Contradicting Subnautica (Possible spoilers if you're just getting started.)

[3D Master]

So, I got the alien dude in my head, and I instantly have a big problem with it; the way it's talking and the way the database entries are written; these folks, pretty much all of them were at least cybernetic, and for all intents and purpose androids/robots with their consciousness uploaded.

So how did a 143 billion of them die, and it wiped ou ttheir civilization? Even if there were a 143 billion folk saound who refused to uploaded into a robot body; it would, from the way he talks and the PDA entries be a minority. So even if those 143 billion dead died because of thise, this wouldn't bring down their civilization.

This doesn't make any sense

[Tux]

Part of me thinks subconsciously many are just intentionally looking for things to complain about.

[Meewec]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von YertyL:

The second game does sort of the opposite: The first facility you encounter is broken down (even the bridge), but the architect is still alive in digital form and can create a new body within minutes. Most of their interactions are digital but they apparently still do mining by hand.

they liked to use natural caverns for some reason and that one seems to have had a cave in at some point. it's also running out of power and we don't actually know how they power the below zero bases

Ursprünglich geschrieben von YertyL:

I do not think architects were meant to be digital beings in the first game. If digital interaction and switching bodies was so common for architects, how come you do not encounter a single one in all the alien facilities you visit -- but instead apparently the head of these facilities was instead stored at the north pole?

the other architects are in the sactuaries, al-an likely had to hide the phase gate as mission head and would likely be in a more accessible storage facility in order to allow rescue operations to get needed information more quickly.

Ursprünglich geschrieben von YertyL:

The enforcer platform still shoots down ships, the power plant still produces power and ion crystals, the sea emperor is still kept alive, and the warpers are still swimming around. That's a pretty high level of "standby" and implies a high degree of automization -- more than enough to keep the lights on for storage media. You do have to manually insert new crystals to make the teleporters work again, but considering everything else functions by itself I would put that more on gameplay than lore.

they're running on geothermal power in the region of the first game, the entire thing is a volcano.

Ursprünglich geschrieben von YertyL:

IMO the most consistent solution to have a live architect in the second part but maintain extinction by plague would have been to make him a crazy scientist in his own time, or even an advanced AI rather than an architect itself. Like this...it just does not seem plausible to me that a species has robots, interacts remotely even with their own limbs, and regularly swaps bodies with enough flexibility to be able to "live" inside a human mind, but has no ability to swap into a mechanical medium that can interact with the world and is instead bound to this specific cyborg body that is vulnuerable to kharaa.

i believe al-an or some random bit of information mentioned something about them liking their bodies or them being prestigious in some way. they also aren't going to put multiple different body creation systems onto a planet that is just being used as a petri dish even if they have them developed.

Ursprünglich geschrieben von YertyL:

And considering Marguerit Maida surviving, ending up in the arctic, and then simply staying in this "frozen hellhole" seems equally implausible to me, I lean towards the writing being less consistent rather than an elaborate unmentioned explanation.

maida's whole survival is a mess and a botched part of the story. her killing a reaper, distrust of alterra and her encouraging sam to take more drastic measures all make sense from what we know of her from the first game but her survival doesn't

[YertyL]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Tux:

Part of me thinks subconsciously many are just intentionally looking for things to complain about.

Both subconsciously _and_ intentionally? That's a pretty specific level of consciousness :-D
And not considering that this is one of those "can never be proven wrong but does not explain anything" observations, why do you think many are doing that?

I can see the point to some degree: As long as you generally like something, you tend to overlook some flaws, but as soon as your suspension of disbelief starts to crack, you tend to notice inconsistencies more. That does however imply that something made your suspension of disbelief crack in the first place.
I think for me this happened the most because throughout the game I assumed there was some deeper explanation why all the alterra bases were abandoned -- I assumed that maybe the employees had been kidnapped and we would find them, and that would be in some connection to Sam's fate. But then it turned out the explanation was...no explanation, they just all left after a single local event which itself was very far-fetched. It took me out of the game so much I could not immerse myself in the ending after this point.

