Psychonauts 1 Storyline

This is the summary breaking down the story beats of Psychonauts 1.

Opening Cutscene
The game opens with Coach Oleander giving a speech to the campers about the Psychonauts, when Razputin breaks into camp. Oleander and the other counselors, Agents Sasha Nein and Milla Vodello (who are teaching at the camp as special guests), are impressed by Raz's show of mental defense and allow him to stay until his parents arrive. Raz determines to become a Psychonaut before then. Meanwhile, camp bully Bobby Zilch is unimpressed with Raz, while Lili Zanotto is smitten by him. When he goes to sleep in one of the cabins, he has a dream about a mysterious man that feels oddly familiar to him.

Basic Braining
Raz wakes up and heads to Coach Oleander's Basic Braining class, where Oleander teaches him Psi-Punch and other basic techniques. There, Raz hears Lili talking about seeing strange meat-shaped plants in her nightmares, and Bobby Zilch harasses Raz throughout the level, until Raz passes him on a rail section toward the end of the level and imitates Bobby's mocking dance. When Raz arrives at the end of the level, Oleander is strangely absent, and he notices a door leading to a long hallway with something behind a small set of curtains at the end. Just as he approaches the curtains, Oleander returns, yanking him away and presenting Raz with his Basic Braining badge.

The Brain Tumbler Experiment (part 1)
Upon exiting the Coach's brain, Raz encounters Sasha Nein, who commends him on his work and gives him a button, asking him to visit him in his lab. Raz, unsure of where the lab is, explores camp and asks campers about the button, eventually discovering that it belongs to the Geodesic Psychoisolation Chamber. Also while exploring camp, he hears strange things around camp about a supposed lake monster, and also runs across Lili, who thinks about her attraction toward Raz, unaware that he can read her thoughts. At the GPC, Raz frees Maloof, who had been trapped in the main chamber, and places a button on an empty space inside, which reveals the hidden entrance to Sasha's lab.

Sasha wishes to test out his Brain Tumbler on Raz, who agrees. The Brain Tumbler first takes him to the Collective Unconscious, and from there, into what is supposed to be his own mind. Raz encounters a Grulovian caravan, which is where he was born. Upon entering it, he finds himself in a giant egg, which he breaks free of to find himself in a warped forest that is partially made of meat and bones, with rabbit-shaped plants attacking him. He is guided by a mysterious rabbit, only to be forced to stop when he encounters a shadowy monster. As he lacks the proper abilities to defend himself, Raz is pulled out of the experiment, and sent to Ford's Sanctuary to get written permission to learn Psi-Blast.

Sasha's Shooting Gallery
In the sanctuary, Raz realizes that the mysterious man he saw in his dreams, as well as the strange man that's been popping up around camp while acting like a different person each time, is in fact Ford Cruller, the former Grand Head of the Psychonauts. Ford shows him around the sanctuary and grants him permission to be trained for Psi-Blast. He also gives Raz a piece of bacon, which Raz can use to call on him for help.

Raz then returns to Sasha, who pulls him into his mental world: Sasha's Shooting Gallery. In this cube-shaped mental world, Sasha teaches Raz how to control his fear and anger in order to release it as firepower, and requests Raz to destroy ten thousand Censors, which spawn through a generator that consists of a valve and a dial. In an attempt to make the Censors spawn faster, Raz inadvertently breaks the device, which causes Sasha's mental world to explode outward, each facet of the cube revealing details about Sasha's life. Sasha demands Raz correct this, so Raz seals the valves in Sasha's mental world. While this was all part of the lesson Sasha had set up, it goes awry when Raz reveals he sealed all the valves, which results in a monstrously huge Megacensor to appear. Raz uses what he learned to take it down, and Sasha gives him the Psi-Punch badge and asks him to never speak of this again.

The Brain Tumbler Experiment (part 2)
Now equipped with Psi-Blast, Raz re-enters the Brain Tumbler Experiment and attacks the monster, causing it to disappear. He goes further into the strange mental world until he encounters a tower made of thorns, and has a vision of a deranged dentist attempting to steal Dogen Boole's brain. Raz attempts to ascend the tower to rescue Dogen, but is unable to get over an obstacle, so Sasha pulls him out of the experiment and tells him to get his levitation badge from Milla.

