Game Theory: We Let Them Out (Boneworks / Duck Season)

Arthur Fleck: "We live in a society."
Arthur Ford: *"We live in a virtual reality."*

“The problem is”- Ad: Once you start smoking you can’t stop-

The Evolution of Arthur. Step 1: Blonde child with blue eyes. Step 2: Brown-haired man, brown eyes. Step 3: Literal dog

“Do you do anything when you eat breakfast?” “Oh yeah I just do a summoning ritual why do you ask?”

The dog is Arthur. The dog points at David, then at himself, then makes a cradling motion. “You, Me, Child” MatPat originally interpreted this to mean: “You are my child”. But what if instead it meant: “You are me *as a child*”? That would tie in with MatPat’s headcanon that Arthur is a grown up version of David, and would also mean that the dog is the form Arthur takes once he enters the void and become a cryptid himself, and that he’s using the void’s power to circumvent time and space and influence his own past.
But that’s just a theory. A comment theory. Thanks for reading.
EDIT: We did it boys

me: *decides to watch this at midnight*
video: *has freaky intro*
me: *cha cha real smooth outta here*

He needs to make a bonelabs theory now that it’s released, it fixes a lot of plot holes like what myth is. And what the radio channel is.

I love that matpat didnt take down the other video despite his theory being wrong, its all trial and error because, whether hes clever or not, he is still human..
..maybe

Ducks: it’s a great day huh?
MatPat: picks up shotgun.
Duck: why do I hear boss music?

Ok hear me out,
Arthur is also the dog, he's trying to stop this whole thing from happening in the first place and since he already exists beyond time and space, life and death. He doesn't want the future he knows is coming to come to be.
Instead of that message being "I am your dad" he's saying "you're me, kid"

'We just released an evil cat demon into the world. WHOOPSIES!'
Legit the best sentence ever

I feel like the dog is actually a step dad whom the mom had an affair with, which is why the biological father isn't there and why there's the phrase "Bad Dad Bad Kid". So I believe the biological dad worked for Gammon and as revenge trapped the step dad in the game. The creators did mention they were gonna have an ending where the father is the dog, but didn't say which father...

I bet that the twist in the mini theory is that the dog basically “created” or “controlled” his destiny so he will grow up, enter the void, and start a chain off events ending humanity. That is why they have stuff like badkidbaddad. It represents the fact that the dog “created” his destiny, so he is represented as a “father”. David is the bad kid who enters the void and ends humanity as we know it. This also explains the its me tape.

"The bad news is-"
*Commercial Appears*
"College has endless opportunities"
..huh

MatPat, you've missed the nod 13:50 to hall of the mountain king, and the storyline of that how the little one tries desperately to evade the bigger one in an endless struggle.

I wasn’t scared in the intro, I saw a pleasant Môńkęÿ and a super nice Çæt

This is the quickest he’s ever put out a part two/three

Matt: talkes about it being a trilogy
Dead FM:

The cat named 9 says 30 YEARS and writes it in INK feels like a bendy reference

Bonelab came out last year and it's full of lore.

Matpat: “...in this trilogy..”
DeadFM: “Am I a joke to you?”

Matpat:this theory is already long
Matpat’s fnaf theories: am i a joke to you

WCCK is in bonelab so potentially the cat cryptid is in bonelab somewhere in that game. Now we wait for matpats theory 👍
Also for anyone reading this right now after the first day of bonelab
Hi 👋

We need another Stress Level 0 project released soon.

Maybe all of Arthur’s clones are from the “serial item duping” thing that the employees are talking about, it could be a glitch that Arthur exploited to make an army

MatPat: "The bad news is-"
Ad: "Imagine. A home without a family."
*ouch, that's deep*

you need to review this all over again with bonelab

The gate 3 door symbol reminds me of a turn off button like you know those buttons that you two have to like push

MatPat: "I feel like I forgot something."
Stress Level Zero: "If you forgot, then it probably wasn't important."
MatPat: "Yeah, you're probably right."
DeadFM:

Matpat: "Duck season."
Daffy: *rips sign* "Theory Season!"

Boneworks was such a great game, just finished it and i am so sweating. VR can be so intense its unbelieveable

Poor devs, they can make a great game. But can't use the right "than" when they need to.

Matpat: makes a duck season theory
Duck season dev: *Well yes, but actually no*

I can’t get over the fact whenever Arthur is mentioned his character is just standing there like a frozen model.

15:20 His past self that we play in on PC Duck Season was getting close to stopping Arthur (himself but in the future) so Arthur dressed up as the dog and killed him so he couldn’t stop him in the future, the you are my baby message could mean that the child is his younger self (baby version you could say)

Now that bonelab is announced, im looking forward to the next episode!

“The bad news is...”
*Commercial Appears*
“Mike Bloomberg.”

I don't know if anyone has found this yet, but here I go.
In the Tower-level of Boneworks there is a shop where you find the green key. There are cabinets mounted on the wall. On the top left cabinet, there are a handful of video game cartridges, each one made by Gammon. One of them is Duck Season. It looks a bit used and it has a rental sticker on it - just like the one the player uses in the Duck Season game.