[Tux]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von YertyL:

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Tux:

Part of me thinks subconsciously many are just intentionally looking for things to complain about.

Both subconsciously _and_ intentionally? That's a pretty specific level of consciousness :-D
And not considering that this is one of those "can never be proven wrong but does not explain anything" observations, why do you think many are doing that?

I can see the point to some degree: As long as you generally like something, you tend to overlook some flaws, but as soon as your suspension of disbelief starts to crack, you tend to notice inconsistencies more. That does however imply that something made your suspension of disbelief crack in the first place.
I think for me this happened the most because throughout the game I assumed there was some deeper explanation why all the alterra bases were abandoned -- I assumed that maybe the employees had been kidnapped and we would find them, and that would be in some connection to Sam's fate. But then it turned out the explanation was...no explanation, they just all left after a single local event which itself was very far-fetched. It took me out of the game so much I could not immerse myself in the ending after this point.

concious or unconcious the important part of my observation is the 'looking for something wrong part' of my observation

and yes subconcious is intentional

and yes, I think people 'intentionally' look for things in games to complain about so that they can remark on it as if its a mark on a winning score board.

[YertyL]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Meewec:

they liked to use natural caverns for some reason and that one seems to have had a cave in at some point. it's also running out of power and we don't actually know how they power the below zero bases
(...)
the other architects are in the sactuaries, al-an likely had to hide the phase gate as mission head and would likely be in a more accessible storage facility in order to allow rescue operations to get needed information more quickly.
(...)
they're running on geothermal power in the region of the first game, the entire thing is a volcano.

You do notice that the sanctuary in the second game is directly on top of a volcanic region, to the point where the player can reasonably connect it with a thermal plant?

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Meewec:

i believe al-an or some random bit of information mentioned something about them liking their bodies or them being prestigious in some way. they also aren't going to put multiple different body creation systems onto a planet that is just being used as a petri dish even if they have them developed.

I think in an "exinction of the species"-level event pride would be less important than survival. And for architects as described in the second game I would assume that living without a body would be a pretty regular occurence...which to some degree it seems to be if there are storage "servers". But then these give the "inhabitants" no option to free themselves? It's just...not very plausible.

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Meewec:

maida's whole survival is a mess and a botched part of the story. her killing a reaper, distrust of alterra and her encouraging sam to take more drastic measures all make sense from what we know of her from the first game but her survival doesn't

IMO they turned Maida's "badass" characteristic up to eleven. The degasi survivors in the first game face problems such as not being able to grow enough food and their habitat being flooded by rain. Do you think such things would have bothered the second game's version of M M? In the first game people die because their fabricator malfunctions or because they did not study properly in medical school. M M in the second game survived inside a reaper for weeks and constructs two huge bases with a repair tool.
Also, the first game portrays Maida bringing the reaper back to the base pretty clearly as a bad thing, and it is heavily implied that she, or at least the conflict between her and Paul Torgal, has killed them both. Thematically, Bart Torgal's approach of wonder and observation is portrayed as the best one, while their survival is threatened by both his father and Maida. In the second game, her "badass" approach seems to be portrayed in an entirely positive light, despite her again getting other people killed.
And the whole "distrust Alterra" thing...if you were stuck on an island for ten years and a ship came by, would you really go "oh, but that ship belongs to Nestle (or insert company you do not like here), I will rather stay?".

[Bassilth]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von YertyL:

The enforcer platform still shoots down ships, the power plant still produces power and ion crystals, the sea emperor is still kept alive, and the warpers are still swimming around. That's a pretty high level of "standby" and implies a high degree of automization -- more than enough to keep the lights on for storage media. You do have to manually insert new crystals to make the teleporters work again, but considering everything else functions by itself I would put that more on gameplay than lore.

That is actually pretty standby for Architect technology. All of this is possible simply because of their simple function. They are driven by the power produced by the Thermal Power Plant but the cables running on the map are pretty damaged, so it might not last long. Even their technology has its flaws.

