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This article is about Eric LeBlanc refers to the main protagonist in the game and this page DOES contain spoilers for the story. For player characters, see Player. |
Eric LeBlanc is a character and the main protagonist of The Forest. He is the protagonist of the story.
Pre-Crash
Before the events of the game, Eric LeBlanc was a famed survival show host from Canada and author of the Survival Guide along with co-author Sam Sounde. He was also a family man with a wife and son, Timmy. However, tragedy struck after his wife died in an accident, leaving Eric to raise Timmy alone. As shown by his book being dedicated to his son, along with a drawing of the pair by Timmy, it is clear they had a loving father-son relationship. The two were most likely living in Toronto prior to the game, given the airport code on the passenger manifest, and the city's heavy ties to TV and film production in Canada.
Events of The Forest
When the game begins, Eric and Timmy were returning from a trip to New York when their plane crashes. After the crash Eric wakes up on the floor and sees a man in red paint picking up his son. He futilely attempts to reach him, but passes out again. He eventually wakes up, and gathers what supplies he can find scattered around the plane. Most importantly, he finds the Plane Axe embedded in a stewardess and takes it, resulting in his first weapon in the game. After this, he begins to explore with the ultimate goal of finding Timmy, though he also has secondary goals such as finding the other plane passengers, building himself shelter, and more.
While looking for Timmy, Eric runs into groups of savage cannibals, who appear to be from different tribes. He can use the tribe differences against the cannibals, sometimes tricking them into fighting each other so that he can escape. Other times, he is forced into a life-or-death battle, armed with his plane axe and any other weapons he manages to find or craft. Eric discovers a vast cave system beneath the forest floor, and he finds various items (such as drawings and toy parts) suggesting that Timmy had been there, but alas Eric is always too late to find him. Eventually, he will run into mutants, vile aberrations who are much stronger than the regular cannibals. Eric defeats them, too. Along the way, he will find several hints to a company, Sahara, being on the peninsula, along with a keycard. Once he traverses his way to the bottom of the sinkhole, he can discover the vault door, which opens with the keycard.
He enters the vault, and finds the Sahara research lab, hidden deep beneath the cave system. The lab looks to be greatly in disarray, with bodies everywhere and walls and piping having collapsed. There are seemingly no inhabitants, suggesting a mass evacuation or massacre. He eventually makes his way to a room containing the Resurrection Obelisk, where he discovers his son dead inside. Devastated by his death, Eric lays him down on a nearby bed (with wires running to the obelisk) and he tenderly places Timmy's toy on his son's corpse. Eric notices the cords running to and from the machine, and on impulse, he places one cord on Timmy, causing the machine to prompt him for more. He places all the cords on Timmy, and the machine prompts him for a new specimen, re-opening the obelisk. Eric heads off to find his specimen.
Shortly thereafter, he runs into Dr. Mathew Cross, dead in an office nearby, with crayons shoved into his neck, mouth, ears, and eyes. At this point, through the culmination of collecting the autopsy report, restraining order, various notes (here and here), emails, and more, Eric understands that the Red Man was never a cannibal after all, but rather a scientist working for Sahara lab. Dr. Cross' daughter, Megan, had died in a violent Armsy attack, and so he conspired to use the resurrection obelisk to bring her back to life.
Eric then follows bloody footprints leading deeper into the facility, supplemented with various drawings that belong to Megan. He tracks them to the end, discovering many test rooms and corpses along the way, along with information that suggests that Sahara is responsible for creating the cannibals and mutants in their quest for immortality. Eric comes to a final door with a bed outside, with one last drawing of an angry Red Man that looks monstrous, with the caption of "Daddy". This suggests to the player that Megan killed her father. Upon crossing the final threshold, he discovers Megan sitting in a large open room, surrounded by drawings and playing with a toy plane. As Eric gets closer to her, she turns to face him, revealing her mouth, feet, and hands to all be covered in blood. She flies her plane around, then crashes it, and points to him, suggesting she knew how he got to the peninsula. Megan begins to have a seizure, and Eric backs away uneasily. The girl begins to undergo a mutation which results in her turning into a monstrous mutation, the Boss Monster. It immediately begins a forceful assault on Eric, forcing him to fight for his life, killing her in the process. After doing so, he carries her body back to the Obelisk, and places her gently inside.
