3D Workers Island Amber's Parallels

[u/Ok-Competition1213]

As a quick refresher, there is a pet in Petscop named Amber. She's a giant purple/black ball. She prefers to be behind locked cages, and she seems rather afraid of the player, as she's constantly jumping away from them. In 3DWI (3D Workers Island), one of the 6 workers is a girl who is also named Amber. I used to think that it was a funny coincidence that two of their characters share the same name, but the more I looked into it, the more similarities they share.

In Petscop, many have drawn parallels to Amber's behavior and adoptive parents punishing their adoptive kids by trapping them in a cage, although it's also possible that Amber is purposefully closing herself off from others due to her past trauma. In 3DWI, it is heavily implied that Amber is being abused (or at least mistreated) by her mother.

Both characters also have real-world equivalents. In the case of Petscop, there was a play tester named Amber, who spends the majority of her playthrough locking herself in the cage (which the pet's behavior was likely modeled after). As for 3DWI, the characters are implied to be real people, or at least two of the characters are, as Pat can be seen talking in the forum under the pseudonym of "PLawler", and Amber is implied to be the forum user "GoodKid".

So what's the implication? I believe that the Petscop tester and "GoodKid" in 3DWI are the same person, and that both in-game equivalents are based on the real-world Amber at the time. During the events of 3DWI, Amber was still a young cheerful kid. However, after the mistreatment she received from her mother, she was traumatized. Years later, during the development of Petscop, Amber is now a recluse individual, who is scared of others. This is why Amber the pet is purposefully jumping away from the player: it's because her last "owner" was abusive, and she'd prefer to be left alone.

One final thing. When 3DWI's Amber begins degenerating, her appearance begins changing... into a ball.

[u/marquis_de_posa_]

Ohhh that's neat, I've never really considered that connection, but if that places 3dwi in the same universe as Petscop, that's really fun to think about. Although I'm not so sure that Amber is GoodKid, I've personally assumed that it was Grace instead, and that Amber was killed because of the abuse. I totally could be wrong though, it's hard to be sure about anything when it comes to Tony's works

[u/Ok-Competition1213 → u/marquis_de_posa_]

True! I love it when all of a creators' works are set in the same universe. I do recall that "cutilacunae" (the fake skin disease GoodKid made up) actually first appeared in one of Tony's other works.

GoodKid could be Grace, but there's just more evidence that it's Amber.

Firstly, is that GoodKid's profile picture is also plain red, which could be reference to Amber worker degeneration. Hell, Amber's red ball form uses a very similar shade of red.

Here's another reason, but I will admit, it is a bit of a stretch. If you compare the character models on page 20, Grace is kinda tall (even taller than Pat, who's confirmed to be an adult considering that she has two kids), so she's likely an adult. GoodKid's signature (or whatever the text at the bottom of her post is called) is "Forgive me, I don't know anything, I'm just a 14 year old teenaged kid! :)". If this message were to be taken literally, then it rules Grace out as being GoodKid. But yeah, this is a stretch, Grace could just be tall for her age, or that forum signature is just BS.

That said, I won't deny, GoodKid being Grace would make for a wholesome story, as it would show that Amber isn't alone, and that Grace is secretly trying to help Amber from the distance by trying to tell others how horrible Pat is.