Oni2 talk:Truth Number Zero/Digest

Isn't the secret goal more naive than the official goal?

Arguably, adapting to overwhelming pollution - and ultimately embracing the BioCrisis as a new way of life - is both naive and cynical.

Hasegawa's true plan (under the "Truth Number Zero" theory) was far less naive and less cynical

And arguably wanting to change the entire world including Syndicate and WCG is not naive? It is a bit of a stretch... That is why it is important to explain stuff and not lose the reader on big jumps. Just food for thoughts.

The initial idea of the Daodan was to rather not try to repair the world because it looked hopeless. The less naive way was to create something he had a chance of realizing. --'Dox

0. Thanks for asking (that was a question, right?).

1. I didn't want TNZ to turn into a wall of text that even I wouldn't have the courage to read and maintain. The "digest" that you are quoting needed to be even more compact - like the "abstract" of a science article, it just lays the main blocks, and it is natural if the reader has questions at that point. Also, as you see, I have been reformulating the digest, and since we are on a wiki it will never be "final". I intend to keep it short, though, linking to other pages for explanations or FAQs (i.e., to this talk page, or to the main non-digest page - which I am about to rewrite as well).

2. We do not know if TNZ was a true "plan" from the beginning, or a contingency that came up later. When Hasegawa started Daodan research, he may have wished/hoped to develop a perfectly controllable "resilience patch" for mankind, as a better-than-nothing solution. It does look cynical when you take it to the extreme (mutants roaming the wasteland, freed from WCG's authority - perhaps not unlike Muro's vision?), but in the earliest development stages it is easy to envision/advertise it as a cure that "consolidates" the current world order, instead of completely disrupting it. However, the uncontrollable nature and disruptive potential of the Daodan became clear very soon: that is why the research moved to Syndicate labs - "we couldn't get backup from any legitimate source" - and also why the experimentation stayed very cautionary, at least according to Kerr - "we never planned to implant those Chrysalises". Once Hasegawa realized the "world-changing" potential of the Daodan, the rest of the plan began to take shape (helped by the insight and advice of the "true Mukade") - first as a "what if?", then as a growing certainty that this is what Jamie would have wanted.

3. Hasegawa was not a rebel initially, but Jamie's activism grew on him, and upon trespassing the Wilderness Preserve he already saw it as their collective struggle. He didn't follow Jamie into the Zone reluctantly, and he didn't follow her as a protective father figure. Instead he says "we" the whole time, like they're comrades/buddies in this activism thing, as well as young lovers. Literally - "we were young and thought we were indestructible" - it looks like Hasegawa was a very young professor, without much of a generation gap between him and Jamie, so he naturally identified with her naive idealism, eagerness to change the world for the better, disrespect for the conservative establishment, etc. Thus the naivety of TNZ is somewhat more natural for Hasegawa (both as a follow-up to his own activism and as a way to honor Jamie's sacrifice), as compared to the half-naive-half-cynical concept where we deal with pollution by changing people so that they can live in their own shit.

4. Naive or not, the first steps of the supposed TNZ plan are consistent with what actually happened. It quickly became clear that the Chrysalis was dangerous - a perfect weapon rather than a perfect cure, and with potentially monstrous side effects - i.e., absolutely not compatible with the current world order. The conservative Syndicate was destroyed from within and completely repurposed: lucid bosses and businessmen were replaced with maniacs and military types; organized crime and technological black markets became vestigial; the main ideological/financial focus was irreversibly shifted to STURMANDERUNG. Also, the cops-and-criminals equilibrium between TCTF and Syndicate had already been fragilized by the BioCrisis (if there is a permanent state of emergency on the ecological front, then the WCG does not really need the Syndicate to justify its authority). At the time of Jamie's death and/or early Daodan research, the trends were already towards an actual crackdown on crime by the TCTF, and a more or less radical militarization of the Syndicate. The TNZ plan/contingency merely saw this instability and exploited it - first by using the Chrysalis as "warlord bait", and then by alienating/radicalizing the Syndicate even further, around the raw charisma of an angry monster boy. --geyser (talk) 12:39, 20 May 2020 (CEST)

Bravo. That is the kind of explanation that should be available - although in a self-telling way as you too already proposed. --paradox-01 (talk) 20:29, 20 May 2020 (CEST)

Follow-up question: was the Daodan's danger really clear from the beginning?

"we couldn't get backup from any legitimate source"

For the beginning it is way too early to argue the Daodan is the perfect weapon. They had only theories and prototypes. They were not sure what mutations could emerge - the Daodan could turn out to be a flop. Some proof is needed.

Also it seems the WCG is very strict about high tech and regenerative meds, see inaction: letting people die because of overpopulation.

