Transistor - A Literary Analysis
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- Опубліковано 25 лип 2018
- Supergiant Games' sophomore effort is a sci-fi action RPG that's just as beautiful as Bastion and significantly more confusing. Let's talk about what it means!
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Music:
Arcade Academy, by Pixel Head -
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"Transistor's commentary on choice ultimately doesn't manifest in the action of the Camerata or any decision made by the people of cloudbank, but rather in a single decision, made by a single person, for that single purpose. Let's talk about Red."
That was a killer transition. Damn.
When you're rewriting the blocks for the fairview bridge, the statues on the edges of the platform are of a man and woman reaching for eachother. The closer you get to Boxer's corpse the closer the statues get until their hands are touching.
Isn't Red's ability to hear the "music of the world" one of her quirks as a member of this society? In a similar way to how other folk who you download into the transistor all had a particular quirk/talent that let them see their world in a specific way? An example would be the lady who painted the sky/controlled the weather.
I believe it's only stated that Red is a wildly popular and influential singer, and that's why the Camerata wanted her. There's nothing that indicates Red can actually hear the in-game background music.
My headcanon is that Red is composing the soundtrack inside her head based on the location and situation, and we just happen to have the privilege of hearing it. A lot of Red's own songs are a part of it, and it would explain how she's able to hum in tune to it.
I always thought that since the music we’re hearing is, within universe, songs that Red wrote, her humming to what we hear is because she’s humming her music to herself and the Boxer.
37:10 I find the labelling of Transistor as dystopian to be interesting, since I personally have never seen that to be the case. To me, the story of Cloudbank and the Camerata is more about the dissatisfaction-fuelled, misguided action of a few ruining a utopia for everyone else. In fact you might say the Camerata's actions stem to some degree from a place of narcissism.
Grant is frustrated that he doesn't feel like he has sufficient power of his own, and instead has spent his life fighting for issues on behalf of others. Royce, as an artist-engineer, wants people to perpetually appreciate and admire his work, but can't understand the naturally shifting tastes of the people, and in the end becomes bitter at what he perceives as fickleness, but might equally be called healthy variation. And, as you touched on, Sybil is guilty of a sense of entitlement; just like Grant, Royce and Asher seek to inhibit the autonomy of the people of Cloudbank, Sybil refuses to respect Red's autonomy.
Whatever philosophical arguments might be levied against Cloudbank and the meaninglessness of its choices, the real issue (as I see it) is one of a few bitter individuals refusing to respect those choices.
Great video as always btw!
It's not totally off the mark to call Transistor a dystopia. That's the thing about utopia and dystopia: no utopia can be a utopia for everyone. One man's utopia is another man's dystopia. Imagine having a minority opinion or desire in Cloudbank, never able to actually get what *you* want.
The reality is that it's *both*. It's entirely correct to say that the Camerata were bitter, and ruined the utopia of others. But it's also correct to say that the citizens of Cloudbank were very much enacting a tyranny of the majority, creating a dystopia for those that wanted something different.
In my opinion, it's deliberately left up for interpretation what the exact nature of Cloudbank is (if it's just the simulation of a virtual life, if the people in it are "real people"/have a real counterpart or if they're just complex, unique AIs, if the recursion was a planned feature or a bug etc.), aswell if it's supposed to be a utopia, a dystopia or something in between.
There is a pretty clear message that living in a post-scarcity society is not without its issues (like the issues the Camerata grew so frustrated about), but it's never directly stated if the Camerata's world view is right or if living in this world is better or worse than living in our real world.
That’s the exact point. While the averages citizen’s day to day life is void of struggle, hardship, or disappointment; it’s the operators of said utopia and the more extraordinarily of the citizens that perceive themselves to live utterly dissatisfied lives. Completely shackled to the whims of Average. The society is so devoid of challenge, because everyone can just vote that challenge away. With challenge comes growth and progress. Without challenge there is no growth. Nothing is allowed to settle, or to grow. Cloudbank changes so much so often, that the very cycle of change itself has paradoxically stagnated.
While outwardly a Utopia Cloudbank is, on the subconscious level, a dystopian city. This is made evident through the merely insignificant fact that just because of Red’s music a fight broke out at her concert. On some level at least a few average citizens are subconsciously aware how unfulfilled everyone’s lives are and their society itself is.
Cloudbank definitely isn’t your run of the mill dystopian cyberpunk future, but the events of the game and the games very own existence are evidences to this. The Camerata, are in no way the good guys here. They did fucked up stuff to those people they believed were important to society and had influence because the Camerata may have believed them to be the ones for who the masses “whims” and “influence” and “choices” depended. Subtracting then from the problem was what they believed to be their “monkey wrench” in the gear of society. Only, ironically, they still deemed these individuals’ intellect and skill to be essential in the Camerata’s new world. However, one can understand where they may be coming from. I think they missed a step in their plan however. They should have attempted to implement how they believe the world should be via the manipulating the masses into believing the changes were their own idea when actually they were the changes the Camerata wanted all along.
