DAEDALUS Folder

The DAEDALUS Folder is a compilation of various documents related to a playtesting session of Super Mario 64, known as the "Let's-a-Go! Play it Early Contest" that occurred on and around March 21st, 1996.

The documents were discovered on an unknown date in January, 2017 when a UK bookstore temporarily closed for renovation. A locked safe was discovered inside a wall when it was demolished. The only contents of the safe were a single beige folder with "DAEDALUS 21/3/96" written on it in red marker. The documents describe a playtesting session of a near-completed version of Super Mario 64 where the Personalisation A.I. was tuned to be far more active, and was framed as a contest to play the game early that was held in a defunct game store called "Superfun Games", presumably a previous tenant in the building.

In total, 20 documents were discovered in the folder. However, 15 of those documents were doctored in such a way to be rendered unreadable, or outright destroyed. The surviving documents include a memo from Nintendo of Europe, a portion of the description of the experiment, and three transcripts of individual playtesters.

Memo
"Robert E. (last name illegible, with what appears to be a coffee stain causing the ink to run)""As per our contract, we will host the 'Let's-a-Go! Play it Early Contest' at your storefront, 'Superfun Games', to demonstrate our upcoming products, the 'Nintendo 64' and 'Super Mario 64'. In order to ensure the highest quality experience, we politely ask you and your employed staff to not be present a day before, during, and after the event. As a reminder, you and your employed staff are under a strict, legally binding non-disclosure agreement. Failure to comply will result in legal action being taken.""Regards,""(full name illegible, hastily scribbled over with red permanent marker)""Nintendo of Europe'"

Experiment description pages 1, 3, 4
Written over with red permanent marker. Unlike all other instances of redaction, these pages were doctored with seemingly no purpose or thought, being scribbled over repeatedly instead of being crossed out, rendering all of them unreadable. Page 4 has several large splotches of red ink covering it and several holes punched in it.

Experiment description page 2
Much like the other pages, most of this page is scribbled out with red permanent marker. The following is a transcript of the readable portions of the document, with text in brackets being an approximation of the missing text."...[t]his, Project DAEDALUS has been tweaked to be much more sensit[ive]...""...[ha]lf of the subjects w[il]l be given the release candidate, while the [oth]er half will be given a versi[on]...""...given a comp[leted] save f[ile] for an hour...""...[d]on't know why the eggheads d[ecide]d to stress test somet[hin]g this important so late into de[velopment]...""...we're not gonna get [thes]e changes to print for [mont]hs..."

Subject File 3
"Subject Name: (first name illegible, with the portion of the document being torn off) Domino""Subject Information: 19, M""Subject Notes: N/A""Cartridge Information: Release Candidate""Subject quickly grasped the basics of the game and made their way to Princess Peach's Castle faster than every other test subject. The subject spent 20 minutes playing the game with unnoticeable interference from DAEDALUS. The subject completed missions with minimal effort invested, and appeared visibly frustrated at how easy the game was. The more the subject played, the more DAEDALUS adjusted the difficulty. 40 minutes into the experiment and the subject appeared significantly more engrossed in the game, but appeared to still be seeking an additional challenge. 2 minutes prior to the end of the experiment, the subject entered the door leading to the Basement's final course, Bowser in the Fire Sea. The subject looked at the clock, seemingly to determine if he had enough time to clear the course before the experiment ended. At 59 minutes in, the subject decided against entering Bowser in the Fire Sea and turned around to exit the hallway. 30 seconds before the experiment ended, the sound of laughter could be heard from behind the player character. The subject could not operate the exit door, and turned the player character around to reveal that which should not be charging down the player. Before impact could be made with the player character, the 1 hour period of the experiment was over, with the game automatically cutting to the 'Thank you for playing!' screen.""Additional comments: The compulsory psychological evaluation that followed the experiment revealed the subject was, quote verbatim, 'creeped the fuck out' by that which should not be. Several days after the experiment was conducted, medical records from a local psychiatric hospital reveal that the subject voluntarily checked themselves in after claiming to see that which should not be in the corner of his eye."

Subject File 4
Damaged beyond readability. Burned in various places. The only surviving text consists of "that which should not be".

