to the obstacle to stop them just before they grab you.

''Inside'' (stylized ''INSIDE'') is a PuzzlePlatformer by Creator/{{Playdead}}, developers of ''VideoGame/{{Limbo}}''. Although its name wasn't revealed until E3 2014, the game has been in development since 2010. It runs on the UsefulNotes/{{Unity}} engine. The game was released on June 29, 2016 for UsefulNotes/XboxOne, July 7, 2016 for Microsoft Windows, August 23, 2016 for UsefulNotes/PlayStation4, and June 28, 2018 for UsefulNotes/NintendoSwitch.

* BodyHorror: The remote bodies you see later in the game are not in good shape: some are missing a few or all their limbs, and a few more can be seen without heads. A few seem bloated from water, and there's the possibility that they are failed attempts at synthetic people. [[spoiler:That's not even getting into the total abomination, the Huddle, that you see later.]]

* OlympicSwimmer: Your character may not have SuperNotDrowningSkills ([[spoiler:not at first, at least]]), but he's got superb swimming skills for a kid. This is in contrast to your character in ''Limbo'', who had SuperDrowningSkills.

* TheManyDeathsOfYou: Of course. However, it is implied that [[spoiler: the CEO]] wants the boy captured alive, as the armed guards use tranquilizer darts rather than bullets. Also, if an adult catches the boy, they subdue him with what looks like chloroform rather than outright strangling him.

* TheVoiceless: Everyone, though they do grunt.

* ArtisticLicenseBiology: The player character is required at times to swim surprisingly deep underwater, at depths that have tremendous water pressure. Doing so in real life would rupture the eardrums or even crack the skull open, but the only indication that anything is amiss is when he starts to drown. [[spoiler:This is possibly justified when he gains his SuperNotDrowningSkills]].

* BewareOfViciousDog: Angry dogs are among the obstacles you must run away from. If you see or hear one, ''run the hell away'', because they are fast, persistent, and want you dead. And since the player character is a defenseless little boy, you have no choice but to run away and avoid them.

* BlendingInStealthGameplay: In one level, the player must join a line of mind-controlled zombies whose responses to commands are being tested -- the player must walk, turn, and jump at the correct times to avoid alerting the guards.
* BloodierAndGorier: Compared to Playdead's previous work, ''Limbo'', ''Inside'' is even more gruesome. The boy can be shot, have his throat ripped out, drown, be blown apart by sonic waves, and choked to death. [[spoiler: And once the boy joins the Huddle, anyone who gets in your way is trampled. And should you crush the lone man in the office, his body will be reduced to a red splatter on both the floor and your body as his scream rings out.]]

* BodyHorror: The remote bodies you see later in the game are not in good shape: some are missing a few or all their limbs, and a few more can be seen without heads. [[spoiler:That's not even getting into the total abomination, the Huddle, that you see later.]]

* CruelAndUnusualDeath: [[spoiler: Should you crush the lone office worker, he suffers the fate of being pushed out a window by a massive BodyOfBodies, falling a great height, screaming unnervingly loudly all the way down, and being reduced to nothing but a red splatter on the ground.]]
* DeliberatelyMonochrome: Averted. Unlike its predecessor, the game utilizes a color palette, which is easiest to see when objects and characters are standing in light (or simply are light sources). However, the colors are very unsaturated to help maintain the game's oppressive atmosphere.

* {{Dystopia}}: The whole game takes place inside an utterly massive complex built upon the ruins of a much older, dilapadated city. People are enslaved en masse, and used as either fodder for experiments on weird, otherworldly MindControl technology or slave labor using helmets that command them telepathically. Parts of the city have no clear purpose and are unnecessarily huge, and seem to go on forever. People in white masks appear to be in control of herding the captured slaves, and these notably include children. At the end of the game, you enter what appears to be the newest part of the city, and get in on the conspiracy mentioned above. [[spoiler: You highjack a massive fusion of several people together into something that looks straight out of ''Franchise/SilentHill'' before going on a rampage. Whatever the ball of flesh was made for is never completely explained, but considering the plugs you pull off of it look identical to mind control helmets, it's possible it was controlling all the "active" slaves you saw towards the beginning of the game.]]
* EasterEgg: There are enough in the game that one of the speedrun categories is All Easter Eggs. One of them figures right into the progression of the game: [[spoiler:Wait long enough in the CEO's office and he will move out of your way so that you may spare him instead of kill him.]]