See Bertram Navarre (propaganda: pirate island, really?). Look at all the science prisons. They are there but we tend to ignore them.

In that context it is rather "normal" that Kerr and Hasegawa couldn't get funding.

The game worked because there was a high focus on Mai(?). But as the stories continues more question pop up. This is maybe more of a general concern than a specific critic.

Of course Barabas and older Muro show the danger but add quite late to the picture. --paradox-01 (talk) 20:29, 20 May 2020 (CEST)

0. I am not sure I am getting your argument, so feel free to reformulate/elaborate later.

1. "we couldn't get backup from any legitimate source" is just Kerr fumbling for words as he tells Mai's story, so it's full of understatement and open to interpretation. But it does imply that the project was too risky and/or unethical by WCG standards. This means that Hasegawa's "official plan" - to make the human civilization pollution-resistant - was never going to work, one way or another. He couldn't make/spread the cure with WCG support, and he couldn't complete the project under the Syndicate's wing, either - because giving out the cure to everyone is "too nice" and brings no new profit or influence. At "best", the Syndicate would have ended up selling Chrysalises to the highest bidder, maybe with extra bio-terrorism to motivate their clients - which is close enough to what we see in Oni (Muro's STURMANDERUNG), but hardly in line with Hasegawa's altruism.

2. "the WCG is very strict about high tech and regenerative meds, see inaction: letting people die because of overpopulation." -- sorry, I don't see what you're getting at. That the WCG wouldn't have backed up the Daodan project even if it was proven 100% safe and ethical and kawaii? (because if undermines the WCG's authority by taking away the BioCrisis threat) - well, sure, that's one of my points too, but it does not demonstrate that the Daodan looked 100% safe and ethical and kawaii when the project started - by design it's "smart cancer" that overcomes disease by filling you with tumors.

3. Even if the Daodan did not seem dangerous at the planning stage (and was rejected by the WCG for other reasons), the risks certainly became clear while working on the first prototypes. When Kerr says "we never planned to implant those Chrysalises", he can only mean that the risks for Muro and Mai were too great. Whe he implanted Mai's Chrysalis later, it took some hard persuasion from Griffin.

4. "See Bertram Navarre (propaganda: pirate island, really?)." -- You are suggesting that the Picasso Island record is a badly written cover-up, but for what, exactly? Admittedly it's a bit cheesy, but you can't dismiss all of Oni's cheesiness as "propaganda", or there won't be much left. By the way, it's not a pirate island, but a freak scientist's lab; the pirates were just hired to abduct test subjects.

5. "Look at all the science prisons. They are there but we tend to ignore them." -- We played Oni, we know Kerr is Griffin's "pet doctor", we have visited a Science Prison, so who tends to ignore what?

6. "The game worked because there was a high focus on Mai(?). But as the stories continues more question pop up." -- I have no idea what this "general concern" is about, sorry. Please reformulate.

7. "Of course Barabas and older Muro show the danger but add quite late to the picture." -- It's OK if a game starts by trivializing the Daodan (superpowers, yay!) and reveals sinister aspects later. If that's what your previous point was about, then I see no contradiction. Whether she's brainwashed or not, Mai knows as little about the Chrysalis as the player when the game starts. It is implied that she never experienced the "overpower effect" and had no idea that she's not like "other people". Of course it's "just a gameplay choice", but there are also reports of her training at TCTF HQ: she is treated like a normal trainee, the "Daodan spikes" observed by the science staff are not revealed to her, and training staff is having a hard time reining her in - because their tongues are tied.

8. I really think you should separate the player's (Mai's) level of knowledge (guinea pig level) from Hasegawa's and Kerr's understanding of what's going on (inventor/designer/researcher level). When telling Mai about the Syndicate's raid, Kerr admits that he didn't see it coming - "They left us alone for the most part. We didn't think they were interested in our work. We were wrong." - but it also makes sense to him that the Syndicate took over the project once they realized its potential - "They has been watching us very closely. When they figured out what the Chrysalis was, they raided our lab." It doesn't matter if the Syndicate saw the Chrysalis as a weapon or as a source of profit - the risk of the Chrysalis falling in the wrong hands was clear both to Kerr and to Hasegawa.

9. From the TNZ perspective, the risk of the Syndicate stealing the initiative on the Daodan project was so obvious to Hasegawa that it became part of the plan. The realization - spontaneous or helped by the "true Mukade" - came at least at this point in time (while working under the Syndicate's wing, but before the raid), if not earlier. Also, this time range (initial research at the Syndicate, before the raid) offers good opportunity for meeting/exchanging/plotting with the true Mukade - Hasegawa's lack of intuition and determination is compensated by Mukade's insight. --geyser (talk) 00:25, 21 May 2020 (CEST)