squatina on 3/10/2007 at 06:56
Quote Posted by ZylonBane
Never mind the fact that the SHODAN avatars were cyberspace projections, and the escape pod is most certainly not in cyberspace.
That part in the end has never made any sense to me. You just walk from the spaceship into cyberspace? And you can use the items and weapons in your inventory there? Huh?
The ending is a real piece of s*it compared to SS1 ending.
ZylonBane on 3/10/2007 at 14:07
Quote Posted by squatina
That part in the end has never made any sense to me. You just walk from the spaceship into cyberspace?
Yes. Don't blame SS2 if you didn't bother listening to Delacroix's final logs.
Assidragon on 3/10/2007 at 14:15
Actually, the last part indeed doesn't make much sense. First of all, SHODAN could just erase you from reality once you're in her proto-reality. Secondarily, you walk out of the Rickenbacker, so if the proto reality is gone, you should be floating in space, not being teleported back onto the bridge. :erg:
heywood on 3/10/2007 at 14:20
Quote Posted by squatina
That part in the end has never made any sense to me. You just walk from the spaceship into cyberspace? And you can use the items and weapons in your inventory there? Huh?
The ending is a real piece of s*it compared to SS1 ending.
Perhaps, but after finishing the BOTM, any final level would have seemed good. On my first play through, I figured the Many brain was the last boss battle and I was prepared for the game to end on an utterly lame note ala Half-Life. You can't imagine how relieved I was to end up in a cyberspace version of Citadel with the opportunity to kill SHODAN. Imagine if the game had ended like Half-Life, with SHODAN giving you the choice to be her cybernetic uber-agent or die.
Quote Posted by Assidragon
Actually, the last part indeed doesn't make much sense. First of all, SHODAN could just erase you from reality once you're in her proto-reality. Secondarily, you walk out of the Rickenbacker, so if the proto reality is gone, you should be floating in space, not being teleported back onto the bridge.
Just because SHODAN created the proto-reality version of cyberspace doesn't mean she is omnipotent in it. Cyberspace is the software construct that the AI was created in, like a hardware abstraction layer or operating system of sorts. That software construct will have features, properties, rules, and constraints that govern how the AI executes and are beyond the AI's ability to change. When SHODAN creates proto-reality with the intent of occupying it, she presumably creates it in the image of cyberspace, with the same rules & constraints. At least, that's how I rationalized it.
Kolya on 3/10/2007 at 15:46
Quote Posted by Assidragon
Actually, the last part
indeed doesn't make much sense. First of all, SHODAN could just erase you from reality once you're in her proto-reality. Secondarily, you walk out of the Rickenbacker, so if the proto reality is gone, you should be floating in space, not being teleported back onto the bridge. :erg:
When you leave the bridge, you don't walk into space. You walk into SHODAN's proto-reality. It has nothing to do with your previous reality which stops existing at this point (or freezes if you like that better). Once the proto-reality pocket collapses, normal reality is re-established and bam, you're back where you are with no time passed and without a trip into space.
So why does SHODAN not just "delete" you? First of all it's not cyberspace. You couldn't physically enter cyberspace after all. It's a deformed reconstruction of Citadel Station's reality. Clearly some basic laws of physics still hold here. For example there's gravity for most things. There are data fragments traveling around weightlessly, which is a deformation of the original Citadel reality. But most things work like before. Like your guns.
So why would SHODAN not deform this reality to protect herself? I'm sure she did. But Delacroix had also access. She inserted the hacking terminals. And she is the one who tells you that SHODAN will be vulnerable to your weapons. It seems reasonable to assume that she also re-instated a few physical laws that SHODAN may have dropped or bent before to protect herself.
ZylonBane on 3/10/2007 at 21:22
Quote Posted by heywood
Cyberspace is the software construct that the AI was created in, like a hardware abstraction layer or operating system of sorts.
No, it isn't.
heywood on 4/10/2007 at 20:27
Eh, you're right. Cyberspace is the construct created for human-computer interaction.
My rationalization obviously needs some work, but the basic idea is that SHODAN is not omnipotent and some rules and constraints still apply in her proto-reality. The portion of proto-reality you visit is a mix of Citadel station and cyberspace, so it's reasonable to expect some of the rules of the normal world to apply and some of the rules of cyberspace to apply.
Ahkaskar on 4/10/2007 at 20:41
Quote Posted by Kolya
So why would SHODAN not deform this reality to protect herself? I'm sure she did.
I think the ethereal, virtual assassins count.
sacolton on 4/10/2007 at 20:56
Ah ha! I found a very important clue in the audio logs:
Quote:
DATE 12.JUL.14
TOMMY SUAREZ, COMMANDS: POD PROBLEMS
Getting the escape pod working again wasn't as easy as we thought. Bec had to go back down to engineering! Thank God somebody managed to get the elevators turned on again. I found the bridge key and performed an override on the access protocols and now I think we're ready to go.
So, Tommy let Rebecca wander down to Engineering
BY HERSELF while he's hunting for the bridge key. The "somebody" who managed to turn on the elevators was, of course, Shodan. There is no mention of how long Rebecca was alone, but it is a safe bet that at some point she was overtaken by Shodan and implanted.
For the record, I never once doubted that the person who speaks to Tommy at the end was Rebecca-Shodan. Question is ... does she kill him?
Kolya on 4/10/2007 at 22:20
Quote Posted by sacolton
The "somebody" who managed to turn on the elevators was, of course, Shodan.
No simpleton, the "somebody" is you.
