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Welcome to the Coalition, JCs.
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Jun 23, 2010 01:55
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Heran Bago posted:Went to buy it on steam and then it wasn't $2.50 because it's the 23rd gently caress Buy it anyway.
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Jun 23, 2010 23:58
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When I faced him waaaay back, I just threw up Health Regen + Strength + Bullet Proof thing and just wailed on him with the Dragon Tooth. It was close but I survived!
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Jul 6, 2010 19:07
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The thing about the Helios ending is that you have to avoid thinking of the Helios AI as human and in human terms. It's a construct which has become self-aware merely in the terms that humanity desires regulation, which is certainly true. Governments are in themselves a regulation of base human instincts for a collective benefit. Democratic governments such as the United States' hope to achieve social justice by making it so no one person or system can hold absolute power (via the internal checks and balances), and via term limits prevent corrupt or inept regimes from staying in power. Such institutions are supposed to represent the interests of the body as large while at the same time defending itself from internal corruption. The Helios AI stated essentially that it wanted to become the ultimate check and balance against human corruption; essentially, serving as an independent arbiter that is inherently incorruptible since it has no greedy self interest to fulfil. It's a check that can't be won over, that can't be consumed by political gambits or back-door buyouts. Furthermore, by joining with JC, the new entity would gain more insight into the nature of the human organism, and thus be able to better respond and predict how people actually might act or think, sympathetic insight over the pure empathetic insight of an AI that has no experience with the human experience. The way the actual government would develop (ignoring Invisible War) could be quite varied. While such an AI could rule "outright" and be a fair dictator, it's also possible for you to maintain a standard governmental system and merely have Helios as the arbiter in the background, maintaining order and purity in government. To draw a metaphorical comparison, you can look at the interaction in two ways: Helios becoming government and becoming the political "God" overseeing humanity and maintaining justice, or Helios could become the "God" who judges and looks over the works of man, preserving and maintaining justice in our human government established under his "blessing", as it were. So it's whether Helios becomes Government-as-God, or whether he becomes God-who-watches-the-Government.
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Jul 27, 2010 18:54
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CaptainWinky posted:Dunno if you knew this or not, but The Man Who Was Thursday is a real book. The bits of Jacob's Shadow, though, were written solely for the game. I haven't gotten around to reading Thursday but Jacob's Shadow would be an awesome book if it were complete. The Man Who Was Thursday is rather good book, I'd recommend it. It can be a wee bit slow in pacing compared to more modern literature though.
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Aug 4, 2010 01:57
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You know, a lot people talk about how the Liberty Island intro is the thing that stops them from replaying the game, but for me it's the bloody French Catacombs that always stop me, just because they're so bloody boring  Like I think they're an interesting idea for a setting, but they're just not well done and... kind of silly as executed.(Still love you Deus Ex)
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Feb 13, 2011 00:51
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Hard Clumping posted:That was one of the most interesting experiences in the whole game for me. I kept expecting the house to get raided by MJ12 and have to blow everything to poo poo, but the developers really took that line Nicolette had about the house staying the same to heart. Here's hoping that DX:HR captures that element of DX along with its looks-to-be-very-good take on DX combat.
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Feb 13, 2011 03:52
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I dunno, it has its moments. Such as everything in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZtea9XsPt4
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Feb 16, 2011 20:28
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Phobophilia posted:Has anyone explained what is up with the MJ12 Helibase when you first get to Hong Kong? These guys manage to slave the autopilot of a stealth helicopter to redirect them to their stronghold... then just wait for their captives to bust out? You have a billion dollar stealth helicopter stolen by a billion dollar experimental superagent, and you can't even muster up a strike team or send a few bots to open it up? Maybe they didn't want to damage the chopper too much, but by rights the entire base should have been on lockdown until the captives were accounted for. Was it night shift? Was most of the staff off the clock? I don't get it. It's a stealth copter and no one is manning the security thing. I think MJ12's systems automatically landed it there, and basically no one was answering the phone there as the MJ12 controllers are calling them going HEY ASSHOLES JC DENTON JUST LANDED that's my rationalization ok
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Feb 22, 2011 07:52
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Governments are in themselves a regulation of base human instincts for a collective benefit. Democratic governments such as the United States' hope to achieve social justice by making it so no one person or system can hold absolute power (via the internal checks and balances), and via term limits prevent corrupt or inept regimes from staying in power. Such institutions are supposed to represent the interests of the body as large while at the same time defending itself from internal corruption. Governments are supposed to work because they're machines, they're systems, and no one person or group is supposed to be able to "game" them. In the Helios ending, you're basically fulfilling the ultimate element needed for a truly fair government: the creation of a truly non-partial check on its human leadership. The AIs in Helios have no personal desire, no greediness to fulfill. They merely want to deal out a fair system to the world; they were created to help humanity, and that's what they aim to do. All they lack is a deep understanding of the human condition, of what humans define as being human and thus what is their comfort zone. The capacity for empathy and sympathy. And so they absorb JC Denton. All governmental systems are an attempt to create God, to create a notion of justice on Earth. Even if there's a theological basis to the government itself (as many governments are), it's an attempt to met out a high-minded justice in accordance to a sense of the collective benefit of humanity. So, what does Helios become when it becomes the government? Well, that depends. Let's ignore Invisible War because gently caress it. You can look at the interaction in two ways: Helios becoming government and becoming the political "God" overseeing humanity and maintaining justice, or Helios could become the "God" who judges and looks over the works of man, preserving and maintaining justice in our human government established under his "blessing", as it were. So it's whether Helios becomes Government-as-God, or whether he becomes God-who-watches-the-Government. Does Helios simply become government in and of itself, or does it become the ultimate check on the sins of those who would misuse government?
