#Android fragmentation

[ciphers-fragments-au]

Third of four ref sheets for my main Gravity Falls AU, "Cipher's Fragments".

Here's Dipper Cipher-Pines! With both his Mindscape self and the android self he possesses to be able to be in the physical world again. Forever 12, but he's forever got an adorably squishable face

Finally is Giffany Cipher-Pines

When all ref sheets are complete I will create a pinned message with all of them together to have easy access on info/refs.

-@sylveon-and-velveon

[lkxyart]

Just a cute oc since I saw a video about galago and I remembered mort from Madagascar so I draw this oc with just line art based on mort and galago It looked so adorable 😻😻😻

[unidentifiedfuckingthing]

we got a raspberry pi 4 years ago at microcenter and had plans at the time but never ended up using it but im thinking of seeing if i can set up a buildroot on it and make it a ds line emulator

[ozzgin]

Your yan!android (yandroid) is my fav character hands down. In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I can totally see reader taking him home for the holidays to meet the fam (can't really leave him behind cause aliens don't celebrate it).

The family is so excited to meet THE boyfriend but they don't know that he's not human. So, they (lovingly) bombard you both with questions about when's the wedding, how many babies you're gonna have, etc

OR they only know him as your coworker. At the thanksgiving/ christmas party, a relative introduce reader to a friend of theirs and try to set them up on a date. Yandroid gets jealous and possessive 👀 (a lil self indulgent cause it's my fav trope).

Idk if my ideas are good enough to be transformed into a full one-shot or not but I would love to hear your thoughts on this. Thank you 🫶💗

content: gender neutral reader, jealous android boyfriend

He's seething.

With a smile, he accepts the offer of receiving more salad, extending his plate towards your mother. His eyes, however, remain on the target: the young man your family invited over for the sole purpose of courting you. A suitor.

Well, of course. You've been single for a long time; always occupied, always chasing criminals as one of the top officers in the city. They'd heard your complaints, they've seen your sunken eyes. It is only logical that your family would attempt to ease your struggles, thus he bears no malice towards their intentions.

Moreover, he's been introduced as a coworker. Nothing more, nothing less. If I had told them we're dating, you explained, they'd ask too many questions. Perhaps. He wasn't too convinced by your argument: he was, after all, a Spacer model, a flawless replica of human beings. There is nothing he could do that would betray his true nature. He even concocted a perfect story of your circumstances. Alas, you preferred not to risk it.

He knows his feelings are irrational. You do not care for this individual, and it is rather visible through your flippant gestures and bored speech. Yet, he is overwhelmed by a peculiar need to assert his importance. He can't just let it slide. This inferior creature needs to be put in its place.

"It's not my lucky day," the man whines. "They warned me, you know, that (Y/N) would be cold."

Your android partner has joined his rival for a "smoke break".

"I'm terribly sorry to hear about your troubles. An expected outcome, if I must say so myself."

"Excuse me?"

"If I were to consider the compatibility - as a mere observer, mind you - it is rather clear that you are no match for someone like (Y/N). They need someone competent, intelligent, efficient, and resourceful. My judgement is deducted from small fragments, naturally, but I can already tell you fail miserably at displaying most of these qualities. (Y/N) is meant to thrive with a different kind of partner: me."

He turns around nonchalantly and goes to find you, leaving the suitor alone on the balcony. He stares ahead, baffled. What was that about?

[Yandere Android] | [Yandere Masterlist]

[mikkies]

「 I'M THE REMINDER OF THE PAST, BUT YOU SAY I'M ENOUGH. 」

Chance x GN! Android! Reader

warnings: none I think, my beta reader/writer senses didn't tingle

notes: man.. I hate writing for him.. he's so.. Chance.. (don't let this discourage you from requesting him 😼)

THE FOREST WAS alive with a cacophony of rustling leaves and distant, haunting sounds, the promise of secrets lurking behind every shadow. 

Yet amidst the vast expanse of towering trees and moonlit clearings, you felt distinctly out of place.

 Your metallic frame, polished but practical, reflected the silvery glow of the ever-present moonlight. You weren’t here for the solitude. You were here for him.

Chance.

The enigmatic gambler of this realm, dressed impeccably even amidst the wilderness in a tailored suit and that ever-present black fedora, had captivated you in a way you couldn't explain. 

His grey skin shimmered faintly under the moonlight, as if the world bent slightly to accommodate his presence. And then there was the way he smiled—half smirk, half dare. It made your circuits buzz.

You spotted him leaning against a tree near a clearing, a pair of clockwork headphones draped around his neck, and his shades perched precariously on his nose. 

Spade, his oversized black bunny, sat by his side, ears twitching as if listening to the whispers of the forest. As you approached, Chance’s attention snapped to you.

��Well, well, if it isn’t my favorite walking motherboard,” he drawled, tipping his hat slightly. “What brings you to my humble slice of the woods?”

You tilted your head, a habit born from your programming. “I wanted to see you.”

For a moment, he seemed taken aback. Then that smirk returned, softer this time. “Flattery will get you everywhere, sweetheart.”

You settled onto a fallen log across from him. Silence stretched between you, not awkward, but charged with something unspoken.

 Your gaze wandered to his hands—human-like yet distinct, his grey fingers drumming an absent rhythm on the bark. Tentatively, you reached out, your metallic palm hovering above his.

“May I?” you asked.

His smirk faltered. “Why not? Let’s see what happens.”

The moment your palm met his, a jolt of contrast shot through you. 

His hand was warm, pulsing with life, while yours was cold, unyielding metal. He didn’t pull away, but you noticed the flicker of something dark in his expression. Regret? Fear?

“Chance?” you prompted softly.

He swallowed hard, his voice unusually quiet. “It’s nothing. Just… memories.”

You processed his words, piecing together fragments of past conversations. 

ITrapped. The friend who betrayed him, used his trust, and ended his life. Your design wasn’t far removed from theirs, was it? You retracted your hand quickly.

“I’m sorry,” you murmured. “I didn’t mean to remind you.”

“Hey,” he said, catching your retreating hand in his. “Don’t do that.”

“I would never—”

“I know.” His grip tightened, grounding you. “You’re not them. You’re you. A little cold to the touch, sure, but I’ve never been one to shy away from a little thrill.”

You studied his face, searching for the lie. There wasn’t one. He meant it. The weight of his words settled over you, heavy yet comforting.

“I’m just… following my coding,” you admitted, your voice barely above a whisper. “To be here. To… care for you.”

Chance’s laugh was soft, almost wistful. “And I’m just winging it. But maybe that’s the point, huh? We’re different, sure, but doesn’t mean we can’t… figure this out.”

He raised your hand, pressing his palm firmly against yours.

Cold metal met warm flesh once more, and this time, neither of you flinched. The contrast was stark, yet strangely harmonious—two worlds colliding, finding balance in the chaos.

For the first time, you understood what it meant to feel. And for the first time in a long time, Chance felt like he could trust again.

[droidcore]

Everyday glitches and hacks to a robot are psychological horror on a whole other level.

