Text/Whale Heart
(Note: This article is the interpretation of the narrative technique of "Thirteen Machine Defense Circle" and the related science fiction works involved, in addition to the plot of "Thirteen Machine Defense Circle", it also involves complete spoilers of "Death Stranding", considering that any sentence or a frame screenshot may affect the actual experience of the two games, if you have plans to play two games or have not yet completed the level, please close this article immediately.) ）
The pinnacle of group portrait narrative works
After the "ThirteenThmes Defense Circle" (hereinafter referred to as "Thirteen Fighters") landed on the NS platform, I once again passed through this AVG masterpiece of the Vanilla Society. It's been two years since the game was first released, and I've only made this review because of procrastination, and I found that if I don't write a post-play feeling, the next time I want to rub into a hot spot, I may have to wait until the day it lands on the PC (big truth).
"Thirteen Machine Soldiers" uses almost all of the narrative methods, and works that use such narrative techniques usually fix the perspective so that the viewer can sort out the whole picture of the events in the chaotic timeline. However, "Thirteen Pilots" adopts an extremely bold multi-perspective narrative method, which not only divides the narrative into the "collapse chapter" of using the machine soldiers to fight and the "reminiscence chapter" composed of the thirteen protagonists' stories, but also places the thirteen protagonists in 5 different time and space, and then lets them have countless intersections due to repeated time jumps.
When I first entered the game, I once thought that such a chaotic narrative would have some impact on the interpretation of the plot. But in fact, this is not the case, unlike the general AVG game to use the mesh narrative, the player is not through the opening of one line and then through repeated trial and error into another line, "Thirteen Machine Soldiers" adopts a narrative method more like a spiral ladder, whenever a character's story to a stage, you must push the progress of other characters to unlock a new story.
This "false open true linear" mode can both leave the player with choice and preserve the suspense until the last moment.
Speaking of the suspense set for the player in the game, in literature, narrative tricks are often applied to identity and time and space confusion, and identity recognition usually appears in the last scene, positioning the real culprit on a seemingly absolutely impossible identity, or confusing the audience with the identity of the protagonist, Hideo Kojima used this technique in Death Stranding - every time Sam connects with BB, Clifford Angle will appear, causing the player to fall into a wrong judgment. Even in the three battles with Unger, it was repeatedly emphasized that Unger was fighting for the BB that Sam carried. It is not until the last moment that the father and son finally complete the inheritance in the memories of the marquee, and from beginning to end, the audience is always confused by the identity smoke bomb created by Hideo Kojima.
The identities of clifford Unger, BB, and Sam have been confused by numerous interludes
Time and space disorder is the narrative trick used in "Thirteen Machine Soldiers". The first is the sense of separation between 2188 and the five years, so that players mistakenly think that 2188 is the end of the story, but the actual 2188 is the beginning of the story, when the "future" is packaged as "past", the confusion of time is the first layer of the game's trick, and the most amazing thing is that "space" is packaged as "time" by the author, and create the illusion of time and space jump, the player will be confused by such a dazzling operation, thus ignoring the real position of these people.
Thirteen in 2188 would mislead people into thinking this is the real future at first
It is precisely because the transformation space is disguised as a time jump that allows the player to misjudge the cause and effect of the game, and the fallacy of time and space causes confusion of identity, such as the character "Morimura Chihiro" has the most complex identity setting - 500 Miles of Tomasaka in the last cycle, Morimura Sensei AI in the last cycle, and Dr. Morimura from 2188 who is possessed by Chihiro Kojihiro.
The layered narrative technique allows the player to have enough time to understand the tedious settings, but if all the cycles are only to cover up the trick of time and space, it is too single, so "Thirteen Machine Soldiers" also retains a small suspense for the player, such as Shiba's true identity has actually been given a full hint under the contrast between the two lines of Saddle Shirō and The Netguchi - the same scene and lines, The ShibaKuta in the eyes of the Saddle has become a lump of air under the observation of the mesh. Kotaro Miura eventually turned this hint into reality: "Kurabe, who are you talking to? ”。
When the player suddenly realizes that the mystery of ShibaKuta's identity is revealed, the cat named "Little Tail" next to Yakushi Teraji is also merged with Shibakuta's identity through the efforts of Hijiyama and Okino. Of course, this suspense has also been fully paved - the non-talking cat that Yakushiji met at the school gate, the small wild cat raised by Okinoji, and the Afu encountered by Hijiyama when he was collecting money all hinted at the "Schrödinger's cat" trap set by the author's mysterious array.
There are such intertwined plot lines everywhere in the game, and whenever several lines are combined, all the seeming contradictions and irrationalities are reasonably explained, which is the best part of the game. Content aside, from the perspective of narrative skills alone, the best narrative of the TGA that year gave the two-line narrative of "The Last Survivor 2" instead of "Thirteen Machine Soldiers", which really surprised me.