Subject File 6
Damaged beyond readability. The document appears to have been submerged in water, with the ink running and becoming illegible.

Subject File 8
"Subject Name: (full name illegible, written over with black permanent marker)""Subject Information: 39, M""Subject Notes: Imprisoned and released on 4 separate occasions for non-violent crimes, imprisoned once as a conspirator for a violent crime.""Cartridge Information: Recalibrated""Subject was slow to grasp the controls. At 22 minutes in, the subject entered Princess Peach's Castle and explored the game world. Testing personnel noticed a significant increase in collectible coins appearing in courses. At 54 minutes in to the experiment, the subject appeared to be uneasy, shifting uncomfortably and looking at the clock on the wall. At 59 minutes, 1 minute before the doors were to open, the test subject lunged for the console and attempted to unplug the console, presumably trying to escape the premises with the testing material. Without warning, a trap door opened under the player character's feet, dropping them into an area created by DAEDALUS, a large circular room that used the textures of the collectible coins for the walls and floor. The sudden movements on screen caused the subject to look back at the screen. That which should not be emerged from the floor of the room, cackled with an as of yet unheard of intensity, and made a beeline for the player character, reducing the player character's hit points to 0 instantly. The subject collapsed to the ground out of shock, and was hospitalized for several days. When testing personnel came to inspect the testing material for damage, the television screen showed a crash handler screen with the error code '67 72 65 65 64 79 20 47 52 45 45 44 59'.""Additional comments: After the subject regained consciousness, the compulsory psychological evaluation revealed that the subject had forgotten everything that occurred the day of the experiment. Several days after regaining consciousness, the subject made several large charitable donations and left the country."

Subject File 11
"Subject Name: Veronica (last name illegible, written over with red permanent marker)""Subject Information: 9, F""Subject Notes: Both parents were killed in an armed hostage situation that escalated at a Tesco Express, and suffered immense psychological trauma. Placed in an orphanage; this spot in the experiment would be determined by a sub-contest hosted by that orphanage as per contractual agreement.""Cartridge Information: Recalibrated""Subject initially seemed disinterested in the test, sitting in the chair and crossing her arms for 11 minutes. Eventually, the subject began to participate in the test, experimenting with and learning the controls for 15 minutes. At 32 minutes into the test, the subject reached an area created by DAEDALUS; a grassy room on the fourth floor of Princess Peach's Castle with sky-blue walls. As the subject continued to interact with the non-playable characters created by DAEDALUS, the subject began to cry. While none of the text created by DAEDALUS could be read by the surveyors or in the recorded footage, the emotional intensity of the subject de-escalated with each character interacted with. By the final character, the subject had been completely calmed, and spent the remaining 20 minutes of the experiment peacefully asleep on the floor, holding the controller to her chest.""Additional comments: The compulsory psychological evaluation that followed the experiment revealed that most, if not all, of the emotional trauma inflicted on the subject had been resolved. In addition, while the subject had refused to vocally communicate with testing personnel prior to the experiment, following the experiment the subject verbally thanked the testing personnel before returning to her legal guardian.""Note from overseer: get this back to hq, i think this might be a lead"

Subject File 12
The top half of the document is missing, with the bottom half describing a completely normal Super Mario 64 experience.

Subject Files 1, 2, 5, 7, 9, 10
All text has been written over with black permanent marker, rendering them unreadable.

Trivia

 * The Nintendo 64, and by extension Super Mario 64, would not be released in European territories until March 1st, 1997, close to a year after the playtest. The Nintendo 64 was theorized to have been delayed as a cover to either fine tune or remove the Personalisation A.I. for the PAL release.


 * In Greek mythology, Daedalus was an architect most well known for designing and building the Labyrinth, which served as the prison of the Minotaur. It can be inferred that "DAEDALUS" is a code word referring to what is now known as the Personalisation A.I., with the player potentially serving as the "minotaur".


 * While not confirmed, the phrase "that which should not be" and descriptions of side-effects inflicted upon players that encounter it seem to refer to the Wario Apparition, or another equally damaging anomaly.
 * The error code in Subject File 8 translates to "greedy GREEDY" when converted from hexadecimal to text. Whether this error code was personalised or a normal part of the game is unknown.