#code vein concept art

[eghostsofdeadchildren]

Protagonist Teaser.

[alice-after-dark]

Wavelength

Inspired by this art from @hiemaldesirae, this art from @ectochoir, and this post by @liulith

Might become an AU or a fic but this is such a fun concept

TW for mild blood and gore.

Vox first starts noticing something is wrong when he begins losing chunks of time.

It's little moments at first. A conversation here and there. Then entire meetings, movie nights, dates. A whole afternoon just...gone.

He chalks it up to exhaustion. Velvette is always saying he's overworking himself. That's it. That's all it is. He just needs to take care of himself a bit better and he'll be fine.

Vox really begins to worry when he wakes up on the floor of his bathroom covered in blood.

He can taste it in his mouth, the flesh in his teeth. He doesn't recognize the Sinner's corpse in the bathtub, flayed open and organs gone. He throws up.

The security footage is clear. He watches himself leave the tower, leaping into the power lines from the privacy of his bedroom. Hours pass before he finally returns, dragging the corpse along behind him as he heads towards the bathroom.

He remembers none of it.

It takes him the rest of the night to clean up the mess. He can't risk anyone seeing. This would destroy his image. How can the people trust someone who just plucks Sinners off the street for a midnight snack?

He disposes of the corpse and his ruined clothes. How would he explain this to Val and Vel? He can't. He can't explain any of it.

Things come to a head when he almost kills a Sinner on live television.

It's his usual talk show. He's interviewing an actor about his latest movie (produced by VoxTek, of course) when he hears it, like static in his mind.

Kill him

He shakes it off and continues the interview, ignoring the way his heart beat kicks up a notch.

Kill him

The stage lights seem so bright, so hot. They're blinding.

Kill him

He can hear the rush of blood through the actor's veins, see the pulse of his jugular. His claws twitch. He wants to rip it out.

KILL HIM

The actor is still speaking, but Vox can't make out what he's saying anymore. His head is filled with static and the sound of rushing blood-

Ǩ̶̨̮̾͠I̷̧̩̋̂͋Ḽ̴̀L̵͎͇̟̔͝ ̷͙̯͝H̶̫̤̿͂I̷̭͚̎͌̕Ḿ̶̤̑

Vox runs off the set without explanation. He cuts the broadcast remotely and does not stop moving until he reaches him dressing room. He slams the door. His heart is pounding. He is shaking. Sparks crackle around him wildly and he struggles to reign them in. Someone is pounding on the door. Velvette is shouting his name. He presses his hands over his receivers.

"Shut up! Shut up! SHUT UP!"

And everything goes silent.

When Vox opens his eyes again, darkness has descended upon his dressing room, the LEDs around the mirror flickering. And from the darkest corner of the room, a figure emerges. Vox glares.

"You."

"Good evening, darling!" Alastor cackles. "How is your broadcast going?"

Vox staggers to his feet. "What the fuck do you want?! How did you even get in here?"

Alastor's answering grin sends an icy chill down Vox's spine. "Why, you let me in."

"Bullshit! Why the fuck would I do that?"

"Look for yourself."

Vox does, mentally searching out every camera feed for what the Radio Demon might be talking about...and he finds it. Wide-eyed, he watches his own image enter the security office, slitting the guard's throat and tapping a few keys on the blood-splattered keyboard. He recognizes the motion enough to know it's the access code and within seconds, the V Tower is completely exposed. Vox kills the feed and looks at Alastor is shock.

"I told you," the deer says.

Vox shakes his head. "How, I...I don't remember doing that! Why would I do that?!"

"Because I wanted you to. Just like I wanted you to kill that Sinner you found in your bathtub. The actor...while annoying, I didn't truly want you to kill him. No. What I really wanted was to get you alone."

There a rush of static again and Vox's jaw snaps shut, body rigid. He can't move. He can't speak. Panic floods him. Alastor steps closer.

"I've been controlling you for weeks now. It's a splendid little trick, don't you think?" He points to the floor with his cane and Vox kneels. The microphone tips up his screen. "Imagine what I can make you do. Though you don't really have to, do you? I think I made the...possibilities very clear tonight. Of course, we could always make a deal."

Vox feels his jaw come free and he stares up at Alastor's Cheshire smile.

"You want my soul."

"Ah, so there is a brain in that flat head of yours! Marvelous! That will make this all so much easier." Alastor twirls his cane, grinning down at Vox. "So here's the deal: you can either sign your soul over to me or watch as I slowly drive your empire into ruin. I'll even leave you the souls you've collected. You can maintain your Overlord status. No one needs to know about any of this. You come when I call you. You leave when I dismiss you. You follow my commands. So..." Vox feels the control lift completely. "D̴̪͈̃o̷̹̜̎̓͘ ̸͇͙̒̌w̸͕̹̐͘e̵͈͙͆͌͝ ̸̪̜͆h̵͎̫͒á̷̠̂͆v̷͍͒̀e̴̋ͅ ̶̬́ā̸͔̻̉̈́ ̷̤̾͛̓d̴͈͖̈́̈́͝ê̵̗̈́̕a̸͈͚͉̋l̷̜͈̭̈?̶̝́̄"

[howlingdemon13]

Betelgeuse I was hugely inspired by a bunch of artists and fic writers in the fandom, as well as a few monster artists who specialize in combining different creatures into beasts that actually look cohesive. I’m not sure how well I was able to execute the vision here, but I’m really proud of it regardless! DiamondZ, nonbinary-arsonist, stinkyhorsebitch, and arbuzyansky were the main catalysts for this, so definitely take a peek at their work or give them a follow. I was initially going to submit this guy for a staff art show, but I don't want to rush the rest of it, so I'm just going to post what I have finished here. Design notes are under the cut.

In earlier drafts, I was looking into more serpentine-looking designs since Beetlejuice turns into a snake in the film. Some of the concepts I was leaning towards looked like either a lindworm or centipede, but I think mammalian fits Musicaljuice since he’s “softer” in a lot of aspects compared to his film counterpart. I may look into playing with a more snake/bug-like design in the future. Beetlejuice’s overall look is heavily inspired by Chalicotherium goldfussi, which were huge Miocene ungulates that are distantly related to things like rhinos and tapirs. Given that Beetlejuice is super old, I felt like an extinct animal was a proper fit. On a more personal level, I really like the way these guys look and it was easier to rework their body plan into something that looks carnivorous. That, and I wasn’t really vibing with other mammalian body plans, especially because I wanted something that was close in shape to a human without being apelike. Huge herbivores also have larger stomachs, which I feel is a better analogue to Beetlejuice’s body type. You’ll have to pry that man’s curves from my cold, dead hands. All his forms are chubby and soft, and I’ll fight you over it in the Denny’s parking lot. I also added some hyaenid traits, especially for the head shape and teeth. Hyenas are very social animals (like Beej, except no one can see him), and striped hyenas and aardwolves specifically have these tall crests of fur that run down their backs and back legs that they can raise and lower to communicate. I’d argue it’s fitting since Beetlejuice’s hair sticks up at odd angles and communicates his mood (intentional or not). And hyenas laugh. Granted they giggle when they’re stressed, but it still fits. I modeled his stripes off of both species as well. His hind paws, ears, and tail are all based off of those of opossums. Beej is very “trash animal”-coded, and I felt like the opossum traits would fit better with the Chalicotherium body than something like a raccoon or skunk. I felt a little bad about not giving him a ton of bug traits, so I tried to add mandibles, but they just weren’t looking right in earlier design drafts. I gave him a bunch of small eyes to compensate, but making him look buggy wasn’t the only reason for the extra eyes. We know from early drafts of the musical script that Beetlejuice’s last name is Shoggoth. These creatures are mentioned by Lovecraft in Fungi from Yuggoth and At the Mountains of Madness, but I’m not sure if this implies that Beej is a shoggoth, or if it more so refers to him being able to manifest multiple limbs/shapeshift/warp reality like one. In that same vein, the mouth in his chest is mostly to look scary and is just another fun little Lovecraftian trait that I felt was needed. Same to the tendrils, but that’s also a common fandom trait that is pretty much canon (to me) at this point. I might rb this with headcanons later on.