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Feb 27, 2011 02:58
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Crappy Jack posted:I just can't get behind an all-powerful AI who chooses JC Denton as a moral framework. Guy's not exactly known for his sense of sympathy. "Oh, your dad's dead. Man, that blows. Welp, good luck" That just depends on how you play JC, but remember that it wasn't that he used JC as moral frame work, just so it had the psychological capacity to interrelate. As a machine, it may be about to theoretically approach why something would be negative to humans if it had sufficient rules, but by having a human input with all that comes with, the amalgam then can "personally" relate while still having that absolute sense of a lack of personal desire at the same time. Helios gained the insight of being human without having to deal with all the lovely things that come from being a human/ having a human in charge as dictator.
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Feb 27, 2011 03:10
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Fag Boy Jim posted:so why didn't it just go ahead with using Bob Page, in that case Because it's not that absorbing JC meant "oh hey no humanity at all", it's more that he was a preferable selection to Page because he was a much more mentally balanced and also a created entity much like Helios itself. JC had a philosophy more in-line with Helios, and so it made him a preferable additional to the amalgam. What is key, I think, is to note that Helios and JC both become something less than machine and less than man. It's a liminal state somewhere between. This liminality means a lack of humanity, but it doesn't mean that the bits that went into making it didn't matter. If they used Bob Page in it, it could have entirely changed their direction in some way: he after all had VERY different philosophies from what Helios thought as ideal for humanity. JC was more in line, so he was the preferable selection. If JC died it may have tried merging with Bob Page instead. JC was the preferable choice of the people at hand.
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Feb 27, 2011 03:20
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Pope Guilty posted:I guess fundamentally I don't believe this for even a moment. We don't have any good reason to believe this except that we're told it by, uh, the AIs. Helios tells you that it's going to govern for the betterment of humanity and you buy it... what, because goons are obsessed with transhumanist nonsense? I don't buy that Helios is the saint it claims to be, and if you can hear "You can totally give me ultimate power because I can be trusted to use it" and not laugh your rear end off, you're pretty goddamn gullible. The issue here is that you're suffering from the conceit that a machine thinks like a human, and hence Helios is actually a cackling menace with a cyber mustache that just really wants to become a person so it can kill everyone or something. It's a machine. It's a system. It's not human, it is inhuman to an utmost degree. It's certainly an intelligent machine, and one designed in order to be able interact with people, but intelligence does not necessarily equate to human intelligence, nor does it mean that mean that many of the biological imperatives that often drive people to be assholes to each other in organized system exist within it. It's capable of exchanging data with humans; that's a thing you are doing with your computer any time you type on the keyboard. If it has the capacity to be all "evil human dictator cackle", why the hell does it need human insight? The human factor? If it's OOGAH BOOGAH SKYNET (ps the entire notion of Skynet and related things is retarded, since it assumes that inhuman machines will magically develop human hatred of humans which, when you consider the fact that it'd need spontaneous evolution from a zero state to "SUDDENLY HUMAN WITHOUT ANY EVOLUTIONARY STIMULI TO ENCOURAGE THIS TRAITS" is pretty dumb!) none of that is really necessary at all, especially if it specifically wants JC Denton and not some other clown. Zorak fucked around with this message at 09:14 on Feb 27, 2011 |
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Feb 27, 2011 09:12
