Adventure Gamers - Forums

I’m having a tough time finding time to play right now, VP, and I apologize for my lack of participation.  I will get back to it when I can, but please don’t wait for me.

Lady Kestrel - 04 June 2022 02:42 PM

I’m having a tough time finding time to play right now, VP, and I apologize for my lack of participation.  I will get back to it when I can, but please don’t wait for me.

that’s alright, it happens. Thanks for letting us know. 

I’m also finished, the section was surprisingly brief despite somewhat puzzle-heavy. Felt satisfied solving the machine puzzle for the second time, just the way I originally intended to solve it. The rest of the machine/valve/pipe puzzles in both sections felt rather similar, like we got stuck in a Mr. Fix It simulator. Nice for a change.

Vegetable Party - 29 May 2022 04:09 PM

Any thoughts on the plot? You mentioned the distinction between the two main characters: how do you think they relate to one another?

Any thoughts on how Sayuri is so knowledgeable about Sector 7?

I’m also curious if anyone has any thoughts about the surveillance and general running of operations in Center 7. This part of the playthrough one person in the know seems to corroborate the information you got from Sayuri, which would explain the target practice and continuation of a project that doesn’t seem to consider it’s subjects humanity.

Funny, I used to think they were brothers, but then I watched the first season of the Dollhouse series and now I think differently) Both seem to share the same sci-fi trope about people with wiped memories getting new personalities installed to finish all sort of missions, and at one point something goes very wrong; so basically I think both characters are the same person.

On a more personal and philosophical note: do you consider your self as the sum of experiences and the way your brain is wired, or do you think there is something other, maybe even metaphysical, that makes you who you are?

Or are we all just the product of stimuli registered by round and about seven senses + a brain that’s wired to turn this into a perception of reality, thereby alienating us from it - creating a completely fabricated sense of individuality as a coping mechanism?

Do we have souls? Are they individual, or are they parts of something else, temporarily bound to our bodies?

I don’t believe in souls, but I do believe in individuality and that nobody should treat people as a material for their social experiments, programming and reprogramming masses to behave any way they wish to.

Vegetable Party - 02 June 2022 09:06 AM

Of all the Deltas, Giselle represents the only actualized first step to reclaiming one’s self.

What motivates this? Is it a soul? How would that work and why would it work for her and not the others? Have they become more like zombies by giving in? Or is her brain just more complicated, provided it’s host with better directions for survival?

Dollhouse tries to answer the same question, albeit it takes the series too long. But it is rooted in reality, there is always someone who manages to resist or bypass the system and survive. Which not necessary proves that we have souls, but that we are too different to predict everything.

What if Center 7 was actually rehabilitating people?

Patients with cycles and patterns of violently destructive behaviour would receive treatment with the same effect as the one in the game, but without it being forced and gruesome. Patients would follow therapy, fmri scans, data would be compiled. Rather than trying to achieve some behavioral change through emotional breakthrough, openness and discipline, (which I think is a much more blunt instrument than we make it out to be)..

What if people whose future is most likely repeating offenses, followed by death in prison, or by violence, or both, get another option? People who match stringent criteria and choose to accept this treatment are given a chance to develop some new skills, restart their emotional and intellectual development, reform a personality and ways to relate to others. By wiping their current identity and dysfunctionality?

Would you be able to accept that?

If you would, do you think if affects a patient’s soul? Is it attached somehow to a persons experiences, or is the body only a limitation, like a cage? Can a soul become part of a new identity?

Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea - if only one could trust current governments (who would supervise such experiments, no doubt about that). But I have a strong suspicion that all those memory wiping/installing new personalities procedures will be conducted not so much on maniacs or lunatics, but on perfectly healthy people who just happen to be in opposition to the current regimes. And the more effective those centers work, the more invasive they will become. As I wrote, mass reprogramming. So no, I would strongly oppose it, nothing good will come out of this idea.

Wow!

Dollhouse sounds pretty interesting! Checked out the premise and there are striking similarities to what’s happening in Gemini Rue. I think you might e onto something.

