The Callisto Protocol ending explained: Plot summary & everything that happens

Jacob Lee’s ordeal in The Callisto Protocol spans many hours, chapters, and events. Here’s The Callisto Protocol ending explained.

The Callisto Protocol is a tense, survival-horror experience fueled by some of the minds behind Dead Space. As a result, gamers can expect yet another terrifying franchise that could result in future entries to come.

The events of The Callisto Protocol would have a huge bearing on any sequels and potential future content – which has been discussed by the devs. If you haven’t got around to playing the new horror title from the team at Striking Distance Studios, then we’re gonna give you a full dissection of the story, as well as an explainer of The Callisto Protocol’s ending.

It goes without saying that this guide contains spoilers, so turn back now if you don’t want to know what happens in the game.

Striking Distance Studios

What happens in The Callisto Protocol? Plot explained

Jacob Lee and his friend Max are contracted employees who transport cargo and are tasked with moving items from Jupiter’s Europa moon to the nearby moon Callisto.

They are intercepted by a group called the Outer Way and Jacob’s ship ends up crashing. As a result, Max is killed in the crash, and Jacob and Outer Way organization member Dani Nakamura are captured by Captain Ferris of Black Iron Prison and are both sent there.

Whilst there, Jacob escapes due to an outbreak and befriends a fellow inmate called Elias. Using his knowledge of the facility, due to a long-term sentence, Elias guides Jacob throughout the facility as our plucky hero collects new gear, weapons, and has to contend with an unknown alien parasitic presence trying to kill everyone.

After many obstacles in the way, Jacob and Elias are able to meet up, suit up, leave the facility, and attempt their escape via Callisto’s surface. However, an accident in the ensuing escape barely leaves Jacob with his own life, and he eventually finds Elias whose suit has broken and succumbs to the unmanageable conditions of Callisto.

In the same moments, Dani finds Jacob and refuses to go with him, believing him to be untrustworthy, but says she’ll meet him in a nearby hangar. Once there, they find transport to head towards a ship that can get them off the moon, but they find Jacob’s crashed ship along the way.

She discovers what the real cargo Jacob and Max were carrying and realizes that Jacob didn’t actually know what he and Max were peddling, cooling the animosity between them.

Just as they’re about to escape, Black Iron’s Warden Cole appears and destroys the ship, and Jacob and Dani are separated. After circumnavigating the area and making his way through Midtown, the pair find each other and are eventually confronted by Captain Ferris – thought dead after being attacked by the creatures.

He is now a bigger, stronger, more alien-looking version of his former self and fights Jacob. After holding him off, Jacob escapes, but Dani is attacked by a parasite and it infects her with the disease.

The pair carry on and make their way to the main testing facility where they find Dr. Caitlyn Mahler, the woman who inserted the Black Iron chips into Jacob and Dani. She gives Dani a suppressant to suspend the spread but says that the only cure is by defeating Warden Cole’s ‘Alpha’ monster and securing the antidote from it.

Striking Distance Studios

The Callisto Protocol ending explained

Jacob finds Cole, and the Warden explains that The Callisto Protocol was an experiment to recreate the original Alpha that died as he wants to advance human evolutionary growth. He essentially conducted his own experiment using infected larvae in Black Iron Prison and Europa – which we learn resulted in the death of Dani’s sibling.

Jacob fights Warden Cole’s new Alpha – Captain Ferris – and after a brief scuffle, Ferris realizes his true potential and morphs into a giant, hulking, monster.

Cole challenges Jacob to face the new breed of Alpha and see which race is superior. Jacob is able to take Ferris down, extract the antidote, and cure Dani. In an act of retribution, Dani shoots at Cole, but it’s merely a hologram, and Cole sets the planet to self-destruct.

Jacob and Dani find the escape pods, but there is only one left, and Jacob forces Dani into it claiming that he belongs there and can’t forgive himself for inadvertently bringing the virus to Callisto.

Dani’s Escape pod takes off just as Jacob is swarmed by monsters, sacrificing himself in the process. She is left to ponder Jacob’s actions as she and Jacob’s thoughts had become intertwined through their chips, and they both know the full extent of each other’s past and connection to everything that’s transpired.

Back on Callisto, Jacob has managed to defeat the monsters and Dr. Mahler’s hologram appears and says that there may be a way out, as she says this, Ferris’ face appears, and screams at Jacob – but now in his pre-Alpha form.

The open-ended nature of the finale sets up nicely for the forthcoming content coming in The Callisto Protocol season pass, posing several questions: What happens to Dani? Do Jacob and Dr. Mahler survive? Where is Warden Cole, and what are his future plans?

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