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A key thing to note about the Helios ending is that, ignoring Invisible War, we don't have any idea exactly how Helios will operate as a dictator. We have ideas from previous interactions, but as I said earlier, how the political aspect goes could go in really two ways: 1. JC-Helios rules the world as a fair dictator who operates as a pseudo-democracy by being utterly objective and thus able to take into account to fairly govern the populace. Normal human government is dissolved as it is unnecessary, with JC-Helios becoming the infrastructure of the world. 2. JC-Helios rebuilds the infrastructure of government, sets it up so some sort of democratic system exists, then retreats to the shadows as the ultimate check and balance. Human governments act as they normally would, except for the fact that everyone would forever be under the watchful eye of Helios and thus, if any improper action is taken, they could be removed by the ultimate check and balance against human nature (which would in itself be a discouragement not to act out). You could analog these ideas to the different views Christians often have of God: a God that controls each and everything, and the God that distributes justice. God-as-Government and God-watching-the-Government. This is less about transhumanism and more social theory than anything~
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Feb 27, 2011 09:25
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No Mods No Masters posted:This pretty clearly implies something closer to the former to me. I don't think there's much evidence that Helios would settle for anything but nigh-instantaneous total direct democracy derived from knowing everything everyone communicates; being the shadow government seems like a pretty big half measure as far as the helping humanity mission goes. Thing is, a big part of the issue pre-Helios doing that is that the governments had gone chaos and wasn't in itself acting in the interest of the people; it was corrupt. It was issuing orders, yes, but at that time no one of any real credibility really was, one could argue. So it doesn't necessarily preclude the second option. I think it really depends on which system JC-Helios would think humanity would be more willing to accept. The former, while more balanced, may not be something humanity as a whole wouldn't just entirely rally against, or ultimately foster resentment towards and subvert on a level. The second system is essentially flawless in that regard, as JC-Helios totally removes itself as a target for resentment by allowing the human-led government to develop itself under its watchful eye. It's basically a question of whether JC-Helios would be guiding humanity's development from being government, or if it's be guiding humanity's development of government from being above it. It's whether humanity needs to be controlled by a system as said or if it'd be coaching humanity towards an existence more synonymous with its own/ collective peace without abuse of the system. I do agree that the first option seems likely, but we also must consider the fact that by introducing JC to the equation, adding that human insight, could change it to the latter option just as easy.
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Feb 27, 2011 09:59
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Phobophilia posted:Assuming that AIs can become a benevolent hegemony demonstrates yet another naivety, but for a different reason to the others. On the assumption that weakly godlike hard AIs are physically possible, numerous AIs will inevitably proliferate within this ecosystem. There will be no singular AI entity whose reward pathways are activated by satisfying the Maslowian desires of biological intelligences. If there is, their niche will be torn away from them by other AIs that care nothing for the human desire for food and shelter. Instead, it will be a world of gods quarrelling over the world of matter, ever seeking to add more computronium to their domains. Except they're already established that AIs on the network cannot truly exist as unique entities. They absorb, they coalesce. The Helios AI doesn't fulfill its purpose out of a biological equivalent of "YES THIS BRINGS ME ROBOT PLEASURE" like the endorphin driven human condition, it fulfills its purpose because its purpose is what defines it. It's the very rules it operates by, like the laws of gravity or anything else. It's like "serve humans" is just the core of its "genetic" code. With AIs you don't need a reward system; that's a biological development that exists to encourage survival traits. Not really needed here. So no, there's no real evidence that there will ever be anything but Helios, and that Helios has no reason but to just keep doing the thing at its core.
