Heartwarming / Psychonauts 2

Per wiki policy, Spoilers Off applies here and all spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned.

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Reuniting a family... or making a new one.

• Slightly condescending towards Raz or not, the Motherlobe's Receptionist sounds genuinely impressed when she finds out Raz really is a Psychonauts Intern and immediately is much more helpful towards him.
• After the interns swipe Razputin's clothes, he's forced to sneak around the facility in his underwear. When he gets caught by Sasha in his lab, he immediately drops what he's doing to clothe the boy and tells Raz not to mind the other interns and their bad attitudes. While this is already kind enough, the kicker is that the clothes Sasha gives to Raz are the "smallest pair he had" of his own clothes, meaning Sasha dressed up Raz to look like himself. It's also a Call-Back; if you used Clairvoyance on Sasha back in the first game, he saw Raz... dressed in Sasha's clothes.
• Some of the game's sidequests are actually quite nice - There's one for Lili that involves finding a specific type of mushroom for her. There's also a lot of optional extra dialogue you can miss with Lili if you don't go out of your way to track her down and it's all very sweet.
• Clairvoyance once again supplies a lot of these:
  • Using Clairvoyance on your fellow interns early on in the game reveals that most of them just think of Raz as that dummy they pranked, their mental image being him running around in his underwear. After the Lady Lucktopus Casino mission though, most of them (Norma still views him as The Mole and Sam still sees him as a Squirrel) start to respect him, and their mental images show a cooler, idealized version of Raz they can be friends with. And after Raz defeats Maligula, even Norma sees the error of her ways and begins to see him as a true psychonaut.
  • Using Clairvoyance on Oleander reveals he sees Raz as a proud soldier. As gruff and dopey he can be, Oleander is clearly fond of Raz and sees him as a capable psychonaut.
  • In the first game, Milla saw Raz as a baby in a swaddle; in this game, she sees Raz dressed up in 60s fashion a-la Austin Powers. She used to see Raz as a helpless child she must protect, but after seeing what he's capable of in Whispering Rock and the Rhombus of Ruin, she acknowledges his abilities and thinks of him as someone capable of taking care of himself, as well as being fun to be around.
  • Hollis initially sees Raz as a barely hatched chick, but as the game goes on she eventually sees Raz as a full-fledged agent. Even if Hollis does not make him a full fledged psychonaut in the end, it is clear she thinks Raz is already worthy of the title.
  • She isn’t the only one either, once again Ford sees Raz as someone who has already earned the psychonaut moniker. This becomes especially heartwarming after how strained their relationship becomes during the events of the game.
  • Unlike the other rats who see Raz as a tall ugly monster, Harold sees Raz as a him in a rat suit. Crosses over with funny, but it is sweet to see how surprisingly close Harold is with Raz.
  • Just like in the first game, Lili sees Raz as a taller more dashing version of himself, but unlike the first game where he was a literal Prince Charming Knight in Shining Armor, he's... just himself, a more handsome looking version of himself, but still Raz. Lili's gotten past her Rescue Romance phase to fully see Raz for who he is... and if anything loves him even more.
  • Truman sees Raz as a lovably-awkward prom date in a baby-blue tux, which seems to indicate he approves of Lili and Raz's budding relationship.
  • After helping him out, Helmut sees Raz as a familiar roadie, this is heartwarming in both how Helmut already sees Raz as a vital friend and is a nice shout-out to a previous Cult Classic Double Fine game.
  • Compton Boole sees Raz as a bee, one of his favorite animals.
  • Donatella, like any mother would, sees Raz as her little baby.
  • Morris, after hiring Queepie as a DJ, sees Raz as a rock star.
  • Gisu and Dion continue to flirt; Gisu sees Raz as a cool skateboarder. (Unfortunately, Dion still sees his younger brother as a punching bag, while Frazie sees him as a crybaby.)
  • Augustus, Mirtala and Queepie all see him as a circus ringleader standing confidently with a lion tamer whip. For Queepie in particular, this proves he looks up to his big brother in spite of how he tries to avoid spending time with him.
  • One moment involves a pair of minor side characters, Motherlobe janitors Kim and Colin (the bacon vision guy). After Raz finds Nick's debrained body, they can be found talking in the Intern wing, and Raz can use Clairvoyance to see how they see each other - Kim sees hearts around Colin's head, while Colin only sees bacon. After you beat the game, Raz can find them again in front of the atrium mural - and this time, Colin sees hearts around Kim's head, too.
    • This change to Colin's view happens much earlier, at the Noodle Bowl. While Raz is getting the last piece of Honey Pepper Boar Bacon, you can listen in on a conversation between Kim and Colin, where it's revealed that Kim bought all of the bacon for Colin. Using Clairvoyance on Colin here will show the same hearts around Kim's head.
