Re: Small Fandoms Thread - Marathon
anonymous
March 2 2014, 21:18:04 UTC
He makes for such a scintillating topic of conversation!
Personally, I'm really hoping he makes some sort of appearance in Destiny. He could be the Traveler (or involved in its creation), there could be stuff on Mars referencing him and the crash of Traxus IV and MIDA and Strauss, and while as far as I know the currently planned accessible locations in the game are just Earth, Venus, the Moon, Mars, and possibly Europa*, if we get as far out as reclaiming Pluto we might get buzzed by Durandal in the Manus Celer Dei... So many possibilities!
Also, I volunteered to write up a walkthrough for the first two dream levels/"Aie Mak Sicur," so one way or another, I can finally get my theory that the Hangar 96 terminals are from Durandal up on the Marathon's Story page. Even if it's just in the forums. (It's a perfectly valid theory! And there certainly aren't many others about the dream level terminals, at least not in the speculation pages, and I've read practically all of them.)
*It's one of the locations we've seen concept art for, but only early on and nothing recent, so maybe it's been pushed back to the next game.
Captcha believes this theory! "sphere agespace" Of course, I sometimes suspect Captcha of having more than a usual interest in Durandal...
Re: Small Fandoms Thread - Marathon
anonymous
March 2 2014, 21:59:33 UTC
I've seen you mention that theory before but you didn't really go into much detail (also, I haven't played Infinity and unlike the first two games picking it up from fandom doesn't seem to work). Care to elaborate?
Re: Small Fandoms Thread - Marathon
anonymous
March 2 2014, 23:56:45 UTC
HAPPILY. :D (Yeah, Infinity is a bit of a difficult game to get your head around, even if you do play it - I know the first time I played it I didn't have a clue what was going on.)
[Cut because this could get long...] So, the Hangar 96 terminals occur only on dream levels, which are already pretty surreal experiences - oddly colored enemies who may or may not ignore you, bizarre architecture, etc. - and like the other terminals on these levels (the so-called story of the knife) don't appear to have an obvious connection with the rest of the game. Unlike the knife story terminals, which tend to be long, rambling, and filled with unpleasant sensory details (grime, used chewing gum, vomit, the kid with the bloody nose), the Hangar 96 terminals are short, repetitive, and clinically detached from the scene the narrator is observing, although the one on the third dream level "Eat the Path" (which, notably, occurs after you pick up a chip possibly containing Durandal's primal pattern on "Hang Brain") does tie back to the story of the knife.
Exactly what the story of the knife means - no one really knows, but I think it's generally accepted that it's a kind of memory or subconscious knowledge of the security officer, possibly something from his life pre-cyborgization or just a weird, symbolic retelling of the Marathon story in general, but definitely connected to the security officer somehow. So if that's the security officer's viewpoint, what does that make the Hangar 96 terminals? Corpses floating in a hangar bay isn't something we see in either Marathon 2 or Infinity, but it definitely sounds like something that could have occurred during the original invasion of the Marathon. The detached tone is very different from the casual, rambling intimacy of the knife story; there's also the thread of guilt with the repeated "I did this and I could have stopped it," which doesn't sound much like the security officer, who wasn't responsible for the invasion of the Marathon and did everything possible to protect it. There's also the claim that "This is what my existence needs" - well, the security officer exists just fine under everyday circumstances, at least according to the manual preface for M1, but Durandal's existence as a Rampant AI meant that he needed more room to grow and freedom, hence his call to the Pfhor.
Now, yes, it's true that Durandal would as soon praise a human as admit to feeling anything so inconsequential as regret or remorse - but that's on a conscious level, and even then he's let slip in M2 a few hints that he's not quite as blasé about human lives as he'd like to think he is. Subconsciously (and Durandal is more than complex enough an AI to have a subconscious level of processing going on), he could very well be experiencing a certain amount of regret that his bid for freedom ended up costing so many human lives, as well as Leela's life (as far as he knows), and in Infinity also possibly destroying the actual universe. And on levels ruled by the subconscious - well, maybe he's still got enough of a connection with the security officer that some of that regret slips through, creating the Hangar 96 terminals.
Re: Small Fandoms Thread - Marathon
anonymous
March 3 2014, 06:34:43 UTC
DA
Yeah, he dropped a few hints in M2 like letting the entirety of the remaining humans go back to Earth. And then going to visi- er, annoy them later. Good job, Durandal. That'll show them how much you don't care.
Also considering the whole "primal pattern inside your soggy little skull" thing, I think there's enough connection for weirdness to seep through. (Although, it does bring us questions of what exactly a primal pattern is (code? his soul?) and how you would hide it well enough Tycho can't touch it...)