* EscapedFromTheLab: Your character appears to be doing the inverse of this. [[spoiler:Played straight once you join with the Blob.]]

* HoistByHisOwnPetard: If the man sitting alone in the big office near the end is indeed the [[spoiler: director/CEO of the lab conducting horrific human experiments and/or generating a race of humanoid slaves, then seeing him splattered by the Blob Monster (his possible own creation), gives one a strangely satisfying feeling.]]
* HopeSpot: [[spoiler:You climb up a chain out of a flooded area, heading for a catwalk bathed in the first rays of ''sunlight'' you've seen all game . . . and then the chain slips, and you fall back down into the water, where the StringyHairedGhostGirl seizes you to give you the "upgrade" that will eventually lead you to the Blob. You won't see the sun again until the very end, and then you have been subsumed by a mass of flesh.]]

* MoodWhiplash: The game takes a rather drastic tonally when you find [[spoiler:The Huddle inside the sphere. The giant fleshy mass is at first repulsive, but the rampage that follows is cathartic and hilarious, albeit in a [[BlackComedy pitch black manner]].]]

* PressurePlate: A game mechanic carried over from ''Limbo''.

* TooDumbToLive: [[spoiler:After becoming the Blob monster, you swim over to the looking glass and begin to break it. For some reason, one of the onlookers thinks he can prevent your escape by pushing on the glass. It doesn't end well for him.]]
* TurnTheOtherCheek: Near the very end of the game, you're given an opportunity for {{revenge}}... but if you're careful, you don't ''have'' to take it. [[spoiler:When, as the blob, you reach the man who [[AmbiguousSituation might be]] the CorruptCorporateExecutive responsible for ''everything'' you've suffered, he's standing in your way, and the obvious route is to just keep going, [[DestinationDefenestration sending him through his window and to his doom]]. But if you stop charging when he's got his back against the window and just stare him down, he'll eventually [[WhyIsntItAttacking take the hint]] and get out of your way, allowing you to spare him.]]
** During your [[spoiler:rampage as the blob monster, it's also possible to crush random office workers who get in your way if you're moving fast enough]]. But if you go slow, they'll have enough time to get out of the way.

* AmbiguousEnding: After a long, terrifying and painful journey attempting to escape to safety, you ultimately end up [[spoiler:as a fleshy husk motionless on a beach just outside the facility. It's unclear whether you survived, or whether it was the correct way to deal with the MindControl.]]
* AmbiguousSituation: A whole lot worse to figure out this time too- unlike ''Limbo'', which was almost entirely symbolic, it appears that ''INSIDE'' does hold some answers to its most confusing questions. [[spoiler: It's widely accepted that the bonus ending basically tells the player that the boy is a remote body, but this creates a lot more questions- if he is a remote body, why can he emote so effectively and pass for a real human perfectly? And who is controlling him? [[MetaFiction Is it you]]?]]
** There's also a lot of ambiguity on whether or not you were ever "outside" to begin with. Certain things like spotlights that seem a tad too convenient, the insistence of a lot of your human stalkers to at least try and take you alive, the omnipresence of certain things [[spoiler: like the Orbs required for the secret ending]], and the sheer EldritchLocation level use of geometry and space would all seem to point to the entire game taking place in some sort of massive facility. [[spoiler: One thing that further cements this is during your rampage as the Blob, you fall into a small diorama that is an exact scale replica of the place you find yourself in after "escaping" the facility, making the whole rampage sequence seem like a huge experiment.]]
** If the boy really was [[spoiler: a remote body the entire time, like the ones the scientists were controlling, does that mean the part where you take control of the horrible Blob thing and supposedly escape the facility is actually just [[AllAccordingToPlan another part of the experimental process?]]]]

