Symbolism in Dear Esther

[Elias Blackman]

While playing the game I came across the story of Paul meeting Jesus inscribed on the wall of cliff. Along with those inscriptions were some chemical formulas. The initial ones were easy. I figured some of them, but later on they became complex. Also there were diagrams of brain’s neural system and electrical circuits. What do they mean? I thought over it but couldn’t figure out much.

[Bubboy]

The chemical symbols that we find on wall refer to alcohol. As seen in the beginning of game, it begins with an accident. The brain neural diagrams refer to the activity of neural system after consuming alcohol. This is used to denote one of the causes of accident. The brain neural system diagrams also refer to the unstable state of mind of Paul who met Jesus on way to Damascus. Paul was the one who killed Jesus’ disciples and later turned Christian himself.

[MACALL]

The electrical circuits which you are referring to denotes the anti-air lock system which can also be the cause of accident. Some of the diagrams also refer to the plane crash caused due to low altitude flight. The diagrams referring brain’s neural system demote mental illness.

[Irene-I]

Another reason for the presence of electrical symbols on the wall can be the reason that the narrator was an electrical engineer. The first location in the game that is a lighthouse has a document on a floor. If zoomed on the document, you can read that it is a certificate of qualification in fie;d of electronic engineering.

[Daksha90]

If the electrical symbols we encounter in the game are closely studied, then we can see that the 2 types of symbol that are mostly use are that of a transformer and another of LED (Light Emitting Diode). One explanation for them can be that
1) Transformer denotes change of one form to another.
2) The LED as we know is one way device that emits light is used in the game to denote the light house.
This is my opinion on the symbols.

[Wyl]

In the chapter 2 which begins with a shipwreck, again these symbols are used. At the shipwreck, you see a rock with a straight line drawn with a transformer in its path and ends with an LED. It is found along the right hand side path where we find an intel to whose left hand side is a ghost. According to me the rock signifies the island and the straight line signifies the path along which the transformation occurs and the LED at the end signifies death.

[Ashley Parker]

Further to that on the beach, we can find a Fibonacci spiral with transformer. According to the theme of the game, that is, ‘transformation’, this diagram denotes ‘transformation matrix spiral’. If you search for transformation matrix spiral in Google images, then many results show us images of spiral staircases going downwards . So it hints is to find downward going staircases to proceed.