There are 2 things worth noting -
1. If you move mouse really fast, Umbra can jump through non-shadow areas. Sometimes it can save life, if you pressed shadow button either too late or too early and there is ~5-ish pixel gap between shadows.
2. To stop moving crates - all you need to do it put Lumen between you and crate and move it down through the floor. Yes, it is actually written in the tutorial at the very beginning, but you really have to use it only by the time you get to 2nd boss. So it's easy to miss/forget.

There is set of achievements for each non-event chapter in the game - 16 in total. Not all of them are hard, but if you cannot complete them easily from the start, better leave them for 2nd playthrough, instead - focus on collecting all memories. There are couple of stages, where collecting memory and getting achievement in one go is impossible, and memories are more important.
So when I'm writing about those achievements, I assume that you already know what is where after finishing game once.

I made a video with almost every achievement - timed links will be inside chapter's numbers. For 2-1 and 4-1 there are separate vids, as in main one I prioritized memories.






1-1 - After reading all tutorials and watching memory-1, restart the level and complete it fast.
1-2 - you have to press random button with Umbra at the very beginning of the stage and die.
1-3-1 then 1-3-2 and 1-3-3 - There are 3 dolls to pick up, vid shows how to get them.
1-4 - simply complete entire chapter 1 or 2 times, remember exactly what to do, then do it without dying.
2-1 - Don't use first lever to go faster. Next 2 levers are necessary. You can pick up memory, it won't spoil achievement. And the last lever (after the lift) must be used twice - there is a small chance that crate will be destroyed by press, but either compare it to my vid and do ~same, or just hope for your luck - you have a good chance, normally.
2-2 - after you pick up memory (at the bottom), reload checkpoint or use the lift to get back. Press the button, then use Umbra twice to get to levers fast. Afre getting memory it shouldn't be hard.
2-3 - my advice, finish the game first, practice on stage 4-3 to get better at controlling Lumen. It's really easy, when you practice a bit. Maybe also finish 2-3 couple of times to know for sure when camera moves and when it can screw you over :)
2-4 - you have to know how to let go of crates fast (look up basic controls), have to keep exactly right distance, and have to let go only when you sure - dog is going to bite, not roar or use fire.
3-1 - hardest part is the very start. You have to move to 2nd blower before you hit max height of 1st one, or you won't have enough impulse. btw, if Mion appears to land, but legs aren't touching the ground - you're still ok, achiev isn't failed. You can land here.
3-2 - Just go up and up and up, until you see the moon and blowers turn off by themselves - then it's done.
3-3 - Feeding Shadow Raven is a bit tricky. 1st - make Mion sit nearby. 2 - make flower lean to the right by 3 or 4 pixels (depends on your game scale, it was 3 for me, at ~720p). 3 - move Lumen away slowly, and after flower stops following it, move Lumen to right-top corner to see where 1st shot land. 4 - use Umbra on flower and see your result. If you missed - simply adjust flower a bit and try again.
3-4 - Very easy one. Just wait until boss starts it's big attack (repeated hits of the same spot under you), lead it under the dead clone, wait until it hits 20 times, move away a bit, use Umbra to get that body, feed it to closest plant. Repeat 4 times.
4-1 - Impossible to get at the same time with collecting memory, so it's on separate video. It's quite a puzzle, btw, better try it by yourself first :)
4-2 - Things get easier if you reload checkpoint after lift starts it's movement - it'll give you some time to adjust your aim and kill first couple of monsters before you even start moving. One small detail - always make Mion sit, so ricochet has less chance of hitting her.
4-3 - Personally I got it for going the right way (with memory). If you will not get that achievement - maybe you should try other pipes. (right way is - to break first plant under you, jump down, go left. then there is only 1 way to go).
4-4 - You must guess right 24/24 answers. At first i thought that "naturally lucky" meant "you guessed right". Actually, it's more like "you got slower puzzle". Seriously, to get that achievement you just have to try over and over again, until card puzzle will be relatively slow. Or maybe guess right answer 1-2 times when it's fast. If you get fastest variants there - no way you can keep up. Guessing shadow figure puzzle, on the other hand, can be completed normally every time. Just remember, before checkpoint (when both shadows appear), that figure never holds a plant. After that, it holds plant once, so check only for that part. and next time it doesn't hold anything, so check for legs/hands, as you did first 5 times. next time - again, plant. and last 4 times it can be anything, but your best guess is to look on his upper body - if he has empty or full hand, and if his 2nd hand is up or down. It may seem insane at first, but with practice it's actually not very hard.
So in short - you normally can see 12/12 shadow puzzles, but it is most likely, that 2-3 last card puzzles will be too fast. Maybe more than 3. So just take your time, until you get slower card puzzles and you have to guess only 1-2 times. 1 try is ~8 min, so prepare to be there for 2-3 hours. Most likely, you'll get it. Maybe even faster.
Btw, I only have 23/24 in my vid, obviously you have to get 24/24. I made that mistake on purpose to demonstrate glitches, but then got too lazy to redo the whole thing again - but I hope, my description is enough :)

I made a video of entire game finished, without any big mistakes. It's still long, as game is very slow-paced. But there is nothing missed, and that run can be even considered cinematic. So you can watch this either to look up how to solve puzzles, or just to see game entire scenario. Little advice - you can watch most of the gemeplay with x2 speed.


