This guide details the exact calculations in order to receive each ending and clears up misconceptions behind some of the values.
Math Logic
There are 4 endings in Signalis. One is a secret ending (Artifact) that is obtained by completing certain objectives throughout the game. The remaining three endings are calculated from a list of values the game keeps track of.
The three endings are the “Memory”, “Promise”, and “Leave” endings. Each ending corresponds to an internal value that is tallied up the moment you enter the Cryogenics room at the end of the game. These values are Circle (Memory), Death (Promise), and Leave. Below you will find what increments these individual values originally posted by Zantezuken and updated by me. DISCLAIMER: I obtained this new information via testing in Cheat Engine. If any of this information does not line up with what is in the game, let me know and I will update it.
Circle=2 at the start of the game. Death and Leave start at 0.
TotalPurePlaytime < 6h: +2 for Circle
TotalPurePlaytime > 12h: +1 for Death
Kills > 90: Death+1
Kills > 120: Death+1 (again)
DamageTaken > 1900: Death+1
Deaths > 5: Death+1
regenTime > 5m (300sec): Death+1
regenTime > 5m (300sec): Death+1 (repeats twice)
NearDeathSurvives > 8: Death+1
NPC talks > 25: Leave+1
NPC talks > 35: Leave+1 again
HealingTimeFraction calculated as healedTime / healedTimeSegment
HealingTimeFraction > 0.6: Leave +1
HealingTimeFraction > 0.8: Leave +1
MemoryTime > 5min: Leave+1
doorChecks > 40: Leave+1
Final logic flow-chart:
In layman’s terms the final flow of logic goes like this:
Death < Leave > Circle results in the “Leave” ending
Death = Leave results in the “Memory” ending
Leave < Death > Circle also results in the “Promise” ending
Leave < Death < Circle results in the “Memory” ending
Death < Leave < Circle also results in the “Memory” ending
Let us now define what each variable means:
[TotalPurePlaytime]
Only actual player agency recorded. Time spent in inventory, dialogue text boxes, notes, menu, loading, etc do not count toward this value.
[Kills]
Enemies killed. Reanimated enemies still count as new kills.
[DamageTaken]
This one is interesting. This value does not actually reflect the damage you received in a playthrough, rather it most likely only factors in base damage before any modifiers like difficulty/resistance are added. For example, running into an enemy increments this value by 20. In reality you probably received ~72 damage on Survival difficulty and 18 on Normal.
[Deaths]
The amount of times you died. Can be easily tracked in the diagnostic menu, represented as Yellow or Red triangles. Carries over to the same saves of the same playthrough.
[regenTime]
Another interesting value that can easily trick everyone by name alone. Many people believe that Repair Patches and Repair Sprays increment this value, but that is false. This value only goes up while Elster is healing damage below a certain threshold. If you’re unaware, Elster will auto-heal when her HP is below 12 on survival and 26 on normal and casual difficulty. This is the only thing that will make regenTime go up.
[NearDeathSurvives]
When Elster receives a blow that would otherwise kill her, a red, 3×3 square will appear on screen, indicating Elster is in “Near Death Mode”. While Elster is in this mode, if the next hit makes her HP reach zero, she will die. This value goes up by 1 the moment she enters this state. As far as I’m aware, saving is the only way to restore the cooldown from Near Death. Saving the game also restores Elster’s HP to a fixed point if it’s below that threshold.
[NPC talks]
The amount of unique interactions you’ve had with the NPCs throughout the game. Once you exhaust all the new dialogue from an NPC, this values stops going up.
[HealingTimeFraction (healedTime/healedTimeSegment)]
I don’t know exactly what this value means, however, after on multiple tests, I believe [healedTime] represents the amount of time spent in Nominal health (over 80HP). [healedTimeSegment] represents the time spent in each section. Either that or it’s the amount of time your spend in Nominal Health in the Mynah and Falke bossfights because forcing the game to go the ending without fighting either results in no points for the Leave ending. However, I loaded a save file where I spent the majority of time in low HP, fought Mynah in 100HP the whole time, then loading into the ending area in debug and didn’t get any points. Either way, if you plan on going for this ending, keep your HP at Nominal at all times and you should be good to get these two points.
