Outer Persephone

Checkpoint at the entrance to Persephone.

“In the house of upside down, cellar's top floor, attic's ground. In the house of upside down, found is lost and lost is found.”

― One of the Little Sisters' songs

Outer Persephone is the eighth level of BioShock 2, which takes place in the outermost area of the Persephone Correctional Facility.

History

Main article: Persephone

After the events of the Rapture Civil War, Sofia Lamb seized control over all of Persephone. She, and the followers she had gained among the prison population, waited for the violent conflict in the city above to die down. Lamb eventually used the prison as her staging grounds to begin quietly reinserting her influence in the rest of the city. She set up an office in the outer part of Persephone from which she broadcast her public address announcements. Later, as she began her plans for the transformation of her daughter, Eleanor, Lamb had a quarantine room set up for her there.

BioShock 2

The quarantine chamber.

Outer Persephone is preceded by Fontaine Futuristics, and is followed by Inner Persephone. After getting Gil Alexander's genetic key, and triggering the opening of the entrance at a false oxy-fill station, Subject Delta enters a hidden elevator which takes him down to the confines of Outer Persephone. His objective is to finally reach Eleanor Lamb.

After fighting two Big Sisters, Subject Delta reaches the Quarantine Room where Eleanor Lamb is being held. But he is suddenly halted as Sofia Lamb keeps the other door in front of him shut, while she speaks of Eleanor taking every action of the protagonist as "Gospel", until she finally says "Forgive me." She then proceeds to grab the pillow from below a sleeping Eleanor Lamb, and smothers her with it until her heart stops long enough for Delta's bond with her to be broken completely.

Once Subject Delta reawakens, he finds himself restrained and left to die. As Eleanor explains what has happened, a Little Sister appears and injects Delta with a solution that allows him to control the girl. He sees Rapture through her eyes, as a beautiful place of grandeur. Eleanor then orders the Little Sister first to slip behind her mother and turn off the locking system, then to find the pieces of Big Sister suit for her.

While seeing through the eyes of the Little Sister, the player can observe the idealized version of Rapture that the Little Sisters have been brainwashed to see. While walking around, the player will see statues of Delta representing how the protagonist has treated the major NPCs. If he killed them, Delta will be seen attacking the NPCs, but if he let them live, he will be shown forgiving/saving them. Whenever the Little Sister approaches a part of the Big Sister suit or collects ADAM from an "angel" (corpse), the view will switch back to the horrifying reality of the level. This also happens when approaching a jail cell with a hostile inmate and when returning past Sofia Lamb's chair in her office.

Eventually, the protagonist finds all three pieces of the Big Sister suit and brings them to Eleanor where she rests in the Quarantine Chamber. Eleanor then either rescues the Little Sister or harvests her (depending on the player's choices to save or harvest earlier in the game), thereby transferring Delta's consciousness back to his true body.

Once Delta reawakens, he sees Eleanor in her new Big Sister suit kill a Brute Splicer and cut Delta out of his restraints. Then Eleanor gives Delta a special Plasmid called "Summon Eleanor" so that she can be called into battle when necessary. Delta leaves the room with Eleanor and goes through a barrage of many different Splicers to reach the atrium into Inner Persephone.

Map

• Level One
• Level One (Original)

Health
Station

Circus of
Values

El Ammo
Bandito

Gatherer's
Garden

Gene
Bank

Bot Shutdown
Panel

ADAM
Corpse

Little Sister
Vent

Power to the
People Machine

Audio
Diary

Plasmid

Gene
Tonic

New Discoveries

Single Use Events

• There is one Power to the People station.
• There are 3 ADAM bodies.

New Enemies

• Elite Brute Splicer

New Plasmids and Tonics (Found)

• Summon Eleanor

Audio Diaries

1. Augustus Sinclair - Selling Ryan Short - The first medical/scientific room you come across on your right (after walking down the long hall), it is in between a Little Sister vent and a large microscope machine on the floor.
2. Eleanor Lamb - Behind Mother's Back - Right next to a Big Sister helmet.
3. Eleanor Lamb - Blessing in Disguise - In front (to the left) of the big statue of the Big Daddy/Sister.
4. Eleanor Lamb - Freeing Father - Under Eleanor's bed in the Quarantine Chamber.
5. Sofia Lamb - Withholding Visitation - In Lamb's office, just past the switch.

Gallery

Concept Art for the Deco-Rosie, as seen by Little Sisters.

The model of the Deco-Rosie statue.

Outer Persephone as seen in Deco Devolution.

Entrance.png

Checkpoint

One of the "angels" your Little Sister encounters.

The Little Sister's view of a group of Splicers.

Lambs office, through the eyes of a Little Sister.

Behind the Scenes

• Strangely, when Subject Delta wakes up after being knocked unconscious and just before taking control of the Little Sister, he is facing the wall with the Little Sister vent on it, but when control of the Little Sister is dropped and he is rescued by Eleanor, he has somehow been turned a full 180 degrees and is facing the doorway. This may be because he is strapped to a swivel-table.

• When Subject Delta is strapped on the table, it seems that it's impossible for him to look to his feet without removing his helmet, as unlike Big Sisters or Rosies, Alpha Series have their helmets strapped to their chests.

• The Deco-Rosie statue seen by the Little Sister in this level originally would have been featured as a functional Big Daddy model. Sadly, the developers did not finish exploration of this idea, so the model was only used as a statue. An unposed version of the statue is seen in the Deco Devolution Artbook, although the model derived from the game files has no joints and is permanently in pose. This model would later appear as a fully functional Big Daddy type in the Minerva's Den DLC.

• Using noclip (with console commands on the PC), it is possible to see and explore the entire Persephone level in nightmare/brainwash mode as the Little Sister. Not all areas that are rendered in the brainwashed world have a nightmare equivalent however, for example near Sofia's desk, there is no actual switch to be flipped to unlock the doors, most likely an oversight by the developers.

• The song playing on the Persephone Outer loading screen is Daddy, Won't You Please Come Home? by Annette Hanshaw.

• In the help menu, on the messages tab, Audio Diaries from Outer Persephone are actually labeled as coming from the level "Lamb".
• Looking in the quarantine chamber, it's possible to see what looks like a pair of glass doors near the back. Although the darkness inside makes it difficult to see, the object looks very much like a Vita-Chamber.