We Were Here Tomorrow Rune Puzzle Solution (Rift Zero plant pods, WHEN / THEN devices)
Updated 28 Oct 2026 · Game version: 1.1.1 · By the Indie Walkthrough crew
The answer in one line
Each device takes two runes, a plant (cross-shaped tile) and a state (triangle tile). Red-lamp devices are WHEN (the condition), and they feed the THEN device at the other end of the pink cable (the result). In the split rooms: one player sets their red device to eye + detect, the other sets the blue device it feeds to seaweed + shrink. The first player stands in front of the eye plant, the seaweed shrinks, and the room's preset pair (seaweed small, then ear transparent) makes the ear plant see-through so you can get past it.
Some pods are fixed and can't be taken out. Build around them. Two other teams ended up with slightly different runes in these rooms but the same chain of cause and effect, so read the preset pair in your own room first.
Where the puzzle is
Late game, after the null-time loop: the transit takes you to Rift Zero, the alien world, and on into an overgrown Norček outpost lab.
A terminal says the parts of the Theta Splice are scattered, and in a cutscene a striped worm, the macrophage, swallows one of them. Someone shouts to find a rune that stops it. The runes are how you deal with it, a few rooms later.
The rune devices are tables with two big plant pods and a small lamp. You carry loose runes in the bar at the bottom of the screen; spares sit in six-slot cabinets.
Not sure you’re in the right place? Search for your room in Quick find tool.
What you need
- Runes from the cabinets and the hub. Cross-shaped tiles name a plant; triangle tiles name a state.
- Both players, talking. In the split rooms each of you only sees your own half.
Step by step
Learn to read a device
Put one plant rune and one state rune on a device and read it as a sentence. A device with a red lamp is a WHEN device: its lamp lights while the condition is true. It's wired with a pink cable to a THEN device (blue), which makes its plant take the state you set. Go by the lamp and the cable, not by the arrows printed on the table; both kinds have arrows. A red device can drive a blue one on the other side of a wall, in your partner's room.
Know the runes
Plants (crosses): coral = seaweed, a bulb or pouch = ear plant, an eye shape = eye plant, a flower with a yellow centre and pink petals = flower, a spiky one = cactus, a trident = the tall tentacle plant that throws lightning. States (triangles): inward chevrons like a snowflake = shrink, a curly swirl = transparent, a sunburst with a ring of dots = activate, waves going into the centre = detect. The eye plant only counts as detecting while it sees one of you standing in front of it. An ear plant has to be activated before it can detect.
Open TEST ROOM #2
The first use: the tentacle plant by TEST ROOM #2 throws lightning when it's activated. Set the device for it to tentacle plant + activate (trident + sunburst), and the lightning arcs to the door and opens it. Zero Reviews does exactly this at 2:59:44–3:00:10 in Part 3.
Split rooms: find the fixed pair
Further in, the two of you end up in separate, mirrored labs. Each has a red WHEN device and blue THEN devices, and some pods are stuck. In one room the stuck pair says: when seaweed is small, then ear is transparent. You can't change that one, so the job is to make the seaweed small.
Frame from “We Were Here Tomorrow with @zer0Reviews (Part 3 - Finale)” by Crystal Dreams. Watch at 3:14:00 Split rooms: wire the eye to the seaweed
Player A sets their red device to eye + detect. Player B sets the blue device that red device feeds to seaweed + shrink. Now A stands in front of the eye plant: A's condition is met, B's seaweed shrinks, the stuck pair fires and the ear plant turns transparent. Walk through it.
Swap rooms and carry runes back
A pull handle lets you swap rooms, and you can take runes with you to the main room. You'll need them for TEST ROOM #4 (below) and for freeing the part from the macrophage.
We checked this against three teams. Darlom’s pair worked the rules out loud, so their audio gives the WHEN/THEN logic and the split-room chain. Zero Reviews and Crystal Dreams (same session, two views) show the devices and runes up close. A Steam guide by another player agrees on the fixed pairs. The preset pairs matched in every run we saw.
Test Room 4 (make the cactus transparent)
Right after the split rooms, a giant teal cactus with red spikes fills the doorway under the TEST ROOM #4 sign. Rune devices with grey pods stand near the door. You make the cactus see-through with a four-link chain and walk through it. Bring the cactus, ear and flower runes and the detect, activate and transparent states, and keep one player free to stand in front of the eye plant.
- Read the preset link. One pair is already fixed: WHEN eye detects, THEN flower activates. Darlom summed it up as “when eyeball sees us, then flower dance”. Leave it as it is.
- Flower activates → ear activates. On the next free WHEN device set flower + activate, and on the THEN device it feeds set ear + activate. The ear plant can’t detect anything until it has been activated, which is why the chain goes through the flower first.
- Ear detects → cactus transparent. On another WHEN device set ear + detect, and on its THEN device set cactus + transparent.
- Stand in front of the eye. One of you steps in front of the eye plant. The flower starts to dance, the ear activates and detects, and the cactus fades to see-through. Walk through it into TEST ROOM #4.
If the ear won’t detect, it isn’t activated yet: check the flower → ear link and that someone is standing in front of the eye. If nothing happens at the eye, check each red lamp along the chain; the first one that stays dark is where it breaks.
Darlom’s pair solved this room talking through every link, which is where the chain comes from (“Test room four is open”, day 3, 5:06:08). Zero Reviews and Crystal Dreams play the same room from both sides, and their cactus turns see-through at matching moments.
If it doesn’t work
- I can't pick a rune out of a pod.
- That pod is preset. Leave it and read it as part of the room's rule; your job is to make its WHEN half come true.
- The lamp on the red device won't light.
- The condition isn't true yet. For eye + detect, someone has to stand where the eye plant can see them. For anything with the ear plant, activate the ear first.
- Which device is WHEN and which is THEN?
- The one with the red lamp is WHEN. Follow its pink cable to find the THEN device it controls, which may be in your partner's room.
- How do I open TEST ROOM #4?
- Same rules, longer chain: see [Test Room 4](#test-room-4-make-the-cactus-transparent) below.
Sources
- We Were Here Tomorrow Can A Couple Solve All The Puzzles? (day 3) by Darlom Timestamps used: 4:00:32 (eye plant), 4:07:28 (shrink / expand), 4:20:58–4:23:45 (red is WHEN, blue is THEN), 4:29:31–4:33:41 (split rooms solved), 4:35:39 (swap rooms), 4:38:40 (Test Room 4 preset eye → flower), 5:04:17–5:05:55 (flower → ear, ear detects → cactus transparent), 5:06:08 ("Test room four is open"), 5:06:16 (ear must be activated first)
- We Were Here Tomorrow - Part 3 (Finale) by Zero Reviews Timestamps used: 2:22 (Theta Splice), 2:57:45 (macrophage), 2:59:44–3:00:10 (TEST ROOM #2), 3:22–3:34 (split rooms), 3:36–3:52 (Test Room 4 devices), 3:51:57 (cactus blocking), 3:52:10 (cactus transparent)
- We Were Here Tomorrow with @zer0Reviews (Part 3 - Finale) by Crystal Dreams Timestamps used: 3:03–3:16 (split rooms), 3:14:00 (eye + detect device), 3:17–3:33 (Test Room 4, other view)
- We Were Here Tomorrow rune guide by Saint's Father (Steam guide)
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