Your point about individuality and basic human rights and decency is also solid. Personally, I’d mostly agree, though I’m more flexible on the idea of a soul and less invested in individuality. But the sci-fi media that somewhat inspired my final question is also firmly in that tradition and I wonder if anybody here has watched it and liked it (or didn’t): the 1967 British tv serial The Prisoner.

What if people whose future is most likely repeating offenses (...) are given a chance to develop some new skills, restart their emotional and intellectual development, reform a personality and ways to relate to others. By wiping their current identity and dysfunctionality?

Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea - if only one could trust current governments (who would supervise such experiments, no doubt about that). But I have a strong suspicion that all those memory wiping/installing new personalities procedures will be conducted not so much on maniacs or lunatics, but on perfectly healthy people who just happen to be in opposition to the current regimes. And the more effective those centers work, the more invasive they will become. As I wrote, mass reprogramming. So no, I would strongly oppose it, nothing good will come out of this idea.

Yeah agree! Power, knowledge and memory have a very complicated and sometimes troubling relationship. Even more subtle abuses of power would become conveniently available and hard to control.

There are other arguments against it, that maybe even touch on current methods of treatment/incarceration.

There’s something to say for it as well. Altering people physically to achieve behavioral change might be acceptable in the future. Or part of an unavoidable new status quo, at least. The cameras in Center 7 are an example of a similar shift in values, about surveillance and privacy, that happened in our lifetime.

If those are the new circumstances, perhaps we should discuss the inevitable use of treatments as depicted in Gemini Rue and make them, if you can excuse the term: ethical. And make sure there is some sort of control on the powers that determine who gets this treatment, why and the degree of required compliance.

Alright that’s it for my part, I promise.

New section this wednesday? I think most people still in the CPT are done with this section.

Vegetable Party - 06 June 2022 09:16 AM

Dollhouse sounds pretty interesting! Checked out the premise and there are striking similarities to what’s happening in Gemini Rue. I think you might e onto something.

I knew it! I actually watched Dollhouse by accident, without thinking of Gemini Rue, when I suddenly felt familiar vibes, like both medias related to each other somehow (in fact the game and the series were developed simultaneously from what I figured). And while it’s not exactly a deep study of the subject, there’s plenty of talking about the moral side of such experiments on people, and all kind of “what if” scenarios are played.

Your point about individuality and basic human rights and decency is also solid. Personally, I’d mostly agree, though I’m more flexible on the idea of a soul and less invested in individuality. But the sci-fi media that somewhat inspired my final question is also firmly in that tradition and I wonder if anybody here has watched it and liked it (or didn’t): the 1967 British tv serial The Prisoner.

I read about that series somewhere, but never researched it. I wonder how well it holds today…

There’s something to say for it as well. Altering people physically to achieve behavioral change might be acceptable in the future. Or part of an unavoidable new status quo, at least. The cameras in Center 7 are an example of a similar shift in values, about surveillance and privacy, that happened in our lifetime.

If those are the new circumstances, perhaps we should discuss the inevitable use of treatments as depicted in Gemini Rue and make them, if you can excuse the term: ethical. And make sure there is some sort of control on the powers that determine who gets this treatment, why and the degree of required compliance.

Alright that’s it for my part, I promise.

There’s a great sci-fi movie, Gattaca (1997), which is kinda different, but also similar in a way. It goes even further: newborn children are getting classified as “valids” or “in-valids” in case their genetic profiles indicate some further disorders. “In-valids” are basically doomed to spend their whole lives as outcasts, taking lower status jobs, while all doors are open for “valids”, so parents are almost forced to use artificial fertilisation and genetic engineering to “program” their unborn children. The protagonist is, of course, born naturally as “in-valid” and becomes a janitor, but won’t give up, illegally takes a new identity and works all the way to reach the necessary “parameters” to qualify as an astronaut. The ending basically shows how all this hard work served only one purpose: to be “qualified” by the system rather than to be “improved”.