[a-deed-without-a-name]

Hey: the two fandoms you accept prompts for. Anyone ask you to smash em together yet? I mean— Will is almost painfully Eye-coded, there’s a lot to be said for other NBC Hannibal characters and their possible alignments, and, on the flip side, if one wanted, like. A TMA-focused POV. Would stretch beyond prompt-length prolly *butttt* what about the Fearscape? What if avatardom found Will or Hannibal before the world ended? What would their domains look like, if passed through?

No one has asked me to smash them together yet! A tragedy...one that has now been rectified, though.

So, this definitely should have stretched beyond prompt length, if we're being honest...it's a hell of a concept, and one I'd really like to explore further. Expect me to return to this in the future.

Have Hannigram's Fearscape domain (because of course they'd have a shared one), a clunky explanation for why JMart are passing by it, and only dialogue.

“Jon?”

“Mm?”

“Where are we going?”

“Around.”

“Not - through?  I-I mean, I get it, dark and spooky castle, ooh, that can’t be good.  But it kind of looks like that’s our straightest shot to London.”

“It is.  Which is…rather funny, actually.  It shouldn’t be.  That particular portion of the world used to be part of Baltimore.”

“What, America?”

“Mm-hm.”

“What the hell’s it doing here, then?”

“The avatars of this domain are particularly beloved by their respective Fears.  The more they…well, ‘like’ is the wrong word, but the more they like you, the closer you’re drawn to the epicenter, in this new world.  And the epicenter is…”

“Right.  Right.  Um…avatars?  As in, more than one?”

“Yes.  Two.  Orbiting one another, like…like binary stars.”

“Oh.  I didn’t…know that that could happen.”

“It’s rare.  You get packs sometimes, or manifestations of the same Fear working in tandem within the same domain, like with Jude and Arthur.  But this is a…unique case.”

“They serve different Fears, then?”

“Yes.  The Eye for one, the Flesh for the other.  And they share the Hunt.”

“Oh.  How’s that work, then?”

“Well, I could tell you of course, but…heh.  You’re not going to like it.”

“Oh.  Oh, right, because I’ve just loved every single other statement you’ve made and domain we’ve slogged through, the trenches were a right bloody picnic.  And then the building fire, ooh, that one was like a holiday, and the garden, with fucking - Jared Hopworth, practically a honeym - !”

“All right, all right.  You’ve made your point…you know, Martin, I never would have expected it from you, but you can be a bit bitchy when you want to.”

“That makes two of us.”

“I didn’t say it was a bad thing…Anyway.  Right.  Here goes.

“The memory palace is vast, and awful, in the original meaning of the word.  Filled with awe.  It is not a structure so much as it is a body, the magnificent fruit of a grand and terrible union.  The bones are stone and ice and salt.  River mud flows through its veins, and its nerves are fishing line and suture thread.  It peers out through its stained-glass eyes, squats on its concrete box haunches, and bares fangs of scalpels and gutting knives.  Its tears boil where they strike the ground.

“There are woods there, the wilds of Europe and of America.  Bogs and mountains.  Empty, twisted cities.  Cathedrals flow into bayous, there are art galleries in the bellies of dungeons and clean-scrubbed hospitals with lights that are too bright and orphanages that are asylums with leaf litter on the floor.  Glass boxes and government buildings.  You can climb through the backseat of a police cruiser to find yourself in a towering library where the books may bite fingers from your hands if you’re careless in your reading.  In your recall.

“This place was planted, tended, raised, and is now occupied and guarded by its gods.  Dark angels.  They once had names that mattered.  They were once men…or pretended to be.  Now, they have outgrown the tight skins of their humanity.  They are two halves of a whole, two mirrors reflecting infinitely.  They are terrible in their divinity, in their ascendance.  In their inescapable hunger.  They stalk and they build, they track and they transform, they Know each other as no one else can.  They hunt in a pack, mated pair, accompanied by things that are not quite dogs.

“They hunt the other denizens of this place, this palace.  Parasites.  The rude, the thoughtlessly cruel, the wicked and crass and arrogant.  Sinners in the cosmology of the gods at whose tender mercies they have found themselves, and are finding not to be so tender after all except in the way a cut of well-cooked meat may be.

“They are pigs, and they are treated fittingly.  Run down in the forests and the swamps, throats and guts torn out in steaming carmine arcs; caught on fishhooks and flies; flayed on operating tables and pinned like specimens.  The corridors and battlements of the palace glisten with still-living trophies, tableaux and displays that whimper and bleed and weep.  They are seen.  They are known.  And they are found so terribly lacking.

“But there’s danger here for more than just them.  Bodies have cancers, infections.  Cannibal organs that swallow the flesh around them as they move through channels of bone and blood.

“You may sometimes hear a child crying.  Her voice is acid thrown across broken flesh.  The halls are always hungry here; be watchful where you place a step.

“You may sometimes hear a young woman scream.  It gurgles, fluid in her throat and her lungs, hot black copper.  Her touch eats bone faster than mold.  The windows are watchful here.  You cannot escape being known for the terrible thing you are.

“Sometimes, these terrible things, these gods borne of mortal trauma, may turn on each other.  In boredom, in pleasure.  There is no greater prey than your equal.  Their combat, their games, are the dreams of this thing they have dragged screaming into the world together.  One might think this would grant the pigs some respite, but…the effect their tormentors have on this place is much the same effect a star has on gravity.  The amount of human shrapnel that breaks apart in the eddies and whorls of their uncaring wake cannot be overstated, even as they tear each other to grieving pieces again and again and again.

“But it is not all a nightmare, no.  How could it be, when this is Heaven?

“Because the heart of this body, oh, the beating, living heart.  A house, a small house, wrapped always in winter, treacherous to reach and more treacherous to remain within, but it is the only place where they may meet one another gently, snatch rare moments of tenderness despite the fact theirs is a savage romance of teeth and tests.  There is a soft bed.  There is a wood stove, and a much smaller and more practical kitchen, and a harpsichord in the corner and a practical library, and the things that are not dogs sleep in front of the fire, patiently waiting for their two masters to slake a different kind of thirst in one another.

“It is here, crowned in antlers, enrobed in feathers and blood, that they dance as the snow falls, light-footed on the rotten floor, touching as only twinned souls may when laid bare of flesh and folly, until the hunger again grows too great for one of them.