One of my favorite parts of the game that this video helped bring into context for me a bit more is they way Red edits herself when trying to leave comments at the terminals. In many cases she starts off by being more aggressive and direct in her wording, before backing off and being more polite or vague. I originally read this as her having already lost her "voice" in response to the fight at her show: in the blowback from that event and the accusations of being a provocateur Red felt like she could no longer say what she really meant or felt. Over the course of the game, in trying to regain her actual voice, she also regains this more abstract sense of her voice, becoming more direct again (for example her declaration about breaking the Spine's heart). In the context of this video, I think there's an additional or alternative meaning to her self-editing, however. Seeing the power her music and words had on people and struggling to figure out how to responsibly use that power, she constantly self-edits and revises her public posts as she thinks through what unintended or negative effects they might have.
It was a nice touch that the track Paper Boats that played at the end when Red and the Boxer are united featured male vocals harmonizing with her.
Always viewed the distorted version of In Circles as Sybil singing back to Red. Made the boss fight a bit more sad my second play through once I understood
Now you need to move on to the third gem from Supergiant: Pyre. Even from a strictly design perspective Pyre is such a weird beast. It's a sports RPG which is just not something you see often but the bigger catch is Pyre is one of those rare games that simply watching the gameplay does not remotely do it justice. You really need to play it to understand the game flow and appreciate it.
yes we need a pyre!
FUCK YEAHHHHH PYRE!!!!
Supergiant Games dev1: "Lets make a silent protagonist that the player not only wont project themselve into, but who is also a fully emotional character themselves while sticking to all the silent protagonist tropes, it'd be hilarious." Supergiant Games dev2: "Thats a great idea."
Sugergiant Games don't really have dev, its 12 people team
Devs 3 through 12 were nodding in agreement.
Dev 3:
Nah brotha lets do a sports game
@@assafchen6462 Dev 4: No wait... I like the sports idea, but I think we should keep these ideas seperate for now.
My god I loved this game. Games that tell powerful stories and build huge words and complex characters with barely any dialogue are fantastic.
I'd say the ending is less suicidal, and more in line with the ending of "San Junipero" from Black Mirror:
Choosing to transition from one part of life to another in order to be with your loved one. That is, prioritizing your happiness after you've given everything to make sure others are happy.
I really didn't feel like Transistor was glorifying suicide the way it exists in real life, but what I did feel was that Red's choice could be out of despair in front of an empty city of Cloudbank, bodily separated from her lover. It wasn't a sad choice and her motivations were to find the person she loved, not to truly end her life, of course. But the way Red existed in Cloudbank felt... so bad. Even before the events of the game, when she writes her songs, it feels like she is torn apart by this existence. Perhaps her music and lover are the only things keeping her alive until the game starts.
It still holds true that her choice is given meaning that way, with that I agree.
Yeah, it felt like making a real choice in contrast to the meaningless choices made just before that. Like Giving up everything cloudbank stood for in exchange for a fulfilling life of hardship. I think that's also the main reason why "Death" is framed as going to the country in the game. It's logging off, it's giving up what in Cloudbank is seen as agency but what we learn can be an expression of actual agency. It feels like a subversion of the trope of the woman giving up her life if she can't be with her man. It's her reclaiming her life, the expression that matters to her that was taken away.
I swear, the first time I played this game, when the Transistor glitched out & the Man became disoriented, I stopped every time to hum to him, and he eventually responded if only a little. I have not been able to get that reaction since, and don’t know whether my game is now glitched or if I remember the first time wrong. I’d be really sad if it was the latter, because it really touched me that I could actually comfort him, if only a little bit.
I also wish you’d talked about how the move Red uses to kill herself at the end is the “flourish,” another mechanically useless ability the game gives us. It’s given to us as a fun means of self-expression, which means (just like the humming) we’re in-tune with Red and the joy she finds in that expression.
There is something really powerful in seeing her use this same ability we’ve had from the start, something that has always been a way for us to snatch small moments of happiness from a horrible situation, and using it in such an incredibly dark way. The idea that she “dies” with a smile on her face ties into that: it’s still an expression of joy, hope, & defiance for her. But to her companion, to the player, to the anyone watching from the outside, it’s gut-wrenching.
Red's one word at the end literally brought tears to my eyes.
I have a lot of thoughts about this, so this will probably be a long comment.
First, this analysis... surprised me. It's the first analysis of yours from a game I actually played that was different from how I saw the game. There were also topics you didn't discuss that I thought would be at least here, like the songs Signals and Paper Boats (Which you played multiple times but basically never touched, which was a SERIOUS tease I did not enjoy), as well as the Backdoors, which shows Sybil's obsession very effectively and also have some interesting dialoug with the Boxer, Recursion Mode and it's impact on the plot, or the game's use of color and how it drains as the life of the city is erased, or the names of some songs on the OST and what they can reveal about the music, or even going into more detail about some of the function names and some of their interesting stuff, or how Turn is you typing out lines of code to literally "Execute" the Process. It was even to the point where I was surprised you talked about Limiters. I realize there will always be a difference between expectation and what happens, but, and I truly do hate to say this, it felt almost incomplete in terms of being an analysis of Transistor.. I still think the analysis was phenomenal, and made some VERY strong points, but some things were missing.