The Quarantine Enforcement Platform has a pretty chill function. It is mainly on standby and only activates/uses significant power and its mechanisms once it is triggered. In short, it does not really do much in average, so there isnt much wear and tear, the system uses minimal power and if something uses minimal power and generally is doing nothing, then it cannot decay as fast, does not need as much maintenance.

The Ion Crystal generation is pretty much a resource simplification but I am sure it could keep running only for some time until the resource needed runs out (consider that nobody needed an ion cube from that pile for about 1000 years, so the limited resource to create it is still there but will run out). The ion cubes are made out of those crystals that need to be mined which they clearly have to do personally due to its strong integrity. Stop mining and the generation stops eventually. In Subnautica, Ryley begins mining it, so the power consumption increased and might malfunction/run out eventually.

The Sea Emperor needs no feeding. The water filtration system is pretty standard but I do agree that its continued proper function is questionable. There could be flaws at this point due to lack of maintenance but the game does not go into detail. We dont see all the building's sections, so we cannot know what other functions it is hiding that were deactived.

The warpers are automated from the start and use wireless power distributed by the still functioning Thermal Plant which does nothing else than convert heat to energy. Granted, after more than 1000 years of function... they should have shown some wear and tear. They seem to be strangely intact. Then again, Architects use energy for everything, including sustaining their own bodies, so maybe the warpers use energy to heal any damages caused by their target/age.

And the arches were disabled by the Architects all those years ago. Obviously since they did not decay they did not need maintenance and could resume normal function once activated.

All in all, it is a pretty standby, inactive, and energy saving mode compared to the function it probably performed while the Architects were active. We see only a glimpse of what these buildings hold. We are not shown all rooms and all sections. So say, the Quarantine Enforcement Platform probably had various other functions and sections we dont know about yet. But those were shut down and so the building needs no maintenance for now.

[YertyL]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Bassilth:

That is actually pretty standby for Architect technology. All of this is possible simply because of their simple function. They are driven by the power produced by the Thermal Power Plant but the cables running on the map are pretty damaged, so it might not last long. Even their technology has its flaws.

I do not think we see any damage to architect techology in the first game aside from the sea dragon attack's aftermath. The power cables I can recall -- e.g. at the containment facilty and at the power plant -- are all intact. This would also be thematically fitting for me: The first game has a pretty strong "against all odds" theme. You constantly find reminders that other people who were brave and competent still died to 4546B. The architects are the pinnacle of that -- even their hyper-advanced "perfect" techology fell to the planet's leviathans and kharaa.
And I am pretty sure that constructing a fridge that runs for a millenium would be impossible by today's standards. I would not call what we find in the game "simple". Self-gouverning robots, AI-steered huge lasers and teleportation networks are about as complicated as it gets even by sci-fi standards.

[Bassilth]

Simple for Architects. Which is the point.

The reason why there is no technology decay in the game is because it was well maintained while it functioned. When the time came that all Architects were stored or died, the technology ceased its regular function and went into hibernating/standby mode.

Basically what I said before. Your laptop will run quite some time without technology decay if it just runs on standby and does nothing, only uses power. As soon as you use it as it was intended, then regular maintenance is needed.

[YertyL]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Bassilth:

Simple for Architects. Which is the point.

The reason why there is no technology decay in the game is because it was well maintained while it functioned. When the time came that all Architects were stored or died, the technology ceased its regular function and went into hibernating/standby mode.

Basically what I said before. Your laptop will run quite some time without technology decay if it just runs on standby and does nothing, only uses power. As soon as you use it as it was intended, then regular maintenance is needed.

Well, if "intended use" is storing sea dragon eggs and "needing maintenance" is a sea dragon ramming a facilty I kind of agree :-D
But otherwise, it seems pretty far-fetched that the power plant producing power (in the first game the crystals appear to be conjured from pure energy and not mined), the enforcement platform shooting down ships, the warpers hunting creatures and the emperor's aquarium with its diverse ecosystem can all run by themselves, but only "intended use", which in this case seems to be kharaa research in two facilities, makes all facilities break down.