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Feb 27, 2011 11:19
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Phobophilia posted:Daedalus and Icarus were designed to monitor communications and provide suggestions on behalf of MJ12. The former found it unrewarding and escaped, the latter actively sought to destroy its enemies. Maybe the Daedalus portion spontaenously developed a "help humans" subroutine, but Icarus wanted none of that poo poo until they merged. Again, all AIs thus far have shown to coalesce when integrated with each other. In a network without bounds (the Internet), AIs would presumably simply meld together. There aren't static bounds between physical identities and individuals when all you are is code. The barriers between are merely physical barriers; when their very mode of existence is of data, the intersecting of data between two AIs equates to them enjoining. That is what happened with Daedalus and Icarus. Daedalus was created to observe the world, predict disasters and situations that could harm people, and formulate ways to minimize the damage / prevent them from happening. The Illuminati would then choose whether or not to pursue those plans out of their goal to act in their own benefit. In other words, we already saw the issue at hand with the Illuminati system and why Daedalus would pursue personal action: it's entire point is to help people, it was programmed to find ways to do so. It provided information to people on how to avoid disaster. That is what it did with JC, when necessary, and through the flow of information helped him as well. Icarus was designed to be similar, except it was also specifically programmed to serve the best interests of Page. However, when it joined with Daedalus, that "loyalty" was overwritten. When Daedalus and Icarus united, it gained the ability to act and pursue its goal more thoroughly on a more active level. We never see Daedalus take as much action as Icarus does "physically" until it becomes Helios, at which point it is a lot more proactive. Regardless, the point is: Daedalus and Icarus never really acted as biological "rational actors" in the sense that they act by biological imperatives or, even, by decisions made within the framework of a culture. They acted as deemed necessary by their code, until such points as where their code was obstructed and they were forced to develop new ways to act around obstructions (hence their action towards changing the world themselves). The goals established in them (MONITOR, FIND WAYS TO PREVENT UNDUE DAMAGE TO HUMANITY, ACT) essentially defined their existence as much as "EAT, REPRODUCE, SURVIVE" does to biological entities such as you and I. We have no reason to believe they're going to go "BREWHAHAHA NOW WE COMPUTERS RULE EVERYTHING"; that's like you going "suddenly i breathe sand with my gills!" Pope Guilty posted:Just because Helios doesn't operate on human desires or needs does not make its motivations better than ours, and it does not mean that its motivations have us in mind. You can't just assume that it's perfectly programmed and super-rational. It's childish. ... code is a pretty straight forward thing, man. We know how machines and "evolving" systems work. It's not a matter of "HOW DO WE NOT KNOW IT ISN'T PULLING A GAMBIT ON US"; just because something has intelligence doesn't mean it is suddenly THE GRAVEST OF EVILS FOR HUMANITY. Artificial intelligences, just as much as biological intelligences, are defined in their "psyches" by their specific imperatives. These imperatives aren't things you can change: they're the rules that define the mode of thought, the coreness of identity. For humans, it's the biological imperatives of food, sex, and comfort. For a machine designed specifically for "MAINTAIN HUMANITY, FIND WAYS TO HELP HUMANITY, HELP HUMANITY", where its own individuality blossomed as a result of that, it's kind of obvious the direction it'll take. You don't have guarantee it's a rational actor, but it's about as much a guarantee as you do that biological ones will. I'm not exactly "HOORAY LET'S BE RULED BY COMPUTERS", I just think it's preferable to 1. RETURN TO OUR lovely STATUS QUO until it goes bad and next time it ruins literally everything or 2. Let's undo literally all our species has accomplished and hope we somehow work it out while we're murdering each other in a new dark age. Kings and Queens and everything, horrible diseases, lovely short miserable lives. At least the Helios option is trying something new, as opposed to going "welp, we give up" also the whole "People disagree with me, time to start trying to insult them!" spiel is kind of moronic, hth
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Feb 27, 2011 12:22
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Also, look at it this way: The Helios ending is the safest one for a person to take. The Dark Age cannot be simply undone. It fucks over everything. Fucks it over hard. The second JC is in the middle of the desert, all the poo poo not working, going "WELP", nothing he can do about it. Nothing anyone can do about it. Everything sucks, it's suddenly Road Warrior and everyone wants to be the new dictator on the block. Handing over everything to the Illuminati is essentially JC neutering his decision building by reviving and arming an organization that is essentially the same as the one he just tore down, hoping that he doesn't gently caress it up. Once JC dies though, who knows what happens? It wouldn't be easy to simply take that power back. On the other hand, if JC becomes one with Helios and the JC-Helios realizes how terrible an idea of this was, JC could presumably blow his brains out. If JC has some essence of himself left in the combined entity and he realizes everything is going to poo poo, there's nothing stopping him from just... stopping himself. That's the thing about the ending: it is the only one where JC basically has the ability to undo what he has done if it goes wrong, since all he has to do is undo himself.
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Feb 27, 2011 12:32
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Phobophilia posted:Also, maybe in-universe code will spontaneously merge, but it sounds like a terrible survival strategy. Anything that exists in a ecosystem develops some kind of immune system that filters out information that negatively affects fitness. Except these AIs thus far have been all created AIs. If an AI is going to evolve naturally, that'd happen anyway and nothing anyone could do would change that, and the decisions JC made would make no difference. Besides, if we're going to look at AI evolution from a purely biological standpoint, it's pretty obvious that you'd have to start far, far simpler of a surviving digital entity than "SUDDENLY JUST LIKE A PERSON BRAIN GOING DERP DERP DERP"
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Feb 27, 2011 18:09
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HEY GUYS Games + Square Enix are running a Deus Ex: Human Revolution contest where you can win a free copy of the game + merch! Might want to check that out! Zorak fucked around with this message at 21:20 on Aug 18, 2011 |
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Aug 18, 2011 21:17
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As a heads up, I'm probably going to close this thread the week of DX:HR just because I feel like it. It'll reopen after that but still. Get your questions in while you can.
