The QC Fail label, which only appears on the low-level cyborg units, implies that the mass-production of cyborgs is very sloppy and imperfect - but they still represent a corporate investment that can't be wasted. They're greedy and cut corners wherever they can. So the QC Failures (the majority of them) are simply dumped onto the frontlines as rushdown beasts. Only the cyborgs which pass Quality Control are given weapons and fielded as infantry.
That's certainly a good thought too, would also imply that with the massive number of defects these factories have been running a long time (an AI told to produce but not able to repair itself).
@@killpo_1 From where I am (and this is pure conjecture/HC) it could be that there's a priority system where somewhat wealthier customers can afford cyborgization with a higher chance of Quality Pass. Slaves and refugees get conscripted and shoved through the cheap/old process while volunteers and clients who can pay for the "deluxe upgrade package" will get priority attention and be assured that their cyborgization will go "well" for them. Imagine there being ads to enlist everywhere that give an incomplete story of what cyborgization is like. That feels in-character for the corporate dystopia.
I definitely think that's the case at the end. There's almost assuredly propaganda going around and citizens aren't aware of what becoming a "soldier" of Eurasia is. The QC Fail / Pass could certainly also have some corporate meddling, with more well off citizens able to pay for better parts to pass QC while the failed ones get thrown into a garbage truck (the flying bombers) and dumped onto the battlefields.
@@vezanmatics good call. My theory was the zombies where rejects both in initial production but also from repeated reuse. It felt off for the zombies to directly crated as such as there is no point in making a zombie with fully conscious, but there is plenty in making solider that way, so it logical that the zombies are byproducts of Solider production and not intentional constructs.
Its like the chip making process your fab is making only the high end product but some of it fails so you sell it at a lower level. Like a 9700x having cores disabled versus a 9900x processor. Just a thought
well in mass produce cybermeat-shield they seemed didnt botherd with lobotomy (Servitors in 40k are more lucky, but there the proces isnt 100% efective), so there wont be combat decision making decrase
@@jakubkvacala1880Working on it likely, especially since not all the guns, mods, maps, etc aren't in yet. Heck, even Mr "not this guy" isn't implemented yet. Though that being said I'm kinda scared to see the rest of eurasia's military
"We dance under phosphor skies" could also mean that the skies rained white phosphorous, which is a chemical weapon, similar to napalm. If so, the 'dancing' that's referred to, takes on a much more sinister meaning.
Yeah, I did think of white phosphorous but leaned away from it. Perhaps they might be paying homage to Spec Ops The Line in some capacity. My main reservation was that it would scorch the cyborgs under it, but perhaps thats the point "lol we dont care we don't have free will" as they dance and get melted.
@@killpo_1actually white phosphorus when used as an incendiary weapon leaves high temperature synthetics like vehicles (and cyborgs) unharmed as it burns organic material and produces toxic gasses so if they are actually that augmented they could be deployed under a huge cloud of the stuff to blind and kill organic enemy units.
My first thought on seeing the title was 'Oceania is at war with Eurasia. Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia.' It's from a different dystopia but fits well enough.
I have some different theory about life cycle of the cyborgs: - Final result of the processing is validated for its function, either becoming a soldier, or thrall (n rare occasions like recruit's high IQ, lower rank officer). That's explains "Failed" label on Runners. Besides, if the final result would always give Runner thrall, which has VERY slim chance of surviving its first battle, then there would be no soldiers altogether, not to mention lack of officers. - Once soldier is killed, but his body is mostly intact, he's brought behind front lines by Mother to receive quick patch up and reactivation to be sent as thrall fodder (the same goes for killed thralls with intact enough bodies) - Another death often results in ruptured body, which results in crawlers being sent once they're reactivated. This is a stage that can be repeated infinitely, until cyborg corpse becomes completely useless And since the war lasts already for several decades, we can assume that this is exact reason why there's more fodder than actual soldiers. Just an infinite cycle of fight-die-repeat.
That's my perspective on it too. The minds of the thralls could have been physically damaged as a result of the conversion process or emotionally from the trauma stemming from it, especially if they were made from prisoners or otherwise forced into it and suddenly found themselves in a body that's no longer their own. They're labeled as defective products and just chucked at the enemy Sturm Z style without training or equipment to provide meat shields for the more advanced units and wear down the enemy with sheer attrition. The cyborgs that undergo successful conversion are turned into soldiers or upgraded into specialized types, but being destroyed and revived multiple times could certainly take its toll on them until they're too mentally unstable and get downgraded. I bet that's why some of them are given more realistic facial prosthetics, to help them retain some image of their humanity to keep them emotionally functional for longer. The comment about there being so much more fodder than soldiers is kind of haunting, what's seen in the game could be only the empty shambling husk of what their army started off as. Slowly circling the drain as they scrape and recycle any cyborg that's still of use, grinding them up again and again and again on the battlefield until there's nothing left of their humanity at all.
Agreed. They definitely 'wear until it's worn completely' and no longer useful. Besides, large amount of 'Failed' labels could be also the result of recycling components, instead of producing new ones. In this case, cyborgs made mostly of used parts and components are mostly becoming Runners, while those made with brand new ones become soldiers.
The only disagreement I have is that it makes more sense that we see more traditional soldiers who get demoted to thralls as they fall in combat as opposed to being promoted from a thrall. I can see it more likely people who fail the transition are converted to thralls and they sort of stay that way, while taking whatever more capable soldiers they can from a pool of converts to instantly promote to armed soldiers. Hell, Officers might even be promoted from skilled volunteers who are groomed for the roll from birth.
That's a fair approach too. My only hesitation is the number of thralls we see over soldiers. Though, if thralls can be recycled multiple times via spare parts it could explain that after a demotion from soldier to thrall they have multiple "lives" from being recycled before eventually being beyond repair.
@ that was my line of logic. You get one shot as a foot soldier, then you become reusable canon fodder until you’re just spare parts for the less damaged thralls.
Apparently Mother Courage also has a Zaikatsu Biomedical brand too on her, alongside a 'Made in NEO S.E.A. low orbit' which is also seen on the 9mm ammo item. With how the cyborg armor is also made in micro gravity, we can somewhat conclude that Eurasia has significant industry up in orbit (despite the setting's kessler syndrome?) Oh, and we do know Eurasian troops still have a morale to maintain, with there being a regional media department producing distributing propaganda around in Lost Angels
It's possible they have massive reserves of items from orbital manufacturing like Europa and their tanks, as I don't see why orbital sites wouldn't be hit during the nuclear war.
I feel like turning recruits directly into pure melee first then hoping they live long enough be given a gun seems horribly inefficient for an A.I and even less so in the combat effectiveness department. Im pretty certain Rasia doesnt make thralls directly and is rather a cause of something. My headcanon is they all start out as regular infantry with P90s then, some flaw with cyberware or lack of adaptability meds in the field likely caused them to develop a form of "cyberpsychosis". Seeing them as damaged goods, they just drop'em as cannon fodder.
It kind of depends on how much Eurasia's factories / corporate factories able to produce imo. Considering the coprorate landscape their could be artifical scarcity to inflate profits or increase influence or power. The armor being labeled as essentially made in Space (Nano-Fabricated in a Micro G enviroment) personally gives me the thought of there being a lot more cyborgs than armor, meaning that these thralls have to "earn" their spot as a soldier. Sort of like Enemy at the Gates vibes (one soldier gets the weapon, one the ammo, pickup the weapon when that soldier dies). When they get to this state they get a great deal of investment into them, with armor, weapons, a Cybrain and likely pick of the litter of parts for repairs. The worn red-eyed variants seem to also suggest that these soldiers are invested in so heavily that they're essentially "zombified" after brain death. I do like the cyberpsychosis idea though, mental instability I think does play a clear factor in some capacity.