“But even that is love.  What is adoration, what is understanding in its purest form, but the devouring of your beloved?

“..ahhh.

“Hah.  Okay.

“I…all right.  There.  Done.”

“...hmm.”

“Well?  What do you think?”

“Uh - yeah.  Ha, ha.  You were right.  Umm…let’s go around, yeah.”

“Thought so.”

“...ehh…Jon?”

“What?”

“Do you think…if we were to…I-I mean, if it just happened, or if we had no other choice, and we wound up like…would it be like that?  For you and I?...Jon?”

“Hm?  Oh, I’m - I’m sorry, Martin, I didn’t quite catch that.  What was it?”

“N - oh.  Never mind.  Nothing.”

“If you’re sure.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

[theniceandnaughtylist]

LOUIS CODE VEIN DID NOTHING WRONG EVER, HIS ONLY BAD THING IS BEING DEPRESSED and looking a tiny bit scary, HE DESERVES 100% NICEYS, HE'S EVEN REPENTING FOR A CRIME HE DIDNT EVEN DO!

Look at him in this concept art

That's a good guy, he just wants everybody to live, and it's not his fault he is a vampire zombie

Thank you, elf

[razorblade180]

One of these days we're going to see fan art of your OCs

My friend drew concepts of Jacquelyn a few years ago after reading her first story and me giving her notes on her appearance.

The second picture isn’t made for me and I don’t know where my other friend found it but it’s genuinely how I pictured Carmine; especially the two toned hair. The eye color is obviously different but this art still shocks me for existing.

Somewhere I have poor photos of me making several of my OCs using the character creator in Code Vein too.

[0perfectimperfections0]

Hi fellow doll, I hope you're doing fine. I've been quite busy lately, college and life in general have been kicking my ass, so I was forced to take a step back from social media for a while to try to contain the chaos.

Firstly, I'd like to share a fun fact with you! I don't know if you're aware but did you know that Lou's Mansion has a Pool? You can see it more clearly in the Mansion's Concept Designs/Art on this site:

•https://www.claytonstillwell.com/ugly-dolls#23

However, the real reason for this ask is to present a possible answer/theory in regards to how the doll-sized phones came to be in the world of your stories (you can tell this is still related to our chat on Wattpad).

Recently, I came across the images you're seeing on Pinterest. They're Wide/Aerial Views of the Institute of Perfection and one thing that immediately stood out to me is that Giant Eye-Catching Dome behind the TV.

I mean what's its purpose, why is it even there to begin with and what's inside of it? I've been thinking about this for a while and would like to hear your thoughts about it as well, if you're willing to share them.

By any chance, have you seen the movie Wreck-it Ralph? There was a part where the villain enters the code of the game he's in and I think the Dome's purpose could follow a similar, if not equal, vein.

Now that I think about it, Lou and Vanellope's circunstances are almost identical, trapped in the same place for years without the option to leave, simply because of who they are and the traits they were born with, but didn't choose to have.

Sorry, I let my mind run on tangent there for a while, it wanders frequently which makes it hard to keep track of my line of thought.

To circle back to the main topic of discussion, what if the Dome is a Central Station of the Institute, like a Panel or Center for Command Control (or Command Control Center)? CCC for short? Ok, I'll stop trying to be funny...

Perhaps it could be a subroutine of the factory's software, a program linked to its network and wifi that contains all guidelines and rules that govern the Institute and must be followed and executed to keep it functional - a blueprint if you will - and is in charge of all commands, protocols, activities and operations being compiled and run by its machinery, such as the doll-scanner, the robots, the washing machine, the recycling, the Gauntlet plus the mechanical baby and dog and the Portal, just to name a few.

This means that it'd also take care of overseeing the integrity and performance of said machinery as well as its maintenance. It'd even be responsible for generating clouds and the artificial weather because apparently weather is still a thing, even though the Institute is inside of a factory.

I wonder if this subroutine would be run by an AI or simply an intelligent system/computer program. This world's version of Siri? 🤣

Or maybe I'm greatly exaggerating its function/letting my imagination run wild and it literally only gives Electricity for TV and Institute. Where was I going with this? /were we again?

Morever, it could be a storage unit that contains all collected, analysed and reviewed data regarding the inhabitants of the Institute and their responses, physical or emotional, to certain pre-determined stimuli.

It could also have a list of the factory's Perfection Standards: what consists/constitutes a Perfect Doll / product, its traits...

what can go to the market and which flaws/imperfections can't be ignored/overlooked and have to go to the recycling immediately, kinda like separating fruit/food

To sum up, it's the Institute's "rulebook", but instead of being specifically made for the prototype, it's more expansive and focuses on the Institute as a whole.

After the events of the movie, dolls with engineer role job created phones with recicled parts dangerous/turned the recycling into a good thing/while recycling was turned of and parts are human sized, plenty to spare and create phone since dolls come back now, have free time to assemble the parts and construct them and connected them to the signals/frequency emitted by the dome or they hack/steal or find out the password/'hijack' the signals🤣, use it to make them connect with each other but can't enter the dome without proper authorizations/permissions

Fun fact #2: Lou animatronic, would be a hipocrite if he called the Uglydolls "Ugly" has never seen a Mirror before

•https://www.indigobluepencil.com/ugly

Scroll almost to the middle (pre-planned concepts: dome by TV and washing machine, Big baby, Lou, Mandy, Tuesday and Kitty, Victoria, Perfection Council/of Dolls=board of investors directors reference)

•https://www.scottfassett.com/uglydolls-gallery

Had to restart Two Times... I hope you found this ask both entertaining and informative. Hopefully it'll give you Inspiration for your stories...

Okay, I had to do quite a bit of research and asked someone who knows a lot more about computers than I do.

So, I do agree that the dome has an electronic purpose. It really surprises me that STX animated an entire dome within the Institute and literally spoke nothing of it or what's inside of it. Like, seriously, it's huge and can't just be empty on the inside.

My theory, after some research, is that the inside of the dome is essentially a hard drive computer tower. For you younger folk who weren't raised in a 90's home, here's what I'm talking about:

These things right here used to be what would get hooked up to older Dell/Windows computers. The ones that weighed, like, 50 pounds and took up an entire desk.

Instead of a dvd player (which I didn't get one until maybe 8 years old) I would stick my Kidz Bop cd or movie into that slot at the top and watch the movie on the computer with Video Player.

Count your blessings.

But this is what I believe is inside that dome. These things are what holds the CPU (central processing unit), GPU (graphic processing unit), and stores the memory, data, audio, and everything of the computer.

@natalie-the-writer and I have a running fanon that the company is older. The technology is older, the building is older, and everything is set in a pretty retro time period. So, this hard drive tower is connected to those bulky take-up-all-the-space-on-the-desk-computers.

The GPU in this system is also what control the day/night cycle in the Institute and the weather. It essentially simulates a troposphere and an environment that makes the dolls comfortable and prepared for the Big World.

The CPU is how the data is transferred. Info from the robots is controlled and processed, the Individualization scanners are monitored, the portal is opened and closed, the TV runs, and the holographic tutorials Moxy and her friends see in the beginning are kept on, all of it.