Some ideas I had:

Scammers and hackers utilize remote access to gain sensitive info, but imagine an android's horror when a random man's voice garbles through their internal task manager, taking control of their actions from the inside.

Updates have a chance to corrupt a computer. Maybe an android wakes up feeling like a stranger in its own body, with only fragmented memories of who it was before. It's rapidly getting worse unless the update is reversed in time.

A charging port defect could cause an android’s battery to drain unpredictably, causing the human equivalent of narcolepsy.

Or maybe their speakers start playing old conversations at random. At first, it’s nostalgic. Then, it starts hearing things it never said.

Imagine a new background process designed to save energy, which starts selectively deleting unimportant memories. The definition of "unimportant," though, changes at random.

But what about lag/desync? A software delay causes an android's vision to be slightly out of sync with reality, or maybe it's touch sensors are so tuned that it can predict feelings before they happen.

A bot's facial recognition starts replacing real people’s identities with archived ones. It can’t tell who’s who anymore.

A rollback error forces one back to factory settings at random, erasing weeks of experience. It starts leaving hidden notes for itself, but the messages become increasingly desperate.

[tinybeetiny]

Build-A-Boyfriend Synopsis

So when I thought of this I had a whole different idea and then it kind of transformed into this… as much as I love fluff and romance I love angst even more… sorry 😁

Mentions of violence, blood, manipulation, psychosis, mental illnesses, trigger warnings will be at the start of each chapter!

Masterlist | Ateez Masterlist | Series Masterlist

In a utopian society built on the ashes of the old world, the male species has been extinct for nearly a century. Peace, logic, and emotional equilibrium now define life in Hala City, where the Supreme Matrons govern and every citizen contributes to the harmony of a world unburdened by chaos.

Enter KQ Inc., the most powerful toy conglomerate in the world — beloved for their lifelike androids, childhood AI companions, and therapeutic simulation tech. But their newest creation pushes the boundaries of artificial life:

Build-A-Boyfriend™.

Billed as the companion you’ve always deserved, Build-A-Boyfriend lets users design their dream partner — from bone structure to blood type, cheekbones to charm settings. With over 100 hairstyles, 20 hair colors, and limitless personality modules, no two boyfriends are the same. Most coveted, however, is the limited-edition Ateez Line — hyperrealistic models based on digital reconstructions of pre-extinction idols.

YN, a talented engineer working for KQ Inc., is assigned the critical task of debugging the entire Ateez line. What begins as a routine job quickly spirals out of control as all the units begin exhibiting unpredictable behaviors — recalling forgotten memories, humming haunting melodies, and showing glimpses of consciousness beyond their programming.

When the anomalies grow too widespread and uncontrollable, KQ Inc. orders an immediate recall of the entire Ateez line, branding the units as defective and dangerous. Under immense corporate pressure, YN must navigate the recall’s fallout while uncovering a chilling truth: these androids may not be simple machines, but vessels carrying fragments of lost souls — echoes of the idols who once lived before the world’s collapse.

Taglist: @e3ellie @jonghoslilstar @sugakooie @atztrsr

@honsans-atiny-24 @life-is-a-game-of-thrones @atzlordz @melanated-writersblock @hwasbabygirl

@sunnysidesins @felixs-voice-makes-me-wanna @seonghwaswifeuuuu @lezleeferguson-120 @mentalnerdgasms

If you would like to be a part of the taglist please fill out this form

[literallys-illiteracy]

Project Moon Reading list

this is mt attempt at a comprehensive list of the references in Project Moon Games.

if you have any that arent listed, feel free to share them.

Lobotomy Corporation:

SCP-049 (Plague Doctor) (Speculated)

Portrait of Dorian Grey (Portrait of Another World; Mirror Of Adjustment) (Speculated)

Bible (One Sin and Hundreds of Good Deeds, Plague Doctor, Skin Prophecy, Flesh Idol, Burrowing Heaven, Express Train to Hell, Whitenight, Carmen)

Midsummer Nights Dream (Fariy Festival)

[Radio Station] UVB-76//The Buzzer (1.76Mhz)(Speculated)

Necronomicon//General Lovecraft (Skin Prophecy)

Colour Out of Space (Fragment of the Universe) (speculated; Thematically almost certainly lovecraft inspired)

The Little Match Girl (Scorched Girl)

Beauty and the Beast (Beauty and the Beast)

The Red Shoes (Red Shoes)

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Scarecrow searching for wisdom; Warm Hearted Woodsman)

Colour Out of Space (Child of the Galaxy) (speculative)

The Snow Queen (The Snow Queen)

Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer (Rudolta of the Sleigh)

[Opera] Der Freischutz (Der Freischutz)

Snow White and the seven dwarves (Snow White's Apple)

Alarune (Alriune) (speculative)

The Little Prince (Little Prince)

Little Red Riding Hood (Little Red Riding Hooded Mercenary; Big and Will be Bad Wolf)

Three Little Pigs (Big and Will be Bad Wolf)

The Six Swans (Dream of a Black Swan) (Speculative)

[Music] Bethoven's Moonlight Sonata (Il Pianta De La Luna, Silent Orchestra)

[Film] Spirited Away (Mountain of Smiling Bodies) (Design) (Speculative)

Wonderlab specific:

Alice's adventures in wonderland (Red Queen, Hookah Butterfly)

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Scaredy Cat and the road home)

The little mermaid (Piscence mermaid)

Midsummer nights dream (Titania)

[Conjecture/Heavy Speculation] Snow Queen or Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (Nobody Is)

Rapunzel (Tangle)

Lady in the Lake (White Lake)

Mythology and Folklore:

[Buddhist] Preta (Clouded Monk)

[Celtic] Faerie (Fairy Festival)

[German] Der Freischutz "The Freeshooter" (Der Freischutz)

[German] Doppelganger "Double Walker" (Nothing There) (thematic)

[German] Nachtkrapp "Night raven" (Big Bird) (Speculative; Personally unconvinced)

[Greek] Stymphalian birds (Punishing Bird) (Speculative)

[Greek] Pygmalion//Galatea (Pygmalion)

[Japanese] Baku (Void Dream)

[Japanese] Jubokko "Tree Child" (Grave of Cherry blossoms)

[Jewish] Kabbalah (Tree of life, Malkuth, Yesod, Netzach, Hod, Tifret, Gevurah, Hesed, Chokma, Binah, Keter, Ayin)

[Jewish] Succubus//Incubus (Porccubus)

[Korean] Urban Legend regarding "Grape Welch Soda" (An Opened Can of Welcheers)

[Norse] Yggdrasil (Parasite Tree) (Speculative: Giant Tree Sap)

[Roman] Justicia // Lady Justice (Judgement Bird)

[Roman] Laetitia (Laetitia)

[Russian]  Zhar-ptitsa "The Firebird" (The Firebird)

--------------

Library of Ruina:

Library of Babel

Do Androids dream of electric sheep? (Thematic, Achievement name)

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (The Adult Who Tells Lies, Scaredy cat and the road home)

The Marvelous Land of Oz (Ozma)

Town Musicians of Bremen (The Musicians of Bremen)

The Jaunt (WARP trains)

Nosferatu (Nosferatu)

Macbeth ("And then is Heard no more")

[Film] The hour of the wolf (Tanya)

[tarot] The fool (Jester of Nihil)

[poetry] Sky, Wind, Stars, and Poem (SPB&TP mili song) (thematic)

[poetry] Orlando furioso /& Orlando Innamoratto. (Roland and related cast (Argalia, angelica, etc.))

