Shangri-la on Mars...but how? A possible answer!

[FatedTitan]

A couple years ago (wow...it's been that long...), Jimmy Z tweeted out a mysterious tweet:  "Shangri-la Mountains".  This sent CoDz into a frenzy as other devs commented to the tweet with things like "Best easter egg yet"  "No one even knows" and such.  As we searched, Tac came to truly believe that Shangri-la was, in fact, on Mars.  I didn't believe it.  It made no sense.  How could Shangri-la get to Mars in the first place.  It's a barren wasteland.  There's no source of water for the waterfall.  There are radios from people who were at Shangri-la (Brock and Gary) that could not have been from Mars.  Nope.  It can't be on Mars.

 

 

But after that, it seemed as though this became a confirmed fact.  One person tweeted Jimmy Z saying they should put a map on Mars and he responded to it something like "sigh...does anyone wanna help him out?" as though we already knew there was a Mars map.  So I began to accept this as fact, whether it made sense or not.

 

 

But it has always bothered me.  How could that work.  Today, something came to my mind that may make sense of it all.

 

 

"Time Travel Will Tell"

 

 

This is obviously the achievement you receive for completing the easter egg on Shangri-la.  Named due to the nature of the easter egg, going back and forth through time to change things that happen and rescue Brock and Gary, it all of a sudden occurred to me that this could be our answer.  Time Travel Will Tell.

 

 

Time travel tells the secrets of how Shangri-la, in its presence state, is on Mars.  We're there because of time travel!  Shangri-la isn't a present day location...it's from the past!

 

 

"Hold up hold up Fated.  I get that we go back and forth in the easter egg throughout time, but how can we be in the past on Shangri-la?"  

 

 

We aren't.  Simple as that.  We are not in the past on Shangri-la, but Shangri-la is from the past.  If you look at the mountains of Shangri-la, we're surrounded by a barren wasteland.  It's nothing like the deciduous location we are located in.  It makes no sense that this tropical oasis is located here.  But it is.  Which means one of two things is out of place:  the background or the map.

 

 

So then, the question must be raised:  How did Shangri-la get there?  I have a solution for you.

 

 

 

 

Yes!  The Time Bomb from Buried!  The residents of Shangri-la obviously knew how to tamper with the fabric of time, as we experienced during the easter egg.  I believe that they created a very ancient version of a time bomb.  When it was activated, it shot Shangri-la to the present day and wa la.  We have Shangri-la on Mars.

 

 

There's one main problem with this though:  the walkie talkies.  To explain this, I have two different options that I am torn between.

 

 

1.  Somehow Mars was once inhabited by intelligent life that left these here.  When the Time Bomb activated, it brought these walkie talkies with it.

 

 

2.  This is my preferred choice.  Shangri-la was on earth.  Think about Buried.  How is an old west town in Africa?  One of the best theories I've heard is that the time bomb was activated and it basically threw that old west town into that location.  It's underground because that's where the Time Bomb was.  The Time Bomb was activated and it sucked old Shangri-la into a vortex, sending it to Mars.

 

 

Another option I just thought of while writing this.  

 

 

 

 

In the loading screen, we see a hole in the ground that looks to be sucking things in.  What is this was an ancient (or early prototype) Gersch Device.  It sucked in Shangri-la and it released it on Mars.  That explains how it all got there.  

 

 

Shangri-la formerly being on earth would explain Brock and Gary's presence.  A Gersch Device could explain the transportation element.  And a Time Bomb could explain why it's still fresh and living, unlike the rest of Mars.

 

 

 

What do you think?  I think I may have stumbled into two different theories here when I intended to only write one.  I hope you enjoy it and let's discuss.

[The Clay Bird]

Very nice theory fated.

 

I still am curmudgeonly on this and refuse to accept shangri-la being on mars for one main reason: why?

 

Why would they make any sort of deal about a map being on mars if it holds absolutely no significance?  At this point, probably jimmy z and peter livingstone and the crew were smoking some medical marijuana and eating cupcakes and thought, 'heyyyyy mann. what if like those red mountains in that game we made are like, on mars."  "yeahhh man, like the moon is green cheese and mars isshangri la man," "hold on let me tweet about this"

 

 

Other wise, if it does somehow hold some significance story wise, then it is worse, because then it confirms that the developers for some reason really get their rocks off by knowing the full story and never disclosing it to the public, and rather just respond with "i dont know maybe it is maybe it isn't" to every question that is ever asked.