Milla's Dance Party
When Raz heads to the beach, he sees Dogen has already been de-brained. He gets his canoeing badge from Admiral Cruller in order to canoe out to Milla's class on the dock, and enters her mind. Milla trains him in levitation, and he also encounters some of her traumatic memories of orphans she watched over dying in a fire. Milla holds a levitation race in her mind, which Raz beats Bobby in, before reaching Milla at the end of her classroom, where she gives him a levitation badge. Upon exiting her mind, Raz encounters Lili, who notes that something weird is going on, and asks him to meet her out at the lake later. Meanwhile, more and more kids are losing their brains.

The Brain Tumbler Experiment (part 3)
Raz returns to Sasha's lab one final time, now able to ascend the thorny tower, where he sees Doctor Loboto steal Dogen's brain via sneezing powder. The brain is then sent through a chute, which Raz dives into. Before he can rescue the brain, it is put into the blueprint of a psychic tank, which comes to life and attacks him. After defeating the brain, he comes to the realization that these blueprints were what were behind the curtain in Oleander's mind. But before he can do anything else, Sasha pulls him out of the experiment and hurries away, saying that there's an emergency, and leaves his Psycho-Portal behind. Raz "borrows" the portal and leaves to check on Lili.

Lake Oblongata/Shaky Claim
At the beach, Lili informs him that she's been listening to Oleander mumbling over the camp's PA system, and he's been talking in his sleep about plans to take over the world. Raz relays what he's found as well. Lili is excited about the prospect of a "psychic emergency," and in her excitement, falls for a lure put out by a gigantic, mutant lungfish, who captures her and heads out into the lake.

Raz rushes to Ford's sanctuary for help, and finds that all the other campers are brainless, and have been placed into a separate chamber. Ford explains to Raz that he's the only one left who can stop this. When Raz asks Ford for help, Ford explains that he cannot leave his sanctuary, as the psitanium within is the only thing keeping his mind together. His mind, he explains, was shattered in a psychic duel long ago, and the Psychonauts don't really take him seriously these days, so he can't call on them for help. He offers to continue helping Raz using the bacon, and tells Raz to use the bathysphere at the docks.

Raz enters the bathysphere, which takes him to the bottom of the lake. There, he encounters a mucus-lined air bubble, which enables him to explore the lake bed, which is home to the flooded town of Shaky Claim. While there, the hideous hulking lungfish chases him through the lake bed and attacks him. Raz ultimately wins, but Ford informs him that the lungfish is frightened of Raz, and needs his help, so Raz enters the lungfish's mind via Psycho-Portal.

Lungfishopolis
In the lungfish's mind, Raz becomes the size of a kaiju from a monster film, and finds himself in a city with a bunch of tiny lungfish people, who dub him Goggalor. As he moves through the town, he learns of someone named "Kochamara," a supposed superhero that the citizens of Lungfishopolist trust. Kochamara makes a number of announcements throughout the city, telling everyone that Goggalor is a monster, and sends multiple branches of Lungfishopolis's military to oppose him. Meanwhile, Raz encounters some rebels who do not trust Kochamara, and want him stopped. They teach him the power of Psi-Shield, which Raz uses to protect himself against Lungfishopolis's military. Raz makes his way to the end of the city, where he finds a radio tower that is used to control the lungfish. Kochamara, actually a mental projection of Coach Oleander in disguise, stops him, and the two fight, resulting in Oleander accidentally knocking down the tower and breaking his connection with the lungfish. Before exiting the mind, Oleander says that he has Lili in his lab.

Milkman Conspiracy/Thorney Towers Lower Floors
When Raz exits the lungfish's mind, the lungfish speaks telepathically, thanking him for helping her, and takes him to Thorney Towers. She says her name is Linda, and gives him an instrument that can be used to call her if he wishes to cross the lake again. Raz climbs up to the gates of the abandoned asylum to find they are closed, and a former patient of the asylum, Boyd, is scrawling paranoid conspiracy theories on the walls. He says the Milkman can open the gates, and Raz enters Boyd's mind to try to uncover the identity of the Milkman.