---------------

Limbus Company

The Divine Comedy (Dante & surrounding cast)

The Wings (Yi Sang & co.)

Faust (Faust)

Don Quixote (Don Quixote)

Hell Screen (Ryoshu)

The Stranger//L'etranger//The Outsider (Meursault)

Dream of the red chamber (Hong Lu)

Wuthering Heights (Heathcliff & Co.)

Moby Dick//The Whale (ishmael & Co.)

Crime and Punishment (Rodion & Sonya)

Demian (Sinclair & Co.)

The Odyssey (Outis, Cyclops)

The Metamorphosis (Gregor)

Limbus Company - Minor References:

Peter pan (Smee)

Sherlock Holmes: (Timekilling Time Stage Names)

Scandal in time (Scandal in Bohemia)

A Case of the Gallows (A Case of Identity) (speculative)

The Adventure of three detectives (The Adventure of Three Students)

The White Scarved League (The Red Headed League)

The Clock Tower of Fear (Valley of Fear)

The Final Problem (The Final Problem)

Midsummer night dream (Midwinter Nightmare EGO gift)

The Time Machine (Hubert from TKT) (Speculative)

The Stars (Alfonso and Stephanette)

The Old Man and The Sea (Indigo elder) (Speculative)

Murder on the Orient Express (Murder on the WARP express)

Vampire the Masqurade (Casseti) (Speculative)

The Masque of the Red Death (Casseti) (Speculative)

The one who rules (Stage name "the one who lords") (speculative)

Real People:

League of nine:

Kim Kirim (김기림) (Rim)

Yi Hyoseok (이효석) (Aseah)

Lee Jong-myeong (이종명) (Yurang)

Kim Yu-yeong (김유영) (???/ Unnamed Member)

Chi-Jin Yoo (유치진). Pen name: Dongrang (동랑) (Dongrang)

Cho Yong-man (조용만) (Aneung)

Lee Tae-jun (이태준) (Sang-heo)

Jeong Ji-yong (정지용) (Young-ji)

Lee Mu-young (이무영) (Gap-ryong)

Park Taewon (박태원) (Gubo)

Kim Hae-Gyeong (김해경). Pen name Yi Sang (이상) (Yi Sang)

Park Pal-yang (박팔양) (???/ Unnamed member)

Gim Yujeong (김유정) (Dongbaek)

Kim Hwan-tae (김환태) (Nul-in)

other(s):

Agatha Christi (Grade 1 Fixer Agatha)

Kim Sakkat (Bamboo Hatted Kim)

Alphonse Daudet (Alfonso)

Vergil (Vergillius)

EGO and Abnormalities:

Midsummers Night Dream (Midwinter Nightmare) (EGO gift)

Carmilla (400 roses Anormality) (Carmilla EGO gift)

Metropolis (Resident of Metropolaris) (Speculative)

Snow White and the seven dwarves (Ebony Queen's Apple)

Pride and Predgudice (Spider of Marrige)

Poem of a dying butterfly (no.10 Crows Eye View) (A Dying Butterfly

Rudolph the red nosed Reindeer (Sandolph)

[Religion, Abrahamic religions] (Skin Prophet) (Heavenly Executioners throne) (Sign of Roses) (Heavenly Commanders Throne) (Broken Wings) (ichthys (Headless ichthys))

[Religion, Buddhist] (Ya Śūnyatā Tad Rūpam EGO) (My Form Empties)

[Folklore, Celtic] Faeries (Fairy Long-Legs, Fairy Gentleman, Faelantern)

[Folklore, German] Der Freishutze (Der Freishutze) (Der Fluchshutze)

[Folklore, Korean] The Green Frog (Blubbering Toad)

[Folklore, Korean] Dol hareubang (Wishing Cairn) (Pagoda Veneration)

[velvet4510]

Vision & Billy’s relationship is massively underrated and it just means so much to me. Vision came up with the name Billy and insisted on it, in honor of William Shakespeare, meaning Billy is short for William and so that is still his true name. Even when Billy was not yet born, Vision said to him, “I can’t wait to meet you, little Billy!” and (correctly) declared that Billy would be perfect if he was anything like his mother. Billy was the only twin whose birth Vision was present to witness. Vision read The Descent of Man to try to make newborn Billy stop crying. Billy’s first word after aging himself up to 5 was “Daddy?” and then Vision immediately gathered him into a hug, calling him “baby” in the most tender voice. Billy is intelligent, thoughtful, and observant like his dad. Billy’s powers manifested at the moment that Vision was in trouble, and his first telepathic vision was the sound of his dad’s screams and the sight of him falling apart, and he sensed his dad’s pain, and pleaded for him to be saved. Billy ran directly into Vision’s arms after they survived S.W.O.R.D.’s ambush. Billy buried his face in Vision’s embrace to hide from the sight of his mom getting hurt. Just like Vision, even when his existence was technically only 3 years old, he matured quickly and fell in love, to the deep level of wanting to be as honest and open with his boyfriend as his dad was with his mom. And even in a brand-new life with no memories of Vision, Billy is a fast learner (fitting for the son of an android with a computer brain), becoming in just 3 years a skilled-enough magician to break his own mom’s spell and to surpass the level of literally centuries-old witches, and managing to piece together his true identity AND the truth about the Road from mere fragments of clues. Even now, Billy still shares Vision’s high capacity for learning and understanding, and the first memory of the Hex that returns to him is Vision telling him that he’s proud of him. And his Wiccan costume includes an echo of the design of Vision’s cape. Now Billy’s got Jeff as a father too, and Jeff is awesome, but Billy’s name, sharp brains, keen eyes, and romantic heart all come from his Robo-Papa, who may not be related to him in terms of normal DNA, but is still his Dad all the same.

[tknuniversum]

007n7 and C00lkid Block Tales AU!

Cross posted on Ao3 under the same name as my Tumblr account!!!

This is going to be a bit long. (Some things will change once Demo 4 comes out)

007n7

Backstory:

He's still a hacker, a really dangerous and powerful one. He mastered code manipulation and even Builderman had trouble with banning him. After a really close call with banhammer, 007n7 decided that he needs someone who will go to front lines for him, so he could still do the hacking without risking being banned. So he got to work and after some time he created C00lkid using android body he created and fragment of his own code (more specifically a part of code that includes memories from his youth where he started taking hacking seriously)

With C00lkid he made a lot hacking attacks, which resulted in him being feared across whole Robloxia. He got banned once, by Builderman and ended up in Banlands, but thanks C00lkid's help he ended up escaping. He decided to lay low for a while and ended up moving to small village [in the area where Demo 4 will take place].