• While Hollis is understandably angry with Raz after the Lady Lucktopus incident, she composes herself and gives him a heart-to-heart about her own mistakes with Mental Connections. After dismissing Raz as a new kid she won't remember, its touching to see her demonstrate a willingness to reach out and push Raz in the right direction. She also fully demonstrates her newfound trust and respect in Raz by letting him tag along the mission.
  • It's also a sweet Call-Back: In Hollis's second memory reel, she was given another chance by being invited to the Psychonauts by Truman Zanotto after she tried to "fix" her boss's mind via Mental Connections. It's really nice of her to do the same for Raz.
    • Fridge Brilliance: When you think about it, it must have been relieving for Truman himself that he was able to help somebody like Hollis, especially considering the fact that he was unable to help his uncle, Bob, overcome his alcoholism.
  • When Sasha later reprimands Raz for his actions, despite him saying that he's going to be harsher than Hollis, he does so in a very gentle, and even sympathetic, tone. He even gives Raz smelling salts, in case Raz ever feels like overreaching, showing that Sasha understands how it can be very tempting to look inside a person's mind without asking, considering that, as a kid, he too, used his powers on his father without consent to look inside his mind and felt bad about it afterwards.
    • If you hadn't talked with Sasha in his lab yet before this conversation and then do so, hearing Sasha relax and be encouraging to Raz after his stern talk is especially sweet and downright relieving.
• Raz has a bit of a stressful relationship with his family, but Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other is in full effect during their time at the Motherlobe. Even with his status as The Unfavorite (at least in the eyes of his older siblings), it's clear the rest of the family was deeply hurt by Razputin running away from home, and each member of the family comes to respect his independence more by the end of the game if Raz does their sidequests.
  • As passive-aggressive Donatella is with Raz, her love for him is made fully clear. The first thing Donatella does when she sees him again is not to lecture Raz, but embrace him in a huge hug. She is also always ready to listen to his suggestions on how to improve the circus, even if she thinks they are ridiculous.
  • Dion is shown to be incredibly hostile to Raz most of the time, but after claiming the family would be better off without him in a dialogue sequence, Dion visibly looks shocked and guilty at what he just said. He lightens up a bit after Raz helps him with the tent, then in the post-game he happily relates to Raz what new things he has learned about psychics.
• Ford's feelings about Lucrecia in his memories. It's very bittersweet for him of course, since now Ford wonders if he could have done something differently to avoid what happened, but it's clear he cared a lot for his Lucy.
• One silver lining to be found in the aftermath of the situation with Maligula 20 years ago was Cruller bringing Lucrecia to her nephew, Augustus, since each of them were the only family the other had. Despite their initial memories as mother and son being an implanted lie, they were able to make real, happier memories with each other and later with the other Aquatos. It's even shown she's the one who gave Raz the original flyer to psychic summer camp, having subconsciously recognized his growing powers and wanting him to have friends who understood him.
• In an alcove of the Psi King's mind, Raz will find figments of Bob's wedding, with the rest of the Psychic Six, including Lucy on Ford's arm, attending.
• The finale of Psi King's mind. Raz helps Helmut regain his senses by putting the band back together while the king reminisces on the good times along the way. After a glorious song and regaining his true mental form of Helmut Fullbear, the nightmare of Maligula attacks and he flees back inside his vault where it's quiet. The obscured memories from before become clear as Helmut despairs how useless and forgotten he was only for his bandmates, who are representations of his friends in the Psychic Six, explain how they haven't forgotten him under the ice. They explain how they each gave their all in the battle and failed. Despite all this they have not forgotten him. The sweetest one is Audie O/Bob who tells Helmut that he's still out there waiting for his return. Sure, this is all in his mind and it's just him speculating, but as we see later, this faith in his loved ones could not be more on the dot. All in all, shows just how much Helmut values the others as his True Companions. And with that, He, The Senses, and Raz give the crowd a grand finale in vanquishing his nightmare of Maligula for good.
  PSI-King: Memories, my boy. Just a show we put on inside our heads. Sometimes, the first draft of the script stinks. Thanks for helping me with the re-writes. Now, let's go give the people what they want!
  • Bob Zanotto being Audie O (whose head is an ear) in Helmut's world is even more heartwarming when you think about it, because in one of Helmut's Memory Reels, Bob fell in love with Helmut because of his singing. Helmut sees Bob as someone who always listens to him.
  • There’s figments of Bob everywhere in PSI-King’s mental world. Even before Helmut remembers who he is, his mind is filled with images of his husband.
• When Raz goes to visit Cassie O'Pia's house in Green Needle Gulch, one of the dialogue options available is asking her to sign his copy of Mindswarm. She is happy to agree, and signs it for him with gusto. This is doubly heartwarming since she's currently deep in the middle of a mental breakdown and is otherwise hostile to human contact.