Even though this analysis was focused. I think that was both the biggest strength, and the biggest negative. A heavy focus on Red's specific part of the narrative, while VERY interesting (I can NOT stress that enough. I still enjoyed the analysis quite a bit) still resulted in some parts of the game which share some form of importance being completely ignored. I feel as though, as a general analysis of Transistor, this hurted it more then anything else possibly could have. But as an analysis focused on a specific part of Transistor, that being Red's character, it worked well. Though what surprises me the most is that ignoring of discussing Paper Boats and Signals, which are 2 songs that are so highly tied to the game's ending, and Red's character, I thought, when you started the heavy focus on Red, you would discuss them. I'm not sure if it was time constraints, as this would easily have been multiple videos if you dived into all the other stuff, but it's still something I wanted to mention.
I hope this doesn't come off as hostile to you at all, as I did actually enjoy the analysis, it just felt... different from what I expected and I wanted to say a few things why. Who knows, maybe you will make another video (Probably not though). (Continued in a reply).
I do want to take some time to mention one thing I think would be interesting for you to read, which partially gives a point to why this analysis was so different from how I see parts of the game. It's about the Camerata's main phrase "When everything changes, nothing changes" and that I perceive that quote is a comment on the significance of an individual's perspective on things that can be wildly different between individuals.
I'm going to start by explaining how I came to this conclusion, then proving it with evidence from both the art style, and the music. At first glance, "When everything changes, nothing changes" is a contradictory statement. How is it possible for everything to change if nothing has actually changed? (I think my usage of "actually" here is what causes my opinion on this quote to be so different). The first thing I thought was that it was a statement similar to "Freedom is Slavery" from 1984 by George Orwell. But that didn't make sense in the context of Transistor's gameplay, story, music, or art.
So instead I started asking myself, what can change everything, but also change nothing. And my response that I came to was this: Perspective. How you perceive a song, story, event, movie, image, etc... can have a large impact on that. And when your perspective changes everything can change about that, even though nothing has really changed.
Let's start with, to me, the weakest example I have in game of how this is supported. An example I had during the game itself. The first time you hear the quote, it's from Asher Kendrell. When I think of Asher, I think of his depressed, but serious voice, and one color. Red. To me Asher is when Transistor changed, mostly because it was when the Camera turned from villains to main characters. Because it's when I realized a color normally associated with hostility or violence is also the name of the main character. It's something so minor, and so small, but it changed everything about the game for me. The game wasn't a different game, it was the same game. Nothing had changed about the game, but my perspective had shifted, and now everything about how I perceived the Camerata, and some other things, had changed.
The second example is the music. I have a couple of songs on this game's OST that I really, really like. Notably In Circles, We All Become, and Tangent. However, as time went on, I have looked at these songs differently. In Circles turned from this beautiful melody with active and beautiful highs set to a dark and depressing vocals, to a song that felt both hostile and empathetic at the same time while still remaining beautiful. Conflicting emotion is one narrative element I have recently become very interested in, and it's strongest with music. When I ask others what they think, they don't say the same. They don't see the beauty in the song, they hear the hostility. The anger. We All Become had one verse that changed completely "You tell yourself that you're lucky, lying down never struck me as something fun, no, any fun. Stabbing pain for the feeling, now your wound's never healing till your numb, oh it's begun. Before we all become one." I hear this song as foreshadowing, but now also I hear the hostility from In Circles return. It's a connection I haven't been able to find. Tangent is a completely different beast. Tangent is a song I hear as calming. Everyone else who has listened to it that I talked doesn't see that. It changes everything about the song, all of these things do, but nothing changed about the music.
The third is the art style, where the game most supports it. Transistor's art style is beautiful, it truly is to me. The use of color and environmental design shows Cloudbank to me as a digital utopia at first. So much so that when you said "dystopian fiction" I swear I was watching the wrong video. After all, how can it be a dystopia when food is literally complimentary, when no one we know or meet is unsuccessful? If the Process wasn't destroying it that is. What changed most about the art style for me was the use of color during the late game. Notably Fairview. Fairview is one of my favorite levels in gaming. The place is beautiful, but you wouldn't normally say that? It has so little color, and yet the environments are detailed and incredible, and when they do use color it's interesting and adds to the area. And that is when Transistor shifted again. Because I saw the beauty of Cloudbank, even when it was being destroyed. It still felt like something was lost, but it felt like this wasn't something worse. It was different. The layout hadn't changed, but everything, once again had changed. And then you walk upside down. And the game breaks the 4th wall with Royce saying "You see? When everything changes, nothing changes." EVERYTHING had just changed. Every-time I play the game, and when I have watched a few people play the game, they get uncomfortable there. The camera is so important in games, but now you are upside down. But still the game controls the same. Everything is the same. It's just your perspective that shifted. As Royce said, everything changed, but nothing changed.
I hope this long and extended example shed some light as to why I perceived this game differently then you, but that is part of why I like this game. To me, Transistor isn't a single narrative. It's a group of stories about characters and the place they live and work with clever foreshadowing, lore, references, and music tying it all together into a game that, to me, has created a space to rival Rapture from Bioshock 1 in it's immersion, and how well the world is realized.
just curious, in what ways do you think recursion mode impacts the plot?