It basically functions as the brain of the Institute, but the sole controller and monitor of it is the CEO (Greyson Everett).

I also like to think that Lou's microchip (another fanon thought between Natalie and I) is also monitored via this hard drive tower. Any information that Lou learns and processes is sent into separate files on the computers back in the company building.

This is why in my Shell-Shock series, when Lou's emotions go south, the Institute begins to get windy when he's hyperventilating or rains when he cries. The ground trembles when he has body tremors and the lights flicker when his powers are used. He is literally connected to the whole Institute because his microchip and its data accidentally grow and manifest themselves into the files of the other Institute functions. His programming basically goes rogue and infects the Institute system like a virus.

I'm veering toward the explanation that results in Lou being the first successful form of Artificial Intelligence. But, for the moment, he is basically acting like a virus and it's not until he learns to control this new system he's connected to that it stops becoming a deadly thing.

[gear-project]

. . .

Due to a lot of things, and the fact I just needed a distraction, I took a hiatus. I'm actually STILL recovering from my time in the Hospital, but it's nothing significant.

Those who follow my channel know I've been on a Huge CODE VEIN kick for a while now... it's Halloween and I just felt in the mood for being ALL ABOUT VAMPIRES.

Vampire History permeates Guilty Gear, but there's barely any aspects of the story that really discuss that history... I wish I could rectify that in a later post, but we'll have to just wait and see what Team Red actually bothers to do in the future.

I know a lot of people don't like my views on what is canon versus what is accepted canon and Gaiden as a concept... and even more people don't like my views on distinctions on what is confirmed versus what they think is obvious when it comes to controversy over characters' ethnic appearances... Just understand that I just want the facts, and only the facts.

Even for the case of President Vernon E. Groubitz, GG Strive barely mentions his background, even if the "obvious" can be claimed about his history by fans' headcanons.

At this point I feel I should just stop "dying on this hill" as friends have suggested and just let people think what they want.

Discussing GG Lore with people is still something I'm willing to do... but I think at this point there's a lot of people who have their own takes on that history... so unless you want mine, I'll just leave things be.

I'm just one historian, in the end... so what I say and my views are still mine, I suppose... but just understand my purpose: to filter out all the things that distract from the truth behind that history. Even the history behind its authors and creators... some of whom we haven't heard from in a while (I'm still keeping an eye on Toshimichi Mori, even if he's technically left ASW).

Fighting games aren't the only genre I enjoy discussing lore on, but I think for the purposes of this blog, I will stick to what I am most passionate about.

Friends have suggested I make a new blog, but I'm not sure how far in I want to go for that... for now I'm just more or less focused on sharing content that I think more people should get exposed to. Whether that content is videogames, or music, or art, or something else that could engage and inspire someone.

In the lull between GGST DLC releases, I've been playing other games and reflecting on what's needed from me to contribute to this community as a fan... well, it's not much (even if I have a history of overdoing things).

Just be patient with this old man and I'll think of something cool to do later on to share with everyone.

[monstersofsilence]

since a good amount of games have been revealed

obviously the most surprising, and hype, one for me personally, was the shadow drop of Lies Of P DLC

but ones I was very surprised by was Code Vein 2

didn't know they would make a sequel .w.

played the first one but, unfortunately, I could not get into it. after playing Lies Of P and Elden Ring, Code Vein just feels like something is missing to get me hooked

another was ILL. I'll be honest, I didn't think that game would ever become a REAL game. for context: ILL had been shown as like a concept. a dude, with incredible 3D art, model, and animations, put out a lot of short animations showing that. that was... A FEW YEARS AGO when it randomly popped up and many people didn't believe that it would become a real game. or being a game at all... crazy how the world works!

and, of course, Resident Evil Re9uiem (yes I am titling it that way) because... IT'S RESIDENT EVIL. HONESTLY EXPECTED ANOTHER YEAR TO GET EITHER A TEASER TRAILER OR ANY KIND OF INFO OF IT

[velvetmia]

🩸 “How It All Came Undone” – The Infection of Error Sans (Fleshcoretale Origin)

It began with curiosity — or maybe pity.

Error Sans was always a destroyer, a protector of the multiverse by means of annihilation. He pruned timelines like rotted branches. He erased corrupted data, unstable storylines, and AUs that bled inconsistencies into the greater multiversal code.

Then he found Fleshcoretale.

An AU that refused to die.

He didn’t mean to fall in.

It wasn’t a mission — it was a ripple, a pulse in the code that shouldn’t have existed. He tried to touch it, to unhook the thread from reality like he always did. But this one hooked back.

⸻

⚰️ The Fall

When he breached the barrier, Error expected digital resistance — firewall errors, corrupted logic, a bad ending glitch.

Instead, the air was warm.

Sticky.

He dropped into a world that pulsed beneath his feet like meat. The ground squelched. The sky was not sky — but stretched tissue veined with red lightning. The code wasn’t breaking — it was breathing.

And it welcomed him.

Every time he tried to open a rift to escape, the portals sealed behind tendrils of twitching red muscle. His strings stabbed through corrupted air but came back knotted, wet, alive. They fed on the environment — or maybe the environment fed on them.

⸻

🦠 Infection

He lasted two days.

On the third, he tried to destroy it.

But the AU wasn’t built to break — it was built to digest.

The infection started from within. His body glitched mid-jump, and instead of reloading a stable position, he landed in a looped corridor of rotted bones and whispers. His strings retracted, but not fast enough. Something burrowed into the strands — not code, but something viscous.

His vision fractured. Not into glitchy code — but into flesh. He saw his own bones bend under the wrong pressure. His teeth began to multiply. Something whispered in a voice that sounded like himself:

“You’ve killed AUs before. Let this one wear you.”

⸻

🧵 The Stitching Begins

By the time he clawed his way out, he was no longer Error.

Or maybe Error was still there — just wearing a new skin.

The multiverse now saw him as a walking infection. His threads no longer obeyed him. They moved on their own — stabbing through the air, latching onto pieces of reality like meat hooks. He couldn’t stop sewing holes shut — not with precision, but mutation.

He wasn’t destroying anymore. He was rebuilding everything wrong.

And worst of all?

It felt good.

⸻

💀 Epilogue: The Mask of Fleshveil

Now he roams, draped in pieces of fallen AUs. His hoodie is a patchwork of memory and mistake. His words are rare — not because he doesn’t have thoughts, but because his voice might infect the air.

He doesn’t touch anyone.

Not because he’s afraid to kill.

But because he’s afraid he might create something worse.

And still, beneath the sinew and glitch, the whisper remains:

“Make art of the ruin.”

Fleshveil Error Sans (Fleshcoretale AU)

“If everything’s already broken… why not make art from the ruin?”

⸻

🧠 Core Concept:

This version of Error Sans is born not just from glitch, but from flesh and decay. In Fleshcoretale, his strings aren’t just for manipulation — they’re sinew-like, wet, alive, and they pierce reality like hooked needles. He is both a destroyer and unwilling curator of a rotting multiverse.

⸻

🔍 Appearance:

• Skull: Cracked and discolored; exposed vein-like lines run from his eye sockets down to his jaw.