The machine king logo at 8:34 seconds is the same logo as the rival companies logo in boneworks. You can see the symbol on the container Arthur Ford gets the headset out of.

watching these theories again because BoneLab came out this year in september !!!! hyped to see if matpat will make follow up theories

Game Maker: glances at game... | *Matt Patt: WRITE THAT DOWN, WRITE THAT DOWN!!!*

Towards the end, you kept talking about it being a trilogy and there being 3 games and u theorized about the last game but you forgot about DEADFM

When mat plays bone works:there is a theory
When slime plays it:goblin vent

The only thing I'm trying to connect is.. The last episode had 3 doors, 1 was open which was explained as boneworks...

Wait, if the void is outside of space and time, and we know that arthur went into the void, could arthur have used the void to go back in time to the time of duck season to become the dog?

wait, what if the X characters name is really "ten", like roman numerals and they are related to 9? like a sequence of cryptids
Edit: thank you matpat ILY

ok, but no one's gonna talk about the who let the dogs out meme at the end? ok

Onggggg I literally loooove going this deep into things, I have goosebumps!!!!

13:43 is this a reference to the piano piece “hall of the mountain king”? it’s weird actually because that song was used to advertise the smiler ride at alton towers. the ride and aesthetic of the ride is a cat like the clock in duck season. coincidence i would assume but you never know lol

Is no one gonna talk about this "Sabrelake" company that also has access to the void? 10:50

So I think DeadFM will fit into the series as a post-apocolyptic world after HOTMK and the radio system is either:
A) A last ditch effort for a resistance group trying to see if anyone else is out there
or
B) Some sort of mind control radio station like the one from Brawl Stars (Starr Park's whole shenanagins) and perhaps the cat walked through that door because the cat cyrptid (or ever arthur) is in charge of the whole mind control thing (if the arthur thing is true in this case, I think the cat will be trying to oppose arthur)

Listen me out: the guy from the second game, who fought against clones is the dad of the kid from the duck hunt game (BAD DAD BAD KID) and he IS the bad guy in the future, as he stays in the void (thats why he isn't around). The dog comes from the same void as the dad- possibly the void CONTROLLED by the dad and the dad tries to communicate with his son through him (loving messages). Mayby the dad even found another way to leave these notes instead? Who knows what left these notes! Alternatively the dog can be the kid from the future and the guy from the second game in the future (as the kid and the guy could be the same person), but thats a theory in progress.
Edit: by the way if anyone notices this theory they can comment ideas under it and help me improve it

"Who let the dogs out? "
Dog: Arthur, Arthur, Arthur, Arthur

"The bad news is-"
*"AT AGE 39 MIKE BLOOMBERG-"*

I'm ROLLING 🤣🤣🤣
MatPat:the bad news is-
Ad: one~ oh yeah~

Can we get like a hour long theory marathon one day just a ton of theories about a topic

Me: Oh yay I get to see the end to this theory!
MatPat: So actually it’s three parts...uh see you soon!

Mini Theory:
Arthur may have killed his own mother so that his younger self would feel loss, leading to determination to bring her back and so tries to become immortal so that he doesn’t end up like his mother or something along those lines.

8:24 they fooled us with bonelab realese lol but dead fm is actually a part of the bonelab's story you should make a theory about it.

I thought there was only 1 duck season video, then I was shocked, and DELIGHTED at the same time :D

Keep in mind what you thought the dog was saying: “You are my son”
“You are me, but younger”

"The bad news is..."
"he's sitting right next to you"
It was a commercial for "The Invisible Man" lol

I think more that the doors show a vital plot item. Boneworks was like a middle man between mythOS and the void way. And the radio station in bonelab is just the radio station. So i belive the mashine king will be like an attack on the void way

Hey, Mat, BoneLab is out, you should probably cover that

Dog wasn’t miming “your my baby” it is “You are me as a baby”, dog is the Duck Hunt kid grown up

I feel like "The hall of the machine king" is a reference to "In the hall of the mountain king", that was just my immediate thought.

7:00 I love how the one reading that is a cat 🐈

Mat : "The bad news is-" [7:32]
Ad : "So when your son starts asking questions about his past-"

What if the reason Arthur was fighting clones of himself was to stop himself from doing it, like he regretted it.

MatPat: This video is already WAY too long
Me: **checks watch time**
Me: Bro it’s like 15 min

DEADFM is the radio station thing in bonelab, it has the same name on the radio in the levels, could that mean that the cat named “9” is in the depths of monogon and mythos?

You should do a vid connecting all three games, bone labs, bone works and duck season

The Dog is David going back in time to stop David from doing all of this. It’s why in “It’s Me” he points to David then him, then cradles a baby “You’re me as a child.”

X: the monkey and cat are tricksters, (meaning they lie, there for bad dad bad kid is a lie)
matpat 2018: Imma pretend like i didn't see that.