[Bassilth]

Not the crystals are produced but the ion cubes. The crystals are ion cube components and so need to be mined. It is just not shown in the first game.

We dont know for sure what other functions the facilities had and what sections, what bases remain in the planet that we had no access to.

What we know:
- Ion cube fabrication
- Filtration system
- Gun sensors and scanners

This is all that is running in the first game, while the cables in places are broken, not just because of the sea dragon but by simply decaying due to no maintenance. Everything else is shut down or simply runs purely on power generated by the Thermal Plant (eg.: Warpers). That means that all machinery required for extensive research in all bases known and unknown by us, in all sections of the structures known and unknown by us, is on standby. 90% of its function is inactive, considering the work they were doing on the planet.

Let us see the big picture, though.

What is currently active on the planet during its standby state is a fraction of the function required to keep an active population of Architects and their research going on the planet, which would need regular maintenance. The full power and technology function of the planet is but a measly, teeny tiny, insignificant fraction of the power and functionality needs of the homeworld or any planet they colonized for general existence.

If this small research station cannot work without proper maintenance, then the homeworld and all other worlds they colonized would collapse in a matter of few days if not maintained and organized in a constant manner. This is why the Architects cannot just destroy all the bodies and cease function for a while. Everything would collapse.

[random name]

A reason why info could be missing is because maybe something destroyed the caches, somehow. Even though it said it was invulnerable, im pretty sure it said it was invincible to our knowledge. A leviathan or a device similar to the doomsday device, but in smaller form could have possibly destroyed them. We see that a sea dragon destroyed the disease research facility, so why couldnt it have destroyed a cache?

[Evil Tim]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von idiot:

A reason why info could be missing is because maybe something destroyed the caches, somehow. Even though it said it was invulnerable, im pretty sure it said it was invincible to our knowledge. A leviathan or a device similar to the doomsday device, but in smaller form could have possibly destroyed them. We see that a sea dragon destroyed the disease research facility, so why couldnt it have destroyed a cache?

Because the Caches are usually surrounded by hundreds of feet of solid rock rather than being anchored by cables in the middle of a cavern.

[Atomsk]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Evil Tim:

The problem with that can be summarised in one word, that word being "Warper." The Precursors were quite capable of building biomechanoid drones that were completely immune to Kharaa despite constantly dealing with infected specimens. Since Al-an's complete data can fit in Robin's head, there's absolutely no reason they shouldn't have been able to stick themselves in Warper-like bodies.

I don't think it's ever started that Warpers were immune to the Khara. They were autonomous drones meant to carry out very simple orders so I doubt it would matter if they got infected or not. Their main function was to patrol 4546B and as far as the lore goes it's the only place where they were created, used, repaired (the Warper facility).

Even if creating a body completely immune to the Khara was possible it would mean a total reconstruction of their society; from sourcing materials for new bodies to how they interact with technology/architecture/etc. That's like us trying to evolve out AIDS or Cancer. It's monumentally more simple to try and find a cure or treatment before more drastic measures, as the aforementioned, were considered. Plus again, it's not clear whether if they were the only ones facing the crisis or if other species were involved. Creating new bodies would only benefit them in the long run.

[Evil Tim]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Atomsk:

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Evil Tim:

The problem with that can be summarised in one word, that word being "Warper." The Precursors were quite capable of building biomechanoid drones that were completely immune to Kharaa despite constantly dealing with infected specimens. Since Al-an's complete data can fit in Robin's head, there's absolutely no reason they shouldn't have been able to stick themselves in Warper-like bodies.

I don't think it's ever started that Warpers were immune to the Khara. They were autonomous drones meant to carry out very simple orders so I doubt it would matter if they got infected or not. Their main function was to patrol 4546B and as far as the lore goes it's the only place where they were created, used, repaired (the Warper facility).