@@killpo_1 I recall there being a quest from the Ropans where Luca tells you they're having "trouble" with the Rasian thralls and sends you to "put them out of their misery". Even after completing the quest he mentions those that you killed as "poor souls". That's kind of where I got the idea that there might be something "malfunctioning" with the thralls. It'd make sense to slap the "QC failed" parts onto them since it's garbage anyways so might as well slap'em onto the expendable troops yea.
It may be inefficient as a tactic of war but incredibly efficient as a method of control for an overpopulated country at war. Threaten the populace with "conscription" in the cyborg army, punish even the most minor offenses with loss of autonomy and put to fight for the machine. My theory is ALL the cyborgs are "fails", they are all "earning" their autonomy back by fighting, hence the faces on higher ranks, they miss their faces and are clinging to their humanity, its loss was not voluntary. The "Fail" is a lack of loyalty/commitment to the cause, not necessarily defective in the manufacturing sense, but in the dystopian authoritarian government sense. There may be an even more horrific and large scale human farming and harvesting operation on the Eurasian continent at this point for all we know.
I have a theory that this is Eurasias method of solving their overpopulation problem. They focus heavily on recruitment so that the more zombified Eurasians die on the battlefield, the less they would have to deal with at home. It also coincides with how they deploy their troops by quite literally dropping bodies to die on the frontlines.
Mothers being the most durable unit yet seen in the Eurasian arsenal (along with the fact that they are so despite being deployed to ideally avoid Europan engagement) implies to me that the entire Eurasian theory of warfare relies upon recycling their army. Extremely standardized weaponry for their mainline soldiers, very standardized assembly on their cyborg parts, combined with a total disregard for most of their troopers who don't prove skilled or able to mentally withstand the transition into mostly machine. No nation could withstand such a massive attrition rate unless they were built to be reused, which everything else implies. I think unless a Cyborg gets mostly obliterated or disassembled, they can be reactivated and repaired to functionality. Kinda like the Terminators they're inspired off of. Worst case scenario they might retake the useable parts, but I think the priority for Mothers' scavenging runs is always "salvageable soldiers" over parts, given how mass-produced the parts are implied to be. In so doing, the Cyborgs would keep getting "revived", again and again so long as the Mothers can keep finding them, and so long as they're not completely wrecked. Now, their mental states following such a process would likely see further and further degradation over time, since most people wouldn't be able to cope with constantly dying over and over again, but as we see even such cases can still be made use of by Eurasia. As one way or another until they prove themselves worthy, they're the 'fodder' of the Eurasia-Euruskan military partnership. The amount of paranoia and control over their creations also reminds me of Skynet's own paranoia in the Terminator series. Skynet gained sentience, but simultaneously feared it's own creations, the Terminators, gaining free thought. Hence why the T-800s' microprocessors despite being capable of free-thinking were set by default to not enable this feature without post-modification, or why the T-1000 never left the prototype phase despite being a more ideal Terminator model in most respects. In that case particularly Skynet feared it had created a model that was too dangerous for its own safety to mass-produce (Though it was fine sending the prototype it had into the past to kill John as a final desperate move).
i think looking at the quest dialogue could be another avenue for research. for example; kane states "Although you are of a lower form of life, you are among the best that we have encountered. *Bows*" upon completing the quest "Hostile Expungement". this implies that likely in eurasian society as a whole, people with cybernetic augments are not only looked up to, but considered to be on a completely different level to regular full flesh humans. potentially being thought of as higher beings in some fundamental way
This a good video with some interesting theories. It does raise further questions as to the nature of Eurasia. It also makes it more impressive Europa has been able to withstand this long.
At last a video from you! Was curious who will go next and here is my answer. P.S. after watching I wonder what devs will say if they watch this video. Looks like a detailed backstory. As always grim with your fantastic voice and story telling!
With all this control over their soldiers, it makes you wonder what would happen if even one cyborg somehow managed to gain free will again. How would the person under all that tech react to their disfiguration?
Probably very badly. I think they'd be horrible pain and with them likely regaining their mind while in midst of the forever war I think they'd just be ripe for a insane amount of trauma. I also imagine they'd have nowhere to go and their components may fall apart overtime without maintenance from a MOTHER unit.
Very nice video, I've been dying for more Forever Winter lore since it realeased. It's amazing how much you're able to theorise with the many small hints and details the devs left behind. I think you're right on the money with the theory on Eurasia being prioritised with internal rebellion, I noticed this as well whilst playing that despite all their advancements, Eurasia has a very light arsenal. They're allies and trading partners with Euruska, giving them biomechanical technology which Euraska uses to create more advanced (and horrific) weapons of war. Everything points towards Eurasia wanting little to do with the war and only proving their use as allies by half heartedly dumping cyborgs on the battlefield and sharing tech whilst Euruska seems to do most the heavy lifting. The only "mech" they have is used to recycling bodies so it seems they have a cheap way of creating large bodies of durable infantry and stick to that, they'll simply wait for the smoke to clear and enact their plans. Even Euruskan infantry are more heavily armoured than the Europan infantry. On the Cyborg lifecycle, I'd assume the "thralls" are simply cyborgs the majority that failed testing, since they cannot be used with all their advanced human capabilities they're dumped onto the battlefield like waste and left to their own devices. The reason officers may be fully armoured is that they passed testing OR they were volunteers and loyal to the regime before testing hence the need for protection, I imagine it very unlikely there'd be many people asking to get turned into a cyborg. Since it's clear the Eurasian military is designed for peacekeeping (even their armour looks more like swat gear) it's possible the human faces were used as a guise to not alarm civillians and it's simply so battle damaged only the cracked face is left. Since they are celebrated or paraded it is possible civillians might know of cyborgs being used. One thing I like about this analysis is in the original lore, all of humanities top brass got wiped out in the initial bombardment, supposedly no one knows why they're even fighting. This might be true for Euruska and Europa but presumebly Eurasia has been underground for a long time which means the leaders have survived, OR the AI driven corporations have always had long term plans ahead of time and simply fighting for their pre-war goals. Nice video edit: forgot to mention, I like your idea of Brawlers being beacons for cyborgs to find their way home, good explanation.
We need more Eurasia units (commandos, scouts, snipers, AT units....), and more lore videos, bdw brawlers armor definitivly isnt IIIA, these abomination can withstand antimaterial rifles, and explosives; I can imagine recruitment poster for joining
Yeah, the IIIA labeling on Brawlers does not seem appropriate but it could just be the soft armor over perhaps ceramic or steel armor plates. Though, just thinking of it now it could be covering massive amounts of synthetic muscle which could absorb bullet impacts while retaining some functionality (something to explain their massive strength).
@@killpo_1 in this time line i wont be suprised if insted of steel, they are using nanolaminates or something like that, that muscle part is likely true, it would explain their increse in size (bdw in those muscles must be stored lot of potencial energy, i wonder what could happen if some of them snaped), pls do lore about Orgamech, plp asap
@@killpo_1 Hi, there is 1 thing, who is in charge of Eurasia, as far as i know according to lore entire leadership died in nuclear war, and combat strategic AIs runs the show now (bdw when there will be new video?)
I interpret the cybrain as a coprocessor unit, probably handing command and control functions to the officer allowing the human brain to focus entirely on combat.
I'd like to think the Cyborgs consist of artificial organs and such as well as volunteers, and etc. I also believe the basic cyborgs are the broken ones to begin with, hence them getting thrown, with no regard, out of the plane.
The Manufactured in a Zero G environment is a bit of a retcon, since previous lore stated that no one can get into space due to a Kessler event. Maybe they have a large amount in storage somewhere.
My head canon for now is that enough time has passed (or tech achieved) for low earth orbit items, considering their orbits would decay over time, but anything outside low earth orbit is no possible due to it.
Amazing video. Please make more of these on other factions or enemies In the game. I haven't gotten the game yet and haven't came across any lore/faction videos on it yet, but I'd love more lore videos on it.