  • After Raz and Cassie's archetypes manage to defeat the Die-brarian, she laments that her once again failing must mean she's not the real Cassie after all. The other archetypes immediately go to comfort the Librarian, telling her that they're all Cassie in a way, which finally allows them to come back together.
  • In the upper level of Cassie's mental world, Raz can see Archetypes she's formed of the other members of the Psychic Six. While they're all little more than Cassie's biases, such as "Otto" saying he always tries to look smarter than he actually is, it's nice that she still views Lucrecia as "Lucrecia", rather than as Maligula.
• Despite Bob's current condition, Raz always refers to him as "Agent Zanotto", and continues to do so throughout his mental world. He still respects him as one of the legendary founding Psychonauts, no matter what.
• In Bob Zanotto's mind realm, you can actually approach a representation of his wedding with Helmut. As you do, Bob's voice is heard giving a heart-warming speech about how he'd given up on love, until Helmut came along.
  Young Bob: I, Robert Zanotto, take this man, Helmut Fullbear... the happiest day of my life... I used to think I loved plants more than people, until I met this man... when these feelings appeared in my heart, I thought... they were weeds, a-and I tried to pull them out... but this mighty oak has given me shade, shelter, and something to lean on when I needed it. Just when I was turning to seed, you made me bloom again... I do.
  • Helmut's Mind Realm also has references to his dear husband. Figments of his wedding to Bob are there, and one memory vault shows when Helmut was first recruited into the Psychonauts, with Bob beaming after seeing Helmut show off his psychic abilities.
  • When it comes to the Truheltia boss fight, bear in mind this isn't some foreign entity feeding Bob lies; this is a part of his own mind. These are the lies he's creating to justify never forming another connection to another human being. That means the idea that his husband never loved him is the one lie he can't tell himself. His love for Helmut is stronger even than his fear of being hurt again, strong enough to make him decide to change himself for the better. Despite his fears that the rest of the Psychic Six just barely tolerated him, Bob has zero doubts that Helmut truly loved him, and the Truheltia Memonstria implying that he didn't is enough to finally spur him into action and take the first real steps to overcoming his alcohol addiction.
    Helmut Plant: Why don't you get lost, kid?
    Raz: How can you do this to Bob? You love him!
    Helmut Plant: Love? [laughs] I don't really love him. If I did, how could I have left him all alone?
    Bob: Helmut... Helmut would NEVER say that!
  • What's more, Bob sounds hurt at first after the Helmut Plant says he never loved him. However, after the pause he gathers his thoughts and ends up sounding pissed. He's realized the plant isn't Helmut and is mad as hell that it dared imitate his, to his knowledge, late husband.
• At the end of Bob's mind realm, the game openly admits that he's not done on his road to recovery with he and Raz witnessing dozens of memory seeds floating to his island, representing more things he hasn't come to terms with. However, his growth means he's finally willing to face his troubles head on and his comment states he's going to do it in a way that's healthy for him.

  Bob: Welp. I'll just take 'em, one at a time.

• Despite the two not having seen each other in years, Bob is still well aware of what Lili currently looks like. Although Truman had to fire Bob over his alcoholism, he was clearly torn up over the decision and still kept trying to reach out to his uncle for years by sending him letters, along with pictures of Lili.
  • Listening to Bob's dialogue from when he was fired reveals that during their argument, Truman tried to give Bob a phone number, presumably for Alcoholics Anonymous. Even though Truman was furious with his uncle for becoming so self-destructive, it's still clear that a big part of it was Anger Born of Worry and the only reason he fired Bob was because he had no choice.
• The Psychic Six/Seven reuniting. There's fond reminiscence, a bit of light-hearted ribbing, joy at seeing how much they've healed (thanks to Raz's intervention), and when it's revealed Lucrecia's still alive all of them go in for a Group Hug. Despite everything, the seven still care deeply for each other.
  • Otto overhearing Ford commenting about his engineering only has him generally reacting as it being nice. But when Ford starts interacting with him more like how he used to, the dawning look of joy in Otto's face and tone when he realizes his old friend is back to his old self again after decades of being mentally shattered beyond repair is truly sweet.
  • When Cassie and Compton reunite, her first reaction is to call him "Boolie" and give him a hug. Even without looking at them through Ship Tease goggles, it's clear that they're very important to each other.
  • Even though Helmut's brain is currently in Nick's body, all Bob has to do is hear Raz call him Helmut to realize that yes, his beloved husband, thought to be dead for twenty years, is back. Also despite being still deeply in love with Bob, Helmut refuses to even kiss him while in Nick's body, because it doesn't belong to him.