Simulates the wheel of space-time in the world
"Huh? Guest, you've been drinking alone. ——Taizo Kobayashi, "Drunken Walking Man"
Artificial intelligence, genetic engineering, time jumping, mech combat, brains in the cylinder, contact of the third kind, Thirteen Machine Soldiers has all the elements of the golden sci-fi era, and vanilla Society is a skilled bartender, blending these ingredients into a great cocktail in proportion.
The highest proportion of nature is the "time jump" that has been played by countless science fiction writers until now, so as explained in the previous section, Vanilla House uses narrative trickery as a technique to transform the jump of time into the transfer of sectors, and add reincarnation (reset) to lead the player astray. During the game, I was like reading Taizo Kobayashi's "Drunken Walker", which is inspired by the science fiction work of "Manyoji", and Kotakeda and Blood Swamp Are lost in the long river of time, like a stumbling drunk who finds the truth of time in the cycle.
The two have a striking similarity in the discussion of time, and the countless reincarnations experienced by the protagonist are not time jumps, but changes in perception of time, but mistakenly hit and glimpse the tip of the iceberg.
On the cover of Taizo Kobayashi's Drunken Walker, the feeling of time confusion is very similar to the jump in the clouds and fog in the early part of the game
This bears a striking resemblance to a suggestion from Miura's AI in the game that "we never invented a time machine." This implication is like thunder on the ground, as if countless cycles of reincarnation and struggle, as everyone understands the causal relationship, are wrong. Somehow, after completing the level, I can always think of this sentence, perhaps the essence of this work is to tell a story of survival in the gap between nothingness and disillusionment.
Another breaking point in the plot of "Thirteen Machine Soldiers" is the design of the "brain in the cylinder", and to be honest, this design itself did not impress me too much. There are two reasons for this: the first is that the way it is presented is different from other science fiction works, and the second is that the setting in the same type of work is more perfect.
The more ancient ones, such as Koji Suzuki's "Circle Quadrilogy" (the original science fiction novel of the well-known movie "Midnight Bell"), are more attractive to the transmission mechanism of the "ring virus" (compared to the DD426 presentation method is actually a magic gun is a bit boring) and the world view setting are more attractive.
But it is still the narrative that masks this shortcoming, the setting of "naked mecha" is not reasonably explained until the end, and the Vanilla Society's use of several small reversals to promote the "brain in the cylinder" is also very clever, from the net mouth to find the edge of the city, to Minami Natsu's recognition of this planet is not earth through BJ, repeatedly making the player mistakenly believe that the site of the story is a man-made planet, but the truth is that everyone repeats the daily life in the simulated environment, and they have been struggling to survive at the junction of illusion and reality.
To be honest, as a sci-fi fan and a fan of speculative fiction, I roughly guessed the story's tricks in the middle of the game, but I was still very touched by the ending. Tightly seamless logic paired with dazzling sci-fi elements, first-class narrative techniques can definitely support everything.
Mechs and cats, the ultimate romance of the sci-fi world
Once you establish telepathy with cats, they're not bad. They were clever enough to meet the needs of battle, and if you imagined some concrete images for them, they communicated well; but if you started reciting Shakespeare or Cole Grove, or tried to tell them what the universe was, their minds would immediately close and go to sleep. - Caldwina Smith, The Dragon Rat Game
Cat and mech, it looks like probably the hardest combination to appear together. Perhaps their greatest common denominator is that in the infinitely distant future, as a being more eternal than human civilization, they coldly watch the final outcome of humanity.
In the last days of Love, Death, Robots, there are only cats and robots
Unlike the cats you see on a daily basis, the cat in science fiction is no longer a human pendant and accessory, but a philosopher, a magician, a soothsayer, a psychic, a monarch, and every other name you can think of. They are mysterious, calm, and occasionally full of a hint of childish arrogance, but often in the end it is this group of seemingly harmless cats that change the world. These elves appear in a sci-fi background without any sense of contradiction, just as Xi Shihui appeared in the world of DOOM.
《DOOM Moritomokai》
The first to use cats as the main body in science fiction works is Lao She's "Cat City" (Lao She: "I can't imagine it, Grandpa will not only write "Camel Xiangzi", but also a science fiction writer), in today's view, this work is simply a tragic prophecy, and the cat star people on Mars are actually tools used to satirize the old society.