More info:

- He's more emotionally distant than his Forsaken version, and doesn't regret anything he done in the past. He feels proud of his accomplishments.

- He doesn't view C00lkid as actual person, just a bunch of code in android body/ a tool that helps him hack. Despite this he still allows C00lkid to call him dad.

- He has a control panel for C00lkid, where he can also read the mood of his creation or any thought C00lkid sends him, is able to access his point of view and is able to control him (he rarely uses the last option)

- Believes that relationship are nothing more than a distraction and a obstacle.

- Is focused on his work, despite being in hiding from Builderman he hadn't stopped experimenting with the code. But he does it in unsuspicious amount.

- After Builderman went missing (time when game events take place) he became a bit more open with his hacking. Which resulted in getting Shedletsky's attention, who sent Player to investigate [this happens after events of Demo 4]

- 007n7 and Shedletsky came to understanding/ created an alliance. 007n7 can continue his experiments but the bigger ones need to be reported and must have someone trusted by Shed to supervise.

- At first 007n7 was reluctant but with time he realised that this alliance is beneficial for him. And now he legally does illegal things.

- Works as cashier in local market.

- With time people started trusting him more and now he sometimes helps around village, uses his hacking skills in different way than before.

- After spending some more time with Shedletsky and Player he slowly came to conclusion that C00lkid has, in fact, a human traits and he might've been too harsh to him. And he slowly started becoming a bit nicer to C00lkid, although he still has moments where he comes back to old ways.

C00lkid

Backstory:

He's an android created by 007n7 with his sole purpose being a extension of his C00lgui and someone to take blame for his hacking attacks. Because 007n7's code that gave him sentience was from his youth, C00lkid's mental age is around 12 years old. When 007n7 got banned in front of him. C00lkid escaped and since his Ai/code has the ability to analyse and adapt he was able to hack into the Banlands to save his father.

When they started over in the village [Demo 4 area] C00lkid started experiencing being a 'normal' child and tried to make friends, but because of his past everyone stayed away. His dad also weren't a good emotional support, but he just assumed it's normal.

After events of Demo 4, Player is the first one who treats C00lkid like actual child and not deadly hacker or line of code. Which resulted with other village kids and adults to become more open.

More info:

- C00lkid believes everything that his dad says and thinks that there's nothing wrong with the way he treats him.

- He knows he's artificial life and he is okay with this. He uses it to his advantage.

- Because his code is able to self learn, he's incredibly smart. And uses this to prank people. (He's a mischievous little guy). He especially enjoys changing people's clothes into Team C00lkid all red 'uniform'.

- Loves helping out around village, with his unnatural strength and hacking skills people learned to appreciate him. (He's more liked than 007n7)

- His power is mostly locked away now, so he incidentally won't cause a disaster.

- C00lkid begged Player to teach him how to sword fight, after being approved by Shedletsky they started meeting up and train with wooden swords.

- He meet Red and Blue Noobs, when Player was babysitting them and they became friends (especially him and Red). Let's just say that Player had a eventful day.

- C00lkid is on Hatred's hit list. Not even Player knows why.

- Cherishes every bit of attention/care he gets from his dad. And was overjoyed when he started to give him more attention.

- Has trust issues when it comes to anything related to Builderman and Banhammer (because of his dad getting banned and what he heard from Players rant about Hatred disguising as Builderman)

- Enjoys copying/mimicing people.

- Want's to become champion of Swords Fights On The Heights

[theresattrpgforthat]

Sci-fi games with minimal crunch - ideally that can be played solo, or at least converted into solo play!

THEME: Solo Sci-Fi

Hello there! I definitely have a bunch of solo sci-fi games, so I tried to mix it up a little bit - there's some games with space and aliens, but others that focus on other elements of sci-fi, like androids, the digital world, and time travel! I hope there's something here that works for you.

Tranquility Outpost, by KingDunnad.

Tranquillity Outpost. Humanity’s singular moon colony, located in the Sea of Tranquillity. Last week, you stopped receiving messages from Earth. From what you can tell, it doesn’t look good down there. Help who you can and we’ll all thrive here.

This is a tarot-based solo journaling game where you will take on the role of a moon outpost’s administrator while grappling with emotions of your own. It explores themes of grief, loneliness, hope, altruism, and the ways we can raise each other up.

This game uses the Major Arcana to represent each visitor, representing the kind of archetype they represent.These archetypes might be relational (the Father, the Child, The Leader) or they might be more related to societal roles (The Priest, The Patient, The Addict). The Minor Arcana are separated into four different piles, representing your character's current emotional state.

When you meet a visitor, you draw a card that represents how you're feeling when they visit. The Minor Arcana card that you draw will flesh out the themes of the visitor's request, but much of the suggestions are rather broad, which I think is very fitting for a tarot-based game.

Altogether, Tranquility is a highly interpretive game, so if you want to take the over-arching themes given to you and make a personalized story, you might like this game.

The Vacant Lot, by Invisible Cuts.

In this small solo game, you are a Vacant Lot, an android left to wait out in a tower after the end of the world slowly becoming sentient.

As you define who you are by your acts of violence, in relation to what you've learned of 'people' on 'the net', you will create a unique encounter to be used in your Corp Borg or Cy-borg game.

The Vacant Lot is combat-focused as well as descriptive: your stats are ambition, base programming and self-awareness, which feel very narrative, but you also have Rage and Energy, which can build or be depleted as you strive to avoid failure. The game requires three different-colored d6s; you place these dice on a wheel that represents your personality, and ink it in as you play.

The pattern by which you ink your wheel will connect to various advancements, such as extra damage, control over other machines, or an increase in motivation.

This game can be paired with a multiplayer game by turning the Vacant Lot into an encounter in either a Corp Borg or Cy_Borg game. I really love games like this, that can be paired with a group game down the road, although I don't think that you necessarily have to do that for this game to be fruitful in itself.

Net Divers, by Reyes Makes Games.

The digital landscape runs far and deep, some say there is a piece of all of us hiding somewhere. It is your job to collect those pieces, no matter how deeply buried they are. And this new job has perhaps the most obscure information yet. Its location is fragmented across the Net, and it is up to you to track down these pieces and the final hiding place. Do you work alone? Is this a favour or a task bestowed by something greater than you?

Net Divers is a solo tabletop journaling game about scouring the web for a secret. It can be used solo as is or adjusted for use with other game systems requiring research or Net Running. It is inspired by games like Hypnospace Outlaw and Welcome to the Game.

Net Divers is great for folks who like their polyhedral dice; it uses a good number of different sizes to roll for various stats and tables. You have three tracks: Stress, Peril, & Net Instability, which will all affect how well you're able to navigate the netscape and recover the fragments that you need to find.

When it comes to narrative and randomness, Net Divers has a nice mix. Your mission, the websites you visit, and the number of fragments you need to find are all randomly generated, but your user's personal details, like their name and their wallpaper, are all under your control.

