Camp Know Where

Lore & Background

The camp is set in the fictional Whispering Rock Psychic Summer Camp, a remote US government training facility disguised as a children's summer camp. Centuries ago, the area was hit by a meteor made of Psitanium, creating a huge crater. The Psitanium affected local wildlife, giving them limited psychic powers, such as bears with telekinetic claws, cougars with pyrokinesis, and rats with confusion gas. The Native Americans called Psitanium 'whispering rock' and used it to build arrowheads. When settlers arrived, the psychoactive properties of the meteor slowly drove them insane. An asylum named Thorney Towers Home for the Disturbed was built, but within fifteen years it had more residents than the town, and founder Houston Thorney committed suicide. The government relocated the remaining inhabitants and flooded the crater, creating Lake Oblongata. The asylum still stands but has fallen into disrepair. The government then used the Psitanium deposit to set up a training camp for Psychonauts, disguised as a summer camp.

In Their Own Story

The story follows Razputin (Raz), a young boy gifted with psychic abilities who runs away from a circus to sneak into the camp and become a Psychonaut. He is caught by the Psychonauts but allowed to stay until his parents arrive, though refused participation in activities. However, he is allowed to take part in Morceau's 'Basic Braining' course, which he easily passes. Impressed, Sasha invites Raz to take part in an experiment. During the experiment, Raz sees a vision of Dr. Loboto extracting Dogen's brain. After finding Dogen without his brain, Raz realizes the vision is true, but the Psychonauts refuse to believe him. The game centers on exploring the strange and imaginative minds of various characters to help them overcome fears or memories, so as to gain their help and progress.

Reader's Guide

The game includes both the 'real world' of the camp and its surroundings, as well as a number of 'mental worlds' existing in the consciousness of various characters. The mental worlds have wildly differing art and level design aesthetics, with specific goals Raz must complete to resolve a psychological issue. Within these worlds are censors that attack Raz, and collectibles including 'figments' of imagination, 'emotional baggage' that can be sorted by finding tags, and 'memory vaults' that unlock slides providing extra backstory. Most worlds culminate in a boss battle that resolves the character's emotional distress and advances the story. Raz can revisit any world after completing it to find additional collectibles. Raz is given an item to leave any mental world at any time, and another that provides hints. Raz can take damage from psychically empowered creatures around the camp at night or from censors in mental worlds; due to a family curse, he is also vulnerable to water. If health is drained, Raz respawns at the most-recent checkpoint, but only a limited number of times within a mental world, indicated by remaining astral projections; if these are expended, Raz is ejected from the character's mind.

Did You Know?

• The camp is built in a crater created by a meteor made of Psitanium, a fictional mineral that can grant or strengthen psychic powers.
• The Native Americans called Psitanium 'whispering rock' and used it to build arrowheads.
• An asylum named Thorney Towers Home for the Disturbed was built in the area, but within fifteen years it had more residents than the town.
• The government flooded the crater to create Lake Oblongata after relocating the inhabitants driven insane by the Psitanium.
• Raz is vulnerable to water due to a curse placed on his family.