13:40
i have no idea if this is connected at all but the moth in the hall of the machine king title is the same logo for sabrelake in boneworks

14:35
I think that you were slightly off the mark.
I think that Arthur isn't David, but that after Duck Season Monogon found David and got him to tell them everything,
And since David was already missing, then no one would notice if he disappeared entirely.
I think Monogon used David as a Guinea pig to see how far they could go and David becomes / became The Machine King as a way to sirvivr and save himself / get back at Monogon,
As head of security, Arthur might've learned about this and decided to try and rescue David before the robo-apocalypse and void beings getting released, leading to the events of Boneworks,
I'm going off of what was said in these videos, haven't played them myself, and I'd love to hear some feedback,

"The Bad News is-"
"Raid: Shadow Legends"

I believe the Dog from Duck Season is Arthur/David. The IT'S ME tape when played shows the Dog pointing at the player, David, and then back at him, proceeding to make a cradling hand motion indicating a baby. We previously thought this meant he was saying, "You are my baby," but after that was proved wrong by the developers, I think he was trying to say something else. "You are me as a baby/kid." He points toward the player, back at himself, then makes the baby arm gestures. After Arthur/David materialized in the void, maybe he got stuck and found the dog costume from when he was a child. After going mad from spending what seemed like an eternity in the void, he decided to recreate his past, becoming the very thing that killed his mother. It may also explain the 7th ending in which it shows the Dog controlling what's happening. After reaching immortality in the void, he tried everything he could to help contact his past self, but nothing would work. That's when he decided to use brute force instead. It's also why in the Nuke Ending, the Dog comforts David. Please give me your comments and like this so Matt can see.

“A tape labelled ‘It’s me’”
Cassidy: WHO SUMMONED ME?

Bro you guys fr need to make a bone lab theory it would be so cool please man we’re waiting for you

Nobody:
Not a single soul:
Matpat every episode: "this is just like fnaf"

What if X is actually supposed to be called “Absolute X” it would explain the lines on either side of the x- they look like the absolute value sign. Maybe that could have larger implications later?

Huh, Bone Lab actually kinda fits Dead FM, since the main helper is a radio broadcaster.

I can’t wait for the Bonelab video. Also the deadfm 98.6 is a reference to the Bonelab story.

mini theory: going off of what mattpat said, "the void exists outside of *time* and space", arthur ford, after tears of being alone in that void, went crazy with loneliness and decided to travel back, taking to form of a dog in a video game made by the same people who got him there, sort of as payback for his eternal loneliness. but hey thats just a theory, a game theory.
EDIT: this is literally the most appreciated comment ive ever had. also, ive been reading replies and i appreciate the feedback.

MatPat: the war between man and machine
My brain: STOP THINKING ABOUT TF2, you left it behind, GO OVER IT!

5:46 definitely my favorite game theory moment so far

"All right, all right! You are listening to 98.6 WCCK, DeadFM: Road Warrior Edition! And this is Jay, with my new pal on board!" - Jimmy

Stress Level Zero: **Shows a new game with possible bloody violence and many other things that will be harmful and not child appropriate**
Matpat: So I have chosen... *demonetization*

Mat: That's the good news, the bad news is-
Ad: *DOMINO'S TRACKER NOW HAS GPS WITH DELIVERY-*

I think that the reason all the clones are Arthur is that he got into the void and he is attempting to stop his past self as he now knows of the consequences…

This guy can tell me more in one video then a teacher can tell me in 2 weeks

“The Void”
*hollow knight intensifies*

Hey Matpat, when you referred to this series as a trilogy near the end of the video, did you forget that there was a game between Boneworks and Hall of the Machine King on that door labeled "DeadFM" or do you believe it's in some way separate to the other three?

I think the name Stress Level Zero refers to their production style (prioritizing the health of their creators) and not the games

I'm not sure but maybe David's mini house in the cafeteria is the house from the small live action tape that you find in the house

I've seen some other diet theories about how Arthur traveled back in time when he was in the Voidway because he was outside time and space which leads me to the tape of 'It's Me' which I'm stealing from another comment
What MatPat thought it meant: "You are my baby"
What it probably means: "You are me, but younger"

When you’re going to make a quadrilogy of games all with a hidden lore linking them but someone uncovers it after the 2nd one

what if the world that boneworks was created in, the one with overlords monogon and gammon, are not the same world as duck hunt, they're in a world/planet with much higher technology, and the only thing that linked the two were the void. what if the dog was actually arthur, and the reason he wanted to escape so badly is because he has been stuck in the void for so incredibly long. the only immediate problem with this is that gammon exists in this other, less advanced world. if it was separate planets then maybe gammon decided to go look on other planets to spread their fame and enhance their technology? for example, david's world/planet. gammon heads to that planet, observes the most popular games, and makes something like those. like duck season and duck hunt. or what if arthur took for as one of the cryptids? if it was the cat, the "these fools" line would show arthurs regret for getting himself stuck in the voidway. or he'll be a cryptid to be introduced in a later game.
just a theory.

so what if Arther went into the void and then he dresses up as the dog goes back in time to kill him because it is agony in the void and he didn't want to be in the void anymore. also, the reason he would be in a dog suit is that he didn't want his old self to think he was human and try and convince him to not do it because if he did than he wouldn't have the courage to do it. so then the dog is David. and he could time travel because he is in-between space and time. this probably sounds crazy but I think it's cool.