#Generation 1: The Social Experiments

[serashalala]

Generation Loss's Mind Manipulation; A theory by a tired college student

OK. GENERATION LOSS. That was a ride and it’s not even done!

Fuckin loved it, by the way. It was so good. I loved everyone's acting and Sneeg's realization part gave me literal fucking chills as well as Slime screaming and Austin freaking out while Ranboo n Sneeg were just chill.

FUCK that was cool. Thank you @ranboolivesaysstuff for sharing this with us.

Anyway, here’s a nerd dump on the entire mind control thing. I’m not exactly a genius but I’m studying neurosci as one of my college units and this is basically the gist of how I understand the mind control aspect that this is showing.

SO. 

You recognize this? This is the device that we think is controlling Ranboo’s mind. It’s at the back part of the brain, and easily this leads to two possible structures that it can influence: the occipital lobe of the cerebrum and the cerebellum. However, we don’t really know HOW deep this device goes considering Ranboo’s lucious locks of hair covering the rest of the mask and the fact that we don’t know if this is the only thing penetrating the brain.

Anyway, let’s discuss what we know which is that it’s likely latched onto the back part and thus likely embedded onto the cerebral occipital lobe and/or the cerebellum

The occipital lobe is at the back part of the head, and as you see on the picture below, it’s the visual area (mostly).

To make me sound more professional and shit let me introduce to you the brodmann areas. Brodmann areas divide the cerebrum by its function.

Area 17, 18, and 19.

Area 17 is the primary visual area. This is where you see shit. If the device’s influence is only as deep as area 17 then Ranboo is either literally blinded by the device OR the device intercepts what his eyes are really seeing. Damage to this area will lead to literal blindness or difficulty to see.

Area 18 and 19 however are the secondary visual area, otherwise known as the visual association area. This is where you recognize the things that you see. Damage to this leads to dyschromatopsia (color blindness), and visual agnosia (inability to perceive visual stimuli.). 

Basically to explain, as an example you see an apple. That’s the job of area 17. However, you don’t really know yet that it’s an apple. To know that an apple is an apple, you tap into area 18 and 19– the visual association area.

The device LIKELY reaches into this area because the entire time, Ranboo doesn’t recognize that he’s on a show set and he doesn’t see the people on the set like the directors and the staff. What he does see is a 4th wall.

Upon deactivation of the device, only then does he recognize that oh shit, that isn’t a wall. 

Does it stop there? Ok, why not go deeper?

Next to Area 19 is area 37. This is the Facial Recognition area. It's self explanatory if Ranboo's mind control device goes that deep.

How about Area 39 and 7? They're both Someasthetic areas. 39 and 40 specifically have a lot to do with memory, emotion, behavior, sex. rage, fear, and pain.

Area 7 integrates sensory inputs-- it draws upon stored memories of past sensory experiences. This area aint that deep tho ngl, it's basically the part that goes: yo, this fire thing burns you, maybe don't touch it. This can be as deep as you want to interpret it being.

Edit: I WAS RIGHT ABOUT THIS. Ranboo's stream confirms it SCREAMING RIGHT NOW. THEY SAID. "Change someone's perception of reality, and they will act how you want." SCREAMING CRYING WAILING SOBBING. I KNEW IT. The next parts of the theory will be further discussing the things that MAY still apply, alongside the things that Ranboo almost confirmed.

Next suspected area:

The cerebellum. 

The cerebellum is mostly responsible for a lot of important things (as are the rest of the brain but let me get into it)

The cerebellum has 3 main functions: maintenance of posture and balance; maintenance of muscle tone; and coordination of voluntary motor activity. 

You see where I’m going for here?

The cerebellum is a likely attachment site of the device because it is gunning for that motor activity and posture and balance. It controls the agonist and antagonist coordination of the muscles to make sure that there’s no jerky movements going on. As for posture and balance, it can affect your movements so that you don’t look robotic, and so that you don’t have to voluntarily maintain your posture. Maintenance of muscle tone has the same idea.

It is also the best bet because it has its lapses.

While it controls a lot of motor function, it isn’t the only site of motor control in the body. There’s other areas, like the Basal Nuclei, the motor area of the cerebrum (brodmann area 4 and 6) and the spinalcord (though this is more on reactionary shit).