(Warning: This will involve a bit of speculation).
Recursion is one of the main supporting theories for the city of Cloudbank being a computer simulation. Whenever you start the game again, the simulation resets. The intro quote, the fact the player keeps their levels/function loadouts, the Sandbox, and also Cloudbank's accelerated "processing" during the game implies that things are changing with each Recursion. One of my theories is Recursion is actually a 4th-wall-break, or at least the simulation repeating itself trying to get to different outcomes. In a lot of games with this much player freedom in terms of gameplay, there is also player freedom during the story (Dishonored, Bioshock 2, and Prey are all good examples of this). Transistor has some of this, with the multiple different choices you can make during some sections. Examples of this include decisions during votes, or deciding to respond to news messages. Some players might think that some of these choices impact the plot, or there are other choices during Recursion. So they play the game again hoping for a different, possibly more optimistic, ending. The 4th-wall-break comes with Royce saying "Hey Red, we're not gonna get away with this are we?". That quote can be seen as talking to you, saying that even if you try again, even if you reset and go through it again, things won't change. You will always end with the same conclusion.
It doesn't have much impact on the ACTUAL plot, to me Recursion is mostly there to help you unlock the rest of the function files, and to go through previous areas with new knowledge so you can piece together the details the 1st playthrough gave you. It helps your understanding, while also raising more questions that Recursion causes.
When I used Recursion mode, and it's impact on the plot, as an example for things I felt GamesAsLit101 missed, I really meant to say I felt it was odd he didn't discuss the "potential" impact of Recursion's changes, or at least acknowledge the mode exists in his analysis. It wasn't a major loss, but it did start to make me ask what other things he didn't discuss, in some ways leading to my whole comment.
oh I see. I also think that Recursion mode is the simulation restarting over and over trying to find different outcomes.
Hah, I totally missed that bridge symbolism at 49:36 when I played through. They've literally made a little depiction of Red and The Boxer meeting in the Transistor.
In the transistor, the background has three transistor's taller than the others and their position and orientation is mimicking a common placement for skyscrapers in certain backgrounds of cloud bank
5 mins in the video and I instantly bought bastion and transistor on steam ;) ty
Edit : It was awesome
I remember still when the game first came out then this came out, looking back on it has become a yearly ritual. Still one of the few games that touches my heart.
Hey I would LOVE if you could do a video analyzing Hades the same way. The themes of family, of how you can't escape your family being part of who you are, and of how dysfunctional families still find ways to maintain family cohesion, just to start. There's so much to go into, as there is for any Supergiant game - they're a studio that tells stories the way great works of literature do, every time. "It's in the blood," mechanics as metaphor sprinkled throughout, you could probably make multiple videos on it and they would all be amazing.
"Real change happens in response to unchangeable circumstance. Real, meaningful change happens when you have to give something up, to get what you want." - eyo my guy spitting goddamn!!
I could have completely misunderstood the intention of the devs but I didn't see this ending as an idealization of suicide rather than the continuity of the game main discussion: what is choice?
At first, you have a lot of people taking decisions together and going nowhere because of it (a lot to be said about this vision of democracy and I don't think the authors realize how conservative our species is at large but it's another discussion), then you have a group of people who take decisions for everyone else and ends up destroying everything because they coulnd't understand that it is what real change means. Finally, you have one individual, Red, with all the power of the world but no one left to enjoy it which means no power at all and no choices left. This is when she makes the only logical decision at her disposal (knowing how averse to change she has always been). She accepts that this new world will continue without her, that everything she knew is going to be replaced with new forms of life created by the process and she comes to term with it.
It's fundamentally a tale about the impermanence of things and how we delude ourselves about controlling it.
God I had forgotten what good voice acting went on with Royce, just hearing his pauses and wordplay is great.
A interesting point i'd like to make regarding the "suicide" of Red . In regards to agency, it's at the same time a choice to do so (even though it may not always feel that way), however at the same time it's a choice to finally take away any agency of one self permanently, fitting very well with Red's wish to not be the core of socierty having to make the choices or influence people around her.
Loved the video, well done, looking forward to more of these, this channel has quickly become my favorit on youtube.
Thank you both so much for this very in-depth analysis! It definitely made me rethink some of the elements of one of my favourite games. By the way, what are your thoughts on the "Recursion Mode" in relation to the story and theme?
I do wish I had an opportunity to talk about it in the video, but ultimately every way I tried to insert it broke the flow of information without actually contributing much meaning to the video. There's usually one or another thing like that in most of my analyses.
Basically, the introduction in Recursion mode (with Royce saying the opening line from the Transistor instead of the Boxer), along with the word "recursion" itself (which is a programming term referencing a function that calls upon itself, thus looping within its own execution), imply a cyclical nature to the New Game+. This is interesting, but ultimately (I believe) not thematically important. Unlike Bastion, nothing in Transistor implies the story itself is cyclical, and in fact the ending of Transistor hinges on a sense of finality that would be severely undercut by an implication that the story continues to repeat itself infinitely.