It makes no sense thst zombified thralls ascend to greater function. It's the opposite. Eurasia deployed fully functional SMG armed soldiers but the benefit of thekr cyborg state is that they can be reassembled and returned to the battlefield over and over with increasingly broken and degraded parts....now not able to operate a firearm or even to walk upright. The Eurasians stop deploying these broken toys normally and just drop them from gliders. Thrall and crawler are the last stage of degredation.
That's a fair theory. Personally, I dont think the Thralls are zombified at the start, they're just mentally supressed. Their minds hijacked to provide cheaper and more mass produced functionality than a complex component like a "Cybrain", reserved only for those who prove their worth. The red-eyed soldiers (and no red-eyed thralls or scramblers) give the impression that there's additional investment placed into Soldiers, able to utilize the backup Cybrain to operate weaponry while in this zombified state. Though it could easily go the opposite way like you're suggesting, where the Soldier is the default state of Cyborgs, and they are degraded over time (to red-eyed variant) until they get a retrofit into a thrall, crawler and then scrap.
5:03 do we know where the implant is located? Sci-fi lore in general would say that if it's in the brain it's upgraded processing. If it's on the spinal cord, we're probably talking some cyberpunk stuff.
I thought the lore was that no one could have space stations anymore because of the space debris from all the satellites being blown up. Although I forget where I heard that now.
So eurasia might be the only faction with reasonable space travel yea? Im just asking cuz I thought there was some lore stating we werent able to access space anymore due to what caused the forever winter
Id love to see the base cybogs get a buff. Would be awesome to see sparks flying off one in a hail of bullets only to have one connect and take out the skull and head only for the backup AI take over and it contines to slowly walk towards you until you grind it down to blood and metal.
My impression of the military hierarchy is opposite. Instead of ascension through service, it is far more likely that cyborg manufacturing is limited in quality due to its advanced features. Like the ratings on CPU chips being determined by their subsystem’s defect rating, perhaps lower tier cyborgs are the horrific result of lower quality standards where the mental damage of conversion is permanent, yet still utilized like spare parts. It is very likely that Eurasia advertises service in the form of Cyborg commanders and handcrafted brawlers, rather than the reality of most cyborgs being mindless thralls.
considering that eurasia is a police state- it could be equally likely that said cyborgs are not derived from propagandizing and recruitment, but are instead convicts
Ha feels like I’m having one of those zombie media naming conventions, zombies, Zeds, walker, me and my mates call the basic cyborgs ghouls because of their behaviour, but thralls fits really well too
I like the theory that cyborgs are dead Euruskan soldiers that are retrieved by mother courage and turned into cyborgs to serve Eurasia as a term of the alliance between the two nations. Euruska would probably be fine with this due to there use of bioengineering
I mention it fairly briefly during the Eurasia section (just that they have enough grain for significant Liquor production). I believe it's been cannonized that the cyborgs use it to cope (numbing the minds that are hijacked to murder and witness the horrors of war).
Glad I’m a euraska supporter because I can’t imagine being forced into a machine for war anyways I’m signing up for the new orga mech division the posters say it’s a noble thing to do
I imagine that there is no shortage of debtors, criminals, agitators and the like who can be pressed into unwilling cyborg service. Economically it would be a great idea, as there would be no need for prisons and it would be a great tool for encouraging social conformity and economic productivity. The QC fail may not be a mechanical failure, but a social one - humans judged to have failed to live a productive life, by their AI overlords.
2:04 it’s common for religion to be subsumed & stripped of meaning in jingoism & politics to be a justification for whatever the hell they want, prayer becomes a tv show where the profiteers tell serfs to pray for idols & eventually the idols become the object of worship themselves. Mass manufactured prayer books with no sincerity. “Dancing under phosphorus skies” could be them trying to obliterate all life with white phosphorus and dancing at their destructive victory, it is suited by the very utilitarian & menacing designs of their army not much above Euruska, but the officer is a puzzle. It is the only one basically in the entire game who’s visual presence is one of respect & beauty, with how they’re lit up. Not even the brawler has any grace in it’s design despite being more powerful. Who are they trying to impress? Is the upper class taking part in the fight themselves for some reason? Aliens ruling over puny humans to destroy from within? Would fit the uncanny masks trying to imitate people.
19:39 honestly i dont believe Officers are promoted and maybe even cyborg instead high value people with high loyalty who are tasked or want to oversee the oother cyborgs
the IIIA marking could reference also one of the inspiration they got for forever winter, the 3A toy, just look at 3A toy N.O.M and you'll see some cool figures with gasmask also gg, best deep dive so far, gives a lot of lore for many unit and eurasia in general
Eurasia over population , Corporate influenced society with a goverment that promotes a mix of oriental ideals of honor, duty and sacrifice. May have created a a culture of indiference in its high society and leadership, cyborgs are dispensable and a product, the only value they bring is in their results in battle , if a cyborg fails he failed its liders and nation. The same idea may be applied to its population . Those who meet expectations are rewarded , those who do not meet them are punished . That's how i see Cyborgs in Eurasia eyed , they are just products with a goal that is to kill their enemies , they are just a number in some excel sheet . A cyborg only gos up in hierchy if it delivers results , that's why oficers look so good , they consistently delivered or over delivered results and got rewarded for it .
I wonder if its possible that the low tier cyborgs are political prisoners, dissenters, enemy pows, or enemies of the state deemed too untrustworthy or resilient to be given excessive free will while the higher tier ones are more loyal, or more malleable, citizens.
Since we know Eurasia is a capitalistic state it must have an unemployed class(Capitalism requires unemployment as a threat to employees and as a supply pool). I would suspect this class is mostly made of unaugmented humans. Many jobs likely require cyborg bodies as a basic requirement(solider being one example). The Eurasian government or corporations could sponsor candidates with the condition of ownership of the candidates life. Successful candidates who pass QC become soldiers and other cyborg workers. The QC failures become thralls and scramblers.
This would explain the Europans counter measures to deploy much more lighter, and more robust, purely mechanized units to the battlefield, especially to clear out the smaller enclosed area's where they may be infested with these Cyborgs, they outnumber the Europan troop forces by tenfold in the battles and are easily replaceable and repairable when they are harvested and re-initiated into combat, where-as europans do not have any disposable forces or replacements for Hybrid cybernetics due to the lack and demand of Technology, I believe that Europan stance and views on this also restricts and hinders the progression of using similar forces against the Eurasian forces not only due to internal uproar and debate but also a lack of tech and manufacturing resources. Eurasia seems to Embrace the idea of merging Man and Machine into one and making such soldier re-useable for any means necessary because they have the numbers whereas Europa still holds on to a somewhat human dependance for combat and leans more on strategizing engagements, which is why Europan forces are always selectively different on the battlefield.