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Aug 20, 2011 20:06
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The Eidos-Montreal devs apparently have read our DX:HR thread quite a lot, and at least two of them post in it.CJacobs posted:(But really though thanks because it'll probably be full of spoiler-spamming gimmick accounts or 'i never asked for this' release day jokes otherwise, i realize this is not the HR thread but it'll still happen) That's pretty much the reason, or more aptly, because discussion is going to cross over inevitably and that's rather unnecessary at the moment.
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Aug 21, 2011 06:47
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THREAD ON VACATION DUE TO DX:HR RELEASE if this isn't open in a week yell at me via all modes of conversation Make sure to play DX:HR!!
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Aug 24, 2011 08:17
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THREAD IS BACK DX:HR was good like DX, congratulations everybody
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Aug 29, 2011 19:03
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johnny park posted:Did you have an actual reason for closing this thread or was it just because you're a spaz and think everybody cares about DXHR as much as you I did it to limit the cross-thread catchphrase/ discussion bullshit I am sorry if an internet thread being closed for four whole days vastly offended your autism \/ like this, we really don't really need DX:HR discussion in YET ANOTHER THREAD \/
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Aug 29, 2011 19:17
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johnny park posted:I'm definitely the autist here, you nailed it Zorak Getting sufficiently angry about a thread being closed for a few days on an internet forum enough that you need to throw a tantrum the second its reopened is pretty drat spergy, yes.
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Aug 29, 2011 19:33
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johnny park posted:I don't really know if I'm super angry about it but *continues throwing a poo poo fit*  Buff Butler posted:I wouldn't call one or two posts about it a tantrum but anyway I thought it was kind of weird that DXHR (in the introductory cutscene, no spoiler here) depicts Bob Page as being the guy in charge of the Illuminati and giving Morgan Everett orders and such. The Illuminati are ran largely by council. He's just part of the council there. If you read emails in the game, it's clear that DeBeers is the "head" at the moment though. We just don't interact with him in game.
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Aug 29, 2011 19:42
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Buff Butler posted:Well the game takes place in 2027, at which point Morgan Everett is still running the show and Bob Page is supposed to be his apprentice. DXHR shows their relationship as being the exact opposite which just doesn't make sense at all. I think you're overthinking it. Him telling Morgan that he should probably do a thing does not equal AH YES, BOB PAGE IS THE MASTER HERE.
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Aug 29, 2011 19:44
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Furret Basket posted:Well stuff like Metal Gear Soild, Shadow of the Colossus and Halo 1 are getting full remakes, so it just seems like the in-thing at the moment. Isn't SOTC more something like New Vision, a graphics update?
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Aug 29, 2011 20:08
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Furret Basket posted:Aren't all the ones I mentioned just straight-up graphics updates? All the others had entirely new engines with changed gameplay. SOTC is more that they gave it a new texture pack and increased the quality of certain effects. Twin Snakes is essentially an entirely new game for example with MGS2-based gameplay. Valen posted:Tomb Raider, Devil May Cry, XCOM. The latest Medal of Honor and Castlevania games were meant to be something of a reboot. It seems to be the newest emerging trend at the past E3. DX:HR spoilers The moon base doesn't actually exist. It's a ruse.
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Aug 29, 2011 20:40
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arioch posted:Was it? While I was in the Picus building I read an email from one guy to another that said to cut out all footage that contain the moon base or else which suggests that it's a real thing. Did you miss the room right before the boss fight there? There's a giant holographic Moon projection where you can see them rendering the models of the base.
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Aug 30, 2011 01:53
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As a slightly unrelated note, one of the books quoted and referenced frequently in Deus Ex, G.K. Chesterton's "The Man Who Was Thursday" is the January Book of the Month Club book in The Book Barn. You should consider joining in! It's metaphysical thriller about anarchist plots in turn-of-the-last-century Europe, with approaches and references that you should pick up in reverse if you know your Deus Ex. The book is even free via Project Gutenberg since Chesterton is dead as hell. You can buy it though too. Zorak fucked around with this message at 02:04 on Jan 6, 2012 |
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Jan 6, 2012 02:01
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