Pastelland Forum

A portal in the subnet can be described as a method of transportation. Examples of these are karma portals, lab portals, root transporters, and edge portals. However, there are 2 that are strikingly similar: The lighthouse portal in Submachine 2 and the white karma portal in Submachine 9. These games have been described by Apocrypha as games that mirror each other in a chiastic structure, where as Submachine 2 is B and Submachine 9 is I. (for more comparisons on these installments, and others, see Apocrypha's theory video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mN63Pvf4rYM) However, his findings did not go over these so I will do so here

Differences:
Submachine 9: White Karma Portal
This portal appears circular, similar to the karma portals seen in the previous installments. However, it's strength sets it apart from the rest. All of the karma portals outside of the knot are clearly unstable, as they cause deterioration anywhere they were drawn. However, as the knot is the perfect result of the plan, everything there has a sense of stability. Although there is an exception with the karma portal we use to access the mover, the white karma portal is not an exception; therefore, it has a sense of stability. Not only that, but it's sense of strength also comes from the fact that the portal takes you great distances from the 8th layer to the 1st layer and from the Shiva section to the Northern Gardens in Submachine 10. This, instead of correlating to the portal that takes you from submachine 2 to submachine 3, although it kind of should, correlates to the "elevator" that transports you from submachine 1 that somehow takes you to submachine 2. Note how in submachine 10, we entered a karma portal that took us into the arcade machine, or somewhere based off of the arcade machine. Maybe we did this exact same thing, but backwards, to get to the lighthouse. "But Sundex, wouldn't the end scene for Submachine 1 be deteriorated?" That is the thing. Time has passed. We don't know how much time, but clearly enough for instability to take form and for the karma portal to start causing deterioration by the time we reach the arcade machine again.

Submachine 2: Lighthouse Portal
The light in the lighthouse is classified as a portal by Murtaugh in a note he left at the lighthouse.
“I did draw a portal in here, however it's not stable.”
— Portal note (Sub 2)
The fact that it is not stable makes it different from the white portal in Submachine 9. It's instability is the reason it transports us to the loop as seen in Submachine 3. However, instead of correlating to Submachine 9 heading into Submachine 10, it correlates to the "karmic gateway" of Submachine 8 that takes you to Submachine 9. There is obviously one huge difference between these two end scenes: one goes into a "detour" and the other comes out of one. But there is a similarity: before the next installment came for both of these games, we as a community were left in the dark to an extent.

Similarities
Both portals serve as an ending in respect to the games they associate with. Not only that, but have you noticed you need 5 things to gain access to both portals? In Submachine 2, you need to turn 5 red lights to green before the portal functions normally. In Submachine 9, you need to obtain 2 seals, one for Murtaugh and Elizabeth, and 3 wisdom gems, totaling up to 5 items. There are 2 puzzles in Submachine 2 that can easily correlate with the seals: the e=mc^2 puzzle and the spinning knobs puzzle. The e=mc^2 puzzle correlates to Murtaugh's seal. Where we find m is evidence to this claim:
“For those who follow me: I am sorry... and m = (random 3 digit number) sincerely mur”
— Diary 2 (Sub 2)
Because of this, by process of elimination, we can safely infer that Liz correlates to the spinning knobs. The last 3 red lights are turned green by sticking certain objects in certain places: The 2 coils in their respected positive and negative position, the fuse, and the ID card. Each of these represents one of the three wisdom gems you re-obtain from the mover. Just like the coils, fuse, and ID, you have to set the wisdom gem in a specific place. Both portals seem to emit the same shade of white light upon usage. This means that the lighthouse and the white karma portal use the same karmic energy, meaning that the lighthouse portal has the same properties as the white karma portal. This would mean that the lighthouse portal has the capability to change the layer the player is in.

(Feedback will be accepted now! This theory is ready for unvoted status)

If we think the theory is going in a less-than-desirable direction from the get-go are we allowed to give criticism before it gets too out-of-hand? Or should it all still be saved for the end?

Apocrypha wrote:Sundex, I know you don't want feedback for whatever reason on your latest theory but I should point out that, since most of your theory hinges on this, if you're using the chiastic structure thing, the white portal between 9 and 10 correlates to the portal between 1 and 2, and the lighthouse portal between 2 and 3 correlates to the gate between 8 and 9

Moved it here so I can better reference it.