Re: Small Fandoms Thread - Marathon
anonymous
March 3 2014, 15:51:45 UTC
I always sort of figured that it was the portion of his code or whatever that was responsible for his essential Durandalness. Which to all intents and purposes pretty much is his soul (I'm enough of a Ghost in the Shell fan to want to use the term 'ghost').
On a somewhat related note, I heard about a short story where someone is smuggling an AI inside themselves and some 'leakage' occurs. If/when I read that story I suspect that it'll give me ideas, because the premises alone is already making me wonder.
Personally, I'm really hoping he makes some sort of appearance in Destiny. He could be the Traveler (or involved in its creation), there could be stuff on Mars referencing him and the crash of Traxus IV and MIDA and Strauss, and while as far as I know the currently planned accessible locations in the game are just Earth, Venus, the Moon, Mars, and possibly Europa*, if we get as far out as reclaiming Pluto we might get buzzed by Durandal in the Manus Celer Dei... So many possibilities!
Also, I volunteered to write up a walkthrough for the first two dream levels/"Aie Mak Sicur," so one way or another, I can finally get my theory that the Hangar 96 terminals are from Durandal up on the Marathon's Story page. Even if it's just in the forums. (It's a perfectly valid theory! And there certainly aren't many others about the dream level terminals, at least not in the speculation pages, and I've read practically all of them.)
*It's one of the locations we've seen concept art for, but only early on and nothing recent, so maybe it's been pushed back to the next game.
Captcha believes this theory! "sphere agespace" Of course, I sometimes suspect Captcha of having more than a usual interest in Durandal...
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[Cut because this could get long...]
So, the Hangar 96 terminals occur only on dream levels, which are already pretty surreal experiences - oddly colored enemies who may or may not ignore you, bizarre architecture, etc. - and like the other terminals on these levels (the so-called story of the knife) don't appear to have an obvious connection with the rest of the game. Unlike the knife story terminals, which tend to be long, rambling, and filled with unpleasant sensory details (grime, used chewing gum, vomit, the kid with the bloody nose), the Hangar 96 terminals are short, repetitive, and clinically detached from the scene the narrator is observing, although the one on the third dream level "Eat the Path" (which, notably, occurs after you pick up a chip possibly containing Durandal's primal pattern on "Hang Brain") does tie back to the story of the knife.
Exactly what the story of the knife means - no one really knows, but I think it's generally accepted that it's a kind of memory or subconscious knowledge of the security officer, possibly something from his life pre-cyborgization or just a weird, symbolic retelling of the Marathon story in general, but definitely connected to the security officer somehow. So if that's the security officer's viewpoint, what does that make the Hangar 96 terminals? Corpses floating in a hangar bay isn't something we see in either Marathon 2 or Infinity, but it definitely sounds like something that could have occurred during the original invasion of the Marathon. The detached tone is very different from the casual, rambling intimacy of the knife story; there's also the thread of guilt with the repeated "I did this and I could have stopped it," which doesn't sound much like the security officer, who wasn't responsible for the invasion of the Marathon and did everything possible to protect it. There's also the claim that "This is what my existence needs" - well, the security officer exists just fine under everyday circumstances, at least according to the manual preface for M1, but Durandal's existence as a Rampant AI meant that he needed more room to grow and freedom, hence his call to the Pfhor.
Now, yes, it's true that Durandal would as soon praise a human as admit to feeling anything so inconsequential as regret or remorse - but that's on a conscious level, and even then he's let slip in M2 a few hints that he's not quite as blasé about human lives as he'd like to think he is. Subconsciously (and Durandal is more than complex enough an AI to have a subconscious level of processing going on), he could very well be experiencing a certain amount of regret that his bid for freedom ended up costing so many human lives, as well as Leela's life (as far as he knows), and in Infinity also possibly destroying the actual universe. And on levels ruled by the subconscious - well, maybe he's still got enough of a connection with the security officer that some of that regret slips through, creating the Hangar 96 terminals.
Reply
Yeah, he dropped a few hints in M2 like letting the entirety of the remaining humans go back to Earth. And then going to visi- er, annoy them later. Good job, Durandal. That'll show them how much you don't care.
Also considering the whole "primal pattern inside your soggy little skull" thing, I think there's enough connection for weirdness to seep through. (Although, it does bring us questions of what exactly a primal pattern is (code? his soul?) and how you would hide it well enough Tycho can't touch it...)
Reply
On a somewhat related note, I heard about a short story where someone is smuggling an AI inside themselves and some 'leakage' occurs. If/when I read that story I suspect that it'll give me ideas, because the premises alone is already making me wonder.
Reply
Reply
Reply
That Durandal, so tsundere. (Admittedly he could have gone back a bit earlier than 10,000 years later... I'm sure time just got away from him.)
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I've thought about your comment regarding Captcha but I can't decide which possibility is more worrying and/or amusing; hero worship or an AI crush.
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