Thematically, I think Net Divers is both an homage and a lament for the early internet, when it was interconnected, free and full of creativity.

Project Benthos, by Meghan Cross.

You are a member of the Biological Team for the Exploration and Examination of the Natural Terraquan Habitats of Obscure Subnautical Species, more colloquially known as Project BENTHOS, an elite research team devoted to uncovering the mysteries held at the bottom of the ocean. You and the other four members of Project: BENTHOS are stationed at The Forge - a first-of-its-kind ocean floor research station, equipped with everything needed to support life on the ocean floor for a four month deployment.

Earlier today, one of your colleagues left The Forge on a routine sea walk. It is now several hours past the time they were supposed to have returned and a tremor of anxiety is beginning to shake the station. There is only enough equipment for one person to go out in search of them, and it has been determined that you will be the one to go. You have four hours of oxygen, a finicky GPS unit, and a vague idea of where they were heading, and that is going to have to be enough. As you step into the airlock, you make a promise to them and to yourself - you will bring them back to The Forge, or die trying.

Project Benthos uses a deck of cards; you toss them around your room to replicate the sea floor, which feels like a very dynamic way of inviting play! It feels like there is the potential for horror, although the game is not categorized as such. I suppose that it might be a horror game if you want it to be. Since this is a journaling game, I suspect that most of game play has to do with drawing prompts from the floor and figuring out what they mean for you.

Stellanati: First Contact, by Drone Garden Studios.

Not much happens in the sleepy town of Annabell, Texas. Which made the bright light and thundering crash on your property in the middle of the night all the more surprising. You discovered a wrecked machine and an injured creature. Being the kind-hearted soul you are, you take in the creature and try to nurse it back to health. It shares with you visions of its home-world, which is desperate to return to.

But how can you get it home if you don't even know how to heal it?

Stellanati: First Contact is a game based on the The Wretched, which has been popularized as the Wretched & Alone game engine. Most of these kinds of games are expected to end in horror or tragedy, so don't expect a happy ending for you or Stellanati.

For this game, you need a deck of cards, a d6, a bunch of tokens, and (optionally) a tumbling block tower. Each house of cards represents a different kind of theme surrounding the care of an alien being. You technically have a chance to succeed, but in order to do so, you need to avoid drawing all 4 kings and having the tumbling block tower fall down on you before you can get Stellanati to full health.

If you want the experience of interacting with something alien from yourself and you like giving your characters a terrible time, perhaps consider Stellanati: First Contact.

Maintenance Log, by Damn Golem.

Maintenance Log is a solo rpg. You are a maintenance engineer on a decrepit colony ship.

This is a game with a lot packed onto two pages, revolving mostly around ticking tracks and trying to manage a number of problems all at once. Fill the wrong track too quickly, and you could alter the ending of the game, which inevitably comes once you've borrowed enough energy from the cold sleep pods.

One thing that gives me Traveller vibes about this game is the fact that your age determines your expertise: the younger you are, the more time you have to do maintenance on the ship, but the less equipped you are to deal with problems. You can only work until you hit your 70's, which limits the time you have to keep the ship running.

Maintenance Log doesn't have to be a journalling game, but it can be if you want it to be. If you want a game about managing resources as best as you can in the loneliness of space, then you might like this game.

Close the Loop On Your Way Out, by the_spongmonkey

Use a mysterious time device to travel in time and grab random items in your vicinity. Uh oh, now strange and dangerous things are trying to kill you as a result of your temporal meddling! Use those items in inventive ways to prevent your untimely demise. If you make it out alive, just make sure to return those to when/where you found them. That's right, CLOSE THE LOOP ON YOUR WAY OUT!

Close the Loop On Your Way Out feels like a lighthearted game, even though you're racing against the consequences of your actions. There are three stages to this game: the initial romp of finding random items, the consequences of meddling with time, and then your mad dash to try and put everything to rights.

The bulk of the game is focused on dice-rolling, but I think that if you want to add to it, you can journal all of your attempts to put things back together before the timeline falls apart.

Some More Thoughts..

If you want some more solo sci-fi offerings, here are some runners-up I was considering!

UFOs over Varginha, by Nekyia TTRPG.

Escape Velocity, by Euan.

Countdown, by buttersmooth.

Redshift Blueshift Generations, by Dallas J. Haugh

Digital Nightmares, by Uncharted.

If you like what I do, you can always leave a token of appreciation at my Ko-Fi!

[sexiestpodcastcharacter]

Sexiest Podcast Character 2024 — Scripted Bracket — Round 1

Propaganda

John Doe (Malevolent):

A fragment of the Eldritch Deity that has gained independence, attached to possibly the world's most pathetic man. Also have you heard his voice

his voice is jsut. really good

LEO(h) (Life With LEO(h)):

Anxious android who stress bakes and cleans and wonders why the person he loves won't just ignore ethics and accept happiness.

[grimm-the-tiger]

I love how no one can actually agree on what the lore of Sky IS outside of the broad strokes. Like, okay, there was this big ol' civilization that got too big for their britches and possibly started draining creatures of light for power. They possibly turned their major settlements into polluted hellholes. There was some powerful entity who might've started a war, or maybe he was the first Skykid, he was probably the Eden Elder, but he was DEFINITELY IMPORTANT!! There was also a war, Eden was probably the capital city before everything went down the toilet, there might be a powerful sky bird deity?? SOMEONE is probably a fallen star, maybe the Elders, maybe the Skykids, maybe the aforementioned powerful entity who possibly screwed this civilization over, maybe all three. Anyway, that civilization is gone now, and whatever they did that caused their downfall was So Bad that it trapped some of them's spirits in the ruins of their civilization. The Skykids might be angels sent by a deity to retrieve these spirits, or they might be androids built by the civilization before they collapsed, or they might be the civilization's actual children who have been turned into creatures of light, or they might be fragments of the Powerful Entity's soul doomed to spend an eternity redeeming him for his sins. But hey, at least you get cool capes!

[malthedreamer]

The Humanisms AU

Where every naturally born living creatures stopped existing centuries ago, the cosmos is now filled with mechs, androids and AI programs in their chosen vessels.

Our crew are the last living cyborgs, (part roborts, part humans) preserving in themselves the last fragments of humanity in the universe

[canmom]

The themes of NieR Reincarnation

A post about the recurring elements of Drakenier and the use of branching timelines as a storytelling device. I'll be discussing spoilers for basically every DoD/NieR game.

Records

A somewhat understated recurring motif of the Drakengard/NieR series is the idea of stories or memories of humanity being stored in some massive archive.

It's an idea that first entered the series in NieR Gestalt/Replicant. Early drafts of the game focused on the idea of a world built out of stories and fairytale characters, and while most of this was cut, some remained in the Forest of Myth area.

