Spoiler alert, it'll be a while.”

Aw YOU GOTTA BE KIIDING ME!

[Spooky glitch intro]

Hello Internet!

Welcome to Game Theory where last time, we began unraveling the puzzle that is Petscop.

To make sure everything is clear, let me quickly summarize our findings in the form of a timeline:

The story begins in 1977, when a dude rocking some sick eyebrows named Marvin takes his

female friend and her sister to a windmill. As you do....

The friend, who is named Tiara, is killed by Marvin. Marvin then goes on to marry his victim's

sister, a woman who would come to fear him.

So clearly, Marvin's is set up to be our bad guy.

Now, fast forward 11 years to 1988 when we know our next key character is born -- Michael

Hammond.

We know this based on his gravestone.

He eventually disappears, kidnapped and abused by Marvin, leading to his premature death

at the age of seven in 1995.

In the aftermath of Michael's death, his older brother Rainer starts developing the

game Petscop in 1996, which he specifically says is “for Marvin." It's a game that he would

complete a year later in 1997 as evidenced by the copyright date on the game's Start

Screen.

Around the same time, June 5, 1997, Marvin kidnaps his own daughter Care, a girl who

bears a striking resemblance to Tiara - Marvin's first victim back at the windmill twenty years earlier.

Eight days after Care's kidnapping, June 13, a note appears on a copy of the game Petscop that reveals

a password which unlocks a hidden game buried under the surface that seems to expose all

of Marvin's crimes.

And that's where we left off -- a battle between Rainer - the creator of Petscop - and Marvin - the

serial kidnapped / murderer.

But that still leaves us with a TON of unanswered questions.

Why would Marvin kidnap his own daughter?

What is he ACTUALLY doing to these kids?

Why would Rainer create a VIDEO GAME of all things to catch this killer?

And how does ALL of this relate the videos that we're watching and to our Let's Player Paul?

So pluck those eyebrows Ladies and Gentlemen and watch out for windmills, because today we're putting the final touches

on one of YouTube's longest and creepiest Let's Plays.

Let's start today by taking a closer look at Marvin.

Coming off of last episode, I saw a lot of people asking why he would kidnap his own

daughter, but you needn't look any further than episode 11 to find your answer.

In episode 11, we watch as Paul unlocks a “frozen house”, Marvin's house,

that we're told was captured at three different points in time.

And we can tell when those moments are based on calendars found posted on the wall.

Now they don't specify the year, but we can see how the dates align with the days of the

week and extrapolate the year from that information.

The first has Christmas falling on a Thursday...which, by checking past years, we know happened in

1997. Which just so happens to be the year of Care's kidnapping.

The episode makes sure to linger A LOT of this paticular calendar, showing off a strange pattern of days

highlighted in green, beginning as every other day, then reducing to only weekends, then

skipping a few days before turning into a solid block of green for a series of months.

In those few images, Rainer - through the language of the game - has shown us a tale of a family falling apart.

Bassically what we've just seen is a custody calendar -- Marvin sees his daughter Care every other day at the top of

the year, then his custody is reduced to only weekends until finally, on June 5, he breaks

into his old house and kidnaps her, resulting in a solid block of green until November 10, the day that she's

rescued.

In other words, he's kidnapping the daughter that was taken from him by his wife and that

block of green is all the time they're spending together now that she's under his inprisonment.

And like we discussed last episode - it's a kidnapping that we actually see, as the second calendar CONFIRMS that we're

watching her kidnapping. June 5, 1997.

And the last calendar we see puts us at Christmas of the year 2000, a date we'll talk about

a little bit later.

So, what is Marvin doing once he kidnaps these kids?

Well, we know from Care NLM's in-game description in Petscop 9 that “Care NLM escaped from

the school's basement and wandered the Newmaker Plane for days.”

Escaped the school's basement?

What does that mean?

Well, in episode 3, we visit actually visit her room and find out: “A young person walks into your

school building.

They walk in with you.

You're holding their hands.

They come out crying into their hands, because nobody will love them, not ever again.

“Nobody loves me!”

They wander the Newmaker Plane.”

Last episode, we established that the “you” being talked about in these notes is Marvin

-- Rainer made this game for him to see... “Well this part of the game was made for somebody

to see."

...which means Marvin is a teacher who abducts children and takes them to his

classroom or a basement in the school...first Michael, then Care...then does something to them that makes them unlovable...something

that ruins them.

Turns them into NLM status.

But what is he DOING?

Well I'm sure you could be imagining any number of awful things that a guy could be doing to kids in the bottom of a school

but here's where things get a bit odd.

In video 2, Let' s Player Paul finds a device named TOOL under the Newmaker Plane which

gives him the ability to ask questions.

Now most of his questions don't yield all that much information until Petscop 7 when TOOL

suddenly turns pink and starts talking on its own, as if it's possessed, saying:

TURN OFF PLAYSTATION.

MARVIN PICKS UP TOOL HURTS ME WHEN PLAYSTATION ON.

I LOVE YOU NEWMAKER PLEASE SHOW MARVIN WHERE HIS HOUSE IS.

GO THERE AND HE'LL FOLLOW YOU HIS DAUGHTER IS THERE.

ALSO WANTS 1000 PIECES FOR “MACHINE BEYOND SCHOOL BASEMENT STAIRWAY."

So he's not only hurting the kids, but he's putting them into some kind of machine.

It's also worth noting that this Pink Tool asking for help, by process of elimination,

MUST be the voice of yet another child.

I mean It can't be Mike's, since we JUST walked past his gravestone, and it

can't be Care, since she's crying in NLM form under the shack.

This means there must be a third victim, someone else captured and tortured by Marvin.

