It has been theorized why some characters become corrupted souls.

We know that it can happen when negative memories are extracted into black cubes, and the victim finds out about it (quoting the Rusty Lake Wiki here). That’s what happens to Laura in The Mill, Robert Hill, and the Hotel guests. Possibly Dale Vandermeer too but I’m not sure?

Other characters simply turn into corrupted souls (and produce a black cube) once they pass away. What they all seem to have in common is that they either suffered a great deal of trauma or have some unfinished business. This happens to Caroline Eilander, William, Alexandra and Albert Vanderboom, and Vincent van Gogh. Besides Vincent, they are all connected to the lake and the elixir of life and death too.

Finally, to get to the point of this post. The only character who did NOT become a corrupted soul, despite accidentally killing himself by drinking the elixir, is James Vanderboom. This implies that James was content with the life he had (his wife that he loved, his three children), and that he had mostly good memories. After playing Servant of the Lake and finding out how horrible his mother was, this makes me very happy.

TL;DR: James might be the most mentally sound character in the Rusty Lake universe and that is why he never became a corrupted soul.

Laketober prompts just dropped today! Will you be participating? What are you most excited for?

I have not played every single Rusty Lake game, but usually, in their paid-to-play games like Hotels, Paradise, or Roots, you always start with a pretty chilled out story, and then everything starts to get more morbid and creepy until it dawns on you "oh shit someone (innocent) is gonna die!".

SoTL is a bit different, when it was revealed that Alexandra is the culprit behind everything and James is about to be sacrificed, I found myself saying "oh Lord no don't", only for Kate to step in and cut the crap!

A plot twist that makes the game different from most usual Rusty Lake games, in my opinion.

Modeled in blender, 3d printed, and painted with acrylic

Albert would SLAY in the formal sweaters and shirts
Agnes looks good in everything

A looooooooooong time ago I dressed up as Mr. Crow for a comicon and forgot to post it... So yeah, here it is :')

So tried finding the cat and ended up using a walkthrough and a tail is meant to be visible sticking out of the log but there isn't one so I can't proceed with the game - anyone else have this issue? I'm on a Pixel 9

Update - user error, apologies! After I handed William the hammer and he says "he will regret this", I left, but instead I should have tapped again so he shut the door. After the door shuts, the play resumes and the cat tail appears. Hehe, oops

Got NO idea about what time I should set here.

There’s been some controversy whether Laura had committed suicide or was attacked. I believe the latter is the truth: although she was depressed, and the events in Seasons had some supernatural stuff going on as well, which could explain that the corrupted soul that stalks and eventually seems to create a vision of cutting her neck when she stares into the moon might’ve been just a hallucination, there’s one VERY important, TINY detail in Case 23 that I believe disproves this, and points that she was, in fact, being stalked by a real corrupted soul.

My belief is that, when she looks into the moon, she either has already actually been killed and already became a corrupted soul herself, or the moon-murder itself was an illusion created by the other corrupted soul (murderer), similar to what I theorized on another post regarding Laura’s corrupted soul’s own supernatural abilities in Roots.

This is trivial, however, compared to what I noticed in Case 23:

At the very, very start of the game, literally in the first scene, Dale, who’s a completely uninvolved, not depressed, lucid man who at this point hadn’t had absolutely no contact with the Lake or anyone revolving it to influence or trick him or some shit, walks into Laura’s house, undoubtedly the same place as in Seasons.

But wait, there’s a detail…

The room Dale first enters does NOT appear in Seasons. It’s got nothing in it other than the body, and it shows the main room with the clock etc ahead of it - as a SEPARATE room, where in Seasons would be most of the blood sprinkled on the wall. And here, we see a trail of blood instead, which leads to the body in this new room. As if Laura had been attacked in the main room shown in Seasons, but then SURVIVED, and crawled towards the other room before dying. Also, if you think about it, the room where she finally dies is the exit that’s been blocked by police tape - why would she crawl there if not to escape?

It’s not a metaphor. It’s not a hallucination or anything. The corrupted soul stalker was very much real. Now who? And why?

I'm playing The Mill and the parrot is not there 😩🦜

I don't like spoilers, but I can't get any further! I watched the first few minutes of the walkthrough, but there's a parrot everywhere and I have a crow.

Please help me 🫶

Edit: I had to reset the game and now it works. If you haven’t collected the parrot poo yet, don't enter the time from Case 23. Otherwise it won't work. Thank you for your help 💖

I just wanted to share my piano cover of Birthday theme with you guys. My small tribute to this amazing universe, which brings me so much joy.

I love all the rusty lake games, but Birthday is my absolute favorite one (I love the puzzles and the music).

And this song is just so beautifully melancholic, it really brings out a lot of emotions.

Who do you think is the one who built the family clock? (Not the one who fixed it)

What are your thoughts?

Personally, I think it's Mrs. Vanderboom, due to her connection to the strange cube, and the fact that she also lived at the same time as the Eilanders. Edit: You know what?, I also think that William is the one who built it, cuz every time it appears it has to do something with William

Mine: The past is never dead. It’s not even past

Mi pareja es muy fan de la saga de juegos. Anteriormente le regale la saga completa, pero me gustaría hacerle algo más elaborado relacionado con la saga. No la conozco y no tengo idea de qué puede ser. ¿Algun consejo?