I didn't see this in quicklinks, but I'm sorry if this has been posted before...

Anyways, the room where you get dry cell batter in the hospital. There are "hands" right below it and when you examine it, James says something like: Are these hands searching for something? Or are they a sign of pain?

Can anybody tell me what they think the "hands" painting thing symbolizes/represents/the significance please? I've always wondered about this.

Well, James really did need those batteries in the end...

ETA @ 10:42 - Man, I have no memory of writing this post. Uh, well.. the hands could be clawing their way out or they're all bent and scraggly to signify, well, torment. I don't think there's really much thought needed here. Just hands on the wall. Connect them to James, to Mary, to both or all of the characters if you want. I personally think it's just a nice artistic representation of the gravitas found within the game, like the woman painted on the door (to which you have to add rings).

I'm pretty sure it signifies how James actually needed those batteries, like how the hands were "grabbing" on to them.

Konami has alluded the hands to be the souls lost at Toluca Lake.

I've actually never thought about that^^^^^ excellent theory.

A bundle of things seem to point towards James's guilt towards killing Mary (Things about sin, being hung for crimes, ect) This could be another pointer towards his subconscious belief of what he deserves for killing Mary, suffering and such. Just a theory though.

It's like "the sinners (hands) are trying to reach the salvation" (the battery, the light). That's what I thought anyway, since James comments by looking at it again that it looks like a symbol of suffering.

the hands can be of those lost souls, searching for light or forgiveness, James' suffering or trying to grasp reality

Isn't that about the time you re-meet Maria?
Mary DIED, the batteries DIED, maybe its hinting about the whole rebirth thing going on with Maria...or not lol

The hospital in general, is pretty Hand oriented, there are rings, hands on the wall, hands on the door, it takes 2 pairs of hands to open the fridge,,,,

hands hands hands. Or they could me trust and love

Suffering trust and love O.o?

Representing Mary's hands reaching out while she was being suffocated with the pillow by James.
James finds the flashlight on a mannequin wearing Mary's clothes, then the batteries there, & the hand reaching out of the door in Alternate hospital; I think they're somehow related.

How could it represent Mary's hands? A normal human being haves only 2 hands (I'm not saying that those that haves only 1 aren't normal) and in the wall there's like 5 or 6 hands if I'm not wrong.

Well, they actually have a valid point. Over time James's guilt has ate at him even though he lost conscious of it, it could be representative of that, although Mary was sick and probably didn't have the strength to fight back.

Mary reaching out for him to stop or to save her, many different reasons and all very good points. Turst, love, suffering, remorse...

What I meant was, it symbolically represents...

^I know it's symbolically, but it still doesn't make any sense. At least for me, sorry.

In symbolism, you can have as many limbs as you want. Look at Buddha, sometimes he pulls a Vishnu.

The hands we're talking about, have something in common, in my opinion, & that is 'reaching out'.
So I guess that makes them symbolic in a way, or perhaps (well, definitely) the Alt. hospital door hands have more meanings to them. I'm just pointing out the one that makes sense to me. There are many more explanations to them.