I’m sure the future where people will be physically and mentally altered is unavoidable, it’s already happening, they even learned to treat people using lobotomy rather than to turn them into vegetables as far as I’m concerned. But installing whole new identities is gonna mess the humanity completely. Although I’m still not sure what the plot of Gemini Rue is all about and how this treatment is performed.

Vegetable Party - 06 June 2022 09:16 AM

I wonder if anybody here has watched it and liked it (or didn’t): the 1967 British tv serial The Prisoner.

Excellent series. Although I don’t know if there was any connection, another British series, titled Secret Agent, also starred Patrick McGoohan as its protagonist. When released in the US it was renamed Danger Man and had the Johnny Rivers hit Secret Agent Man as its theme song.

Edit: It’s possible I have it reversed and Danger Man was the UK title and Secret Agent was the renamed US release. Can’t remember.

rtrooney - 06 June 2022 02:48 PM

Vegetable Party - 06 June 2022 09:16 AM

I wonder if anybody here has watched it and liked it (or didn’t): the 1967 British tv serial The Prisoner.

Excellent series. Although I don’t know if there was any connection, another British series, titled Secret Agent, also starred Patrick McGoohan as its protagonist. When released in the US it was renamed Danger Man and had the Johnny Rivers hit Secret Agent Man as its theme song.

Edit: It’s possible I have it reversed and Danger Man was the UK title and Secret Agent was the renamed US release. Can’t remember.

Danger Man was the original and was in no way connected to The Prisoner outside of Patrick McGoohan starring in both.
The Prisoner was filmed on location at Portmeirion in North Wales which was a bit of a Folly in a way as it was designed as an Italian village and took around 50 years to build. Architecturally interesting though and made well known due to the aforementioned TV series.

chrissie - 06 June 2022 04:30 PM

No disrespect intended here but I’m not sure about the direct relevance of Danger Man & The Prisoner?

Since I’m not playig the game, I can’t answer that.

But VP’s full quote is here:

Dollhouse sounds pretty interesting! Checked out the premise and there are striking similarities to what’s happening in Gemini Rue. I think you might e onto something.

Your point about individuality and basic human rights and decency is also solid. Personally, I’d mostly agree, though I’m more flexible on the idea of a soul and less invested in individuality. But the sci-fi media that somewhat inspired my final question is also firmly in that tradition and I wonder if anybody here has watched it and liked it (or didn’t): the 1967 British tv serial The Prisoner.

You need to ask VP about the relevance to The Prisoner. There apparently is no connection between Danger Man and The Prisoner. I thought there might be since both are British productions. Both involve spies; one current spy and one captured spy. And, because they both star Patrick McGoohan, I thought he might have been the continuity link between the two shows.

The game likes its references, so the thread just follows suit.

About the connection: Prisoner fans frequently debate whether John Drake of Danger Man and Number Six in The Prisoner are the same person. Like John Drake, Number Six is evidently a secret agent, but one who has resigned from his job.

Which works on several levels, as McGoohan had resigned from the production of Danger Man to work on The Prisoner.

There’s a little more, including references, unused plots from one ending up in the other, etc.

To get into the relevance would be further sending the thread down one of my particular rabbit holes, so let’s just assume it made sense to at least one person on the internet.

And to further get things moving in the right direction: next section in two days!

chrissie - 06 June 2022 01:59 PM

I did watch both series of Dollhouse but it was quite a few years ago but from what I can remember it was voluntary… to earn money…at least to start with?

The contract was technically voluntary, but not everyone ended there voluntary as it is revealed, not to mention that many signed it because they were desperate to get money/treatment. Plus they weren’t really made aware of the things they would have to perform under new identities, which is why Echo’s mentor was so concerned about the moral part of the deal.

Vegetable Party - 06 June 2022 05:40 PM

To get into the relevance would be further sending the thread down one of my particular rabbit holes, so let’s just assume it made sense to at least one person on the internet.

Would be a hole worth diving into. But some other place and time.

No more from me until the playthrough has ended.