It makes the device fallible where the fine motor movements (such as in the fingertips, where the cerebellum controls less of) is less prone to influence by the device, leading to this nifty clip right here:

And this here too:

They're able to do morse code with his hands, the fingers.

And, chances are, the reason they have a mask in the first place is because it’s significantly more difficult to reach the area that controls the facial expressions since that is a direct connection from the brain to the face via the Facial Nerve that stems anteriorly to from the brainstem. It’d be hard to reach from behind especially. (unless the device yanknow, snuck around the spine or something idk)

So if the connection is posterior, they’d have difficulty reaching that (to a safe extent, at least. We have no idea how deep it goes.

Then again, we don’t know the function of the rest of the mask.

Now for some close competitors of where the mind control device is attached/penetrating!

"But sera, what if it influences at a lower level than the occipital lobe or the cerebellum?"

Cervical spine C1 Level

Difficult to defend. That leaves the problem of Ranboo's speech control. The lower the level the less things it's able to influence. At C1 level, a person's speech, which is something Ranboo's clearly being influenced over, can't be damaged from this level.

"How are we so sure that it's at the back??"

Because it's the clearest shot we've got with that weird circle thing.

Frontal Lobe

This one is a good contender. The Frontal Lobe has the Decision and / or Judgement Center of the brain (area 10, more to be mentioned about this later), as well as the motor areas (areas 4 and 6), and twisting that could lead to being able to change what a person does when faced with a stimuli as well as a bigger portion of voluntary movement.

However, this one is difficult to visually justify.

While it's true that we can't see much behind the mask, we also can't see it penetrate towards the frontal lobe. Let's say it penetrates through the mouth somehow-- how is Ranboo's diction so clear?

But the reason why it's a very good contender is that it could possibly go through the nose. Did you know that the cribriform plate, the part of the skull where the olfactory nerve goes through, is the easiest to break? and thus it's also the easiest to penetrate?

Issue with that though is that Ranboo has a working sense of smell. The Olfactory nerve (smelling nerve) is easy to disturb.

Anything deeper? More anterior?

Any deeper structures are likely too unimportant-- the diencephalon, pons are all mostly on the hormonal / nonvoluntary actions (breathing, sweat, thirst, hunger, etc). Those aren't too fun to control especially when what you want is a puppet.

The most likely candidate is the basal nuclei, which has a lot to do with movement. However it's mostly useless when you target it because it's goal is to make sure that when you want to raise a glass, you don't yeet it to the sky. It makes sure that you have the right amount of output to the muscle without overcompensating.

So what does the device control?

Both.

Well, not both. All-- err, mostly. Ding ding ding! They're all winners.

Only at its best, though, which was during Episode 1 (when undisturbed)-- NOT episode 2.

At its best, the mask is able to take full function of the brain-- most strongly at where it's sourced, though, which is at the posterior regions. Weaker control is evident when you see the finger taps that Ranboo is still able to do. Think of it as some sort of energy gradient-- most concentrated at the back of the head, and weakest at the front.

At its blinking state, influenced by the outsider, Ranboo regains Control of most of the more anterior parts of the brain, but you'd notice it's still blinking-- it never really fully released Ranboo. Its still got a strong influence at the back portion of the brain.

It takes a lot to rip away its influence from Ranboo, as you can see from what the weird shadowy figure from the TV says in the end where he had to do something to disable it fully before Ranboo breaks the fourth wall.

How do we know that? Let's go back to the clip where Ranboo FULLY 'wakes up':

It took some effort by the hacker to fully release Ranboo, but until that point Ranboo hadn't even seen the 4th wall despite being able to gain autonomy of most their function.

Then let's go back to the part where, when Ranboo's device was 'reset':

You notice how the showbizz person isn't someone they interact with? They don't SEE these people. The device is still on, because it's intercepting with Ranboo's perception.

Let's go back to the announcements then.

We don't get to choose a lot this episode, instead we're subjected to puzzles that have more to do with everyone else BUT Ranboo.

I present to you, Brodmann Area 10

This is the largest area in the frontal lobe, and is incharge of decision making (among other things). We, the audience, can't make decisions as flexibly anymore because they needed a stricter control of the device.