You play as a young boy in a dangerous and hostile world, but rather than the supernatural horror of ''Limbo'', this one is one of [[HumansAreBastards mechanical and technological advancement gained through human experimentation and cruelty]]. The boy finds himself traversing this almost ruined world, drawn to the center of a dark project. Much of the story is left open to interpretation this time as well.

You play as a young boy in a dangerous and hostile world, but rather than the supernatural horror of ''Limbo'', this one is one of mechanical and [[HumansAreBastards technological advancement gained through human experimentation and cruelty]]. The boy finds himself traversing this almost ruined world, drawn to the center of a dark project. Much of the story is left open to interpretation this time as well.

* AmbiguousSituation: A whole lot worse to figure out this time too- unlike ''Limbo'', which was almost entirely symbolic, it appears that ''INSIDE'' does hold some answers to its most confusing questions. [[spoiler:It's widely accepted that the bonus ending basically tells the player that the boy is a remote body, but this creates a lot more questions- if he is a remote body, why can he emote so effectively and pass for a real human perfectly? And who is controlling him? [[MetaFiction Is it you]]?]]

* {{Dystopia}}: The whole game takes place inside a massive city/series of factories and mines/townships/office buildings/whatever that appears to be building on layers of the older, decimated city. People are enslaved en masse, and used as either fodder for MindControl experiments for weird, otherworldly technology or slave labor using helmets that command them telepathically. Parts of the city have no clear purpose and are unnecessarily huge, and seem to go on forever. People in white masks appear to be in control of herding the captured slaves, and these notably include children. At the end of the game, you enter what appears to be the newest part of the city, and get in on the conspiracy mentioned above. [[spoiler: You highjack a massive fusion of several people together into something that looks straight out of Franchise/SilentHill before going on a rampage. Whatever the ball of flesh was made for is never completely explained, but considering the plugs you pull off of it look identical to mind control helmets, it's possible it was controlling all the "active" slaves you saw towards the beginning of the game.]]

* EldritchLocation: The lab, or office building, or whatever it is that you are running/jumping/swimming through ''makes no logical sense''. You can descend what appears to be hundreds of feet underwater, only travel straight along and emerge on dry land. The facility is utterly massive and also completely nonsensical in its application as well. What appear to be working train stations sit above a completely destroyed factory. [[spoiler:And then, after descending what feels like thousands of feet underground, when The Blob you become a part of breaks through the final wall, where do you end up? ''Outside. Tumbling '''down''' a mountain no less.'' There is some evidence that your final location may still be, well, inside the base- particularly a diorama glimpsed during your final rampage that matches your final position.]]

** The game's final sequence [[spoiler:is as (the controller of) a lumbering mass of flesh that's strong enough to barge through walls and can't be killed by anything in-game.]]

* {{Foreshadowing}}: Early in the game, you'll go to a barn where several chicks will instinctively flock to you like orphans desperately looking for a new mother. [[spoiler:Later, you gain the ability to lead groups of humans into following you and helping you traverse obstacles.]]

''Inside'' (stylized ''INSIDE'') is a PuzzlePlatformer by Playdead, developers of ''VideoGame/{{Limbo}}''. Although its name wasn't revealed until E3 2014, the game has been in development since 2010. It runs on the UsefulNotes/{{Unity}} engine. The game was released on June 29, 2016 for UsefulNotes/XboxOne, July 7, 2016 for Microsoft Windows, August 23, 2016 for UsefulNotes/PlayStation4, and June 28, 2018 for UsefulNotes/NintendoSwitch.

[[SimilarlyNamedWorks Shouldn't be confused with]] the 2007 French [[Film/{{Inside}} home invasion film]].