Feedback now ready to be heard!

Apocrypha wrote:If we think the theory is going in a less-than-desirable direction from the get-go are we allowed to give criticism before it gets too out-of-hand? Or should it all still be saved for the end?

And I should have replied to this much sooner, but yeah. Only if the less-than-desirable direction you were describing is major, and can really change the viewpoint of the theory.

I like it! It's a good symbolical similarity, but whether the two portals have anything in common is hard to say. Either, Mat comments on the matter (not likely) or we develop a complete map of the karma network throughout the entire Subnet (even more unlikely) to see if and how they're linked.

Prupp wrote:I like it! It's a good symbolical similarity, but whether the two portals have anything in common is hard to say. Either, Mat comments on the matter (not likely) or we develop a complete map of the karma network throughout the entire Subnet (even more unlikely) to see if and how they're linked.

If your talking about the two portals linking in the sense that one leads to another, then that is wrong. Yes. But this theory doesn't talk about how they are linked. It talks about their similarities and answers the question "Do they have the same properties?" through analysis of both portals

Sundex wrote:These games have been described by Apocrypha as games that mirror each other in a chiastic structure, where as Submachine 2 is B and Submachine 9 is I. (for more comparisons on these installments, and others, see Apocrypha's theory video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mN63Pvf4rYM) However, his findings did not go over these so I will do so here

Again, I'll reiterate that just because these portals appear in mirrored games doesn't mean that the portals themselves are mirrored. The portals you're referencing both appear at the end, and for a true mirror you would need to talk about one at the beginning of one game and the other at the end of another. This is important because you're using the chiastic structure as the base argument why you should compare these two portals in the first place.

I'm not going to spend too much time on the differences between these two as I don't know what purpose they serve in a theory. If your "theory" takes into account both comparisons and contrasts between the two portals, then it's not a theory; it's a list of observations. A true theory would be more like making a statement that "the two portals are closely related, and here's why". But anyway,

Sundex wrote:it's sense of strength also comes from the fact that the portal takes you great distances from the 8th layer to the 1st layer and from the Shiva section to the Northern Gardens in Submachine 10.

Mateusz Skutnik, 2010-12-17 wrote:yes. dots are irrelevant.
one thing bugs me. you all think that layer 5 will be "far away"

like you could measure distance between two layers of reality. I think the distance is not the point here.

Be careful that you're not missing the fundamental point of layers.

Sundex wrote:This, instead of correlating to the portal that takes you from submachine 2 to submachine 3, although it kind of should, correlates to the "elevator" that transports you from submachine 1 that somehow takes you to submachine 2. Note how in submachine 10, we entered a karma portal that took us into the arcade machine, or somewhere based off of the arcade machine. Maybe we did this exact same thing, but backwards, to get to the lighthouse. "But Sundex, wouldn't the end scene for Submachine 1 be deteriorated?" That is the thing. Time has passed. We don't know how much time, but clearly enough for instability to take form and for the karma portal to start causing deterioration by the time we reach the arcade machine again.

Submachine 2: Lighthouse Portal
The light in the lighthouse is classified as a portal by Murtaugh in a note he left at the lighthouse.
“I did draw a portal in here, however it's not stable.”
— Portal note (Sub 2)
The fact that it is not stable makes it different from the white portal in Submachine 9. It's instability is the reason it transports us to the loop as seen in Submachine 3. However, instead of correlating to Submachine 9 heading into Submachine 10, it correlates to the "karmic gateway" of Submachine 8 that takes you to Submachine 9. There is obviously one huge difference between these two end scenes: one goes into a "detour" and the other comes out of one. But there is a similarity: before the next installment came for both of these games, we as a community were left in the dark to an extent.

None of this needs to be here. Or maybe it does, because it's not clear what your argument is in the first place. And if you do decide to make your argument that the Sub2 and Sub9 portals are closely related, you're mostly debunking your own theory. So I don't know what the point is.

Sundex wrote:Similarities
Both portals serve as an ending in respect to the games they associate with.

Which weakens your basis for using the chiastic structure, but I already talked about that.