The hacker is able to intercept that flexibility and thus the showfall media reduced the extent of which we're able to control ranboo, taking all that control for themselves. It isn't interactive anymore.

Literally being gatekeeped from the audience, smh.

Now what?

A summary of course.

I suspect that when the lights are on (in the mask), it has a stronger pulse and thus influences a larger chunk of his head, ABLE (but not necessarily) to reach the frontal lobe.

It blinks, then it indicates that its pulse is weaker, but still present (the cerebellum is slightly further to reach than the occipital lobe) which is why his sight might still be influenced.

And lights being gone? That's Ranboo's full autonomy baybee. They're back in business!

As for the others' mind manipulation system, I'm not quite sure yet. Probably could reduce it to having already been subjected to being conditioned, not like our 'fresh' protagonist. I'll probably add onto this when something clicks in the future.

This ended up a lot longer than intended...

Anyway, that’s just a theory, a tired-college-student-from-an-allied-health-course theory. Thanks for reading.

[sp-ud]

My theories so far for "Generation One: The Social Experiments" of Generation Loss. (And also just a bit of a recap of all the confirmed things I'm aware about Gen 1)

(This is so long. If you read all of this I love you.)

Also, I wrote this May 1st/2nd, before the keynote. I will likely be adding stuff about the keynote either in a reblog to this post or a completely new post which I'll edit a link to or something)

So ever since the name "The Social Experiments" was announced, it became clear to me this was going to be something that we the audience, would be able to have influence on. To some extent.

This was then further solidified by things like Ranboo mentioning that Gen 1 would take place on his Twitch channel, talking about how important it would be to be there when it happened live, and during his Cult of the Lamb stream, mentioning how chat should familiarize themselves with using Twitch extensions to vote.

And of course, T_2: The Inauguration being a short "choose your own adventure" thing also made this pretty clear. Like a test run for the full event. And speaking of T_2, a quick run-through of that. (Because I finished summarizing the new stuff before I realized, shit that video is also probably still important, but the post is already so fucking long)

All of the videos take place on an old TV with static heavily in the background and white text appearing on the screen, "Welcome. You have our attention. Please ensure you are alone. There are precautions in place. The inauguration is necessary. Prove your worth. Please remain emotional. Act upon first impulse."

And then you are asked "Cats or Dogs?", this question doesn't matter. The result is the same, "Now you understand what this is. Next evaluation. Which is best. Power or Wisdom?"

"Power" leads to a failure, reading "Wisdom becomes power. Your input is no longer wanted. Then the camera backs away from the TV, before it vanishes and the words "Try again" appear on screen, before a bombardment of text appears on screen.

"Wisdom" leads to "Impressive. Wisdom is vital. Which will prevail. Life or death?"

"Life" is another fail, "Optimism makes one naive", before going into the same failure screen as before.

"Death" leads to "Intresting. Let's test that." Before cutting to a screen of a person who's face is obscured with a box of static struggling tied to a chair

"You or them?"

You, "Noble yet foolish." Before failure clip.

Them, the person struggles for a bit before going limp, the censor changing to just black, "Did you make sure you were alone? Yes or No?"

No, "You should have." Fail.

Yes, "Good. One final request. Don't Look away." Then the GenLoss logo as it's pictured above slowly fades in, before vanishing and the text reading "Congratulations." appears. There's a few more seconds of just a blank static screen before in red text in the bottom corner pops up reading "Your failures have not forgotten"

So, at this point, all I really had for theorizing was: Somehow the audience will be able to influence the events that happen. And that's about it.

But luckily, the "Connecting..." teasers came out and there was finally more to work with! Yippee!

So the first one Connecting... is a 30 second video of a cassette tape with the letters "TSE" written on it, heavy visual static over it, with some bopping kinda ominous music over it, before a short jingle plays and we hear "If you have any information on these individuals, don't hesitate to call. We thank you for your cooperation during these times" followed by a sound that reminds me of someone turning off some kind of old tech, or hanging up a corded phone.

Not that much to work with other than that there's a group of people who are being looked for, for some reason. Also the "TSE" is likely short for "The Social Experiments" aka, the name of Gen 1.

Also, in the description, there's binary that when translated reads "From one to another", not really sure what to do with this bit of info yet.

Then we get the second Connecting... teaser, which was just this image.

