Everything outside the Walled City 99 is called just Outside by Companions.
Previously, Humans lived there, but because of something that made it uninhabitable, they had to move to the Walled City 99. It is known that they missed the Outside, dreamed of getting there, and hung up its photos and neon signs everywhere as a reminder of its colors. After the extinction of humans, the city remained sealed and deprived of any access to the Outside, and the Companions who remained in the city could not get out of there for a long time. Not everyone of them believes that someone can get there, and someone even considers it a myth.
In the game[]
You can leave the city only through the Exit or with the Midtown Elevator. Unfortunately, the Exit is located in the Control Room Area, which cannot be accessed due to the inability to travel by train, and access to the Control Room itself is closed to Companions. The Elevator is guarded by Sentinels, and access to it is limited by the protocols of protecting the city from a pandemic, which was launched by Humans. It is also possible to leave the city with the help of a City Technical Network: there is a hole Inside the Wall through which a cat fell into the city, but the Companions also cannot get there because it is too high to climb there and because of the Zurks.
The actions of Chapter 1: Inside The Wall take place entirely in the Outside. There lives a Cat with his Family, as well as other Animals. Having fallen down, the cat could not physically get out the same way, so he had to go further.
Outside mural in the Dead City
In Chapter 3: The Flat, the cat finds a mural on the wall. B-12 recognizes the mural as the Outside and finds a Postcard of it too. The Postcard also shows A Blue Sky. Then later in Chapter 4: The Slums, the Cat and B-12 show the Postcard to the Companions. Most of them just say it’s make believe, a myth, and could only be seen in dreams. Some of them say that there is no need to go there because they have everything they need in the city. Only Outsiders still believe in the possibility of getting out of the city, but only Momo remained in the Slums. The main entries about it are written in their Notebooks.
Throughout the game, the cat tries to find a way out of the city to get into the Outside. He will be able to do this only in Chapter 12: Control Room, returning to the same place from where he came.
Theories[]
The Outside was a disaster. Completely barren, unlivable and dangerous.
B-12
The game does not directly say what happened to the Outside. Meteo TV Channel shows a part of the Outside with brown, dry soil around the roof of the Walled City. Also in the game there is a Sign which reads "Acid Rain Area", and there are obvious problems with waste recycling in the city, so one of the most plausible theories is an environmental disaster.
It is known that B-12 was in the Outside before ("It feels like I’ve been there before." - first memory), and get his engineering degree in 2198 already in the city, so the date when the city was completed and sealed is probably 2190s.
In the TV weather channel, the city can be seen with a bit of the Outside. It is shown as brown and barren. A single road leads out of the city, from the Midtown elevator.
Although there is abundant broad-leaved forest vegetation at Inside The Wall and behind the Exit, it is unclear whether the planetary climate has already entirely recovered from the desertification that is referenced at various locations throughout Stray (incl. the game files) or whether vegetation surrounds Walled City 99 only in close proximity, which would indicate the planet still being in the process of climatic recovery.
Gallery[]
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