I hate to sound mean here but your analysis, while through in some areas, completely misses other areas worth examining. Such as the dialogue with the Eurasian quest giver, who seems to hint that Eurasia is some form of technofascist regime that views "non-augs" as lower lifeforms. Your theories regarding their armaments make quite a lot of sense though, if Eurasia is anything like the modern PRC, then they are paranoid about internal conflict and spend most of their resources on internal security. Although it still brings up questions such as why their standard issue weapons are designed specifically for close quarters when the battlefields of Lost Angels easily stretch past 50-100m. More importantly, what are they doing with a NATO standard sub machine gun? Major Asian countries like China, Japan, and Korea have had their own local arms industries, and even if it was a knock-off P90, it wouldn't be called that as they have their own naming convention. Finally I'd like to discuss the unrealistic nature of your cyborgs life cycle theory, as there are a number of holes in it. Firstly, the reliance on naturally grown human brains for operation strongly implies Eurasia still major hurdles and neuroscience and can't simply edit brains. So the idea that cyborgs can recieved their identity back makes absolutely no sense. Their identity is gone. Erased. Or at the very least lobitimized. They can't just pull out a hard drive with someone's personality on it and deliver it back as part of a promotion. Additionally, the concept of meret based progression seems out of character for a faction meant to represent cyberpunk dystopia, comprised of countries known for serious corporate and political corruption. Allow me to provide my alternative theory. Cyborgs are primarily comprised of immigrants, the lower classes, prisoners, or any other form of undesirables. How much of their identity remains a mystery, it's possible they operate based on a simple punishment/reward system (activating pleasure/pain receptors in the brain based on actions or lack thereof), and that otherwise their actions are done at their own discretion. All basic cyborgs seem to be to some extent brain damaged. The "thralls" for example have what I describe as a "floppy armed Naruto run" gait that makes them hard to take seriously. This would imply they aren't given weapons out of lack of trust, but a lack of motor function. Scramblers are the same but more severe. In this way, the QA stamp is very literal in interpretation. They are the ones who were brain damaged during processing and so are designated to Bakhmut tier recon by fire tactics. Those that are recovered are almost surely never rewarded. They are either repaired or recycled. Soldier Cyborgs are likely the intended end result. It's not clear what their face masks are made of, so the possibility that it's real human skin persists. This could be their original face, meant to provide them with a hint of individuality, or perhaps they skin their victims and wear their faces as some sort of coping mechanisms to help them grapple with their tragic existence. Either theory suggests a disturbing level of autonomy. When it comes to officers and brawlers, I highly suspect they are cut from wholly different cloth. In either a cyberpunk or authoritarian dystopia, there is always a privileged upper class. Often times this class, if forced to go to war, will put their children in positions of officers right off the bat or at the very least make sure they are better equipped. Calling brawlers knights might be more literal than you realize if they really are part of some kind of noble class swearing loyalty to a dynasty. They are always operated on with care during the augmentation process, assuming they haven't already undergone it is civilian life, something that seems like an obligation based on how they view "non-augs".
I envy a man who reads of phosphorous skies and thinks of thinks of environmental lighting... White phosphor is one of the most inhuman C-weapons currently in use. Its both incendiary and toxic.
While it could just be referencing Willy Pete, I really think it being posted on every single cyborg (and other units) means something greater than that, though as these are all theories I could easily be wrong/ Though I imagine if / when we see artillery & bombs I would not be suprised if we see chemical / incendiary weapons like that. The Europan special unit Pyro definitely gives the vibe that incendiary weapons are coming.
For me the Life-Cycle of the Cyborgs feels like 'climbing out of Tartarus' where the dead try to escape hell. Only a very few manage this feat and those are Heros and Champions.
Given how we see Mother Courage units stacking piles of cyborg corpses it makes me wonder if they go in for repair and refurbishing after retrieval and then the internal QC testing and amount of damage taken determines if a former Soldier/Brawler gets downgraded to being a Thrall or Scrambler. Given the sheer distance newly converted recruits would have to be flown to get to Europan territory you’d probably want to recycle as much as possible
"Thrall" and scrambler might just be a final phase of recycled cyborg with Soldier being its mainline model. Considering that the war has lasted for decades it might makes sense that they now outnumbered the Soldiers. Alas we haven't seen much of the elites of Eurasian military including its heavy mechs or even unique characters to fully understand their organization
The P90 and AA12 might also allude to Eurasia having some relation with Europa's mega corps or having warmer relations with Europa at one point considering that the design of the P90 and AA12 are from Europan territories. For Eurasia to have them in enough numbers to have them issued to soldiers, especially the P90, they had to have made a deal with the manufacturers to either locally build the designs or import it from the manufacturer.
The question is, why do they need artificial faces and/or teeth? Such elements of human resemblance are not needed on the battlefield. Apparently, this is either because they are used in civilian life and interact with living people (preserving human resemblance). Or it is connected with some ideological or religious aspects.
It could be a way to help preserve some aspect of their humanity and keep them from going completely insane. Being cyborgified and completely stripped of their former identity would be traumatic for many of them.
I think order of lifecycle is reversed. Ordinary soldier is the starting variant, while runner and crawler is next stages, as cyborg becoming damaged beyond repair and gradually loosing remains of humanity.
While I appreciate it, my videos are way too theoretical to be put into something that should be strictly factual like a wiki. Feel free to use screencaps for things like the corporate logos etc etc.
@@killpo_1 Oh man, there is a lot of stuff on the wiki that is currently theory only xD As long as you formulate it in a way that makes it clear this is not a 100% confirmed fact there should be no problem. The most important thing is sharing what we know with as many people as possible sonew players have a better time getting into the game.
Thanks for the feedback! I'll try investing in a better pop filter to help alleviate this in the future. Its just the harsh nature of plosives I need to work on.
I'd say this whole game is something somewut bulit upon the ColdWar propaganda yeah it's a game yeah it's gotta some pretty gud art design but still it's propaganda
None of the images were actually AI. If they were they were not advertised as such. (All images are either in game, concept art for other games or obtained through license websites such as ShutterStock or Adobe Stock without the AI tag).
@@killpo_1 do the images around 1:40, 8:10, 15:20, and 21:15 not appear AI generated to you though? Whether tagged or not I think you can agree they look fairly weird, and I'm sort of surprised your argument is just that they were not advertised as such. I don't think it takes away from the effort you put in the video, but I mean, I do lean towards the original comment here; if it looks like AI generated just don't use it.
another typical sci-fi setting doing the forced grim dark. With such technology what does Eurasian even need the human brain anymore？Their cyborg can easily be fully automated, it makes absolutely no sense why they need to modify a human, and basically turn it from a functional brain into a low level bot that can only do low level thinking and function. Yea everyone lives like shit but they never run out of people, feed a dude dozens of years just for him to become a bio CPU that can't handle a slight complex task and will easily disable in a simple firefight. Lol,lmao even.
The QC Fail label, which only appears on the low-level cyborg units, implies that the mass-production of cyborgs is very sloppy and imperfect - but they still represent a corporate investment that can't be wasted. They're greedy and cut corners wherever they can. So the QC Failures (the majority of them) are simply dumped onto the frontlines as rushdown beasts. Only the cyborgs which pass Quality Control are given weapons and fielded as infantry.
That's certainly a good thought too, would also imply that with the massive number of defects these factories have been running a long time (an AI told to produce but not able to repair itself).
@@killpo_1 From where I am (and this is pure conjecture/HC) it could be that there's a priority system where somewhat wealthier customers can afford cyborgization with a higher chance of Quality Pass. Slaves and refugees get conscripted and shoved through the cheap/old process while volunteers and clients who can pay for the "deluxe upgrade package" will get priority attention and be assured that their cyborgization will go "well" for them. Imagine there being ads to enlist everywhere that give an incomplete story of what cyborgization is like. That feels in-character for the corporate dystopia.
I definitely think that's the case at the end. There's almost assuredly propaganda going around and citizens aren't aware of what becoming a "soldier" of Eurasia is.
The QC Fail / Pass could certainly also have some corporate meddling, with more well off citizens able to pay for better parts to pass QC while the failed ones get thrown into a garbage truck (the flying bombers) and dumped onto the battlefields.
@@vezanmatics good call. My theory was the zombies where rejects both in initial production but also from repeated reuse. It felt off for the zombies to directly crated as such as there is no point in making a zombie with fully conscious, but there is plenty in making solider that way, so it logical that the zombies are byproducts of Solider production and not intentional constructs.
Its like the chip making process your fab is making only the high end product but some of it fails so you sell it at a lower level. Like a 9700x having cores disabled versus a 9900x processor. Just a thought
Even in the grim, distant future of perpetual warfare we still have to deal with unnecessary advertisements.
At least there are no "Pronouns" printed on them instead ... ... x'D
@@AszkalonOfVerraWas that a joke? By the little laugh face I assume that was a joke. I thought jokes were supposed to be funny.
@@Evil_Noah Oh boohoo cry me a river 😢
@@Evil_Noah Damn, chill bro lol
@@BeatboxGilli I will when people stop thinking that saying something negative about pronouns, something we all use daily, is somehow funny.