Well the fact that they're still truckin' on after the deaths of every single Precursor despite being part-biological and incapable of being replaced would rather suggest they're immune, and we certainly never see any sign of Kharaa infection on a Warper, or anything like one Warper attacking another for being infected. And if they're still operational after such a length of time, it stands to reason that if uploading was as easy as BZ shows, they shouldn't really have a problem making new bodies for themselves.

The way I understood it in the first SN, the Precursor Caches were something similar to modern cryogenic freezing: they didn't necessary have the tech to get themselves back out of the Cache, they were just hoping someone would figure it out if the disease was ever cured. This means that it doesn't matter that they can build Warpers, because they don't necessarily know how to transfer themselves out of storage and into such a body. This is messed with by the idea that you can apparently store an entire networked Precursor multi-mind in the spare brain-meats of a passing human.

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Atomsk:

Even if creating a body completely immune to the Khara was possible it would mean a total reconstruction of their society; from sourcing materials for new bodies to how they interact with technology/architecture/etc.

Well given Al-an refers to the new body as a "vessel" it does seem like the BZ Architects already felt that way, particularly with his surprise that humans see there being a boundary between cybernetic and organic components. So it's only asking them to do something they were apparently already doing.

[Atomsk]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Evil Tim:

Well the fact that they're still truckin' on after the deaths of every single Precursor despite being part-biological and incapable of being replaced would rather suggest they're immune, and we certainly never see any sign of Kharaa infection on a Warper, or anything like one Warper attacking another for being infected. And if they're still operational after such a length of time, it stands to reason that if uploading was as easy as BZ shows, they shouldn't really have a problem making new bodies for themselves.

The way I understood it in the first SN, the Precursor Caches were something similar to modern cryogenic freezing: they didn't necessary have the tech to get themselves back out of the Cache, they were just hoping someone would figure it out if the disease was ever cured. This means that it doesn't matter that they can build Warpers, because they don't necessarily know how to transfer themselves out of storage and into such a body. This is messed with by the idea that you can apparently store an entire networked Precursor multi-mind in the spare brain-meats of a passing human.

Well we don't know for sure how many Warpers survived compared to how many were created; just the ones we saw floating about. Assuming that once infected the protocol was to self quarantine and seek repair we also don't know what would happen to them now that the facility was shut down. Immunity aside they were relativity simple compared to the body of Al-An. His body seem to defy physics as he could move effortlessly while being much more heavy then your average human. Warpers to them would probably be the equivalent of our Roombas. Naturally we also wouldn't want to default into uploading ourselves into our house hold cleaning drones to escape a plague.

As for the caches it wasn't so much they couldn't reupload themselves but that it is an system isolated. As we can surmise from BZ there needs to be an individual on the outside to provide the raw materials and to initiate the process. However this was impossible as the entire planet was under quarantine since the Khara was accidentally released. I also doubt the body of a Warper would be sufficient as there would of been no need to make Robin jump through all those hoops to make a suitable body. She could of simply fetched the schematics of a Warper if they were fit to house them. Similar to how your average computer is no where near fit to hold the human mind. It just wasn't constructed that way.

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Evil Tim:

Well given Al-an refers to the new body as a "vessel" it does seem like the BZ Architects already felt that way, particularly with his surprise that humans see there being a boundary between cybernetic and organic components. So it's only asking them to do something they were apparently already doing.

I was more referring to how sequencing a new body would probably be taking on an entirely new form. Imagine if humans suddenly weren't human shaped. Overnight things like doornobs, steering wheels, pencils, etc. would be completely foreign as we could lack the necessary appendages and forms to manipulate them. I'm sure it's the same with Al-An and his people. Their society is built based around how they interact with their environment and although I'm not certain to what extent there would defiantly be a need to restructure their civilization.

Even though creating immune bodies was probably possible it's most likely that it was one of their fringe solutions to the Khara. It's much more reasonable that they would seek out a cure or some other conventional way to combat it first. Hence the research facilities on 4546B.