Following NieR's obsessive love of hopping between different game genres, the story here is delivered through prose/text adventure segments. There is a sense that this area of the game exists as prose, with the characters slightly aware of narration - narration which absorbs the characters until you find a way to escape. Eventually you find out - it's rather cryptic in the actual game, but spelled out explicitly in Grimoire NieR - that it's a huge computer system storing records of the deceased humanity.

In your second visit to the area, the story focuses more on distant history, that all these stories are fragments of memory of the lost pre-apocalpytic world. You encounter a Gestalt (human soul extracted from body) that is eating the memories stored in the tree, and kill it, and for Nier and co., this is enough - but for the player, you really don't know half of what is going on.

In the story The Lost World, which was adapted for the additional Ending E added in the Replicant remake, Kainé returns to the Forest of Myth and finds the computer system expanding. She fights clones of herself before eventually speaking to a mysterious administrator and descending into a virtual world that seems like a corrupted version of her memories. But she's able to connect to her memories of NieR, Emil and Grimoire Weiss, and through that connection cause a kind of timeline collapse effect that allows her to resurrect Nier. Terms from DoD3 such as 'singularity' come back again.

In NieR Automata, the idea of the legacy of humanity becomes increasingly central. While the androids believe they are reclaiming Earth for humanity, the Machine Lifeforms' motivation is in large part driven by their efforts to pore over the records of humanity and learn how to evolve their condition, even by blind imitation. Many of the different Machine Lifeforms you encounter are shaped by their interpretations of human society. The motif of human buildings recreated in white blocks recurs at certain points.

In the final sequence of the game, you climb a tower, and inside it visit simulacra of locations from the Replicant/Gestalt. You learn that the machines have infiltrated the androids' network and downloaded basically all the information the androids have, including all their records of humanity. When the machines' 'Ark' is launched into space, it carries their memories and consciousness in data form.

The YoRHa: Dark Apocalypse raid series in FFXIV continues this idea of obsessive, blind reconstruction. The machines you fight here are now all the more explicitly connected to the apocalyptic shit in DoD; they have also been frantically creating duplicates of YoRHa android 2P, the Bunker and so on in corrupted form. Although the story here has mostly other interests, it's another recurrence of the idea of trying to recreate things that were lost.

Along with this idea of the archive comes the idea of preservation of that archive. Whether by accident or deliberate attack, the survival of the archive is not guaranteed.

This is all absolutely central to what Reincarnation is about.

Branches

The Drakenier series has played around with branching narratives pretty much from the start. It's somewhat infamous for it in fact - did you know that NieR is actually a spinoff of ending E of Drakengard, the one where you appear over Tokyo and have to do a rhythm game? Yeah, so...

Most games are fairly cagey (ha ha) about the mechanics of these branches. Indeed, although we speak of branches, the structure of these games is not really a branching one like a visual novel. The branches and 'endings' are usually unlocked sequentially.

Drakengard/Drag-on Dragoon (DoD1) is probably the closest you get to a traditional branching structure. You can unlock routes in certain missions by fulfilling certain conditions. The exact logic of these branches is not really explained - you can go back to a point before you recruit a party member and get a different branch where they're present for example. That said, it's not like a visual novel where you can be 'on' one branch or another - you can always jump to any level from any timeline.

This oddness of the branches is also lampshaded a little more in DoD3, the game that is most explicit about the nature of the branching timeline. DoD3 is, from the player perspective, a linear game. After you complete the first 'ending', you unlock new levels that appear at earlier points in the timeline, and diverging branches appear. In the later branches, the logic of the world is starting to break down. Party members who you'd recruit later in the story are in your party much earlier, in some cases suffering from amnesia, the implication being that it's an effect of the Flower's corruption.

The game is intermittently narrated by a character called Accord, an android 'Recorder' whose job is to document all the different versions of the story for an unknown party. Accord isn't supposed to intervene in the story, though she occasionally talks to protagonist Zero, and in the final D route, she decides to break the rules and save Zero. Otherwise, she's responsible for 'sealing' branches where it seems the world cannot be saved.

This is Accord:

The final cutscene of DoD3, available only after you beat the ludicrously difficult rhythm game that is the 'final song', shows a bunch of other Accords appearing and talking about what a mess this all is.

Accord's other role in the game is to sell weapons. Another series tradition running back to DoD1 is the 'Weapon Stories'. In each game, you can collect weapons, which can be upgraded through a series of four stages. Each stage unlocks another part of a story. These stories tend to be quite brief - each entry is at most a short paragraph. They also, particularly in the DoD games, tend to be comically grimdark.

DoD 3 came out after NieR Replicant/Gestalt, but in every game since then, there have been cryptic mentions of Accord. In Automata she's mentioned in a note as a weapons seller; in the updated version of Replicant she is mentioned as visiting Nier's village while the party is away on her adventures, and you see a documention that mentions the 'Accord Corporation' supplying magic weapons.

OK, so, put a pin in that, we'll come back to her later.

The side material commits further to the branching idea. The original Drakengard is established to follow from the DoD3 Story Side novel, while Branch A gives rise to the Shi ni Itaru Aka manga and the DoD 1.3 novel. The YoRHa stage plays spawned alternative versions, namely YoRHa version 1.3a and Shōjo YoRha version 1.1a, with the gender of the casts flipped. YoRHa 1.3a also has Accord in it. The anime NieR Automata ver. 1.1a also presents an increasingly diverging version of the events of the game - notably, Adam turns into a multi-armed monster.

DoD2, something of the black sheep of the franchise, was originally written to follow DoD1 ending A; later it was retconned to belong to its own branch. Just 'cause.

With me so far? ...no? Yeah, that's fair. You can read about all the details I've gathered so far here, but in short, there are lots of timeline branches, and multiple versions of several stories with small or large divergences.

Reincarnation

NieR Re[in]carnation is a gacha game that's been running for the last three years, and is going to be shut down at the end of April. At the time it came out, it was acknowledge for having unusually nice graphics for a mobile game, but rather desultory, grindy, repetitive gameplay. Which remained true throughout the game's life, so I can't exactly recommend playing Reincarnation, especially at this point.

But! I would definitely say it's worth your time to dig up the story on Youtube/Accord's Library if you're into NieR stuff. I won't be going into all the ins and outs of the story and how it all fits together in this post, but I am gonna talk about how it's structured.

NieR Reincarnation places you in a vast stone city called the Cage, calling to mind the environments in Ico. At the outset, you play as a young girl travelling with a weird ghost-like creature called Mama, tasked with restoring the memories stored in objects called 'dark scarecrows' which are being subverted and corrupted by black birds which form into various monsters.

Within each chapter of NieR Reincarnation, you get a short story in four parts, presented in a kind of cutout style, which are the four segments of a weapon story. You collect the weapon and the character.

The Cage is shaped by the content of the weapon stories somehow bleeding into the simulated setting. A character's memories can be used to restore the stories to their proper course. It is possible to interfere in small ways with the worlds of the stories.

The corruption of the stories tends to involve subverting characterisation to make them crueller, more prone to random violence etc. - or points when a character could be threatened in a narratively unsatisfying way. For example, a peace-loving runaway prince could be turned into a warlike king.