The concept of them still being fully conscious is terrifying
Yeah. I'm certain they're going to pack as much body horror into the cyborgs as they can. It's gross and glorious.
well in mass produce cybermeat-shield they seemed didnt botherd with lobotomy (Servitors in 40k are more lucky, but there the proces isnt 100% efective), so there wont be combat decision making decrase
@@Grogeous_Maximus nah, what body horory, where are inbuild weapons etc?
They actually removed a lot of stuff that went too far
@@jakubkvacala1880Working on it likely, especially since not all the guns, mods, maps, etc aren't in yet. Heck, even Mr "not this guy" isn't implemented yet. Though that being said
I'm kinda scared to see the rest of eurasia's military
"We dance under phosphor skies" could also mean that the skies rained white phosphorous, which is a chemical weapon,
similar to napalm. If so, the 'dancing' that's referred to, takes on a much more sinister meaning.
Yeah, I did think of white phosphorous but leaned away from it. Perhaps they might be paying homage to Spec Ops The Line in some capacity. My main reservation was that it would scorch the cyborgs under it, but perhaps thats the point "lol we dont care we don't have free will" as they dance and get melted.
Phospor also as a latin root refers to Burning, or that which burns. Also reference to the Burning Skies of the world.
@@killpo_1actually white phosphorus when used as an incendiary weapon leaves high temperature synthetics like vehicles (and cyborgs) unharmed as it burns organic material and produces toxic gasses so if they are actually that augmented they could be deployed under a huge cloud of the stuff to blind and kill organic enemy units.
The cyborg on the right in the thumbnail is looking at the one on the left like:„YOU GOT SOFT HANDS BOY! YOU AIN'T WORKED A DAY IN YOUR LIFE!“
My first thought on seeing the title was 'Oceania is at war with Eurasia. Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia.' It's from a different dystopia but fits well enough.
I have some different theory about life cycle of the cyborgs:
- Final result of the processing is validated for its function, either becoming a soldier, or thrall (n rare occasions like recruit's high IQ, lower rank officer). That's explains "Failed" label on Runners. Besides, if the final result would always give Runner thrall, which has VERY slim chance of surviving its first battle, then there would be no soldiers altogether, not to mention lack of officers.
- Once soldier is killed, but his body is mostly intact, he's brought behind front lines by Mother to receive quick patch up and reactivation to be sent as thrall fodder (the same goes for killed thralls with intact enough bodies)
- Another death often results in ruptured body, which results in crawlers being sent once they're reactivated. This is a stage that can be repeated infinitely, until cyborg corpse becomes completely useless
And since the war lasts already for several decades, we can assume that this is exact reason why there's more fodder than actual soldiers. Just an infinite cycle of fight-die-repeat.
That's my perspective on it too. The minds of the thralls could have been physically damaged as a result of the conversion process or emotionally from the trauma stemming from it, especially if they were made from prisoners or otherwise forced into it and suddenly found themselves in a body that's no longer their own. They're labeled as defective products and just chucked at the enemy Sturm Z style without training or equipment to provide meat shields for the more advanced units and wear down the enemy with sheer attrition. The cyborgs that undergo successful conversion are turned into soldiers or upgraded into specialized types, but being destroyed and revived multiple times could certainly take its toll on them until they're too mentally unstable and get downgraded. I bet that's why some of them are given more realistic facial prosthetics, to help them retain some image of their humanity to keep them emotionally functional for longer. The comment about there being so much more fodder than soldiers is kind of haunting, what's seen in the game could be only the empty shambling husk of what their army started off as. Slowly circling the drain as they scrape and recycle any cyborg that's still of use, grinding them up again and again and again on the battlefield until there's nothing left of their humanity at all.
Agreed. They definitely 'wear until it's worn completely' and no longer useful.
Besides, large amount of 'Failed' labels could be also the result of recycling components, instead of producing new ones. In this case, cyborgs made mostly of used parts and components are mostly becoming Runners, while those made with brand new ones become soldiers.
nice ideas.
The only disagreement I have is that it makes more sense that we see more traditional soldiers who get demoted to thralls as they fall in combat as opposed to being promoted from a thrall. I can see it more likely people who fail the transition are converted to thralls and they sort of stay that way, while taking whatever more capable soldiers they can from a pool of converts to instantly promote to armed soldiers. Hell, Officers might even be promoted from skilled volunteers who are groomed for the roll from birth.
That's a fair approach too. My only hesitation is the number of thralls we see over soldiers. Though, if thralls can be recycled multiple times via spare parts it could explain that after a demotion from soldier to thrall they have multiple "lives" from being recycled before eventually being beyond repair.
@ that was my line of logic. You get one shot as a foot soldier, then you become reusable canon fodder until you’re just spare parts for the less damaged thralls.
Apparently Mother Courage also has a Zaikatsu Biomedical brand too on her, alongside a 'Made in NEO S.E.A. low orbit' which is also seen on the 9mm ammo item. With how the cyborg armor is also made in micro gravity, we can somewhat conclude that Eurasia has significant industry up in orbit (despite the setting's kessler syndrome?)
Oh, and we do know Eurasian troops still have a morale to maintain, with there being a regional media department producing distributing propaganda around in Lost Angels
It's possible they have massive reserves of items from orbital manufacturing like Europa and their tanks, as I don't see why orbital sites wouldn't be hit during the nuclear war.
@@samuelkral414 thats a good idea, also probably why they recycle so much
Male cyborgs: zombie demon t-800
Female cyborgs: anime girls
Say what you want about Eurasian but you cant deny they are men of culture
I feel like turning recruits directly into pure melee first then hoping they live long enough be given a gun seems horribly inefficient for an A.I and even less so in the combat effectiveness department. Im pretty certain Rasia doesnt make thralls directly and is rather a cause of something.
My headcanon is they all start out as regular infantry with P90s then, some flaw with cyberware or lack of adaptability meds in the field likely caused them to develop a form of "cyberpsychosis".
Seeing them as damaged goods, they just drop'em as cannon fodder.
It kind of depends on how much Eurasia's factories / corporate factories able to produce imo.
Considering the coprorate landscape their could be artifical scarcity to inflate profits or increase influence or power.
The armor being labeled as essentially made in Space (Nano-Fabricated in a Micro G enviroment) personally gives me the thought of there being a lot more cyborgs than armor, meaning that these thralls have to "earn" their spot as a soldier. Sort of like Enemy at the Gates vibes (one soldier gets the weapon, one the ammo, pickup the weapon when that soldier dies).
When they get to this state they get a great deal of investment into them, with armor, weapons, a Cybrain and likely pick of the litter of parts for repairs. The worn red-eyed variants seem to also suggest that these soldiers are invested in so heavily that they're essentially "zombified" after brain death.
I do like the cyberpsychosis idea though, mental instability I think does play a clear factor in some capacity.
IMO Its just like microchips, the flawed ones just get rebranded into a "lower category"
@@killpo_1 I recall there being a quest from the Ropans where Luca tells you they're having "trouble" with the Rasian thralls and sends you to "put them out of their misery". Even after completing the quest he mentions those that you killed as "poor souls".
That's kind of where I got the idea that there might be something "malfunctioning" with the thralls. It'd make sense to slap the "QC failed" parts onto them since it's garbage anyways so might as well slap'em onto the expendable troops yea.
It may be inefficient as a tactic of war but incredibly efficient as a method of control for an overpopulated country at war. Threaten the populace with "conscription" in the cyborg army, punish even the most minor offenses with loss of autonomy and put to fight for the machine. My theory is ALL the cyborgs are "fails", they are all "earning" their autonomy back by fighting, hence the faces on higher ranks, they miss their faces and are clinging to their humanity, its loss was not voluntary. The "Fail" is a lack of loyalty/commitment to the cause, not necessarily defective in the manufacturing sense, but in the dystopian authoritarian government sense. There may be an even more horrific and large scale human farming and harvesting operation on the Eurasian continent at this point for all we know.
I have a theory that this is Eurasias method of solving their overpopulation problem. They focus heavily on recruitment so that the more zombified Eurasians die on the battlefield, the less they would have to deal with at home. It also coincides with how they deploy their troops by quite literally dropping bodies to die on the frontlines.