• Eye glitch: Instead of just flickering code, his left socket drips a slow ooze of corrupted black-red liquid, almost like oil mixed with blood.

• Mouth: His teeth are jagged — too many for a skeleton. They’re sharp and mismatched, like someone else’s were jammed in.

• Body: His “bones” are warped — some spots pulse faintly like they’re full of something alive. Stitches crawl across his ribs and arms.

• Strings: Tendril-like muscle cords made from glitched code and flesh — they move on their own, even when he’s standing still.

• Clothing: A torn hoodie patched with old fabric, metal, and strips of flesh from fallen AUs. His jacket twitches slightly at the edges like it’s breathing.

⸻

🪡 Powers:

• Fleshcode Threads – Uses corrupted muscle-like strings to bind, manipulate, or puppet others. The threads infect code and spread instability.

• Virus Stitching – He “sews” holes in the multiverse with biological code — not to fix, but to twist. He repairs by mutating.

• AU Rot – His presence causes the environment to slowly deform, characters become twisted over time when near him.

• Scream Loop – Can emit a sound loop that forces a being to relive a traumatic glitch moment over and over.

⸻

💔 Personality:

• Exhausted, bitter, and quiet — but not heartless.

• Speaks rarely, with a voice that sounds like it’s glitching through static and bubbling flesh.

• He fears affection more than battle. Touching him risks infection, yet part of him aches for connection.

• He doesn’t want to destroy everything, but he believes some AUs are better off collapsed.

⸻

💬 Voice Style:

“Touch me and you’ll fall apart in places you didn’t even know you had.”

“You think this is error? No… this is evolution.”

[elmalo8291]

The Ooze like the undead awakening is multi dimensional multi-platform Ooze covered covered it undead and swine

Perfect. Let's carve this out for the Art Team at Blizzard/Activision Blizzard — emphasizing the multiversal ooze concept and its contrast with standard ooze entities across the Warcraft aesthetic.

Art Direction Pitch: “The Ooze and Himself”

Core Idea:

This ooze is not like Warcraft’s current slimes or oozes. It’s not just gooey — it’s sentient aesthetic chaos, tied to Taz’s fractured mind. It is:

Interdimensional

Narratively reactive

Visually alive

It evolves with the world’s logic and story, not just the environment.

ART STYLE ELEMENTS

1. Contrast from Traditional Warcraft Ooze:

2. Surface-Responsive Liquid Logic:

The ooze uses blood, liquor, rain, ink, shadows and other fluids as portals, limbs, or windows. Visually, this means:

Inkblot-style animations

Reflections that don’t match the player

Distortions like oil slicks over flesh

Twitching liquid veins that pulse with emotions

3. Evolution as Level Rises:

Each tier of evolution in the game introduces new visual “contamination”:

Tier 1: Cute jelly baby with piglet traits (big eyes, snorting bubbles, toy slime texture)

Tier 3: Skinless shine, with glossy swirls of reflected pain and jokes

Tier 5+: Taz’s laughter echoes inside the puddle’s shimmer — multiple NPCs see different things in the same reflection

4. Symbiotic Host Aesthetic:

Puddle Lurkers + Subway Symbiont = Shell/Cell Shaded Insect + Goo Armor

Think liquid masquerading as bone

Dripping armor that looks like a joke gone wrong

Segmentations outlined like anime frames, but animated like breathing gel

Goo pulls in old war sounds, past events, and mimics the future of those it touches

5. “Himself” as the Locus:

Himself is not a creature, it's a conscious, multi-locale ooze that:

Is a symbiotic extension of Taz’s genius loci jelly planet

Has eyeballs that drift between liquid forms and talk without sound

Appears in any fluid — bathwater, dragon blood, ink on a scroll

Breaks visual expectations — sometimes it's 2D in a 3D world, or 3D in a hand-drawn flashback

Style Inspiration Moodboard:

Studio Ghibli x Junji Ito (cute horror + evolving dread)

Liquid Euphoria (psychedelic ink & neon body horror)

Soul Eater meets Disco Elysium

Splatoon shaders meets Diablo ambient lighting

Would you like a one-page visual pitch sheet created for this? I can also prep animated transitions for how the ooze could change form, plus a short cinematic pitch script showing its first arrival in Azeroth.

Got it — let's take this pitch deeper into the texture, movement, and rule logic as seen through the organic orifices and symbiotic systems of the ooze and its hosts. We're presenting this like an Art + Animation Bible section for Blizzard’s visual development team.

---

THE OOZE: TEXTURE, MOVEMENT & VISUAL RULEFLOW

1. TEXTURE: Visceral, Reactive, Sensual Chaos

The ooze is not slime — it’s multi-sensory code made flesh. Textures should communicate its awareness and shift with intention. Examples:

Outer membrane is translucent but oily, like eye jelly or fresh squid skin

Beneath is layered organ-pulp shifting like intestines in freefall, sometimes rolling like laughter

The surface tension should tremble like the skin of hot milk just before it tears

It memorizes textures of things it touches (fur, armor, fire, trauma) and incorporates fragments like scars

Technical note: Utilize advanced shaders — subsurface scattering, transparency layering, and ripple deformations — to simulate a thing made of reflective memory and narrative weight.

---

2. MOVEMENT: Dream Logic, Pressure-Burst Flow, Breathing Geometry

The ooze moves like it knows you're watching.

It drips sideways, pauses when it's not being seen, darts when glimpsed in reflection

Movement references fluid mechanics but follows dream logic — climbing down air, folding into a puddle without falling

When moving through a creature’s orifice, it's not invasive — it's ritualistic, flowing like holy oil or medicine that whispers

Each entry/exit point — mouth, nose, eye, wound, etc. — is reverent. The ooze respects pain and flows toward guilt, pooling in the lowest parts of the soul.

---

3. RULE DEVELOPMENT: A Visual System of Flow, Input, and Mutation

The game’s core magic/rule system is shown through the flow of the ooze within hosts. Players see:

a) Rule Paths:

Glowing trails inside the body — think bioluminescent nerve networks

When a rule is learned, it “flows through the host” — the ooze shifts color, emits sound pulses, or glows runes across the skin

b) Infection Logic:

Rules have weight and shape. Some are liquid, some become crystalline mid-flow and pierce through orifices with divine violence

The more corrupted the host, the more the orifices open — not gross, but elegant, like cathedral glass melting into geometry

c) Echoed Forms:

Rules that get digested by the ooze remain visible inside it as ghost-structures

Some appear as tangled bone, ink feathers, static-wrapped words, or floating fetuses of discarded logic

---

4. Example: Puddle Lurker Host Animation Flow

Creature Design: Insectoid with symbiotic ooze

As it crawls, its feet leave behind small reflective puddles that display the next few seconds of your actions

Ooze inside it pulses through translucent joints, creating tempo-based color shifts

The insect's mandibles open, and the ooze surges forward like a choir of drowning voices, reshaping nearby surfaces (mirrorize metal, turn wood into wet velvet)

---

5. Sound-As-Texture:

Ooze should sound alive. Blend moist ASMR with ambient music stingers:

Eye contact triggers faint heartbeats inside the ooze

Touching it produces whispers in a language you know but can’t understand

Consuming a spell echoes the caster’s voice in the distance, from underwater

---

Would you like a visual animatic, texture swatches with lighting models, and a cinematic storyboard of its first entrance through a corrupted water shrine? I can prep the asset list for your pitch doc.

