Why, Pendleton? Why?
Psychonauts 2 is a game about diving into people’s minds, uncovering deep secrets, and generally being a fun ‘ol time. It’s not entirely out of character for the game to dive into one of the strangest subjects spawned by the internet’s most foul reaches, but not all stones are meant to be turned.
For those who’d rather not learn that which can’t be unlearned, please skip the next sentence. Mpreg is a kind of art (or fictional story trope) where a man goes through pregnancy, usually in great detail. It has some… associations with a selection of unsavory parts of the internet, so if you were lucky enough to skip that sentence, consider yourself blessed and your mind sacred. You are more fortunate than I, I had to type it out.
Instead of linking a clip of the Easter egg here, I’ll give you an image of a cute dog. I’m sure you could find the video yourself if you really wanted to, and you’re gonna need the eyebleach anyway.
Isn’t that wonderful? Such a lovely creature.
Anyway, back to the chaos. One little detail is all it took for people to speculate on the bizarre clip’s origin: to witness the Easter egg, you have to hurl a pen at the oversized “WARD” sign in the game’s maternity ward, after beating the game. Naturally, players noticed the pun and made the connection.
Is it convoluted and obscure? Absolutely – how players managed to find the exact sequence of moved needed to trigger this is beyond me. You can’t say they weren’t rewarded for their efforts, though you could argue that the “reward” is more of a punishment.
Is it subtle? Not really, the link is right there. Ward’s comedic style has a strong focus on the unusual and unconventional. His work on Adventure Time shows that style extremely well. Plus, Ward’s name is in the game’s credits, and the voice acting in the clip isn’t done by the usual cast (but could have been done by Ward himself?). It’s an odd choice for an already odd clip, there’s no way it exists without reason.
While there’s plenty of reasons to believe Pendleton Ward had a role in this mess, no official source has confirmed the rumor just yet. And to be honest, I’m not sure why they would. It’s so much funnier this way.