The machine beeps angrily at Eric, and it informs him that a live specimen is required. Megan's corpse slumps out of the obelisk, and a new keycard falls off of her. Eric collects that, and, following signs to a second artifact, uses it to access an elevator. He then makes his way to an observatory within the northern mountain, and finds a desk apparently connected to a second artifact, which lies above him in the ceiling. After contemplating his options, he activates the second artifact, and in turn, shoots down another plane.
Happily Ever After?
If Eric shoots down the plane, it is suggested that Eric kidnaps a survivor from the plane and then uses them as a live sample to resurrect Timmy. One year later, they are rescued and both appear on a TV show, where Eric is revealed to have written a book about the crash and his survival. The host then asks Eric to come up with him and use the Modern Axe to display his tree-felling prowess that he gained from his hardships on the peninsula, revealing 2 vertical logs behind a curatin. As the host and Eric compete in a friendly wood chopping contest, Timmy starts seizing violently, and the player slowly shakes his head as he watches Timmy shake just like Megan. The audience and the host panic, beginning to evacuate. The screen cuts to black for about 5 seconds then cuts back to the scene. Eric runs up to Timmy on the ground and holds him. The audience is gone, seemingly already evacuated. Almost immediately, Timmy's shaking slows and comes to complete stop. Timmy opens his eyes and looks at his father, then the cutscene ends. After that, it cuts to Timmy in the shower. He walks up to the bathroom mirror and brushes his teeth, giving a first person POV of his face. It's revealed that this is a much older version of him, maybe 20-25 years in the future. It's implied to be Timmy because of the facial scar, the same one he has in the previous TV show cutscene. He walks back into his bedroom which is a mess of dity clothes and alcohol, implying that Timmy has been having a rough time. He looks at a wall covered in information about the peninsula, and a picture of a new island visible labeled "Site 2" is dead center surrounded by a bunch of other papers covering his ordeal. Suddenly, his arms start shaking, and odd lumps can be seen under the surface of his skin, traveling up to his wrists. This is likely something he has struggled with since his resurrection, most likely some form of side effect from the artifact. He limps toward the window of his bedroom overlooking the city, seemingly being directed by whatever mutation is taking hold of his body, as he looks in a very specific direction. After a few seconds of looking out the window, the scene cuts to black.
Alternate Ending
If Eric chooses to shut down the artifact he'll take another route out of the labs through a cave. He then spends a few seconds staring at the flying plane that he might have crashed, and then burns his photo of Timmy, implying he's letting go of his son and accepts the fact that he will never be rescued from the peninsula. After this the player will unlock mannequins of Timmy and his Wife.
Trivia
- In the game files he is/was referred to as "James" as a placeholder name before being officially called Eric.
- That list states that his passport number is 9DB6781.
- In the inventory you can see a "card" with a picture of Timmy and another covered in blood that is thought to be his passport.
- His last name, LeBlanc, suggests that he is of French-Canadian descent, as Leblanc is a French-Canadian surname along with the fact that the developers are located in Canada, while the airport code of "YYZ" (Toronto Pearson International Airport) is shown on the passenger manifest.
- If the alternate ending was chosen, Eric will exit the Sahara facility back to the peninsula. His right arm will be shaky thereafter, suggesting that the supernatural effects of the artifacts were beginning to take effect on him. That, or he is struggling with accepting the loss of his son and his new life on the peninsula.
- Eric's hand could also be in this state because the facility is located in the mountain area. If not wearing the Warmsuit, the game would register the player as freezing during the cut scene due to being able to continue their endless game play on the peninsula.