• While it doesn't last before hitting her Dark and Troubled Past, after breaking through the flea circus construct into Nona/ Lucrecia's real mental world, Lucy starts leading her old boyfriend Ford around on a tour, acting for all intents and purposes as if this was a normal date, lightly teasing him in the process. It's quite cute.
• In a twisted way, The Mole's mental image of Maligula is this - a memory vault shows she saved them from an enemy ambush in the Grulovian War, which is why they are so fanatically devoted to the idea that she is Grulovia’s protector who can help them regain control over the country.
• After the events of the game, the Hand of Galochio now just helps Raz from drowning, and if Raz fails to find a dry surface, it just holds Raz out of the water til Raz can reset — mechanically, it's the same reset, but now it doesn't hurt Raz.
• Hollis asserting herself after Truman is back, saying that she deserves a two week vacation, then announces that they have Psychonauts business to attend to (promoting the interns.) Truman can only smile.
  Truman: Now that's leadership!
• Also after the events of the game, you can find Sasha and Milla in the bowling alley; they greet Raz as "fellow Psychonaut" and "Agent Aquato" and express how proud they are of him. The conversation eventually closes with Sasha warmly asking Raz to take a well-deserved break and Milla sincerely thanking Raz for all the help he has provided.
  Raz: (wide-eyed) This is the greatest moment of my life!
• In the post-game, Raz can have a heart to heart with his father about the major revelations of the plot. His father understandably has mixed feelings, and expresses them with a sober expression as he describes reconciling his life is built on a lie but even so still had happy memories because of it.
  • He still considers Lucrecia their Nona, and the family will still accept her, partly because that as much pain Augustus suffered, Lucrecia suffered worse.
    Augustus: She's still our blood, Razputin. And she always will be.
  • Augustus also expresses sympathy toward Ford after he tried to manipulate his memories.
    Raz: Are you mad at Ford?
    Augustus: I feel tricked and confused, but that man... He's put himself through enough.
  • He ends with a suggestion to take the whole family swimming, to which Raz smiles warmly.
  • When Raz asks him if he's going to continue putting on the circus, Augustus' face lights up as he excitedly explains all the new aquatic acts they can try now that it turns out they're not cursed to die in water.
  • When Raz figures his father wants to be left alone for a bit, Augustus tells him he doesn't mind his son's company at all. Truly a man who loves his family.
• Even though it's heartbreaking that most of the Psychic Six have buried themselves in their own self-loathing, it's touching to see that none of them blame each other for what happened during the battle against Maligula, not even Lucrecia herself despite her being the one they were fighting against. The fact that Bob, who personally lost his beloved Helmut to Maligula, is the first to hug Lucrecia when she returns, followed by the rest of the old guard, speaks volumes to the bond the Six have.
  • Keep in mind that when Lucy went on her rampage, Bob saw his own husband, Helmut, sacrifice himself to her during the battle, and she made him think that he was dead for a VERY long time. Despite having every reason and right not to forgive Lucy for what she did, he does anyway.
• In an optional conversation, Raz can ask Milla for clarification on the pronunciation of her name. Milla confirms that the correct pronunciation is "Mi-LA" (since it's short for "Camilla"). So why does she also go by "Mi-YA?" Because on her first day as a Psychonaut, that was the pronunciation Sasha used, and Milla thought it was so cute that she didn't correct him. D'aww...
• Ford Cruller, Raz's idol, gets promoted to his step-grandfather at the end of game.
• Even though Compton is overwhelmed by the bees' minds, if Raz offers to kill them with Pyrokinesis, he'll tell Raz to not hurt them.
• In the climax of the game, Raz's mother and siblings family all let go of the lingering anti-psychic prejudices and resentment of Raz for running away because there's a crisis at hand and Raz needs their help to solve it. Mirtala even calls him "Raz" instead of "Pooter." And it sticks, with Raz's relationship with his mother and siblings being less strained in the post-game, with Donatella even going from passive aggressive and treating Raz's Psychonaut career as a phase to supporting him... Admittedly because she realizes that he's powerful enough to destroy anything that might be a threat to him.
• Raz refers to Dogen as his friend in some optional lines of dialogue, which is sweet to know that he considers him one.
• If Raz talks to his dad and brings up Frazie being psychic, Augustus gently tells him that it’s up to Frazie to decide if and when she wants to be open about her psychic powers. Even though he’s excited over his own newfound openness, he still respects his daughter’s space on the matter rather than drag her into it if she isn’t ready or interested.
• The end cutscene for Compton's Cookoff - after the Gluttonous Goats have been defeated, Compton appears back onstage and confidently tells everyone to start cleaning up the mess, even cracking a joke to Raz afterwards. Then, when Raz returns to his body, Compton is now calmly talking to the bees instead of being overwhelmed by them, and heads off to go find Cassie himself.

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