Danya is coming home!


Why is the cursor an onion?
Great question!
In the original English release of Pathologic, the translation and voice direction left a lot to be desired. The Haruspex will ocassionally speak in the Steppe language, and sometimes refers to the Bachelor with the term oynon, which means something akin to "sage". However, a misreading of the word made it into the English translation where the Haruspex infamously tells the Bachelor, "Go, onion! I need to collect the tools."

terrible images
Should you play Pathologic?
Unfortunately, as someone who has made a whole shrine for this game which I love very much, I cannot say to everyone that they should play Pathologic. The playthrough is grueling and the story is confusing and depressing. Pathologic should be played by people who are patient and who can endure weird dialogue, frustrating choices, and lots and lots of brown landscape. That said, if you played Morrowind and enjoyed it, you might like this game.

What is Pathologic?
Pathologic is a survival horror game released in 2005 by Russian studio Icepick Lodge. It was given an English release in 2006, and a remake titled Pathologic Classic HD was released in 2015. In 2013, Icepick Lodge announced that it was going to remake Pathologic focusing on one of the player character's arcs, which was released in 2019 under the name Pathologic 2. Pathologic 3 is slated to be released at some point in 2025.

Pathologic follows the same setting and general plotline regardless of which of the three player characters (the Bachelor, the Haruspex, the Changeling) the player chooses, but their motivations and abilities differ. Overall, each character arrives to a small town in the Russian steppe called Town-on-Ghorkon. Significant members of the community are dying with talk of a serial killer or a mystical figure being the casue of these deaths, but it soon becomes evident that the deaths are caused due to a growing plague known as the Sand Pest, which has no known cure or vaccine. All player characters only have twelve days to save the town from annihilation from both the plague and the Powers That Be, the enigmatic embodiment of the law which seem to reside in the Capitol.

The Bachelor
Is my heart beating? I worry that I am starting to believe them when they say it's stone cold. The gun is heavy with the weight of losing, what is defeating death when you kill others with your own hands?

The Bachelor, Daniil Dankovsky, is a player character for one of the first two available routes, and is generally considered the "default" character route. He is a bachelor of medicine from the Capitol who arrives to Town-on-Ghorkon after hearing of a man living there, Simon Kain, who is supposedly immortal. However, upon arriving, Simon and Daniil's interlocutor, Isidor Burakh, are announced dead with the latter being presumed the victim of a murder. With Daniil's reason for coming to the town now lost, Daniil investigates what might have happened and tries to navigate through the interpersonal relationships of the townspeople and the ruling families. Daniil learns that there is a plague growing in the town, and conspires to leave with two of his friends he had known in college after encouraging the town's government to prepare for the plague. However, the same people that Daniil spoke to end up putting the town on lockdown, and Daniil is unable to escape with his friends.

Daniil's route follows his attempts to develop a vaccine to protect the townspeople from getting infected within just twelve days, while struggling against the folkways Town-on-Ghorkon's citizens and navigating the utopian ideals of the ruling class.

What's his deal?
Daniil is characterized through the game as being someone who is inherently difficult to get along with because he is too involved in his own intellectualism to "get" Town-on-Ghorkon. His ideals are lofty and he is obsessed with the notion of literally overcoming death itself, and this was his objective in the Capitol until his Thanatica burns down. By all accounts his scientific perspective on the plague itself ought to make sense, but Daniil learns a little too late that the plague is not fully scientific. He is a high-minded individual and exceptionally eager for everything, especially as his utopian and logical ways of thinking ally himself with the elite bodies of Town-on-Ghorkon. He is charming in how infuriating he is.

The Haruspex
Helplessness is nothing squashed under the boot of faith. One foot in front of the other, the cause doesn’t matter, only the result. Hold the words close, what little you have, is yours. Hand off your future, and let it lie.

The Haruspex, Artemy Burakh, is a player character for one of the first two available routes and is the player character of Pathologic 2. He is a surgeon and son of Isidor Burakh, having been taught the cultural medical practices of his people, the Kin, who are indigenous to the Steppe. Artemy returns to Town-on-Ghorkon from the Capitol after receiving a letter from his father saying that he must speak with Artemy urgently. However, when Artemy arrives, he is immediately jumped at the trainyards because he is presumed to have murdered Isidor.

The following day, Artemy is given his inheritance, which includes all the duties of his father, the menkhu (a Kin who is given the right to open bodies) of Town-on-Ghorkon. In Pathologic 2, Artemy's responsibilities are introduced to him at his father's funeral, where the earth literally rejects Isidor's body until Artemy resolves his obligations.

Artemy's route follows his attempts to develop a cure for the plague to cure the infected townspeople within twelve days. His duties as a menkhu, alienation from his people's culture, and the mysticism of what the plague and the earth are trying to show him both help and inhibit him.

What's his deal?
Artemy allows a new perspective on the town in comparison to Daniil, who was entirely an outsider and for whom the ways of the townspeople and the Khatanghe were wholly foreign. By comparison, his method of curing the plague is far less concerned with the future and rationale, and instead is more immediate and visceral. Being Khatangher himself, Artemy has a vested interest in the wellbeing of the indigenous lifeways of the Steppe and the preservation of his people's way of life, which is being threatened by the same utopian ideals as the town's ruling families. Yet, all of this is at odds with the fact that Artemy is a wanted man and perpetually loathed by the townspeople despite risking his life for them out of duty.

The Changeling
My hands are in the air, and I'm praying to gods I wish I didn't believe in; I am rain soaked and shivering, I have faith in myself, I repeat the words over and over until it's far too late to change anything. I wish I would wash away into the soil with the blood on my hands.

The Changeling, Clara, is an unlockable player character in Pathologic Classic and is only playable once both Daniil's and Artemy's routes have been completed. She is a mysterious young girl who awakes in the town at the bottom of a freshly dug grave. Her past and her motivations are unclear and made even more ambiguous by the fact that she can lie and contradict things in her dialogue choices. Unlike Daniil and Artemy, Clara has no medical means of addressing the plague, and relies instead on her ability to kill or heal with the laying on of hands.

Clara's route involves following the orders of her adopted family and trying to either help or hinder the efforts of Daniil or Artemy, all while she is being contacted by her twin sister, who might also be Clara herself.



What's her deal?
Where Daniil is the brain and Artemy is the body, it can be said that Clara is the soul. Her primary recurring character trait is in the conviction of her favor with a higher power which allows her to kill or heal, and permits her to perform miracles just as much as she is awaiting a miracle to save the town. Clara has fourth-wall-breaking information about the plot of the game and the game itself, which is why her route is both detached and somewhat omniscient. Unfortunately, this weight is not given its due as her route is rushed in both technical development and story-writing.