My initial thoughts on this, ripped straight from my Twitter are: "I think what's happening in-universe is that whatever audience roll we'll be playing, will think what's happening is just a show with no serious consequences. But what we influence will have real serious impacts on the safety and life(s?) of the participant(s).

And the crossed-out thing makes me think of like. An office building. So maybe that's whatever organization is behind this broadcast, and they're lying to their viewers about what's really happening.

And who's made these sticky notes? They obviously know more than they probably should. And are going to somehow try to stop whatever is happening. From happening. Did they used to be a part of this group? Are they someone who was supposed to be a victim but escaped?"

And at least one part of this got answers in the currently most recent video, Connected.

The first chunk of the video is red and black static with the word "Connecting..." before cutting to a black screen reading "Welcome" before some more bopping but ominous music kicks in and the screen changes to some sort of infinite tunnel filled with red light.

A bunch of text flashes on screen, in order it reads: "Look into infinity. You are now worthy. One of many." this order repeats 3 more times before more is added after One of many. "One of millions. One to another. One to yours. One to another."

After this text vanishes, The image I put at the top of this section fades in, before cutting to a bright red screen with white text in the corner reading "GEN 1"

Then fades in the image from the Twitter "Connecting..." teaser, the static from the image slowly fading. We get a brief flash to this screen:

Before it cuts to the images from before, but now with missing posters taped up for a currently unnamed character (I'm not calling him Ranboo until it's confirmed the character is called Ranboo.)

There's also tape connecting the posters in the "GenLoss 4 Logo" shape, unsure if that means anything or is just a wink nudge nudge to the audience.

The missing posters feature Ranboo's character, what vaguely resembles the logo that was crossed out with "LIES" written under it next to the word "MISSING", and a phone number to call if you have any information.

According to @/alphiebeet in the replies to the video's link on Twitter, calling the number on the missing posters gives you this message:

"Hello. thank you for calling the Showfall missing person's hotline. We appreciate your call, but you are not able to help us. Please hang up immediately."

The audio in this section sounds like nearby a relatively active street, including a car honking and some birds.

The video cuts to this image for a split second

A much clearer look at what this office-building esc logo looks like, along with 05 03 23 written near it. It looks like the same wall as the other images and even uses the same type of black tape, even though it doesn't seem to be close to the other images and the missing poster.

The screen fades into white, before the same jingle from "Connecting..." the video is heard and this full logo, now with the company name, Showfall Media, appears;

"We are happy to welcome you to the Showfall Media family. Please join us for our special keynote on May 3rd of your time" is said by the same voice from the "Connecting..." video. But before the video ends, a voice that I'm pretty sure is Ranboo says "There's something going on here."

Wow, okay that was. a lot. And oh goddamn it one second, Ranboo posted on the Behind The Scenes account. It's a clearer photo of the images taped to the wall.

Note: The number is scribbled out because it is no longer the accurate number seen in the video.

For some reason, the one farther right and at the end/start of the GenLoss 4 logo has a black censor over their face instead of just a mask.

Now, onto what I think is going on here. Finally (Ranboo better not post more while I'm working on this I STG. Or say anything while streaming.)

Obviously, Showfall Media is behind whatever The Social Experiments are. Or at least the broadcast which will be whatever is going to be Gen 1. They also for some reason have their own missing person's phone line, and will even put their own logo on missing posters. For some reason.

I think I was right about the person who originally wrote the notes the missing posters were over being an employee of Showfall, who realized what was happening/going to happen is wrong, and decided to try and stop it. And I don't think they're actually missing, I think perhaps they realized Showfall was onto them and went into hiding, and the missing posters are a way for Showfall to try and find them.

Though, I wonder if more people are also trying to stop Showfall, as the call said "Individuals", plural. But that's more something we'll just have to wait and see.

One thing that interests me, is the text in T_2, the binary in the descrip of Connecting, and the text in Connected.