Mothers being the most durable unit yet seen in the Eurasian arsenal (along with the fact that they are so despite being deployed to ideally avoid Europan engagement) implies to me that the entire Eurasian theory of warfare relies upon recycling their army.
Extremely standardized weaponry for their mainline soldiers, very standardized assembly on their cyborg parts, combined with a total disregard for most of their troopers who don't prove skilled or able to mentally withstand the transition into mostly machine. No nation could withstand such a massive attrition rate unless they were built to be reused, which everything else implies.
I think unless a Cyborg gets mostly obliterated or disassembled, they can be reactivated and repaired to functionality. Kinda like the Terminators they're inspired off of. Worst case scenario they might retake the useable parts, but I think the priority for Mothers' scavenging runs is always "salvageable soldiers" over parts, given how mass-produced the parts are implied to be.
In so doing, the Cyborgs would keep getting "revived", again and again so long as the Mothers can keep finding them, and so long as they're not completely wrecked.
Now, their mental states following such a process would likely see further and further degradation over time, since most people wouldn't be able to cope with constantly dying over and over again, but as we see even such cases can still be made use of by Eurasia. As one way or another until they prove themselves worthy, they're the 'fodder' of the Eurasia-Euruskan military partnership.
The amount of paranoia and control over their creations also reminds me of Skynet's own paranoia in the Terminator series. Skynet gained sentience, but simultaneously feared it's own creations, the Terminators, gaining free thought. Hence why the T-800s' microprocessors despite being capable of free-thinking were set by default to not enable this feature without post-modification, or why the T-1000 never left the prototype phase despite being a more ideal Terminator model in most respects. In that case particularly Skynet feared it had created a model that was too dangerous for its own safety to mass-produce (Though it was fine sending the prototype it had into the past to kill John as a final desperate move).
i think looking at the quest dialogue could be another avenue for research. for example; kane states "Although you are of a lower form of life, you are among the best that we have encountered. *Bows*" upon completing the quest "Hostile Expungement". this implies that likely in eurasian society as a whole, people with cybernetic augments are not only looked up to, but considered to be on a completely different level to regular full flesh humans. potentially being thought of as higher beings in some fundamental way
They Almost look like the T600s to T800s from Terminator
indeed.
But also they mix with that and any anime.
13:46
Oh shit Eurasia has muscle mommies too, they couldn't stop at the goth ones
They bring so much needed booze to the battlefield. Valuable allies indeed.
Please keep making these videos. They really are great.
This a good video with some interesting theories.
It does raise further questions as to the nature of Eurasia.
It also makes it more impressive Europa has been able to withstand this long.
Not really impressive when you realize that they have enough forces due to overpopulation + forced conscription + what amounts to slave states.
I kinda want to see a RTS style version of this game
At last a video from you! Was curious who will go next and here is my answer.
P.S. after watching I wonder what devs will say if they watch this video. Looks like a detailed backstory. As always grim with your fantastic voice and story telling!
With all this control over their soldiers, it makes you wonder what would happen if even one cyborg somehow managed to gain free will again. How would the person under all that tech react to their disfiguration?
Probably very badly. I think they'd be horrible pain and with them likely regaining their mind while in midst of the forever war I think they'd just be ripe for a insane amount of trauma. I also imagine they'd have nowhere to go and their components may fall apart overtime without maintenance from a MOTHER unit.
Very nice video, I've been dying for more Forever Winter lore since it realeased. It's amazing how much you're able to theorise with the many small hints and details the devs left behind.
I think you're right on the money with the theory on Eurasia being prioritised with internal rebellion, I noticed this as well whilst playing that despite all their advancements, Eurasia has a very light arsenal. They're allies and trading partners with Euruska, giving them biomechanical technology which Euraska uses to create more advanced (and horrific) weapons of war. Everything points towards Eurasia wanting little to do with the war and only proving their use as allies by half heartedly dumping cyborgs on the battlefield and sharing tech whilst Euruska seems to do most the heavy lifting. The only "mech" they have is used to recycling bodies so it seems they have a cheap way of creating large bodies of durable infantry and stick to that, they'll simply wait for the smoke to clear and enact their plans. Even Euruskan infantry are more heavily armoured than the Europan infantry.
On the Cyborg lifecycle, I'd assume the "thralls" are simply cyborgs the majority that failed testing, since they cannot be used with all their advanced human capabilities they're dumped onto the battlefield like waste and left to their own devices. The reason officers may be fully armoured is that they passed testing OR they were volunteers and loyal to the regime before testing hence the need for protection, I imagine it very unlikely there'd be many people asking to get turned into a cyborg.
Since it's clear the Eurasian military is designed for peacekeeping (even their armour looks more like swat gear) it's possible the human faces were used as a guise to not alarm civillians and it's simply so battle damaged only the cracked face is left. Since they are celebrated or paraded it is possible civillians might know of cyborgs being used.
One thing I like about this analysis is in the original lore, all of humanities top brass got wiped out in the initial bombardment, supposedly no one knows why they're even fighting. This might be true for Euruska and Europa but presumebly Eurasia has been underground for a long time which means the leaders have survived, OR the AI driven corporations have always had long term plans ahead of time and simply fighting for their pre-war goals. Nice video
edit: forgot to mention, I like your idea of Brawlers being beacons for cyborgs to find their way home, good explanation.
3:12 hmm interesting that it says "quality control fail" on the arm of the cyborg
We need more Eurasia units (commandos, scouts, snipers, AT units....), and more lore videos, bdw brawlers armor definitivly isnt IIIA, these abomination can withstand antimaterial rifles, and explosives; I can imagine recruitment poster for joining
Yeah, the IIIA labeling on Brawlers does not seem appropriate but it could just be the soft armor over perhaps ceramic or steel armor plates. Though, just thinking of it now it could be covering massive amounts of synthetic muscle which could absorb bullet impacts while retaining some functionality (something to explain their massive strength).
@@killpo_1 in this time line i wont be suprised if insted of steel, they are using nanolaminates or something like that, that muscle part is likely true, it would explain their increse in size (bdw in those muscles must be stored lot of potencial energy, i wonder what could happen if some of them snaped), pls do lore about Orgamech, plp asap
@@killpo_1 Join army, become superman, fight well and honor will be yours recruitment plagat, imagine rows of saluting officers and brawlers
@@killpo_1 Hi, there is 1 thing, who is in charge of Eurasia, as far as i know according to lore entire leadership died in nuclear war, and combat strategic AIs runs the show now (bdw when there will be new video?)
Cant miss a Killpo1 vid!! your voice overs are amazing.
Oh man thanks for this, what a well done video too!
I interpret the cybrain as a coprocessor unit, probably handing command and control functions to the officer allowing the human brain to focus entirely on combat.
I'd like to think the Cyborgs consist of artificial organs and such as well as volunteers, and etc. I also believe the basic cyborgs are the broken ones to begin with, hence them getting thrown, with no regard, out of the plane.
6:00 ◥◣X/\V/\X◢◤ nice logo
The Manufactured in a Zero G environment is a bit of a retcon, since previous lore stated that no one can get into space due to a Kessler event. Maybe they have a large amount in storage somewhere.
My head canon for now is that enough time has passed (or tech achieved) for low earth orbit items, considering their orbits would decay over time, but anything outside low earth orbit is no possible due to it.
Amazing video. Please make more of these on other factions or enemies In the game. I haven't gotten the game yet and haven't came across any lore/faction videos on it yet, but I'd love more lore videos on it.
It makes no sense thst zombified thralls ascend to greater function. It's the opposite. Eurasia deployed fully functional SMG armed soldiers but the benefit of thekr cyborg state is that they can be reassembled and returned to the battlefield over and over with increasingly broken and degraded parts....now not able to operate a firearm or even to walk upright. The Eurasians stop deploying these broken toys normally and just drop them from gliders. Thrall and crawler are the last stage of degredation.