Time codes for chapters:
      1-1 1-2 1-3 1-4
2-0 2-1 2-2 2-3 2-4
      3-1 3-2 3-3 3-4
4-0 4-1 4-2 4-3 4-4
[Ending 1]
"X-1" "X-2" "X-3" "X-4"
[Ending 2]

Some memories are just there to pick up.
Some require time to get to them - in that case I make 2 time stamps.
Time codes for memories:
Memory 1 - picking it up.
Memory 2 - getting to It - picking it up.
Memory 3 - picking it up.
Memory 4 - getting to It - picking it up.
Memory 5 - getting to It - picking it up.
Memory 6 - getting to It - picking it up.
Memory 7 - getting to It - picking it up.
Memory 8 - getting to It - picking it up.
Memory 9 - getting to It - picking it up.
Memory 10 - getting to It - picking it up.
Memory 11 - getting to It - picking it up.
Memory 12 - getting to It - picking it up.
Memory 13 - picking it up.

Finally, I made a video, that is (in my personal opinion) shows events chronologically, and in it I try to explain my point of view on the whole story. Note, that I'm open for arguments or suggestions - since scenario can be interpreted differently. Hopefully, it will make things more clear for some people. So I'm putting it here as part of the guide.


00:00:05 - Memory 13. Mion gets a key from her Mother’s lab and hides it somewhere in secret place.

Note: Memories 1,2,3 and 13 all happen before memory 4, but they can all be shuffled randomly.

00:00:55 - Memory 1. Main info that we see here - there is a normal family, Mom, Dad, Mion and their pet dog. The only unusual thing - from TV broadcast we see, that some war is happening.

00:02:15 - Memory 2. We see Dad’s lab - where plants grow. We will see many of those plants later in the game, mostly after chapter 3-3. Also, it looks like that is starting point of the game, where New Mion wakes up. I’m still not sure what dad told her there. But my best guess - that memories and minds can be copied to those seeds. Later we will see things that prove if.

00:03:16 - Memory 3. In this memory we see 2nd boss of the game - or it’s prototype. I actually think, that bosses in this game are made bigger artficially, to be scarier, so that probably is real size.

00:04:00 - Memory 4. This is a continuation of Memory 1, but not necessarily a direct one. It’s just another evening. Mion goes to sleep.

00:04:38 - Memory 5. Something breakes through Mion’s room wall and window and kills her. In memory 1 TV showed some war and explosions, so it is likely, that war was the cause. But for some reason Mion can still walk around, but her parents can’t see her.

Most likely, that happened because her mind and memories were stored in one particular seed - and it was connected to some supercomputer.
We'll see later, that her parent’s minds were stored there as well.

00:06:10 - Memory 6. Mion wants to go back to her grieving parents but she can’t. There is some sort of wall, keeping her outside of the real world room.

00:07:10 - Memory 7. Her parents drop all their research and focus on one thing - recreating their daughter. All plants are fading, only tree of life in Dad's lab is still green. And trial and error do not look pretty.

00:08:13 - Memory 8. As clones finally become viable, Mom tries to implant mind and memories of real Mion through supercomputer to newborn clones.

00:09:25 - Memory 9 & Chapter 4-0-2. New Mion wakes up. It is not specified, but I like to think about it as of her first day alive. Just like Real Mion in memories 1 and 4, she does same things. And we can see, that Real Mion is still outside, watching.

Note: it’s not obvious, but look at the family picture at 00:09:40 and then look at the first boss - 00:24:10. To me they look pretty much the same. As i said before, it is most likely, that bosses were made bigger than they are in reality, to be scarier. So, my theory, that boss 1 is the shadow of a dog.

00:11:03 - Memory 9 still. Mom turns off supercomputer. Seed is still keeping real Mion alive, but apparently, her memories got corrupted, which resulted in all events that happen next. Also, what is most likely, real Mion got angry and jealous at New Mion and her parents, because they replaced her.

00:11:30 - Memory 10. “There are plausible explanations for everything that followed, but i think it was really just a question of hatred” (c) Harlan Wade.
This may not be entirely true, but it definitely played a role. My guess - Real Mion didn’t just started seeing New Mion as monster because she hated her. But more likely, she just got confused, after computer with her memories got shut down. But why she could return at all is a mystery.

