Basic Braining is a merit badge which is given by Coach Oleander for those who dare to take the risk of entering his mental class "Coach Oleander's Basic Braining", and are skilled enough to pass through the entire obstacle course.
Role in Psychonauts[]
After being allowed to stay at Whispering Rock and having a strange dream with a weird yet familiar figure, Raz wakes up in the morning along with the rest of his campmates to get ready for one of the first lessons from camp. Raz successfully manages to complete the entire thing with little to no problem and so upon reaching the end of the obstacle course, he’s reward with his first merit badge, which also allows him to get entire access to the rest of the facility since; if attempting to go out of the Kids' Cabins area before beating Oleander’s Basic Braining, the same old man ("Janitor" Cruller) will tell Razputin that he can’t still leave the location. While it doesn’t offer any special abilities, it’s acquisition seem to be obligatory for all of the campers.
Trivia[]
- In Psychonauts 2, during the events of Loboto's Labyrinth, when the metal shelf blocks the way for Raz and the latter doesn’t know what to do, Oleander tells him to use his basic braining.
- He referred to PSI-Punch this way not because the two badges are related, but more for reference purpose, plus the past mentioned ability is pretty much the basic combo of attacking for Raz.
- Script in the files of Psychonauts reveals that this ability at some point was actually planned to be the original Psycho-Portal.
- One of the unused merit badge icons shows a brain with a door and some promotional screenshots shows this same icon in the PSI-Powers menu (example 1 and example 2).