That's a fair theory.
Personally, I dont think the Thralls are zombified at the start, they're just mentally supressed. Their minds hijacked to provide cheaper and more mass produced functionality than a complex component like a "Cybrain", reserved only for those who prove their worth.
The red-eyed soldiers (and no red-eyed thralls or scramblers) give the impression that there's additional investment placed into Soldiers, able to utilize the backup Cybrain to operate weaponry while in this zombified state.
Though it could easily go the opposite way like you're suggesting, where the Soldier is the default state of Cyborgs, and they are degraded over time (to red-eyed variant) until they get a retrofit into a thrall, crawler and then scrap.
5:03 do we know where the implant is located? Sci-fi lore in general would say that if it's in the brain it's upgraded processing. If it's on the spinal cord, we're probably talking some cyberpunk stuff.
I thought the lore was that no one could have space stations anymore because of the space debris from all the satellites being blown up. Although I forget where I heard that now.
So eurasia might be the only faction with reasonable space travel yea? Im just asking cuz I thought there was some lore stating we werent able to access space anymore due to what caused the forever winter
Id love to see the base cybogs get a buff. Would be awesome to see sparks flying off one in a hail of bullets only to have one connect and take out the skull and head only for the backup AI take over and it contines to slowly walk towards you until you grind it down to blood and metal.
My impression of the military hierarchy is opposite. Instead of ascension through service, it is far more likely that cyborg manufacturing is limited in quality due to its advanced features. Like the ratings on CPU chips being determined by their subsystem’s defect rating, perhaps lower tier cyborgs are the horrific result of lower quality standards where the mental damage of conversion is permanent, yet still utilized like spare parts. It is very likely that Eurasia advertises service in the form of Cyborg commanders and handcrafted brawlers, rather than the reality of most cyborgs being mindless thralls.
considering that eurasia is a police state- it could be equally likely that said cyborgs are not derived from propagandizing and recruitment, but are instead convicts
Ha feels like I’m having one of those zombie media naming conventions, zombies, Zeds, walker, me and my mates call the basic cyborgs ghouls because of their behaviour, but thralls fits really well too
looks like they dump their elderly into cyborg soldiers
Anyone else think the cyborg skeleton face looks a lot like Abaddon from UT2004?
My theory: Cyborgs in wild state are not malfunction, they just super drunk. That why the carry so many booze.
I like the theory that cyborgs are dead Euruskan soldiers that are retrieved by mother courage and turned into cyborgs to serve Eurasia as a term of the alliance between the two nations. Euruska would probably be fine with this due to there use of bioengineering
When lore and lore speculation is actually better than the game. I un-installed it but still watch these vids.
what about the alchohol all cyborgs have on them?
I mention it fairly briefly during the Eurasia section (just that they have enough grain for significant Liquor production).
I believe it's been cannonized that the cyborgs use it to cope (numbing the minds that are hijacked to murder and witness the horrors of war).
Glad I’m a euraska supporter because I can’t imagine being forced into a machine for war anyways I’m signing up for the new orga mech division the posters say it’s a noble thing to do
"Presence of life" makes sense to me. Cyborgs can have all the cool gadgets they can get but still have core human pieces present.
Also aren't there npc cyborgs aswell? Do you think those ones became sentient enough to break free from their programming?
You mean Kane?
Nice
I imagine that there is no shortage of debtors, criminals, agitators and the like who can be pressed into unwilling cyborg service. Economically it would be a great idea, as there would be no need for prisons and it would be a great tool for encouraging social conformity and economic productivity. The QC fail may not be a mechanical failure, but a social one - humans judged to have failed to live a productive life, by their AI overlords.
2:04 it’s common for religion to be subsumed & stripped of meaning in jingoism & politics to be a justification for whatever the hell they want, prayer becomes a tv show where the profiteers tell serfs to pray for idols & eventually the idols become the object of worship themselves. Mass manufactured prayer books with no sincerity.
“Dancing under phosphorus skies” could be them trying to obliterate all life with white phosphorus and dancing at their destructive victory, it is suited by the very utilitarian & menacing designs of their army not much above Euruska, but the officer is a puzzle. It is the only one basically in the entire game who’s visual presence is one of respect & beauty, with how they’re lit up. Not even the brawler has any grace in it’s design despite being more powerful. Who are they trying to impress? Is the upper class taking part in the fight themselves for some reason? Aliens ruling over puny humans to destroy from within? Would fit the uncanny masks trying to imitate people.
19:39 honestly i dont believe Officers are promoted and maybe even cyborg instead high value people with high loyalty who are tasked or want to oversee the oother cyborgs
Pls another lore video
how did you achieve this freecam mode?
Unreal Engine Unlocker. It's a third party tool.
KILLPO IT'S HAPPENING, ON THE 19TH, THE UPDATE!
Fuck that i want ps5 release this game is fuckin awesome.e!!!!!!!!!
Social credit zombies
Мужик, ты делаешь крутой контент. Продолжай в том же духе!
the IIIA marking could reference also one of the inspiration they got for forever winter, the 3A toy, just look at 3A toy N.O.M and you'll see some cool figures with gasmask
also gg, best deep dive so far, gives a lot of lore for many unit and eurasia in general
Eurasia over population , Corporate influenced society with a goverment that promotes a mix of oriental ideals of honor, duty and sacrifice. May have created a a culture of indiference in its high society and leadership, cyborgs are dispensable and a product, the only value they bring is in their results in battle , if a cyborg fails he failed its liders and nation. The same idea may be applied to its population . Those who meet expectations are rewarded , those who do not meet them are punished . That's how i see Cyborgs in Eurasia eyed , they are just products with a goal that is to kill their enemies , they are just a number in some excel sheet . A cyborg only gos up in hierchy if it delivers results , that's why oficers look so good , they consistently delivered or over delivered results and got rewarded for it .
Rat king next please
Why does Eurasia send their basic units into combat with no weapons at all?
The whole cyborg lifecycle could be summarized as a "what if Samsara but evil"
What game is this. And what studio.
Forever Winter
@robertzmuda898 thank you
-1 points for wrong use of the word corporatism. You're looking for the word Corporatocracy in 2:25
I wonder if its possible that the low tier cyborgs are political prisoners, dissenters, enemy pows, or enemies of the state deemed too untrustworthy or resilient to be given excessive free will while the higher tier ones are more loyal, or more malleable, citizens.
Since we know Eurasia is a capitalistic state it must have an unemployed class(Capitalism requires unemployment as a threat to employees and as a supply pool). I would suspect this class is mostly made of unaugmented humans. Many jobs likely require cyborg bodies as a basic requirement(solider being one example). The Eurasian government or corporations could sponsor candidates with the condition of ownership of the candidates life. Successful candidates who pass QC become soldiers and other cyborg workers. The QC failures become thralls and scramblers.
Fantasy/scifi set on earth:
Europe - I sleep
Europa - real shit
The hell video game is this from?
The Forever Winter
This would explain the Europans counter measures to deploy much more lighter, and more robust, purely mechanized units to the battlefield, especially to clear out the smaller enclosed area's where they may be infested with these Cyborgs, they outnumber the Europan troop forces by tenfold in the battles and are easily replaceable and repairable when they are harvested and re-initiated into combat, where-as europans do not have any disposable forces or replacements for Hybrid cybernetics due to the lack and demand of Technology, I believe that Europan stance and views on this also restricts and hinders the progression of using similar forces against the Eurasian forces not only due to internal uproar and debate but also a lack of tech and manufacturing resources. Eurasia seems to Embrace the idea of merging Man and Machine into one and making such soldier re-useable for any means necessary because they have the numbers whereas Europa still holds on to a somewhat human dependance for combat and leans more on strategizing engagements, which is why Europan forces are always selectively different on the battlefield.
seems like europa is both under teched and outnumbered not an enviable place to be in a war
I hate to sound mean here but your analysis, while through in some areas, completely misses other areas worth examining. Such as the dialogue with the Eurasian quest giver, who seems to hint that Eurasia is some form of technofascist regime that views "non-augs" as lower lifeforms.