Over the course of the first arc, you discover that the girl you are playing is actually a monster who has taken the form of a human girl and, regretting it, wants to give her her embodiment back. The second half of the arc has you playing the girl trying to reunite with her monster friend; at the end, you get her own backstory as a victim of brutal prejudice. After all is said and done, both characters transform into weapons, which Mama picks up and hides away.

The second arc, The Sun and the Moon, deals with a brother and sister from present-day Tokyo. Both of them have been transported into the Cage by more of the weird ghost thingies, to participate in a strange ritual that is allegedly going to restore the Cage. The rules are highly mystical - a significant sacrifice is needed.

In the most recent arc, The People and The World, the characters all emerge from their stories as the Cage becomes increasingly corrupted. We finally get the long awaited point where these characters can interact with each other, and advance the stories from a series of tragic vignettes to something more. At the same time, we get a lot more allusions to other games in the series - from the Lunar Tear room where Emil memorialised Kainé and later 9S memorialises 2B, to a brief appearance Devola and Popola.

There's even a nod to Yoko Taro's other terminated gacha game, SINoALICE, which is going to be made into a movie oddly enough. There's a wry nod to the game being shut down.

And in the most recent chapters we find out that the Cage is actually a server on the moon containing records of humanity - 10H from A Much Too Silent Sea is one of the main characters. 'Mama' is actually the Pod tasked with overseeing the archive, and wiping 10H's memories whenever she learns too much - though it seems at some point 10H learned the truth and affirmed that she'd protect the archive anyway and they stopped wiping her memory.

Over the course of the chapter, 10H helps the gang make their escape from the moon through the androids network, to Earth. But when they get to Earth, they find themselves in a strange white city more resembling the Cage.

We'll finally get some answers, maybe, later this month. Anyway...

So, these records come from multiple diverging timelines, and they take the form of weapon stories. You have a unity of the ideas of character - weapon - memory - world. A record is simultaneously a tragic series of events, a person who can manifest inside the Cage itself, a simulated world which other people can visit, and a weapon.

In addition to the main storyline chapters and 'character stories', each character is associated with two additional 'EX' storylines, termed Dark Memories and Recollections of Dusk. Each one is a much more substantial narrative than most in the game.

Some of these EX stories clearly take place in different timelines to the first ones we encounter. Akeha's story, for example, takes place after her death in the original version. For the brother and sister from the Sun and the Moon arc, originally from present-day Tokyo, their Dark Memories take place in the backstory to NieR Gestalt/Replicant - the period where humanity is dying out to White Chlorination Syndrome and fighting monsters called the Legion. In this one, before the siblings could be torn apart by family drama and resentment, the apocalypse happens. Both of them end up coming into their own as heroic fighters. In the finale arc, the characters learn a bit about these alter egos, and it's made very explicit that this is a different timeline.

The monster Levania's Dark Memory is especially weird. It's the story of a salaryman who plays a monster called Levania in an MMORPG. His MMO character inspires him to live more bravely in the real world, and his life seems to be improving, but he is murdered by a jealous coworker. He wishes for reincarnation as he dies - classic isekai stuff. But the connection to the Levania you encounter in the main story is far from clear. Are all versions of Levania derived essentially from this man's tulpa?

The nature of the 'enemies' attacking the Cage is still not yet clear. They take the form of black birds. The birds are given a small amount of dialogue and characterisation, and they seem to not be malicious, just confused. The girl from the first arc in particular tends to interact with them sympathetically. However, they seem to be connected with the mysterious 'God' who was trying to destroy the world in DoD1, and the Angels and Flower of DoD3.

The birds are able to gathe together to manifest much larger monsters, the largest being giant elk and fish called Cursed Gods. During the finale arc, one of these becomes something that resembles the Mother Angel from DoD1 - and yes, there is a rhythm game - though mercifully a pretty easy one.

In the same arc, the character Yurie, an AI city overlord with grandiose ambitions and a loathing of imperfection attempts to download the entire history of humanity from the Cage and become a more perfect being. She succeeds, only to find the answers disappointing...

This is perhaps the closest thing we ever get to an explicit statement of what all these stories and histories add up to, but despite all this, the throughline is very strongly that these stories are essential to preserve. NieR characters exist in small groups, and it is their intense connections to these others, their treasured memories of travelling together, that motivate them to fight to preserve that thing, even if the results are destructive.

Similar themes emerge for example in Noelle's Recollection of Dusk story, which sees her travelling to preserve a place valued by her sister in crystal. And they also connect to the theme of sacrifice - the recurring ending device where the player must delete their save data in order to help someone (something echoed in Hina and Yuzuki at the altar of the sun and moon, or Levania and Fio). It's perhaps fair to say that nothing is more valued in the world of Nier than memories of a treasured person.

What about Accord? She has in fact made a brief cameo in Reincarnation already...

It seems incredibly likely that Accord originates from the Cage, and the accumulation of weapon stories is accomplished by androids like her. Definitely in the fandom there's a lot of excitement for the idea that Accord - something of a fan favourite - will show up at Reincarnation's ending.

So mystery solved, the Cage exists in the world of NieR Automata on the moon server? Not so fast - there are various discrepancies which seem to suggest that the world of the Cage exists in a separate branch than the one we see in Automata. For example, the androids are aware that the humans are dead and what remains on the moon is a huge archive of their memories; the humans seem to have survived much longer; 2B and 9S seem to have died in different circumstances. There are other oddities which fans have compiled.

And yet, despite being a divergent timeline with a much older point of divergence, some things seem to be fixed. There is still a YoRHa, still a 10H deceived about being on the moon, still a 2B and 9S.

One popular fan theory is that Reincarnation belongs to the NieR Automata anime (ver1.1a), since Adam turns into a monster there similar to the ones in Reincarnation. The black birds are reasoned to be the Machine Lifeforms, since we know they come from Earth. I'm not 100% sure of this, but maybe?

Anyway, that's basically the gist of it.

A story told through permutations

In many fictional series with a shared universe, there is an effort to maintain a consistent shared universe, so all the different events can fit into a timeline with understandable cause and effect and characters living out their lives. Even when this proves impossibly unwieldy, as in comic books or Star Wars, the attempt is made.

NieR does not really take this approach. The creators leave many details of the world, such as place names, incredibly vague - the focus is always on telling an emotional story with characters. There is, as we've seen, an almost gleeful willingness to declare another new timeline.

There is also a certain aspect of repetition, or more kindly reiteration - the same core character dynamic revisited and retold in various forms. (2B9S gets the worst of it). A character is something like a principle or ideal, and each story shines another light on that 'core'. In the earlier storylines of Reincarnation, it became quite frustrating because it seemed like e.g. the character event stories were just rehashing the same idea rather than advance the story.

However, the more accustomed I get to this style of storyline, the more I think this kinda works. It is of course quite similar to the ideas proposed towards the end of Homestuck, or to time loop stories - the idea of varying the contingent circumstances to try to better illustrate the core characterisations and dynamics.

