To the Moon

Story

Sigmund Corp. uses technology that can create artificial memories. They offer this as a "wish fulfillment service" for people on their deathbed. Since these artificial memories clash with the patient's real memories, the procedure is only legal for people who do not have much time to live. Sigmund Corp. employees Dr. Eva Rosalene and Dr. Neil Watts are tasked with fulfilling the dying Johnny Wyles' lifelong dream. Johnny wants to go to the moon, though he doesn't know why. The doctors engage in an interactive compilation of his memories, traveling backward through his life using mementos. With each jump to an important moment in Johnny's memories, they learn more about him and what has brought him to his current life situation, including his largely unhappy marriage to his childhood sweetheart, River. When they arrive at his childhood, the doctors are trying to communicate his desire to go to the moon. It is believed that Johnny's mind creates new memories based on this wish and he dies believing that he has lived without regret. However, Johnny's mind does not create the new memories as planned. Dr. Watts and Dr. Rosalene must solve the problem in order to fulfill Johnny's last wish to go to the moon. Eventually, it turns out that Johnny and River met as children at a fair. They looked up at the night sky and invented a constellation: a rabbit with the moon as its belly. The two agreed to meet in the same place the next year, with Johnny promising that they would "meet again on the moon" if he forgot or got lost. That night, Johnny gives River a toy platypus, which River cherishes for the rest of their lives. Shortly thereafter, Johnny's twin brother Joey is killed in an accident. Johnny's mother put him on beta blockers so that he would not remember the tragic event and also forget his first meeting with River. He later met her again by chance and eventually married her. River only later realized that he had forgotten about their meeting at the fair. (Johnny confessed that he had approached her at school because she was different, and revealed that he thought that was their first encounter). River, who as an adult was diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome (although this is never directly mentioned, the game refers to Tony Attwood, who has written numerous books on Asperger's), did not directly tell Johnny about their first encounter; instead, she tried to indirectly jog his memory by cutting her hair and making paper bunnies, including a two-colored one that represented the constellation they had invented when they first met, combined with the blue and yellow dress she wore to her wedding. River failed to remind Johnny of her before she died, leaving him with lingering feelings of guilt and an inexplicable desire to travel to the moon. In the present, Rosalene and Watts eventually implant a memory sequence in which Joey does not die and becomes a popular author, while Johnny does not meet River again until they work together at NASA. As the comatose Johnny begins to die in real life, he imagines going on a moon mission with River. During the launch, River holds out his hand. The moon appears through a window of the spacecraft and Johnny takes her hand while his heart monitor stops responding. In the epilogue, Johnny and River finally marry and build the same house that Johnny and River lived in in real life and retire. Back in the real world, Rosalene and Watts look at Johnny's grave, which is next to River's grave. They reveal to viewers that Johnny left the house to his caregiver, Lily. Rosalene gets a call, and the two head to their next patient. As Watts leaves, he stops and the screen flashes red briefly, just like when Johnny was in pain. Watts takes some pain pills and then continues walking.