 

personally i dont think they have any real idea, they just roll with whatever the community comes up with, and refuse to confirm anything, in case anyone comes up with any holes in the community's story

[DeathBringerZen]

My thought on it all was that Shangri La is currently set on Earth, but when we hit the dials and travel back in time we are possibly travelling to a time when the same area was actually on Mars as opposed to Earth. This is why the radios can be found... Brock and Gary also activated the dials and then travelled back in time to the point when Shangri La was on Mars.

 

We see in the loading screen that massive chunks of the area are being lifted up, possibly a whole portion of the map was teleported/transferred to Earth by the Vril, but the dials are used as a kind of gateway to send them back and forth between the two locations. That would also explain why they needed to take the area in question and put it on Earth... so it could work as some kind of stargate.

 

As it is by default, I don't believe that Shangri La is on Mars, but when we do activate the switches it is a strong possibility.

[Black Hand Smith]

" SHANGRI-LA IS ON MAAAAARRRRZZZZZ!!!!" MARLTON IS A TIEM TRAVELEER !!!!PORTER IS A HEEEEE

[Chopper]

Shang is outside right?

The atmosphere on Mars isn't really compatible with humans. Doesn't that kinda knock any reasoning on its head?

[The Clay Bird]

Shang is outside right?

The atmosphere on Mars isn't really compatible with humans. Doesn't that kinda knock any reasoning on its head?

 

 

exactly my point!  fact is, if Shangri-La was on mars at very least the sky would look black like on moon.  unless the time-travel moved shangri-la to mars several MILLIONS of years ago when it may have had a more viable atmosphere

[Slade]

Shang is outside right?

The atmosphere on Mars isn't really compatible with humans. Doesn't that kinda knock any reasoning on its head?

 

Not in its original form sure, but you can change that by making it more like earth's atmosphere, aka terraforming the planet to allow life to flourish.

 

You need two things for this: oxygen and the greenhouse effect. Let's go over the greenhouse effect first.

 

The first problem is the temperature, Mars is very cold. (something like minus 60 degrees C on average. During winter it can get as low as  minus 125 degrees C) So you need to heat up the whole planet's atmosphere first to get a greenhouse effect going.

You can do this by trapping or absorbing the sun's rays, and adding a ton of flurocarbons to the atmosphere.

 

As the planet warms up, it'll release carbon dioxide, and combined with the above mentioned greenhouse effect, raise the temperature to a steady 30+ degrees. With the greenhouse effect in place, it'll roughly stay at this temperature, just like our planet.

Then Mars's frozen water supplies would melt, releasing oxygen. Not nearly enough though, as just Mars's atmosphere alone is composed of a mere 0.13 percent of oxygen. Earth has 20.95 percent.

 

So then you need to sit around and wait until there's enough oxygen to breathe. Or artificially add more and boom. You can life there.

In theory.

 

 

TL;DR If Shang is on Mars, it means the planet has already terraformed to match Earth's atmosphere.

As evident by the water, viridiplanae and oxygen.

[Chopper]

Ignoring the story (as I just don't follow it) if Shang was anywhere it could be argued that it's an entirely different planet, known or unknown to us.

If you are for Mars being a possibility as a future location, then to me it makes more sense that they would put that type of location further away.

It would give them more options in future story arcs, if they wanted to involve other intelligent life. That would just make more sense coming from somewhere other than Mars.

Edit - how many moons / Sun's can be seen from Shang?

[Electric Jesus]

Couldn't the area just be enclosed in a transparent biodome of sorts?

One Idea regarding the Time Bomb:

So we know that the most common theory about why buried is buried involves the time bomb. The town was sent forward in time but didn't change its position in space. So tectonic plates shifted and the town appeared in the same location, which is now underground due to plate shifts.

So let's apply that to shangri-la. The temple and jungle travel through time, but not space. The planets move around in space, and the location of an area on the surface of mars at the temple's time of arrival happens to perfectly coincide with the point in space from which the temple departed, which was formerly a location on the surface of the earth.

Only problem with this that I see is that if this is true, buried would have probably ended up in space instead of underground on the same planet, when you take galactic motion into account.