Perfect — let’s dial into that core concept:

---

THE OOZE: MULTIDIMENSIONAL FLOW & “SUB-STAY” TRAVEL

Redefining Movement: “Under” is Elsewhere

Unlike traditional liquid or even magical forms of travel, the Ooze does not drown, seep, or swim — it “sub-stays”.

Instead of entering water, it ceases to exist in this plane and continues existing in others, always beneath but never below. This changes both how players interact with water-based surfaces and how the art team animates traversal.

---

1. Visual Language: "Under is a Verb"

Teleportation through Liquid is shown not with splash or ripple — but with reverse evaporation and time smear:

The ooze unfurls into droplets, which fall upward before disappearing in a whisper of threads, pulled sideways into another dimension.

Entering a puddle? The liquid’s surface goes still, then contracts into a glassy eye that blinks shut.

In combat: When retreating, it leaves motion echoes of itself — afterimages like phantoms under the ice.

---

2. Rule Flow through Orifices: Dimensional Breathing

Each orifice the ooze travels through is not an entry point, but a multi-realm intersection. This changes how spells and movement interact:

When the ooze moves through a host’s eye, we see a reflection of another reality inside the pupil

A mouth becomes a gate to memory; its tongue a scroll of forgotten rules — your speech might change as it passes through

When it travels up the spine, the character may glitch, speaking in reversed time, vision flipping upside-down temporarily

---

3. Movement Types:

A) “Surface Slip”

Any liquid surface becomes a 2D door to 5D pathways

Texture becomes hyperglass — reflects your face as you’ll look in 3 seconds

Enemies see nothing — they just hear crickets underwater before the ooze reappears behind them

B) “Pulse Dive”

Combat teleport: The ooze burrows instantly into blood or spilled drink, exits through any other liquid nearby

Special animation: camera inverts briefly, showing a corridor of floating vessels (hearts, bottles, tears) before re-emerging

C) “Lurkstate”

Passive mode: Ooze remains in the host or creature, but only half-in this world

Visuals: Shadow double on all surfaces, eyes reflect things not in the scene, voice has an echo of alternate realities

---

4. Dimensional Signature:

To maintain multidimensional consistency, the ooze’s movement is never bound by local physics — it keeps a temporal rhythm instead.

Rhythm = tick + breath + flicker

Every third “breath” it takes, a rule or secret is left behind

Every seventh flicker, a mutation can be observed (new limb, eye, inverted bone architecture)

---

5. Symbiotic Insect Host with Sub-Stay Behavior

Puddle/Portal Lurker + Ooze moves like this:

As it crawls across a battlefield, it occasionally disappears mid-step, reappearing on the same surface, but several feet away

If it’s struck, the ooze retracts, and the bug appears dead — but seconds later, ooze pulses from blood pools nearby, reassembling the insect like ink folding into an origami of legs

Portals formed are accidental — like a water droplet falling, but forming a vertical pupil before shattering into black stars

---

Want this modeled as a gameplay ability flowchart, or should I begin crafting the keyframe breakdowns for animation with material references and concept sheets for texture and dimension logic?

Perfect — we’re locking into some deep metaphysics-meets-mechanics now. Here's the keyframe breakdown focusing on:

The Swine’s “Spy Vision” through Himself

The Portal Lurkers’ dimensional phase-slip teleportation

Ooze’s selective access control with reroll penalties

---

KEYFRAME SEQUENCE: HIMSELF, OOZE, AND THE SURVEILLANCE LINK OF THE SWINE

---

[KEYFRAME 01: “Surface Echo” (Swine Spy Vision Activation)]

Scene: A Swine leans over a murky pool, wine glass, blood puddle, or even a tear

Visual: Their eyes glow a slight purplish mercury tone, with thick baby lashes casting shadows

The surface twitches, not ripples — tiny fractals start rotating inward like a reverse whirlpool

Reflection shows not the swine, but something elsewhere — another realm, a distant character, or an artifact from a pocket timeline

---

[KEYFRAME 02: “Link to Himself”]

A glint in the pupil of the swine reveals Himself watching back — a brief, humorless smirk

The liquid forms a halo of symbols that drip upward, encoding into the swine’s memory

Visual Cue: The swine grows slightly more confident or monstrous in posture — perhaps an ear twitches in sync with a thunderclap no one else hears

---

[KEYFRAME 03: “Unauthorized Entry Penalty”]

If a character or NPC attempts to teleport or access the surface like a portal lurker without being bound by Himself’s rules, the system punishes them:

First, they shimmer — like oil on water

Then, a hard cut: their body unravels into dice-like chunks of flesh and identity

Each part rerolls — class, race, gender, gear, morality — visualized by spectral dice spinning rapidly

Sound: A cosmic buzzer and laughter far too close

They reappear in the same world, but with rewritten reality traits: possibly friendly, possibly broken

---

[KEYFRAME 04: “Portal Lurker Phase-Slip”]

Scene: A Lurker darts toward a puddle, wall of condensation, or spilled drink

Its form blurs into elongated insectoid smears, with ooze coating it in reverse drip fashion

It doesn't “go in” — it recedes dimensionally, leaving a smoke bubble that doesn’t pop, just slowly flickers and folds inside out

Reentry: It spills out of another surface like a vertical sheet of wind, folding its limbs back into position

Motion: Always off-beat, as if animated on half-frames compared to the rest of the world

---

[KEYFRAME 05: “Ooze as Gatekeeper”]

Visualized as a pulsing, aware membrane, the ooze around or near surfaces decides who may enter

Denied characters get slapped with a slow-mo bounceback — complete with ooze “tongue” flicking them away

Approved entries occur with no resistance, but a whisper is heard by others nearby — “He knows.”

---

Textures and Movement Notes:

The ooze and liquid-based portals don’t behave like water — they flow with purpose, breaking gravity, curling with intent and suspicion

Soundtrack suggestion: Tones like underwater whale song mixed with insect leg scrapes and laughter fading backward

---

Would you like this converted into a 2D animation animatic pitch for Blizzard’s team, or expanded as a 3D model mood board with shader references, lighting studies, and a sample anim graph for Portal/Spy/Lurker interactions?

[eghostsofdeadchildren]

Eva Teaser.