From T_2 the intro text: "Welcome. You have our attention. Please ensure you are alone. There are precautions in place. The inauguration is necessary. Prove your worth. Please remain emotional. Act upon first impulse."

and some of the messages on the failure state: "You were not supposed to fail. Think Different. Try Again. Think harder. Keep going. Do you not understand? Who even are you? Do you think this is just a game? Go back. You are NEVER alone. Do not hesitate."

and of course the end screen: "Your failures have not forgotten"

the binary in the Connecting description: "From one to another"

and the Connected text: "Look into infinity. You are now worthy. One of many." this order repeats 3 more times before more is added after One of many. "One of millions. One to another. One to yours. One to another."

it seems like somehow, people need to prove their worth before... something. Currently I'm thinking it's joining Showfall Media, specifically whatever elite group is the one actually behind the shady shit.

And obviously this group probably isnt small, "one of many" and "one of millions" and an important part of this is connecting to the other members "one to another" "one to yours".

I also think the failure messages and the "Your failures have not forgotten" might hint to some level of time shenanigans, and i think whoever this is might also be Ranboo's character trying to get in with Showfall Media to better be able to stop this broadcast. Possibly this backfired and that's why he went into hiding.

And that's kinda all I really got for now, can't wait for the keynote on the 3rd, cuz I imagine it will be what finally gives us a good grasp on what to expect from the actual stream.

[penwingstar]

You shouldn’t have done that.

[updatingranboo]

from ranboo!

[p4stm4rs]

can we. can we talk about how in the founder’s cut episode three does not go just labeled as restricted content, but how it doesn’t get labeled until the last scene?? in which it is called the hero???? instead of the choice?????? like that actually made me almost get up and take a lap because ough the implications that showfall is trying to make the audience believe that past ep 2, it’s no longer a show, but they are Very proud of the fact that the final scene is in fact not only part of the show, but an entire finale episode all on its own

[t3c4supp0rt]

Can we also talk about how the corporate theme of Generation loss is also a big part of the content creation parallels??

Ranboo as the main protagonist or "the hero" is popular as a content creator and therefore is advertizeable (take as an example the several cheezit ads). The vote at the end, deciding to kill GL!Ranboo so they wouldn't have to live on as a corporate puppet meant to us as the viewers that we cared about our favorite content creator. From a corporate standpoint though, it meant that we no longer cared for him since we voted for them to die. Since the viewers no longer cared, and therefore they would no longer be making the company money through the show, they had no need for Ranboo, which is why they had no problem killing off their main protagonist. Again, we as the viewers DO indeed care and only voted for death so that ranboo wouldn't have to suffer through killing his friends over and over again, but to Showfall it just meant that we had lost interest in the hero.

[paliskale]

WHEREVER I GO I CANNOT ESCAPE THE FUCKING TAPE RECORDERS

[skelpiescool]

heha silly genloss art

[vtimbertiger]

// blood (drawing)

... he's not coming back.. is he.........

[colorful-craze]

I just think it’s funny how we all expected Ranboo to face reveal in Generation Loss but instead he dropped the hardest f-bombs I’ve ever heard and then made us kill him

[r3d-m3dic]

so i watched Gen Loss for the first time tonight (it's 4:32 am rn. help.) Loved it. Charlie is so funny bro holy shit. charlie is my favorite so i drew him in episode ond

:3

[rainy-poems]

(genloss poem that I made after watching a genloss essay/theory video)

Again

67,000 times.

The box crushed my head 67,000 times.

Blood spilled out of it over and over

Just so he can make the perfect cut.

Forced to play the hero of the show and act none the wiser.

And now

You are the one that forces me to play the role

Again and again and again and again and AGAIN.

Till you get bored.

Till you get tired of watching it.

Again and again and again...

It never stops..

[penwingstar]

fanart i drew of slime demon charlie dying in a glue trap, except the glue trap is actually his slime suit

[fandomfuntimem]

I watched the founders cut of vol 1 today! Its soooo good! My parents were even impressed.

The way we explained things to my parents was funny tho. Shit like "oh that guy?? Oh yeah you bought his merch for me!" Or "see that box they have around their head? YEAH! THATS THE ONE MICHAEL [ME] MADE!"

Tho, i didn't have the best time watching. Its good dont get me wrong! Its just my niece is teething so she was crying in my ear, people wouldn't stop talking, and we ordered food so everyone was standing infront of the tv, and i was sleep deprived. So yay.

But ye. Overall i loved it.

[menelron]

watched the premiere of the founders cut. It was so fucking good.

[arisdrawsthingsss]

The Hero