[MemoryTime]
Time spent on the Penrose memory after the fake ending. This has the same exclusions as TotalPurePlaytime. Begins after Elster wakes up and ends after she jumps down the flesh hole into the 1st person beach segment. Contrary to belief, the amount of time you spend in the 1st person segments do not count toward this value.
[doorChecks]
Goes up by 1 for every unique broken door you check (the ones with red X’s over them), so you can’t sit and farm one door 41 times. You must actually check the door and bring up the dialogue box for the variable to go up. Doors accessible by keys/can be opened from the other side do not count.
Artifact ending
To obtain this ending, you have to obtain three hidden keys throughout the game and open the safe in Ariane’s room at the end of Rotfront. This ending was originally discovered via converting SSTV signals in the game into images that showed the location of the keys.
Key of Love
Located in Leng – B2 in the Isolation room. Set your radio frequency to 96.000 khz and check the box in the bottom right corner of the room.
Key of Eternity
Located in Leng – B8 in the STCR Dorm. Set your radio frequency to 65.000 khz and check the bookcase to the right of the painting of “Saturn Devouring His Son”.
Key of Sacrifice
Located in Rotfront (Ground Floor) in the Backroom. Set your radio frequency to 240.000 khz and check the space between the bookcase and the boxes as seen in the picture below.
The Safe
Once you have all the keys, make sure you have them in your inventory BEFORE finishing the eclipse puzzle in Rotfront. Once the puzzle is completed, the game does not allow you to back out of the puzzle. Enter the hole into Ariane’s room and turn to the right and find the safe.
Once all of the keys have been used, you will need to enter the following code:
39486 60170 24326 01064
This code is identical to the numbers displayed in Ariane’s room at the start of the game. Once you’ve entered the code, open the safe and obtain the treasure within.
Tips for obtaining each ending
Memory
By far the easiest ending to obtain. The game is biased towards it and defaults to it in the event of any tie between all three endings. So long as you complete the game under 6 hours, you will more than likely beat the game with this ending. Avoid taking hits, dying, being put in Near Death state. Don’t check broken doors, don’t talk to NPCs, and speedrun the Penrose memory. Even if you ignore this advice, you’re still more than likely going to get this ending anyway.
Promise
Deceptively the hardest ending to receive under 6 hours, especially on Survival difficulty, but if you’re aware of how to abuse the mechanics of the game, you can easily rack up 5 points toward the death value. The easiest way to obtain this ending is to farm [DamageTaken], [NearDeathSurvives], [Deaths], and [regenTime] on enemies directly outside a save room. Park yourself in a save room with an easily accessible enemy. Save the game, exit the room, take damage from enemies until you activate Near Death, enter save room, wait a few seconds to regen, save, repeat. Every time you run into an enemy, you receive 20 damage. If you want to trivialize this further, swallow your pride and set the game to Casual difficulty. Every time you save the game will heal you to 80hp, so now you’ll be able to take a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ more hits before being put in Near Death state, easily racking up those 20’s. It takes about 96 hits to surpass 1900 damage. Even better, on Casual and Normal difficulty, it takes about 42 seconds to auto regenerate to 26 HP. You’ll know you reached 26 HP because the controller stops vibrating at 26 HP. You can easily max out [regenTime] in 7-9 cycles. Then just die 6 times and you don’t have to worry about killing enemies or getting screwed by Circle bias, because you’ll easily have 5 points to this ending.
Leave
Debatably the hardest ending to achieve under 6 hours. Check every broken door, exhaust the patience of every NPC and take your sweet ass time in the Penrose memory. Always keep your HP at Nominal status whenever possible. Heal to Nominal status as soon as you can. That last bit is arguably the most important part of this ending as that additional 2 points will be enough to get you above the 4 Circle points if you beat the game under 6 hours.
Cheat Engine
Wanna ♥♥♥♥ around with the values and confirm this info? I created a Cheat Table for Cheat Engine that tracks pretty much all of these values save [healingTimeFraction] as those values eluded me. The game DOES track how long you remain in Nominal status and appears to reset after the end of each segment that lines up with the “INTRUDER” debug menu, however the boss fights appear to be involved in some way as forcing the game to the end without fighting at least Mynah or Falke results in no points toward Leave.
You can grab the cheat table here.
