Level Analysis- Psychonauts: Sasha's Shooting Gallery (Part Four)

After running away from home, Sasha is hired as an industrial worker at a factory plant somewhere in Germany.

There are no memory vaults at this level, and Sasha doesn’t tell us much to go off of, so the narrative here is left entirely up to interpretation.

Ever since the events of his second sight, Sasha became more withdrawn, beginning to closely resemble the Sasha Nein we know today. However, unlike the Sasha we know today, this one is extremely maladjusted and emotionally compromised.

The layout of this layer is very different from what we’ve seen in the last two sublevels. It is enclosed, with metal beams caging around Raz and billowing smoke clogging the mindscape. Inside, valves spewing fire and pipes bursting at the seams with steam.

Figments in this layer resemble factory workers as insects, possibly hinting at Sasha’s disdain for his coworkers. We also see figments of cigarettes here, hinting that this is where Sasha first picked up the habit.

The environment reflects the mental state of someone who feels trapped in a dangerous situation, but for Sasha, I suspect the factory cage symbolism is as much a metaphor as it is literal. Sasha did work at an industry plant, but the factory setting also serves to reflect his declining mental health.

This is reflected in the dangerous level layout. While the Nursery and Cobbler Shop were relatively safe, aside from the overabundance of censors, the factory is the only layer where the environment is actively attempting to hurt Raz. Sasha also has hardly any control over this layer of his mind, which is saying something, considering he has perfect control over the rest of his mind.

The most important hint of this level’s relation to Sasha’s mental state is the factory’s mechanics involving temperature and pressure, and how they symbolize the lesson Sasha learned from his time at the factory. If temperature or pressure continues to build in a sealed container without a way to escape, it will implode from the inside. We see this all the time, like how sealed bottles often erupt on airplanes.

Sasha’s mind was literally a container of building mental pressure that needed release in controlled amounts. But because Sasha is so withdrawn from himself and others, these feelings have nowhere to go to find release, so they burst out of him in the form of psychic powers.

His self-destructive venting may have even been what led him to use cigarettes as a coping mechanism for his deteriorating mental health, as many people find the habit of smoking to be therapeutic.

It is more than likely these violent outbursts are what attracted the attention of the Psychonaut agency and put him on the route to recovery.

“...if you try to completely suppress your undesirable feelings, they’ll build and build and eventually explode.”

This theme of mounting pressure and fear of undesirable emotions comes to a peak when the boss of this level is revealed slumbering beneath the factory: the Mega Censor.

This is a creature Sasha accidentally created inside his mind during the lowest point of his life. Its sole purpose is to aggressively stomp out any source of foreign emotion.

“You are my own creation. I command you to stop!”

Despite Sasha’s ability to stand up and face his past, he is still censored by the beast, leaving it up to Raz to finish it off and save his teacher.

Sasha’s life at the factory was important for his mental development. At this point in his life, he was at his lowest, and where he learned the importance of mental control and healthy venting. It was this discovery that led him to discover his signature ability: PSI Blast, the same power he teaches to Raz.

“I’ve learned to keep it under strict control. And that’s what I’m going to teach you: control. Your feelings, your fears, your anger. You must learn to control them, focus them, concentrate them, and release them…as firepower!”

PSI Blast is all about venting emotions in controlled bursts, offering an easy way to release destructive emotions without risk of harming yourself or those around you.

It’s an invaluable lesson in mental health, one that sorely needs to be taught more. Unchecked negative emotions are everywhere in the world, and so many of them explode without the consent of one’s mind.

Letting yourself feel powerful emotions like anger, sadness, and even jealousy can be frightening, but they need release. Bottling up feelings is as much of a safe option as it is destructive. Finding outlets for emotions is the key to a controlled mental state.