And based on Petscop 12, we know who this is: a girl named Belle, a girl who we know

somehow manages to escape.

“Hi Belle.

You're free!

I left these messages for you to look at, in case you were ever rescued.”

And it's these messages to Belle in Petscop 12 that actually reveal A LOT about the plot

when you read between the lines.

First, we know these messages are coming from Rainer, himself, since he specifically mentions features HE

put into the game.

“You're not family, so I didn't add your traits to the face system.

That means I didn't add your eyes or your eyebrows or your nose.”

Now that revelation right there also drops a HUGE bombshell on the dynamics of this game -- Michael Hammond

isn't JUST Rainer's dead younger brother, he's also part of Marvin's family.

I mean think about it - the text box says, only FAMILY have their features in the game's facial system, and

since we know Mike's features are in there, his nose and eyebrows, as well as Care's features in there - it means that Rainer,

Care, Michael, and Marvin are all related.

In short, that one line tells us that Petscop is the tale of a broken family -- a family dealing with the consequences

of their abusive father. But thats not all!

The family connection also ties in with our player, Paul.

“When I found my room, I was shocked at first, but it made sense.

In that line Paul EXPLICITLY STATES that he found a room dedicated to HIM in the game, meaning that now HE TOO is aslo a part of this

family.

He also mentions that he and Care look alike and happen to be the same age.

“I remember you saying that we are... exactly the same... age...I

do agree there is a resemblance... very strong resemblance between us."

The game seems to run in the family, as Rainer reappears multiple times throughout the timeline

to deliver it on Christmas Day.

First in Christmas Day 1997, which we see in the Frozen House, and again on Christmas

Day in the year 2000.

Paul actually mentions in episode 8 that his mom was the one with the game, which she had

in 2004. "Well it could have changed between then and 2004. After 2004, my mom had it, reportedly."

So Petscop is the equivalent of a family heirloom, Rainer's chronicle of the bad behavior his

father committed that he now passes down between generations.

Secondly though, thelines that Rainer programed into the game for Belle show that Marvin's machine is somehow tied to playing

music.

“I was overeager before and started calling you Tiara prematurely.

I created a space for you in the menu, still unused now.

Then I put you inside the machine and played the second movement of Stravinsky's Septet

on the Needles.

I played it wrong, but that would have been okay.

If you hadn't given up halfway, you would be Tiara.

This is not what happened, and now I'm gone.”

The machine's connection to music is further supported by hidden images sprinkled throughout

the game's various loading screens.

At first glance, most of the load screens simply look black...and yet, throughout the

entirety of the 13 episodes, there are hidden images that reveal themselves when the screen

is brightened or the exposure is cranked up.

What you find are real-life equivalents of key in-game objects and places: the bedroom

layout we see in the Quitter's Room, wooden stairs leading into a basement just like the

ones we descend in-game to get into the Newmaker Plane, a piano with a Playstation controller

connected to it, someone being forced to play the piano, and Marvin's face...or perhaps

Marvin's mask. I doubt in real life his face is REALLY that green.

So what's really going on here?

What's all this about a piano?

Well, it seems like Marvin steals kids...often his own kids...to “rebirth” the most promising

candidates into Tiara, his friend from decades prior -- the windmill girl.

It began with his son Mike, plucking his eyebrows to best recreate Tiara's hairless face.

We know this based on the tweezers hidden in Michael's room.

When he didn't work out, Marvin moved on to Care, who's natural lack of eyebrows

made her an exciting prospect.

As we can see from a note in the back of her room: “Your wife says, “Care isn't growing eyebrows.”

You say, “That's a puzzle.”

You're secretly very excited to hear this news.

You're in the bathtub thinking about her.

I have a guess at which child you'll pick next.” That last line there CLEARLY indicates that Care is definitely not the first child

to undergo this procedure.

Now once at the school, he forces the kids into the basement, which we see in the real-life

loading screen image descending a wooden staircase, then gets them to play music that somehow

is tied to the bizarre rebirthing process.

As evidenced by the hidden real-life photo in the loading screens, he specifically forces

them to play the piano.

Those who fail are punished by getting locked into a real-life version of the Quitter's Room. Something that Rainer recreates in the game.

That's where Belle is imprisoned at the beginning of the series and where she is rescued

from in episode 12.

While under his watch, Marvin “motivates” his students to do better not by using a controlled

shock, but rather by using TOOL, or rather a tool, what appears to be an awl, a tool

used for punching holes in leather and wood but also, fittingly enough, a tool that's

often included in piano tuning kits.

This is the cycle of abuse he creates, trying to recreate his lost love Tiara.

And that's the way it continues for DECADES. At least until Rainer's game, but the story doesn't conclude in the way you might think.

You see, Petscop doesn't seem content to just retell the story of Marvin's crimes.

Like Paul says: "This game is trying very hard to make it seem like there's an entity in it."

And he's not wrong: Petscop seems able to act on its own.

We see Marvin's in-game avatar literally able to manipulate the level editor in video 6.

We also know this is Marvin talking by the language he is using in the game.

Notice how he phrase his questions: “Where is my house?” “Where

is the School?”

MY house.

Marvin's house.

He's trapped and now he's looking for a means of escape.

It seems like Rainer made Petscop to stop Marvin's violent acts not by simply exposing him but by trapping him inside

the game.

Petscop is Marvin's prison.

And the Demo screen at the end of Petscop 12 confirms it.

If you watch to the absolute last second of the video, there are a few frames that reveal

the pause menu for the demo screen and you can see that there is no escape available.

Unlike when Paul is playing, where the pause menu has a “Quit Game” option, the demo

screen doesn't; the Demo players are literally trapped in the game.

So how'd Rainer get Marvin trapped inside the game?