Sundex wrote:Not only that, but have you noticed you need 5 things to gain access to both portals? In Submachine 2, you need to turn 5 red lights to green before the portal functions normally. In Submachine 9, you need to obtain 2 seals, one for Murtaugh and Elizabeth, and 3 wisdom gems, totaling up to 5 items.

This is not really true because you're using the term "gain access" way too broadly. In Sub2 it's clear that those three items and the two puzzles contribute specifically to powering up the portal and nothing else. But in Sub9 the seals allow you to "gain access to another part of the map", not the portal itself. (With that rationale you could say that the karmic water is another such item because it allows you to gain access to the pyramid.) Only the wisdom gems come truly close to doing that, but that's not really "powering it up", that's just allowing the player to change the navigator so the portal can be revealed where it was all along. So your analogy severely breaks down here.

Sundex wrote:There are 2 puzzles in Submachine 2 that can easily correlate with the seals: the e=mc^2 puzzle and the spinning knobs puzzle.

The e=mc^2 puzzle correlates to Murtaugh's seal. Where we find m is evidence to this claim:
“For those who follow me: I am sorry... and m = (random 3 digit number) sincerely mur”
— Diary 2 (Sub 2)
Because of this, by process of elimination, we can safely infer that Liz correlates to the spinning knobs.

"Process of elimination" doesn't work here because you're working logically backwards to fulfill your main reasoning "Because there are two of them" which isn't an argument. It would work better if you had some way to tie the knob puzzle to Liz directly besides "well it's the other one".

Sundex wrote:The last 3 red lights are turned green by sticking certain objects in certain places: The 2 coils in their respected positive and negative position, the fuse, and the ID card. Each of these represents one of the three wisdom gems you re-obtain from the mover. Just like the coils, fuse, and ID, you have to set the wisdom gem in a specific place.

"Because there are three of them" is also not an argument, nor is "because they have to be used in certain spots" because most of the items in the Submachine series have to be used in certain spots. This is bordering on association fallacy.

Sundex wrote:Both portals seem to emit the same shade of white light upon usage. This means that the lighthouse and the white karma portal use the same karmic energy, meaning that the lighthouse portal has the same properties as the white karma portal.

Same as above with association, and your conclusion doesn't hold up well because you debunked most of it yourself with the "differences" section.

Apoc's constructive criticism count: 8

Fixed: 7

Unfixed: 1 (the last one might take a LONG TIME)

(All edits made on Wiki)

(To be edited)

Yeah as stated before in the Skype chat I'm not a fan of you treating my criticisms as a monolith, just to reiterate.

Also, your "theory" is quickly running away from itself. I don't get why all the extended stuff about the chiastic structure is in there at all because it doesn't serve as an argument for...??? I'm still not sure what the main argument is either. It almost looks like it's evolving into a general extension of the chiastic structure, in which case you really need to break it off from the stuff about the portals because it's getting too confusing to tell the direction it's going in.

And I'm assuming the "last criticism" to be fixed is the fact that you're still incorrectly matching the sub2 ending portal with the sub9 ending portal. I tried telling you this earlier so you could go ahead and Not compare those two to each other, because you use the chiastic structure as an argument, and they don't fit the chiastic structure very well. Sorry of I was being too subtle before, but you need to either find another portal to compare to one you've mentioned already or scrap that part altogether.

Also,

Sundex wrote:Because of this, we can safely infer that Liz correlates to the spinning knobs. Especially since it was told in a secret note in a secret location of Submachine 6 that Murtaugh is the explorer and Liz is the solver.

“Find Liz. She will guide you. If he's the explorer, she's the solver.”

— Murtaugh's Game (Sub 6)

This makes no sense as to how Liz is related to the knob puzzle. Are you saying that it's related because..."you're solving a puzzle" and Liz is called a "solver"?

If that's the case then you're reaching wayyyyyyyyyyyyy too far. There is more than one puzzle to solve in the Submachine series, in any case. I think you've got to let go of this concept that you make the conclusion first and try to fit everything to it, no matter how slim and irrelevant the connections might be.

Theories are not "I think this is true and I will 'prove' it because these things have some sort of connection". They are developed through specific isolated evidence that might support a conclusion, but if it doesn't then you absolutely have to accept that the conclusions might need to be modified or abandoned. Because you can't twist words and facts to reach conclusions that aren't actually there.

Or maybe I'm misunderstanding you.