If we're explaining recursion canonically, I'd say it's something like the system replaying and re-simulating what happened, while of course already having the final results recorded on account of these events having happened before. Which is perhaps an interesting note, but not particularly relevant to deciphering the game's meaning; it's basically just a cool way to make New Game+ make sense in-universe. But using it to interpret the story in a cyclical sense has no basis in the story itself and, I would argue, damages the game's message.
Thank you, and I agree. Mostly I like the idea that the quote in the beginning is a reference to how a recursion in code may start and end with a (Royce) bracket. Seen in that way, the story fits neatly together as a string of code containing the functions.
But I think you are correct in that it isn't meant to alter the meaning of the game, and I also initially thought about as a "copy of reality" within reality, hence not disturbing the original story.
Very interesting, and thank you again!
The devs have mostly confirmed it is just a programming pun, and that recursion mode isn't canon at all, just a normal New game plus mode.
Oh, I didn't know that. Do you happen to know where/when they confirmed that?
well thats unfortunate
I always thought of the connection of Cloudbanbks and the country as 2 Sides in a circle.
The process erase Cloudbanks and build the Country on the blank Canvas.
In the mean Time the people who died during the lifetime of Cloudbanks began to change the Country from a empty Corn Field. They build a new Cloudbanks because it is still there ideal world. (For the most people)
In a way it shows even the creed of the camerata again. The could destroy cloudbanks over and over again. Maybe the only away to escape this circle is the asimilation through a Transistor.
This was a really nice video.
I like Transistor for a lot of reasons. I love the Camerata - they really were well done villains.
And I like the video too, because you dealt with it fully, addressing all sorts of angles with a depth that on youtube you normally see reserved only for [Nostalgic game XY]. Well done, especially the parts I either disagreed with, or didn't see that way. Different opinions are great.
I'm really happy to see the story of this game tackled, as I myself tried to wrap my head around it numerous times. I personally do not enjoy stories with a heavy emphasis on somber tones, thus I prefer Bastion's optimism. I really enjoy the vagueness of the story, but I do wish things were a tad more tangible. Perhaps a definitive answer to what exactly the place the final takes place in is and the significance of elements within it. The pods that contain people, the barn at the background that resembles the country and the various sized transistors behind. I think the main problem is that the ending is placed on a vague story, thus interpreting it "wrong" is unavoidable. After all, getting stabbed with the Transistor being a "good" outcome nullifies the threat we faced earlier. It also means that Red could have stabbed herself immediately after taking control of the sword and nothing would have changed. All we get after completing the story is a new perspective on the situation, likely not so after the first playthrough. There are also certain mysteries left around that I thought told a bigger story, but might not, since they remain a mystery. For instance some people pointed out that the "Boxer" is likely a hacker who gained access to this digital utopia without authorization, since that would likely be the only way to avoid making decisions upon logging in. The fact that Bastion incorporated "new game+" to it's story led people to believe, myself included, that this is the case here as well. The process proceeds to evolve as you replay the game and some even suggested that Royce might actually be the Boxer who turns into him when he is corrupted at the end of the fight. Apparently the first line changes to be spoken by him upon replaying, though I never noticed that myself. Small things like this are scattered around, making the vague story even harder to decipher.
I better finish Pyre before it's story is discussed!
I think you guys should definitely review Hyper Light Drifter if you haven't already. It has a lot of similarities with Transistor. A silent protagonist, a very non-obvious storyline that you really have to dig deep into to understand, and themes of health issues. However, in Hyper's case, it's physical health problems, not mental ones. But the story is actually based on the lead developer's real life health problems, and it's really amazing how well the game manages it all while staying fun.
+Alex Baldwin I'm quite interested on interpretations for Hyper Light, I loved the art and the fact characters talked to each other through images rather than words, but it's safe to say I was really confused by the story. Do you recommend any videos on it?
Fun fact, if you go to the beach sandbox and you have no music on the jukebox you will hum Paper Boats
I'd very much like to see an analysis on "To the Moon" or "Finding Paradise"!
Good god that song "The Spine" just DRIPS of Radiohead circa late 90's early 2000's.
I would've liked more talk regarding the spine of the world, since they exhibit such odd behaviors, for example: why is it that the spine, despite spawning cells and badcells in one part of the game, attacks the process in the later stages?
Also, what's up with its interactions with the transistor? Given that the transistor represents power, and later, more specifically, the power to control and ultimately cause change, the spine seems to oppose the transistor in both cases (but without the ability to snuff its power completely).
Also, the idea of the process as nature seems completely missed - the process, as Royce says, "Is just doing its job." There certainly seems no method to the process's process of processing the city and its inhabitants, other then turning them into a series of plain white boxes. In this case, transistor is a natural disaster apocalypse movie. You can go wherever you want from there.
Also, the ending is incredibly vague. She's left holding the key to the kingdom, and decides to hang it up and hang out with her boyfriend. I believe the video's interpretation of this is that she made a choice to not leave him behind, but I think it's one thing to carry him around in a sword forever and another thing to enter the transistor. It seems weak to say that after 10 hours of horsing around with the process, that undying love was the end of Red. I think it's important that she doesn't just leave to be with the guy, but she gives up the transistor.