Once in Boyd's mind, Raz finds himself in a small house with Boyd, where Boyd teaches Raz Clairvoyance. Raz uses this on Boyd to make sense of his conspiracy theories. He finds the Milkman is supposedly dead, and exits the house to find the truth. The world outside of Boyd's house is a 1950s styled suburban neighborhood that is twisted in on itself in impossible ways. Raz navigates the confusing world, where he meets badly-disguised "G-men," who pretend to be other professions via the use of props as they seek out the Milkman, and strange girls known as the "Rainbow Squirts" who follow him around. After navigating a nonsensical conspiracy, Raz tracks the Rainbow Squirts to their home base, where he encounters the Den Mother, who is the only one to know the Milkman's true identity. After defeating her, Raz finally encounters the Milkman, who is an alter-ego of Boyd himself. Upon being awakened, the Milkman throws molotov cocktails at various mental entities, including his own Censors.

Back in the real world, Boyd unlocks the gates to Thorney Towers, and prepares a molotov cocktail, ready to throw it at the tower when given the word. Raz is unable to change Boyd's mind, and so he explores the grounds of Thorney Towers, finding the brains of his fellow campers scattered around. He is able to pick them up and take them back to Ford in order to re-brain the children. Also on the grounds he encounters several other former patients of the asylum: Gloria von Gouton, Fred Bonaparte, Edgar Teglee, and Crispin Whytehead. Crispin mans the elevator that leads up to the tower, and will not let Raz in, as he is not Loboto, so Raz must create a disguise using items possessed by each of the other inmates, whom he can interact with in any order.

Gloria's Theater
When Raz approaches Gloria von Gouton, he finds she has terrible mood swings, and becomes violent when he tries to take her trophy. Upon entering her mind, he finds himself in a theater, where a group of performers are struggling to put together a play, especially since their star, Bonita Solei, has locked herself away. Raz goes back to help her, but once she's onstage, a supposed phantom kills one of the actors. The director, Becky, gives Raz a script, while the critic, Jasper, who watches the plays from his balcony, gives him another. Using the scripts and different mood lighting, Raz manages to set the stage up so he can get to the rafters and confront the phantom, who turns out to be Jasper. After Raz defeats Gloria's inner critic, Bonita is able to take the stage, and Raz exits Gloria's mind. Gloria allows Raz to have her trophy.

Waterloo World
Fred Bonaparte is in an inner battle and external board game with the "genetic memory" of his ancestor, Napoleon Bonaparte. When Raz enters his mind, he finds himself in a sitting room where Fred and Napoleon are playing a board game. Raz jumps into the board game, finding that Fred's pieces are unwilling to play due to needing encouragement, money, weapons, and food. Raz helps each game piece obtain what they need, and is able to put the knight piece in Napoleon's castle, winning the game and breaking Fred of his learned helplessness. Napoleon leaves, and upon exiting Fred's mind, Raz is giving his strait jacket.

Black Velvetopia
Edgar Teglee is a painter chained to the gallery floor. He is trying to paint a portrait of Loboto, but instead winds up continuously painting bullfights. When Raz enters his mind, he finds Edgar building a tower of cards to reach his supposed wife, Lampita, whose face appears in the sky. The card tower, however, is constantly being knocked over by the raging bull, El Odio, who keeps charging through the city. The citizens of said city are waiting for the matador, Dingo, to kill him. Raz offers to get the missing cards from his deck, and El Odio rams into him and throws him into the city streets. There, he learns of the luchadores guarding the cards. As he goes about to collect these cards, he the story of how a bullfighter supposedly stole Edgar's wife away, only to later find the story is untrue--Edgar was in his school's wrestling team, and lost the state semifinals when his girlfriend dumped him for the head of the cheerleading squad. He also runs into the matador, who gives him the confusion ability. When Raz returns the cards, he find Edgar gone, and himself in a bullfighting arena. Here he realizes that that the bull is actually Edgar, raging about in destructive circles. Raz initially fights with Edgar before Dingo joins in. Using confusion on the matador, Raz is able to attack him instead. After Edgar turns back into himself, he realizes these highschool bullies are too pathetic to hurt him anymore, and finally lets go of his anger. After Raz exits Edgar's mental world, Edgar finishes the painting of Loboto and gives it to Raz.