You know the animation when you activate the eclipse? the screen distortion is almost Identical to the time bomb's effect. just pointing that out.

[InfestLithium]

Couldn't the area just be enclosed in a transparent biodome of sorts?

 

This. But instead of a physical biodome, why not consider Vril energy as a form of "cover" for Shangri-la? We know that Element 115 is capable of displacing certain things throughout time AND space, ignoring any space-time continuum laws. If Vril is very similar to the attributes (effects) of 115, wouldn't it be equally possible to have an Earth-terrain map enclosed in a sustainable biodome while being transported to Mars? I would believe so. Hence, why the map is still lush. Let's not forget that a 115 meteorite hit the temple, which could further the effects of time and location displacement.

 

 

 

I admit I was always an advocate for the area being settled on Earth versus Mars, but over time it started to make logical sense why Shang could potentially be displaced on Mars.

[The Clay Bird]

 

Couldn't the area just be enclosed in a transparent biodome of sorts?

 

This. But instead of a physical biodome, why not consider Vril energy as a form of "cover" for Shangri-la? We know that Element 115 is capable of displacing certain things throughout time AND space, ignoring any space-time continuum laws. If Vril is very similar to the attributes (effects) of 115, wouldn't it be equally possible to have an Earth-terrain map enclosed in a sustainable biodome while being transported to Mars? I would believe so. Hence, why the map is still lush. Let's not forget that a 115 meteorite hit the temple, which could further the effects of time and location displacement.

 

 

 

I admit I was always an advocate for the area being settled on Earth versus Mars, but over time it started to make logical sense why Shang could potentially be displaced on Mars.

 

 

 

 

But why?? It makes no sense as to why it would be on Mars.  Literally the only evidence is the always trolling jimmy zielinski saying something about the "shangri-la mountains" and some how we find ourselves here now with no additional evidence or indication why it would be anywhere other than earth, yet people still remain adamant about its position on Mars. There are just too many other special circumstances that would have to take place to make it even remotely believable that its on mars, but there is no real evidence of any of those things (like a biodome, millions of years in the past, etc...)

 

 

:edit: basically, the way i look at it, until there is some other direct in-game evidence found post shangri-la that supports this theory, then I simply don't subscribe to it

[DeathBringerZen]

If my theory was correct, and you travel back in time when you hit the dials and you go to a period when Shangri La was on Mars, it could be millions of years back when Mars was not a burned out planet. Scientists have suggested that at one point in time Mars had an atmosphere and could have possibly contained life. This could be where the Vril Ya came from... Mars.

 

Maybe in the planets final days they relocated to Earth. Just a thought. It would certainly have a better reasoning that having an artificial dome containing an evironment fit for humans... especially when said dome is never hinted or mentioned in any radios or hidden messages.

 

Then again, neither is Mars.

[FatedTitan]

Well there is a file in the Shangri-la map files that mentions Mars.

[DeathBringerZen]

Well there is a file in the Shangri-la map files that mentions Mars.

 

True, but there is no mention of it in-game... at all!

 

Maybe the devs originally intended on making a Mars map, much like Moon was going to be Paris and the changed it before it actually released and that is why the PC files still contained old references. Same way zm_paris is actually files for Moon.

[MegaAfroMan]

The Shangri-La on Mars thing has always troubled me. There is no good way around this.

Either you basically accept that the Vril-Ya either terraformed Mars, or created some sort of atmospheric bubble around Shangri-La (either of which are near omnipotent tasks.

Or you have to explain a giant red cliff face visible from Shangri-La that shouldn't exist anywhere in the Himilayas. And the Devs' constant mentions of it being true (whether they are just keeping up a long running joke/troll isn't exactly known).

You cannot say it is on Earth, because no where on Earth would mix jungles like that with those bold red arid cliffs.

It's tough to say Mars because of just how seemingly impossible that is.

Still, great read. Thanks for posting.

[Slade]

The Loading Screen itself has always bugged me.

What is going on?

 

 

Things I noticed

- The whole area is far below sea-level.

- Temples being sucked into a vortex

- There are three orbs, or planets or whatever, in the sky to the left of the eclipse.

- The place is about to be flooded.

 

Did we ever find any answers to these questions? If you've noticed anything else feel free to add it.

 

Who knows, this loading screen might be the key to solving the mystery of Shang's location/Jimmy's tweets.