Your theories regarding their armaments make quite a lot of sense though, if Eurasia is anything like the modern PRC, then they are paranoid about internal conflict and spend most of their resources on internal security. Although it still brings up questions such as why their standard issue weapons are designed specifically for close quarters when the battlefields of Lost Angels easily stretch past 50-100m. More importantly, what are they doing with a NATO standard sub machine gun? Major Asian countries like China, Japan, and Korea have had their own local arms industries, and even if it was a knock-off P90, it wouldn't be called that as they have their own naming convention.
Finally I'd like to discuss the unrealistic nature of your cyborgs life cycle theory, as there are a number of holes in it. Firstly, the reliance on naturally grown human brains for operation strongly implies Eurasia still major hurdles and neuroscience and can't simply edit brains. So the idea that cyborgs can recieved their identity back makes absolutely no sense. Their identity is gone. Erased. Or at the very least lobitimized. They can't just pull out a hard drive with someone's personality on it and deliver it back as part of a promotion. Additionally, the concept of meret based progression seems out of character for a faction meant to represent cyberpunk dystopia, comprised of countries known for serious corporate and political corruption.
Allow me to provide my alternative theory. Cyborgs are primarily comprised of immigrants, the lower classes, prisoners, or any other form of undesirables. How much of their identity remains a mystery, it's possible they operate based on a simple punishment/reward system (activating pleasure/pain receptors in the brain based on actions or lack thereof), and that otherwise their actions are done at their own discretion. All basic cyborgs seem to be to some extent brain damaged. The "thralls" for example have what I describe as a "floppy armed Naruto run" gait that makes them hard to take seriously. This would imply they aren't given weapons out of lack of trust, but a lack of motor function. Scramblers are the same but more severe. In this way, the QA stamp is very literal in interpretation. They are the ones who were brain damaged during processing and so are designated to Bakhmut tier recon by fire tactics. Those that are recovered are almost surely never rewarded. They are either repaired or recycled. Soldier Cyborgs are likely the intended end result. It's not clear what their face masks are made of, so the possibility that it's real human skin persists. This could be their original face, meant to provide them with a hint of individuality, or perhaps they skin their victims and wear their faces as some sort of coping mechanisms to help them grapple with their tragic existence. Either theory suggests a disturbing level of autonomy. When it comes to officers and brawlers, I highly suspect they are cut from wholly different cloth. In either a cyberpunk or authoritarian dystopia, there is always a privileged upper class. Often times this class, if forced to go to war, will put their children in positions of officers right off the bat or at the very least make sure they are better equipped. Calling brawlers knights might be more literal than you realize if they really are part of some kind of noble class swearing loyalty to a dynasty. They are always operated on with care during the augmentation process, assuming they haven't already undergone it is civilian life, something that seems like an obligation based on how they view "non-augs".
I envy a man who reads of phosphorous skies and thinks of thinks of environmental lighting...
White phosphor is one of the most inhuman C-weapons currently in use.
Its both incendiary and toxic.
While it could just be referencing Willy Pete, I really think it being posted on every single cyborg (and other units) means something greater than that, though as these are all theories I could easily be wrong/
Though I imagine if / when we see artillery & bombs I would not be suprised if we see chemical / incendiary weapons like that. The Europan special unit Pyro definitely gives the vibe that incendiary weapons are coming.
For me the Life-Cycle of the Cyborgs feels like 'climbing out of Tartarus' where the dead try to escape hell. Only a very few manage this feat and those are Heros and Champions.
Given how we see Mother Courage units stacking piles of cyborg corpses it makes me wonder if they go in for repair and refurbishing after retrieval and then the internal QC testing and amount of damage taken determines if a former Soldier/Brawler gets downgraded to being a Thrall or Scrambler. Given the sheer distance newly converted recruits would have to be flown to get to Europan territory you’d probably want to recycle as much as possible
Aw freakin sweet!
manmade horrors beyond comprehension!
Honestly I thought the cyborg zombies were just raging alcoholics that they threw into the frontlines given how much booze i always end uup looting.
"Thrall" and scrambler might just be a final phase of recycled cyborg with Soldier being its mainline model. Considering that the war has lasted for decades it might makes sense that they now outnumbered the Soldiers. Alas we haven't seen much of the elites of Eurasian military including its heavy mechs or even unique characters to fully understand their organization
The P90 and AA12 might also allude to Eurasia having some relation with Europa's mega corps or having warmer relations with Europa at one point considering that the design of the P90 and AA12 are from Europan territories. For Eurasia to have them in enough numbers to have them issued to soldiers, especially the P90, they had to have made a deal with the manufacturers to either locally build the designs or import it from the manufacturer.
4:20 i think this is totally wrong, is this talking about in game world?
I want a battlefield game with this setting.
Survival looter shooter is boring.
The question is, why do they need artificial faces and/or teeth? Such elements of human resemblance are not needed on the battlefield. Apparently, this is either because they are used in civilian life and interact with living people (preserving human resemblance). Or it is connected with some ideological or religious aspects.
It could be a way to help preserve some aspect of their humanity and keep them from going completely insane. Being cyborgified and completely stripped of their former identity would be traumatic for many of them.
Why would they waste so many resources on cyborgs? Why not make AI units instead?
lowlvl cyborgs desighn is an absurd - imagine the cost... its not 3050rtx the operations and materials ow gaud
So is it just me or does the one on the left of the thumbnail look like Mike Ehrmantrout?
dont show me this again yt
😮
I think order of lifecycle is reversed. Ordinary soldier is the starting variant, while runner and crawler is next stages, as cyborg becoming damaged beyond repair and gradually loosing remains of humanity.
We could use some more high quality writing like this on the wiki, feel free to put your videos in the references 😜
While I appreciate it, my videos are way too theoretical to be put into something that should be strictly factual like a wiki.
Feel free to use screencaps for things like the corporate logos etc etc.
@@killpo_1 Oh man, there is a lot of stuff on the wiki that is currently theory only xD As long as you formulate it in a way that makes it clear this is not a 100% confirmed fact there should be no problem. The most important thing is sharing what we know with as many people as possible sonew players have a better time getting into the game.
My ears hurt every time you say the letter S. What's wrong with you?
Thanks for the feedback! I'll try investing in a better pop filter to help alleviate this in the future. Its just the harsh nature of plosives I need to work on.
I'd say this whole game is something somewut bulit upon the ColdWar propaganda
yeah it's a game
yeah it's gotta some pretty gud art design
but still it's propaganda
There is no lore. It's crap piled on top of crap.
Two words:
Crypto slop
Thumbs-down for the usage of ai slop images. Good luck out there.
None of the images were actually AI. If they were they were not advertised as such.
(All images are either in game, concept art for other games or obtained through license websites such as ShutterStock or Adobe Stock without the AI tag).
Hate it or embrace it, the conflict is already lost, and internet will only get more artificial. Move on, touch grass, get a better hobby.
Thumbs down for assuming before asking, you can always spare yourself from embarrassment.
thumbsing this up out of spite
@@killpo_1 do the images around 1:40, 8:10, 15:20, and 21:15 not appear AI generated to you though? Whether tagged or not I think you can agree they look fairly weird, and I'm sort of surprised your argument is just that they were not advertised as such.
I don't think it takes away from the effort you put in the video, but I mean, I do lean towards the original comment here; if it looks like AI generated just don't use it.
another typical sci-fi setting doing the forced grim dark. With such technology what does Eurasian even need the human brain anymore？Their cyborg can easily be fully automated, it makes absolutely no sense why they need to modify a human, and basically turn it from a functional brain into a low level bot that can only do low level thinking and function. Yea everyone lives like shit but they never run out of people, feed a dude dozens of years just for him to become a bio CPU that can't handle a slight complex task and will easily disable in a simple firefight.
Lol,lmao even.