Why were the Camerata collecting people for the transistor?
"It was nothing personal, you know. You were.. valuable. Handpicked. Unique. But, one of many. All we needed was your point of view. To give the people what they didn't know they wanted. That's all we ever wanted." -Asher Kendrall
I guess you could say, they were looking for god, or truth, or whatever name you happen to choose for the key to the universe. 42
I have never physically played this game, but I've seen other UA-camrs play it. This means I knew the ending going into this video, but I still teared up. I love this game to bits, and I loved seeing your literary analysis as well. You've earned my sub :)
Yessss I jumped with glee when I saw this in my sub box! This is my favorite indie game of all time and you guys totally did it justice with this excellent analysis. I’ve replayed the game three times now (on three different platforms, lol) and I’m glad you called out the little but incredible touches like the PS4 controller audio swap at the end and the clucker reaction sequence to the humming. Loved the discussion about the potentially unnecessary use of the sci-fi suicide trope as well, I hadn’t really considered it in that way before. Awesome work! :)
Great analysis overall, keep up the good work. One point that I would have loved to hear your theories and opinion on is Recursion, not just as a game+ mode, but also as a theme that is heavily hinted at throughout the game and directly pointed to when you start Recursion mode.
The line "Boxer/Breach/Blue" says in the beginning: "We're not getting away with this, are we ?" only makes sense in the context of recursion as a major sci-fi theme, as does the same line being spoken by Royce in the beginning of Recursion (which is more than just a neat little easter egg, it confirms that the "Country" is the "place" people who are stuck in the Transistor "exist in"). Basically, Red, "Boxer" and everyone else is stuck in an endless recursion of computer simulations that all contain a Transistor that also always contains another Cloudbank that also contains another Transistor etc.
"Boxer" was most likely a "Breach" (just like his function), aka someone who came from "outside" of the simulation somehow (either from a "previous", recurred version or as a hacker from outside entirely) - which means what really caused the Process to run amok was absorbing data from something that was simply incomprehensible because it was never programmed to exist within the simulation of Cloudbank.
Hello, just found your channel and I must say that this is a wonderful idea. Many video games are literary masterpieces and deserve to be treated as such. I feel the medium has so much potential in the way it interacts with people and can have lasting impact. Transistor is an excellent example especially, as you mentioned, on the PS4. Video games can be works of art and have their own themes and messages to give to others. Treating it as literary analysis as you have is a great way to show its importance and impactful meaning. Great Video, great channel, great execution, subscribed.
This was the greatest episode ever made. Transistor speaks a lot to me, it's a great game. I cry a lot in the middle of the show realising how much this game has to offer. Thank you for that.
Thank you both so much for this video! I'd found myself at odds with the game after I played it the first time through, because I LOVED its presentation but had issues with the way the ending was framed, and I think that was mostly due to not really understanding the meaning or the bigger context of the ending. This video really helped me understand those themes and meanings a lot better, and I feel you did a good job approaching the intent vs impact of framing Red's choice as a dramatic suicide, and how that relates to the game's message and the way people might interpret it. Keep up the amazing work!
This review turned me on to the soundtrack. I listen to Spine of the World and Paper Boats several times a year and i always think about the ending. Was it waking up in the real world? Was it waking up in the afterlife?
The ideas this review helped inspire havent really gone away.
I don't know why you would think that cloudbank is a simulation, you base your argument on the process being able to change things extremely suddenly but we know it can disassemble and make things semi instantly.
More than that red can literally DRIVE out of town on her motorcycle, the transistor mentions "skipping town" that means there are more things and locations outside of cloudbank.
I think cloudbank is a very real town that was built by the process. As for the country it seems to be both death and the country, out of town. my guess is it looks much like the final scene with red.
Thank you for coming to my ted talk, love the vid
After half a year of mediation and intense self reflection (watching the video again)
I concede that the part about not being able to come back does discredit the real town theory, but if you just go to another server why wouldn't you be able to come back?, Will the residents keep you out? If so then the real town theory holds just as much water
Wow. I've got the idea especially from the design of the world of transistor as a digitized simulator where every person or mostly everyone living there is made consistently if data. A network of sorts that holds information about everyone and everything in it. Another amazing part I loved about this game is the color scheme. It's main colors that blend around in most of its environment is green, red, and yellow. Same color as the transistor itself and everything else. I just find the architecture or environment design beautiful to observe while playing it. With opposition coming from white and red -- The Process and the Camerata, even though I understand they were trying to change how Cloudbank functions just not in one that worked out well considering all that takes place unto the end of the game.