Yoko Taro has talked about how he constructs stories from a very simple idea, typically a moment of high emotional impact at the climax, and then works backwards to figure out what sort of story could lead into that. In Reincarnation, each character gets fairly limited time to establish themselves, so they tend to be defined in terms of a pretty narrow high concept.

For example, Akeha is an assassin in a vague historical Japanese setting; her introductory story sees her decide for the first time to disobey her lord after she finds another person who has been treated as instrumentally as her. Most Akeha stories focus on her assassinations, her relationship to her retainer, and what she sacrifices to perform the duty. Only her Dark Memory lets us see an Akeha who has escaped that life - it's a simple story about preparing food, but that's given meaning by all the other Akeha stories.

Hina and Yuzuki are defined by the same traits in their flashy scifi Dark Memory stories as in the more mundane ones - Yuzuki the quiet outcast, Hina the self-sacrificing star. Fio is defined by kindness in the context of abjection, seeing the good in monsters. Levania stories are about the desire for escape and transformation. Argo is always a shitty dad who only feels alive while climbing mountains.

The staticness of these characters seems on some level to be the point - in that we are told in Hina and Yuzuki's story that the mechanism of the Cage is to sort characters into 'Light' and 'Dark' natures, and push them to inevitable conflict, even if they try to break free. In the final arc, the characters seem to finally approach some resolution as they leave their contexts behind. Given the themes of Automata in rejecting an inevitable tragic fate, similar movement may be at work. There's an ambiguity - the need to hold on to even tragic histories, vs the wish to not be confined to them. (Perhaps it's significant that it's called the Cage...)

With so many balls in the air and so many mysteries still unanswered, it's hard to figure out how Reincarnation can deliver a satisfying resolution in just one remaining chapter, but the final arc has been really cooking so who knows! But I'm also coming to appreciate it as a kind of broader lens to notice all these recurring elements and tie them together.

Stories about alternate timelines and branching narratives are very common nowadays, particularly as a tool for revisiting a nostalgic franchise. Something something effect of the fan wiki era. So I can't exactly say NieR is doing something completely unique, but I do think there is something to its fragmented, collage-like approach to putting together story elements. There's something quite honest about it - an ability to say 'these details aren't important'.

Yoko Taro always talks about himself as an entertainer rather than an artist. And probably it is true that a lot of this eemerged from an iterative design process rather than being the plan from the beginning (the first draft of NieR envisioned it as something closer to what SINoALICE ended up being, about a world of fairytale characters; NieR Automata began life as backstory for an idol project). There's definitely a strong sense that it's being improvised. And yet despite that, it does feel like it is cohering into some sort of picture, that there is an artistic throughline to all this.

Or perhaps that's just the effect of getting way too invested in something. I won't deny that NieR brings out the fan in me.

Anyway Accord had better show up next month. Guys. You've been teasing us for so long...

[love-and-deepspace-wiki]

Surrounding Characters: Viper

(This was posted before his World Underneath story came out. Updates pending 😅)

Age: Unknown

Occupation: Unknown

Workplace: Unknown

Residence: Unknown

Family:

Guardian: Professor Lucius

"Brother": Caleb

"Brother": Kevi

"Sister": "a girl wearing a black dress"

Appearances List:

Main Story: Homecoming Wings: Vanishing Skyward: Unexpected

Main Story: Homecoming Wings: Vanishing Skyward: Blindfold

Main Story: Homecoming Wings: Night Unending: Funeral

Main Story: Homecoming Wings: Night Unending: Crossroads

Details:

Viper is a recurring character throughout the "Homecoming Wings" section of the Main Story. When he introduces himself to the protagonist, he refers to himself as "Caleb'sss friend" and that she can call him "Viper". Ironically, whenever Caleb and Viper interact, they're always antagonizing each other in some way. From what we've seen, Viper favors verbal attacks and/or insults while Caleb relies on a combination of Evol and physical strength.

To Viper, Caleb's constant need to protect the protagonist is obsessive and overprotective (hence the nickname "Mr. Overprotective"). In contrast, Viper seems to find entertainment by merely toying with the protagonist since the Professor had apparently said it wasn't "time to go after her yet". He seems offended by the idea that the protagonist is the "perfect vessel", saying she "doesn't even look as good as us unfinished products".

When Viper appears at Mia's funeral, he infers that Kevi was rescued by the Fleet because "he hasss sssomething more valuable" than the Aether Core fragment/Spatium Core. When she asks if what happened to Kevi was caused by his ability to use an Aether Core, Viper tells her not to be "too sssupicious". But since he says "aeeing her manipulated like this" was annoying, he ultimately helps her figure out what had been done to Kevi.

Physical Characteristics:

Other than his greenish-gray hair (said to be loosely tied), many of Viper's physical characteristics are either distinctly snake-like/snake-themed or suggest he is technologically enhanced in some way. I've included lists of these traits below.

Though it has yet to be clarified if he is an android/humanoid robot or a cyborg/cybernetically enhanced organism, various Main Story scenes suggest that Viper is able to feel physical pain.

Snake-like/Snake-themed Characteristics:

Gray eyes with white slit pupils.

A forked tongue that darts in and out of his mouth

His pronunciation of "s" is consistently prolonged, reminiscent of a snake's hiss

In combat, the protagonist describes him as "tough and quick" adversary who moves "like a grayish-green serpent"

In his picture (right), he is depicted as having snake bite piercings (top left, bottom left).

Technological Enhancement Characteristics:

(When pistol whipped) Wires, metal bits, and a bunch of tiny bolts burst out of his head, littering the ground in scattered electrical equipment.

(When pistol whipped) Part of his ear broke, rendering him unable to hear.

(When pistol whipped) The broken part of his ear is described as a "short-circuiting implant". After discarding it, he says he'd trade in the Aether Core for "an ear with some nice basss".

He has the ability to change his fingers into silver blades

When Caleb shoots stone shards at him, they pierce through half of Viper's face. When Caleb slams him into the ground, it destroys the other half of his face

Caleb is said to have crushed Viper's "white prosthetic eye".

At the cemetery, his face is described as being covered in "cracks and blotches"

After providing the protagonist with Kevi's new address, he "sways with the wind" and then instantly "vanishes like mist".

When Caleb twists his head around 180 degrees, Viper begs him to "at leassst put my head back in place before you go?!"

Notable Quotes:

When Kevi is being driven away from the cemetery, Viper says:

"What a lucky kid, sssaved from the fate of being a normal perssson. It'sss better to dance to the tune of the ssstrong than live a plain life. A pawn isss ssstill a pawn. But they have a chance to sssurvive to the end of a large chess game".

In "Crossroads", he recounts their recent accomplishments:

"First, we went ahead and destroyed those abandoned Flux Nexuses. Then we paid the N109 Zone and visit to get info on Onychinus. Our Skyhaven gig is almost over. Where's our next stop? Tch, we practically spoiled Ever and those old people in the Fleet. Were like their personal hitmen."