Cats really appear as superpowers in science fiction works such as The Game of Rat and Dragon by Caldwina Smith in 1955, a space Cthulhu set in a bit like the scene of Yakushiji and Little Tail in "Thirteen Machine Soldiers" in which humans and telepathic cats form a partnership against mysterious things called "dragons" in deep space. The work is mentioned because the core of both interprets the term "instrumentality"—in the distant future, it crosses the vast sea of stars to control humanity, trying to revive ancient cultures and use it to "rediscover humanity."
The cat in Captain Marvel is even more like a BUG
The "Little Tail" in "Thirteen Machine Soldiers", as a projection of 426, is an important tool to promote development and fill in logical loopholes, and can even be called the Allah angle of the entire work. It is set in part on the film Bloody Whispers directed by Margatha Tapi, in which the protagonist Jerry can talk to a variety of animals, in which his cat tricks him into destroying the body after he accidentally kills someone, thus triggering a series of wonderful stories.
Stills from Blood Lonely
The mecha corresponding to the cat is also a very common element in science fiction works. In the game, the steel monster not only serves as a key to unravel the mystery of the protagonist's life, but also as an ancient method to promote the development of the plot.
There is a term called "mechanical séance" in classical Greek drama, that is, in fictional scenes, whenever a stalemate is reached, a mysterious force that descends from the sky to break the siege. Usually manifested as the use of a huge mechanical crane or hanging platform to bring the actor who plays the god to the stage, the setting of the mechanic is quite interesting.
In the prologue of "Thirteen Machine Soldiers", the machine soldiers play an important role in the plot, not only connecting the two chapters, but also hinting at the identity of Shiba Hisata, and in the subsequent plot, they also repeatedly used as a tool for space jumping to break the siege for the protagonist group. It must be mentioned here that the Vanilla Society seems to not miss any opportunity to "melt the stem", and also sets a "enemy and self homology" attribute for the pilots, and it is gratifying that although it is the same as the Demos attribute, each protagonist does not inherit the "fine tradition" of Alan Yeager's great filial piety.
On the battlefield of the Crash Chapter, the machine soldiers are replaced by circles on the grid line, but this simplified design complements the artistic style of the Vanilla Society and does not feel abrupt at all. In the course of the battle, I can even cooperate with the skill CG brain to make up the battle scene, with the unique skills of the fourth generation of machines, to make the battle more felt - The turret group of Higashiun Gakujie makes the game a tower defense, Ogata's broken blade attack can kill all steel and iron bones in a second, and the missile rain of Rabbit Beauty causes optical pollution.
You can always trust the missile rain
The climax of the battle of the fighters should be the battle in which inohata transmits his consciousness to the satellite, and then uses song to inspire the crowd to defend the position. When the rain of missiles falls from the sky with the accompaniment of "Seaside Vacation", it is like a meteor. In my mind, this famous scene that pays tribute to "Chrono Fortress" can be called the sunset afterglow of the golden sci-fi era. Science fiction is definitely a time-sensitive art, but its romance has nothing to do with the future, it can transcend time, transcend the times, and project the purest emotions in the human heart on every corner.
Chrono Fortress
The answer doesn't matter
As a well-deserved NO1 in the group portrait performance, the portrayal of each character in "Thirteen Machine Soldiers" is remarkable, but unfortunately, the connection between the characters is still slightly thin. In the game's design scrap, there was a scene where everyone met together to discuss it, but it was canceled during the actual gameplay. Since then, the characters have been divided into several small groups, and the links between the groups are not so close. In Persona 5, there is also a meeting section where team members discuss and discuss countermeasures with each other.
The meeting section of Persona 5 is very interesting
I prefer the fragmented approach of "Thirteen Machine Soldiers" in order to expand the conflict and make the plot more interesting. Everyone has in their hands only one key that unlocks the mystery of the world, and only when all the keys are put together can the door be opened. And 426, Morimura Sensei and Ida Tetsuya these "old fritters" due to mutual concealment of information imbalance, which in turn caused a fight and suspicion. This struggle continues until the moment the truth is revealed.
Fortunately, the emotional scenes in this game do not drag mud and water at all, and the way of directly locking CP makes me directly addicted, but except for the emotional line between Ida Tetsuya and Inaba Fukayuki, Okino and Hiji-san, everyone else is slightly abrupt. In addition, the only thing that hurts me is Miwako, who didn't say a word to Goto-nori until the end.
In any case, "Thirteen Machine Soldiers" is the most special AVG game I have ever seen, it is more like a heart-pounding journey of remembrance, at least, it makes me, an old science fiction fan, feel something that I haven't felt in a long time. It strikes me more like some of the most common confusions in life—we're always thinking, we're doubting, we're fighting, sometimes denying the truth we see in our eyes. But at the end of the article, I can't give you a solution, perhaps, in the end, what we do is to find a way to get out of the crowded pod cabin in the cyclical daily life, stand between heaven and earth, and feel the meaning of survival.
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