on of my favourite games of all time. I really wish there was a prequel novelisation. I always want to sink further into this world every time i play
You certainly were very careful with how you engaged with the topic of suicide in your analysis of the text, so I want to stress that I thoroughly enjoyed the video - Transistor is one of my favourite games and your analysis was well presented. That besing said, there is one particular moment at 47:10 in this video that bothers me. "Thing is, suicide is easily seen and very commonly so in literary history, as a metaphor for freedom, especially by neurotypical people who haven't actually confronted the reality of it for themselves." Of course this was just a side-track and I don't expect you to unravel the history of the portrayal of mental health in this video, but this really bothered me and I'd like to explain why:
First, this statement kind of makes a monolith out of the experiences of neurodivergent people. We all engage with suicide in quite different ways. I can say from first hand experience that suicide does not mean freedom to me and suicidal periods are actually quite scary, certain romanticisations of suicide are deeply troubling (looking at you, 13 Reasons Why). I would also caution against the assumptions that suicide in literature was romanticised mainly by neurotypical people, I think that is a projection of our current conceptualisations of mental health to past actors, who we might describe as neurodivergent today. That said, neurodivergent people are also capable of engaging with suicide as a cultural signifier and I think that, if done correctly, such an engagement with a metaphorical suicide can actually be helpful in reflecting on life here and now, what it is we are trying to flee from and what keeps us here. I get what your point is: It's true that Transistor, since its text remains ambiguous throughout the game, might lend itself to unfavourable interpretations - It took me a few hours of reading through a lot of its content to truly feel I had come to a place where I found meaning it it. BUT unlike in the aforementioned example, those interpretations are not really textually supported and I would find it a shame if we overly problematicised Transistor when it works with the imagery of suicide so much more profoundly. Also, Royce is my autistic best boi.
I know that this is not really a counter argument to you, that's basically what you said in your video too, but I thought it interesting to angle it slightly different. I'm also sorry for focusing on such a small portion of the video, when I really find your video very engaging. Transistor is dear to my heart because it transcends the limits of a medium that all too rarely breaks out of its role as entertainment and even with games that do, I think Transistor stands out because it doesn't just ask moral questions, it deals with some of the most profound issues of the human experience: Agency, choice, action. My favourite part of your analysis was from 53:10 onwards. "Real change happens in response to unchangeable circumstance." Couldn't have said it better myself!
I appreciate your perspective here!
Ultimately I approached that whole aside knowing full well I was coming from a neurotypical position, which is why I ran it by so many friends and colleagues who have more personal experience with this sort of thing. I'm fully aware that everyone's experiences are different, though I perhaps could have expressed that particular sentiment better.
Point being, I absolutely appreciate hearing the perspective of more people with more experience on the subject than me! Thanks!
No need to thank me for chipping in with my two cents. Rereading my comment, I apologise for the very frank tone of it - I just wanted to affirm you in your argument, I think it's a strong one to make and though I appreciate the content warning and the care with which you handled the topic, I also think you are spot on with what you said about the motif.
I just discovered your channel and im very glad so, i like hearing your opinion and pretty proud that no matter the views or subscribers, you still do what you like, and i love it.
I think people are underestimating the clear words stated in game of Grant and Asher's relationship. It's clearly stated as marriage, by Asher himself and both of their bios. Asher's bio also clearly states that their relationship started before he was Camerata, but by nature of their intimacy, Grant realized that he could not hide his actions as Camerata from Asher, so he gave him a choice.
Oh thank you! Finally I've been waiting so long for you to cover this game. You are the best professor.
I'm so happy you guys made a review on one of the most amazing of games I've ever seen. Please keep up with this stuff, games like this one definitely deserves more praise.
Got about 20 minutes in and I'm stopping.
Transistor is going on the to do list.
I've been waiting for this since I subscribed and UA-cam had the AUDACITY to NOT warn me. I am genuinely happy you guys did this analysis. This game had me smiling at it and just in awe that games, as a medium, never ceases to amaze me with such beautiful stories, that can only be so effective in the same medium. I think that, the most amazing thing that Supergiant Games achieved, is that it makes me happy to talk and reminesce about this game. That's something that I've never experienced with a game before. Truly beautiful.
So amp'd to have a full literary analysis...Loved the video
Great analysis, guys. I eat this kind of thing up. Looking forward to browsing your channel.
MY GOD, TRANSISTOR IS ONE OF THE BEST GAMES I HAVE EVER PLAYED. I brought it in 2014 cause it could run on my work potato PC and I really needed something to play while I was on a trip but my fuxking god it was so good I was actually happy I brought it... Jesus guys this game is a masterpiece it needs more love.
Was replaying this game recently and this video perfectly encapsulates how if felt whilst playing, love it
This video is amazing! It's my favorite game and I finished it 5 years ago but I still had so many questions about it and you explained it so clearly ! I thought I couldn't like this game more but I was wrong, I definitely have to play it again on ps4.
Thank you for this analysis! I never knew that I needed it, but it helped rethink some parts of my life, and made me understand the game.
I'm seriously impressed by the amount of work you put into this, chapeau!
I just replayed Transistor today, and I must say that its just... so beautiful. This analysis gives me more appreciation for the game. Thank you for creating this.
This was super well written and well executed! Thanks for sharing your appreciation for good games!
Brilliant movie and collaboration. Keep up the great work.
Another wonderful episode, sir.
I've put this off long enough; you've got another patreon.
I LOVED this review. I'm so very glad I got the game on discount. But I am also very slightly sad you didn't mention the Backdoor area. It does matter much in the story though so I get why you didn't.