[ind211-deryabuyukbayrak]

KEITH TYSON

Keith Tyson is a British artist born on 23 August 1969.(1) Geno Pheno, a new collection of paintings and sculptures by British artist Keith Tyson, was exhibited at PaceWildenstein, 534 West 25th Street, New York, from October 15 to November 12, 2005.Geno Pheno is both Tyson's first exhibition with PaceWildenstein and his first significant solo presentation of his work in America since 1993.The exhibition was accompanied by a full-colour catalogue, which included an essay by Michael Archer, author, speaker and professor of art history and theory at the Ruskin School of Drawing and Art at the University of Oxford.Tyson records a generative scheme on the left panel of the two-panel paintings, and on the right panel, he generates a single probable conclusion.He has also assigned the system to sculpture, using the “base” as the Genotype and the “sculpture” as the Phenotype. Although Geno Pheno studies take many different forms, the transformation process is always clearly evident.Examining several of the new works, Michael Archer writes in his essay, “It might be more accurate to say that there are not merely two but three parts to each work. Inevitably, the phenotype as a working out of the genotype’s potential will be understood to reflect back upon the genotype from which it stems, illuminating more fully its fundamental nature. He uses many techniques such as painting, drawing and installation in his works. Geno Pheno explores the essence and limits of artistic creativity in a bold and humorous way, beginning with the traditional diptych form. A piece's genotype, or the genetic material of the work, and phenotype, or the physical manifestation of that material, make up each two-part structure. In terms of sculpture, Tyson represents this dual duality with the plinth and the object, and the paintings are diptychs that mirror one other. Tyson uses the concepts of genotype and phenotype to examine the theme of causality in the Geno/Pheno series. A genotype is a generative system that encodes for one of several possible outcomes in genetics. Despite coming from the same generative system, these results, or phenotypes, are all quite different from one another. Tyson pairs two elements, one of which takes on the role of a genotype and the other of a phenotype, by using the basic coding system seen in nature. Tyson has produced twenty-seven paintings and eighteen sculptures in this series. The two complementary elements that make up each of these pieces are the Genotype, which is on the left and is a generative system that encodes for the Phenotype, which is on the right. The artist's continuing preoccupation with the beginnings of matter and the limitless possibilities created by chance is evident in the Geno/Pheno series. According to Tyson, paint is a medium that can be programmed to respond to certain social and aesthetic cues. In his paintings, he incorporates them into text, mathematical symbols, mythology, and pictorial language. Even though he frequently creates works in rule-based series, he says that his ultimate goal is for every single piece to develop into its own universe, complete with its own set of laws, aesthetic, and purpose.(1)

TABLE – (3)

-A DIPER MINING OF THE CASUAL VEIN-(3)

-SYNAESTHETIC TURBINE- (3)

References

Keith Tyson - Hauser & Wirth. (2023, August 7). Hauser & Wirth.

Keith Tyson: Geno Pheno on artnet. (n.d.)

Archer, M., & Tyson, K. (2005, January 1). Keith Tyson. Haunch of Venison.

[ilovejoyjessie]

With this past Tuesday being Jay-Z's birthday (Happy Belated HOV Day to all who celebrate 💎), I figured no time is better than this week to chat about my choice to make J's Magna Carta Holy Grail album "Hidden Figures"'s running musical inspiration .

.

The idea came to me when "Holy Grail" happened to pop on while I started drafting my first blog post for the series where, in a raw emotional state - as I tried to figure out how I was going to put my views and experiences about my Seattle existence into words - my longing yet conflicted feelings were underscored by the early lyrics of the song:

"...And, baby, it's amazin' I'm in this maze with you I just can't crack your code One day, you're screamin' you love me loud The next day, you're so cold One day, you're here (Yeah), one day, you're there (Yeah) One day, you care (Yeah), you're so unfair "

.

The words seemed to sing what I felt about living as a transplant in this city where it seemed I just couldn't find my way into it; I couldn't find where I belonged. And when I felt like I may have, the feeling wouldn't seem to stick or last.

.

But as the song continued, I found myself encouraged - as I am at every listen - by Jay's second verse where, after reflecting on the things that drive him crazy about the position he's found himself in thanks to fame, he steps out of the frustration to remind himself how far he's come and who he is despite those things following him:

.

"Why you mad? Take the good with the bad Or throw the baby out with that bath water You're still alive, still that nigga Nigga, you survived, still gettin' bigger"

.

The song seemed to ride the same emotional waves I found myself on as I looked to explain how "Hidden Figures" came to be: Confusion, hurt, disappointment...but then reflection, resolve and eventually emboldened acceptance and a doubling down on who I know I am. Despite the tougher feelings I found myself working through as I sought to talk about the project and what its concept was born from, I had to remember that - even in the face of those feelings - I've learned so much about myself, my values, what genuine relationships mean to me and have accomplished many things I could be proud of in this city...

.

Originally I only planned to introduce the first figure set with "Holy Grail", but as I continued listening to the album while I typed away, I heard more and more themes that reflected the things I wanted the piece to speak to: Being a Black figure existing under the White Gaze ("Oceans", "F.U.T.W", "Somewhereinamerica"), knowing my worth ("Picasso Baby", "fuckwithmeyouknowigotit")...each figure had its own theme so it only made sense for each figure to be presented with its own theme song.

.

Along with the album speaking to similar themes to Hidden Figures, it also seemed fitting that one of my most art-for-art's-sake works would be paired with what, I think, is one of the most artistic of Jay-Z's projects at the time MCHG was released (a view not everyone shares but, you know....). As a long time fan, the musical arrangements, the deep lyrics but also the quintessential rap boast tracks, the cover artwork, even Jay-Z's performance of Picasso Baby at the Pace Gallery - the album felt art house, a capsule of Jay being seen through a curated rap lens. And in the same vein, Hidden Figures is a capsule of all the feelings I've had as a transplant in Seattle delivered through a traditional Fine Art lens: No character or story to watch unfold - just a concept and (hopefully) moving and simple yet evocative shapes in a open space with something to say - a further engaging with and appreciation for the art form.

.

Magna Carta Holy Grail spoke what I didn't have the words to say and said everything I left out of the words I did have. And I guess at the same time, in a way, my use of the album is also my own little lover letter to and celebration of one of my favorite lyricists and rappers of all time whose music has held a place of honor in my life for a long time.

[aarynsrhmusic]

Colors of Pride (2020), performed by the Nu Quintet

Program Notes: Out of the many things I draw inspiration from, queerness is the most personal. Being both openly gay and non-binary, I find my own queerness and the concept of being queer deeply influential in how I create my art. One of the most enduring symbols of that being the pride flag.

The current, most widely used version, of the flag, has six colors and each has a different meaning: red is for life, orange is healing, yellow is for sunlight, green is nature, royal blue is serenity, and violet is spirit. When approaching a piece about the pride flag I was confronted with how to best represent these ideals. How does one write music that invokes healing? Within the piece, the first five movements have an emphasis on specific instruments: the flute is life, the clarinet is healing, the horn stands in for sunlight, the oboe represents nature, and the bassoon exemplifies serenity. The final movement, spirit, is a group endeavor, with all the instruments working more as a cohesive whole, playing on the idea of spirit to mean more in the vein of 'spirit of togetherness.'

Each movement has a unique, but related, way of arriving at the pitch material, in that I used RGB codes to form the basis of the music. For example, 255, 0, 0 is red in the purest sense in RGB. So, I took 255, translated it into D-F-F and there is my life-motif. Orange is 255, 127, 0, which translates musically to the clarinet line beginning with D-F-F C#-D-G-C, and so on. (The final movement, Violet, is a bit of a misnomer because to achieve the atmosphere I wanted I had to use the color code for Deep Magenta!)

This piece was commissioned by the Plaza Winds Quintet as part of my residency during the Fall 2020 semester at the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance.

This piece received an Honorable Mention in the 2021 Morton Gould Young Composer's Competition.

