Hollowbody is a short survival horror game that takes you on a panicked run through what’s left of 22nd-century England, 60 years after a terrorist attack infected its west coast with an unknown biological agent. As smuggler Mica Holloway, you have less than 20 hours to find your partner Sasha and escape the quarantine zone around the UK. Otherwise, your forged security credentials will expire and you’ll get shot down by the defense grid before you can make it home. That’d already be a tall order, and then the undead monsters start showing up.
Hollowbody features three unique endings to its story. Naturally, this can’t help but involve spoilers. We’ll try to keep them as mild as possible.
The Stranger on the Roof
Only two of Hollowbody’s three endings are available on a fresh run through the game, and both are tied to a mandatory conversation at the end of its first area.
When you reach the top floor of the apartment building, Mica will end up face-to-face with a suicidal human survivor.
The fate of this survivor, the Stranger, is the single primary branch point for Hollowbody’s story. Depending on your conversation with him, he’ll either jump off the roof or elect to come with you. That determines which of the two conventionally available endings you’ll receive.
If the stranger dies
If he dies, you’re locked in for the Reunion ending, and the achievement of the same name. However, there’s also an exclusive achievement on this path.
Once you’ve found the pack of fuses in the Star supermarket, backtrack all the way to the apartment building. While this may initially seem impossible due to a blocked tunnel in the sewers below the church, you can check the passage near the ladder to find a new alternate route. Just keep looking around and you should end up back in the drainage area near the church exit.
Back at the apartment building, use one of the fuses on the fallen security shutter. This raises it so you can get back into the rest of the building. Among other things, you can now return to the parking lot via your initial entry point in the storage room.
The stranger’s corpse can be found against the wall of the building. Search his body to retrieve the exclusive memo Record of Events.
At time of writing, this isn’t required for the Logomaniac achievement, which is earned by finding every other memo in the game. However, it does unlock the secret achievement Living With Ghosts.
If the stranger lives
If he lives, it puts you on track to get the Riven ending, and the achievement of the same name.
Getting the stranger to step down from the ledge can be tricky. He’s guaranteed to jump if you opt to answer Tax’s radio call instead of continuing the conversation, but that’s not the only trigger. The key appears to be showing him sympathy, instead of trying to change the subject or shake him down for information.
We’ve found that the following choices in this conversation will get the stranger to survive:
- “Excuse me…”
- “Bad things don’t always make you a bad person.”
- “Do you live up here?”
- “I’m looking for someone…”
- (Ignore radio)
Be careful during this sequence and don’t skip dialogue. It can be easy to get the stranger killed by accidentally picking the first dialogue option on a menu.
If the stranger turns away from the ledge and sits down, he’s out of danger for the time being.
The stranger will now follow you throughout most of the rest of Hollowbody. Fortunately, enemies don’t seem to notice him, he doesn’t take friendly fire, and despite his wounds, he moves as quickly as you do. Just go through the rest of the game as you ordinarily would and you’ll get the Riven ending.
The Secret Ending
When you clear Hollowbody on Casual or Intended difficulty, you unlock a new setting: Punished.
On Punished, Mica takes substantially more damage, to the point where she can only take two or three hits from standard enemies before dying.
Slain enemies also won’t stay dead unless you burn their bodies with Mica’s Lighter or the Flamethrower. There are relatively few other changes, but you have much less room to make mistakes.
If you can clear Punished difficulty while using three Repair Sprays or fewer, including the one that you take from the ambulance at the start of the game, you’ll receive a new ending. This unlocks the secret achievement Woof, which also serves as a nod to a running gag in the Silent Hill series.
It may be helpful to make a “dry run” at Punished before you try for Woof. Your reward for beating the game on Punished is a new melee weapon, the Scissor Blade, which can be a big help.
You also don’t have to worry about any other factors besides the amount of damage you’ve taken, so save-scum to your heart’s content. As long as you’ve healed Mica three times or fewer by the time you defeat the final boss, you’re on track for Woof.
The solo developer on Hollowbody has teased that he might not be done with the game, but for now, that’s how you can get all three endings and their related achievements.
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