00:12:55 - Memory 11. But what isn’t a mystery - somehow she killed her parents and her dog. Dog became the biggest shadow - first boss, which will follow New Mion for the entire game. Mother became Lumen, and Father became Umbra - 2 fireflies, basically, souls, which apparently, were also connected to the same seed, as their daughter’s soul (or mind, whatever term you prefer).
Now, the way her parents got killed is shown indirectly, probably not to be too gory. First we see trails of blood ar 00:13:54. Then we see dolls hanging at 00:14:05 - and at the 02:05:07 we see 4th boss - parent’s shadows spiked by tree branches. And finally, look at this attack - 01:25:02. So from all of that my conclusion - 3rd boss is what Real Mion’s got reincarnated into. It is also fitting, because it is very close to the door and the glitch. And apparently, she went inside the room and used those branches to kill her parents (maybe even unwillingly), but she couldn’t do it to New Mion, for some reason, because touching eachother made New Mion fall unconscious, and Real Mion got more glitchy.

00:14:02 - Epilogue (of normal game). Chronologically we see Lumen here for the first time. And note, that Umbra isn’t there yet, he will find and join New Mion and Lumen in chapter 1-2. So, New Mion gets up and tries to leave the house. But she cannot, as she gets severe headache. Which makes her fall into the pit, right to the point where we will start the game.
Why exactly she got that headache is unclear. Most likely is was from the shock of encountering real Mion - after all, such event could lead to any consequences.
So she falls, and Lumen follows her.

00:15:17 - Memory 12 and Credits (normal). Those things happen more or less at the same time - as New Mion falls into the pit, Real Mion comes for all other clones and kills them. We will see all those dead clones later in chapters 3-3 and 3-4. And, as I said before, it is likely, that 3rd boss is Real Mion’s incarnation.
About memory 12. It is possible, that it is illustration on what happens, when player fails over and over. Clones wake up in Dad’s lab, trying to climb up, and get killed by Real Mion or other hazards. And we see all of those dead clones in chapter 3-3. The only problem in this theory - we don’t see any other dead clones anywhere else from chapter 1-1 to 3-2. And there would be at least some. Ofc one can tell, that dog’s shadow or other shadows get them all and bring them up for Mion to feed on. But that’s a little bit of a stretch. So i think, there just were some Mion clones alive already, when Real Mion came back, and she killed all of them (maybe clones were without horns and memories, which allowed Real Mion to kill them, unlike New Mion). But New Mion was out of her reach at that time.

00:15:50 - New Game. New Mion wakes up on a table exactly like in her father’s lab. On her left we see some other clones. Considering, that they still have horns (or branches), they may not be dead, just unconscious. This may support the theory, that there were many clones waking up and dying on a way up. But I’m still against it and in my opinion - there was only one New Mion.
Once more about memories. It looks like both Mion’s memories were lost in a glitch, when they contacted each other, and so they got scattered throughout the place.
The very first memory was Memory 13. There New Mion and Lumen realised where the key to the Mom’s lab is. Then they slowly got to the place where it was, but to get it, they had get through Dog’s shadow (00:24:10), Mechanical guard dog (00:52:39) and Real Mion’s angry incarnation (01:20:15), as well as many other dangers - all that while slowly remembering what happened before. After all that, they had to enter the glitch (01:27:25), get the key (01:27:55) and eventually confront Mion’s parent’s shadows (01:55:14) - which finally closed that glitch and allowed them to return back to the Mom’s lab, where Mion’s soul was still residing (02:05:37). And then parents sacrificed New Mion to resurrect the original one (02:06:33). We can argue, that it was a wrong thing to do, because clone and real Mions are basically the same thing, and they both have personalities/souls/right to live and such. But no matter what we think, neither parents not Real Mion thought, that New Mion also could return as an angry ghost (02:07:30). And New Mion was even more angry that Real one, as she just got betrayed. So she decided to destroy that seed (02:13:40) - which killed both parents and Mion for real. Presonally, I think that the moment seed got destroyed all souls disappeared. But 2 Mion’s souls stayed for a minute longer to give us proper ending.
02:18:32 So now all what is left - a big tree, growing from New Mion’s branches. Real Mion is crying, as she died again and can never return to the world of living, with seed destroyed and her parents dead. But New Mion reaches out, and pats her on the head - and Real Mion realises, that now she’s not alone anymore, now she has a sister. That calms her down, and both Mions finally move on - nothing ties them to the real world anymore and they are finally at peace.
The end.


So, what is the moral of the story, you may ask? Maybe it’s “Don’t try to recreate your passed loved ones, no matter how much it hurts” - because doing so will only lead to more tragedies. Maybe parents should’ve moved on and try and make and raise more kids.
Maybe, the moral is that if you create a clone, that is just like the original, there is no difference between them - they both humans and clone cannot be treated just as a vessel for the original mind.
Maybe it’s “Don’t sacrifice someone to live again” - after all, Real Mion got punished for that - her new body died, and all her ties to the world were severed.
Or maybe, the moral is - to forgive others, after all is said and done. Clone’s soul didn’t hold a grudge in the end, she calmed real Mion, and we can see, how it turned from disturbed red color to calm green, and both souls moved on.
I think, it is probably all of the above.

Thanks for reading & watching.
If I missed something or made a mistake, please, feel free to correct me or add something - I'll recheck and correct things, mostly :)