Thorney Towers Upper Floors/Loboto's Lab
With a painting as a mask, the strait jacket as a costume, and the trophy imitating Loboto's claw, Raz looks enough like Loboto to fool Crispin, who lets him in his elevator and up into the asylum. There, he finds the dilapidated building infested with tumor-covered rats that explode into a cloud of confusion, and the building getting more and more twisted in increasingly impossible ways the further up he goes. He also finds himself followed by a mysterious figure who repeatedly tells him to go away. At the top of the tower, the figure reveals herself to be Sheegor, who warns Raz to turn back before disappearing. Raz proceeds regardless, and sneaks into the lab at the top of the tower.

Upon sneaking into the lab, Raz finds Dr. Loboto testing the brains on a scale model of the tank and proclaiming that the brains he's been receiving are worthless and that he'll turn Sheegor's pet turtle, Mr. Pokeylope, into turtle soup if she doesn't help him. Loboto spots Raz and asks Sheegor to have him de-brained. SHe takes him to the top room in the tower where Lili as well as a brainless Sasha and Milla are being held. Sheegor begs Raz to save Mr. Pokeylope. When he does so, the turtle reveals he can talk, and tells Sheegor to give Loboto his brain. Sheegor does so, and Raz TKs the brain into the model brain tank, which Mr. Pokeylope uses to blast Loboto out the window. Sheegor and Raz re-brain Sasha and Milla who in turn free Lili.

Immediately Oleander steps in, and Sasha and Milla TK Raz and Lili out of the tower before Oleander attacks. While they fight, the inmates escape, inadvertently causing Boyd to set the tower on fire in the process. Meanwhile, Ford teleports into the fight with a chunk of psitanium strapped to his back, and blows sneezing powder at the Coach. He sneezes out his brain just as the tower explodes.

While the Coach is brainless, his brain manages to get into a full-sized brain tank, which immediately knocks out everyone but Raz. Raz fights the tank and damaging the casing holding the brain, only for the tank to shoot sneezing powder at him, which causes him to sneeze out his brain. Raz's brain joins Oleander's in the tank, and their minds intertwine.

Meat Circus
Raz wakes up to find his mental world merged with the Coach's. A child version of Oleander approaches Raz, only to hear his father's voice. Oly runs into the caravan in an attempt to save his rabbit, Mr. Bun, as Raz follows. They find themselves in a circus made of meat, where circus freaks and mutant rabbits attack them, and where a ghostly figure stalks Raz while crying out for him. Raz escorts Oly and his rabbit through the circus until they encounter Oly's father, Butch Oleander. After Raz fights him, Raz gets knockced into a separate room where he is confronted by a nightmarish version of his own father, who begins flooding the room with water. Raz manages to reach the top of the room before it floods, and the nightmare version of his father takes him back into the room with Butch. Butch and Nightmare Augustus fight with Raz, who defeats them. The ghostly figure from before reveals himself to be the real Augustus, who had been trying to get into Raz's mind. He sees the nightmarish version of himself and realizes that Raz sees him in a terrible light, and explains he was only trying to protect his son. He attacks nightmare!Augustus, only for the nightmare to combine with Butch, turning them into the Two-Headed Dad Monster. Augustus uses his own psychic powers to empower Raz, who is then able to defeat the monster, and he and Augustus are able to exit the minds.

Ending Cutscene
An unknown amount of time later, Oleander gives an end-of-camp speech in which he apologizes to the campers, and Ford bestows the title of Psychonaut upon Raz. Just as everyone is leaving, Sasha and Milla receive word that Truman Zanotto has been kidnapped, and offer to take Raz with them on their mission to rescue him. Augustus approves, and Raz, Lili, Sasha, Milla, and Oleander take off on the jet.