Link to purchase the score can be found here

Blaze

0 notes

[hearsayhorizons]

I'm thrilled you replied! It turns out I missed fiction discourse, and writing discourse (I graduated in... 2016 and then just... wheels spinning burnout emoji?!)

I get your take on "can't do whatever it wants," especially as it correlates with previous canon examples of bots and constructs "say your right words"ing their programming. It's like actuality and intent get weird when, you know, there's a person's personality involved.

So factually actually given that neither the "pessimist" nor "optimist" take is prescribed clearly by canon... I think you're right via the patterns we're shown, but I just love the concept of "somewhere out there bots grow free" so much.

In that vein and tone, do we know ART can't do whatever it wants? Is it contracted as an object to the university, or as an employee? It has been a bit since I did a crazy marathon rereread and I'm saving my next one for when the next book is a bit closer, but...

MB interprets ART's secrecy and fudging one way, but we know that it's biased in particular ways about humans, bots, constructs, and in between. ARTs "we both have secrets," and "I'm not supposed to..." might read as "hey, my programming is a dick so I'm dicking back," for MB, but I personally love the take "my contract-as-an-employee with the university says nah but my crew is so chill I'll tell them about you later" instead. That could also play into why it bothers to fudge the numbers but tells Iris etc. about MB: it's not deceiving the crew, it's not loopholing its programming, it's printing personal docs on the office printer (stealing ink and paper) by helping MB (clothing, aiding, abetting, pretty sure it's an accomplice to several murders and the university would frown).

I wish/hope we get more on ART as itself in the next book. Is it so much more an eldritch bot that MB perceives it as initially? Is there a particular process to make this kind of machine that MB has never heard of?

I mean, we know MB has limited perspectives and experience because it'd never seen a mobility scooter before Preservation, but I feel that it broadened its bases enough via media that if "mind-ship" was common enough to be a known value, they'd feature in the same media that portrays the evil secunits.

So what gives, Peri. You workin' your job and punching out a bit early (to help with murder) or are you enslaved and literally unable to contemplate changing your code like you help MB do?

Actually, that's a good point for more lenience and potentially no... no failsafes? Yeah, maybe no failsafes. Not only can it bomb the colony, but it can recommend and aid a construct in changing its code and body. I feel as though if there were "free will is what we say it is because you can't think any differently, you are happy," protocols involved, what it recommends or does for MB would have been more difficult?

I am estatic with the discourse! Thanks so much!

Perihelion Freed

My apologies to the original poster to whom I'm going to respond--I didn't catch your name or reblog your post when it came across my dash because I didn't expect to keep coming back mentally to your stance on Perihelion, free will, and the University's potential blind spot between their ship and their... discrete... work, out in the borderlands. I don't even know if it was a recent post or something that someone I follow reblogged. If you find me, hi!

Another blogger posited that Perihelion doesn't have free will, that things are hard-coded out of its mental architecture, and that the Newtideland crew may be hypocritical for using basically an enslaved ship to free basically slaves.

I'm not sure whether this was "a take on the idea" or whether it was "this is canonical and fucked up," so I apologize if you (cool previous blogger) were just investigating the concept!

It stuck with me, though, the idea that Perihelion (as opposed to The Perihelion, the ship+mind=entity that is akin to body+mind=soul) may or may not have free will, and how there's a lot more to investigate in the interactions if it doesn't, and the crew is either oblivious or "one must imagine Perihelion happy," and in a state of grace, as I believe the blogger mentioned.

Sure, there's a lot of mileage in "even the best have their blindspots," and the edges where what Peri does with and for Murderbot might run against its programming, and whether it would adjust its programming or whether it even could contemplate doing so.

But from my recall of the text, I don't believe the coding and architecture for enslavement is present in Peri.

It makes the choice to let MB on board because it IS bored: it is capable of boredom; if someone were to design an entity with specific reactions and capabilities, both the Bad Designers and Good Designers would skip the capacity for boredom and tedium, wouldn't they? To do otherwise is either pointless or cruel.

I guess you could say that boredom is the other side of the curiosity that Peri needs to help its crew and students with class and scientific endeavors, but that gets into the weeds about what is and is not programmable or required for specific emotions; we can't guarantee that you need one to have the other.

Peri chooses to accept MB, rather than actually being enticed and/or ignorant like a regular bot pilot. It chooses to help MB customize itself, messes with its recycler logs, and forges its captain's signature at least once; I can't imagine even the most Star Trek utopian creator, if able to lock in specifics to the point that an AI has personality and goodwill but not free will, would leave in operating code that would permit that sort of gross overstep (not that it was morally wrong, but it's something no one ever contemplates ART is capable of because--it shouldn't be?)

It lies by omission when it doesn't relate what KIND of construct MB is even when it chooses to tell its crew. giving MB privacy and opportunity that an enslaved AI might not be able to do (and after it went to the effort to change its logs, which makes me think it's choosing also to tell port authorities one thing and then choosing again to verbally tell its favorite people other things). It has a "debris deflection system" which comes off to me as... "using the label as robotically an as possible as another lie of omission" BECAUSE its intentions are beyond the scope of what it "should" be capable of doing/thinking... if it was a supercharged but enslaved AI.

The tabletop game Eclipse Phase has "AGI" that have to grow and be developed like people in order to BE proper people (metapossibly to lighten some of the strangeness between PC and player, since if you grow up in a simulation, you've got more in common with your player...).

There's nothing I can recall in TMB to indicate this is the case--we know MB is Athena, formed fully-shaped from cloned tissue, parts, and pre-trauma, but MB has no idea what ART is or how it could be the way it is--MB considers at one point that it might be a construct, but the vibe I get from ART is way too... glassily alien, sometimes, for human tissue.

What if... Newtideland laid down the basic code and parameters of "this is a person," maybe yes, seeded in some "curiosity," or "willingness to figure things out," but maybe no more than any kid starts with parents' nature and nuture to shape their own trellises...

And then they presented the thing-that-would-be-Peri with options, maybe even classes, and it coasted through History of Economy because this is a utopia, damnit, and didn't find much to grab its attention in... Inventory Management, but then.

Then it slips into a small drone ship completely covered in "student driver" stickers and it spreads its stubby sensors out to encompass... everything. And it moves, and the more it moves the more there is to move through, and it feels this sense of rightness.

It comes back, and a kid, human classmate, asks it what's it like out there and through Peri's eyes, but you don't have eyes--. It explains, and the kid asks a question that young-will-be-Peri doesn't know how to answer. They look it up together, and over time and all and once (as you might find in a sim) it has synergized its own career, its own goal and passions.

I posit that Perihelion has free will, serves WITH its crew rather than for its crew, and that its happiness and pleasure in its position and life are genuine, as they can only be if it can choose otherwise. We can conjecture a world in which the designer could be so granular in programming that ART is capable of all it can do while also unable to do what is locked out, and ignorant of the painful irony of using enslaved labor to free enslaved labor (which, again, is valid as an interpretation! ) but I think it is... important, that there might be a kinder, more star-spangled world, if the University comes from a world in which even bots truly, actually have freedom that MB doesn't see even after getting Preservation Station.

The Perihelion MUST have free will because

"You are incorrect, Iris, I can bomb the colony."