[InfestLithium]

Those three circles in the sky would have to be orbs. Mars only has two moons, and one is shown in the eclipse. That begs the question - if this is on Mars, where is the other moon?

[MegaAfroMan]

Well, although I don't know if they'd check this far, but I'm fairly certain that neither of Mars' two moons can cause a total ecplise like we see on Earth. In fact actually it's a very rare thing in nature.

Our Moon's apparent size just happens to be perfectly slightly smaller than our Sun's apparent size (when at the right point in our orbit of the sun and the moon's orbit of us, and the wobbling of our axis.

Slade: what makes you say it is below sealevel and about to be flooded? What you might be refering to as waves, I see as cliff faces. I think. I'm not really sure anymore.

[Black Hand Smith]

has anyone ever brought up the fact that it's sunset in shangri-la and maybe that's why the mountains appear red?

 

[Slade]

Slade: what makes you say it is below sealevel and about to be flooded? What you might be refering to as waves, I see as cliff faces. I think. I'm not really sure anymore.

Look at the very center of the pages. 

You can see water on top of the cliffs, and if you look slighty to the right you can see the water bursting through.

I'll see if I can find the original loading screen file on my PC, it's more noticeable on there.

 

le edit:

If that's correct, that means the temples must be below sea-level. 

 

@Black Hand Smith

Yes but the problem is the mountains don't change color like the rest of the scenery when you go back in time. That's when they really stand out.

[Black Hand Smith]

If I told you there was treasure hidden under a tree even though I know there is no treasure. How many people will start digging and one day claim to find the nonexistant treasure I was talking about. Then imagine all the people trying to prove that the treasure they found is the one I as talking about. 

 

This is what the whole Shangri-la is on mars thing is. it's just a placebo effect. People took a pill with no medicine in it.

 

Sometimes I also wonder. You can master time travel and invisible biodomes but you still look like primitive natives? Not to mention you still need water to start the Power. Which is odd considering the Perks are only there for gameplay purposes so why would they have a water generator if they have nothing to power?

[Slade]

What's so impossible about it having something to do with Mars?

Let's not forget a guy teleported to the Moon with no equipment whatsoever, walked around and lit a torch like it was nothing. 

 

I'm not saying Shang's location is on mars, but there's definitely a correlation between Shangri-la and the planet Mars.

The devs have hinted to it plenty, and it's in the gamefiles. It's no coincidence, and it has to mean something. Although what exactly, is debatable. Some say it means Shang is on mars, others say Jimmy's just trolling.

 

Who knows. It could be a much smaller easter egg for all we know.

The whole theme of Shangri-La is pareidolia. Seeing faces and objects in clouds and old photos et cetera.

And there have been many people saying you can see egyptian statues, faces, footsteps, structures and most notably - pyramids on the surface of both mars and the moon.

 

So maybe that's what the whole mars thing is all about. It's definitely where they got their inspiration from to put the pyramid on Moon's surface in the loading screen.

 

 

 

Sometimes I also wonder. You can master time travel and invisible biodomes but you still look like primitive natives? Not to mention you still need water to start the Power. Which is odd considering the Perks are only there for gameplay purposes so why would they have a water generator if they have nothing to power?

The inhabitans certainly didn't master time travel. As soon as Group 935 showed up, they were forced to dig out 115.

The power switch is to power up all the various mining equipment, generators and mine cart you see around the map.

[Tasha]

So, wait.

 

The Shang we see in the comic book, does that whole being sucked into that vortex thing occur before or after the O4 gets there? Not to mention why. :3

 

 

 

If that's correct, that means the temples must be below sea-level. 

Great eye ! :3 

[Stop Mocking Me0]

Personally I am 100% against the outlandish Idea that shangri-la is on mars,

 

I mean seriously, the NAME shangri-la specifically defines to: 

1. a place regarded as an earthly paradise, especially when involving a retreat from the pressures of modern civilization.

​Earthly, not mars-ly. 

[MegaAfroMan]

Earthly doesn't necessarily have to mean "on Earth" Mocking.

Like Wintry doesn't have be during winter.

It's just a descriptor. Besides, Shangri-La as a proper noun doesn't necessarily have to perfectly follow any definition. I could name my dog Pickled Herring. Doesn't mean he is a pickled herring. Doesn't mean he isn't a dog.