I think the vagueness of The Country actually does a lot to set up the themes by encouraging you to think about the finale allegorically, despite its dramatic framing. The waters are muddied on what death means in this universe, but whether it's retirement or evacuation or death or even imprisonment in the Transistor, the throughline is a giving up, willingly or not, of worldly power and agency. Cloudbank is a place where everything happens, where everything changes. Whatever the Country is, it's a place where things don't change, a literal or metaphorical peaceful eternity. Red's choice at the end could be understood as a suicide, but it's much more important that it's understood as giving up of worldly power and apparent agency in favor of things she actually wants.
(It might be a bit of a reach, but you could see "being Processed" as a kind of inverse death - rather than going somewhere that nothing changes and nothing happens, you are turned into raw potential, unformed data, all power and possibility without any self. )
Have you played Pyre yet?
I’d love to see another hour video on that. Maybe next year?
Absolutely legendary video
Transistor is one of my favorite games of all time, and I didn't even pick up most of what you discussed LMAO
This is by far one of the most resonating game i played forever, cant wait to see you do pyre
He has returned!
What a brilliant game. Thanks for such a great analysis!!
Glad you’re back!
Also I recommend planetscape torment for a lit review.
I watched this video a while ago but wanted to come back and add my two cents, in particular with regards to the ending. Spoilers, of course.
So for me the thing that was specifically interesting about the ending for me was that with my experience it was almost a twist utilizing the ambiguity of Red's character motivations. And just to be clear it is totally possible I just missed out on the allusions to it on my all-important first playthrough, I can be kindof dense with that stuff sometimes. As a silent protagonist, I found myself unconsciously projecting more traditional heroic tropes onto her. Where the supposed twist, or probably more accurately subversion, comes in is specifically with the fact when given the power to restore cloudbank, but not The Boxer, Red chooses to reunite with him wherever he is. This to me was the reveal that the story and, more importantly Red's stake in it, was never about the Camerata, The Process or even Cloudbank, but instead her wanting to be reunited with The Boxer. She was never in it for anything else.
I'll also say that, in hindsight, despite my love for the story and characters I do find the suicide parallel pretty problematic and distasteful in general and it definitely makes me feel a little weird about the ending
So Red is, in a sense, a Phantom Thief?
WELL WORTH THE WAIT!
Well damn. I've had two wonderful literature professors over the years who made me think as much as your insights have. Make that three now. Subscribed.
Stopping at 37:25 to make these comments
Alright, lets start!
"When everything changes, nothing changes"
THESEUS' PARADOX!! That has to be said immediately.
Also, regarding the premise, a modern rendition of the concept shared is... well... UA-cam. If you think about it, the concept of a "democratic system of changes rendered in the system suiting the needs of the people", doesn't that sound eerie and coincidental? UA-cam does that, Facebook is suspiciously close to doing that too, and Pinterest definitely does that. Google does that too. These are websites, but they democratically change according to the whims of the user, each and ever time.
Also, side note. transistor comes from an electricity concept called transistance: "The characteristic that makes possible the control of voltages or currents so as to accomplish gain or switching action in a circuit". I tended to see that during the humming sections of the game - a transistor lets you make such a thing possible, and the fact that her hum matches the songs running in the background matches a concept of electricity of polarity and the binary nature of all things electrical. She either doesn't speak, or she hums which is speaking. Her ACTIONS make her real, not her voice.
This, in a way, also ties to the action mechanics used in this game. Everything has a very circuit feel to it, almost like drawings of physics experiments on current, voltage, resistance and even a bit of thermodynamics. That's a neat touch.
Amazing video my man
I’m making a big suggestion for you to analysis for next videos: persona series or legend of heroes starting at trails in the sky. Persona i heard is very good with storytelling, connection environment and people. I like legend of heroes for world building, especially how npcs lived on with their lives outside by having different conversation after events. Even though I heard their stories had been done before, the people who played through agreed that the twists and its execution are the best.
Probably my favorite thing about SuperGiant is the worldbuilding, how they create worlds that make sense according to their own specific rules when it comes to physics and just general existence. You can go "yeah, download that statue into your sword", and in-universe it makes perfect sense, which is why I don't enjoy the idea of there being an "outside physical world". I prefer the world just being like that, very loosely based on concepts from real life, it's so much more interesting
Would love to see an analysis on Journey, Celeste or Inside. Either way, love these videos. Keep em coming!
Just found this channel and really like your stuff. It'd be cool to see you cover Pyre and finish out Supergiant's series. Maybe talk about their games as a whole?
YES! THE WAIT IS OVer.. (ahem) Good to see your back
Amazing work!
GOD the music darren korb produces always completely incapsulates the mood, themes and overall vibes of all supergiant games. not only that, but his colleague ashley barret also has one of the best female vocals i’ve ever heard in the video game industry. their pairing is a match made in cloudbank :)
I hope that Pyre inspires a desire to analyze, also.
Fantastic analysis
The whole video is great but I just want to point out how spine tingling that edit at 49:47 is.
IT IS FINALLY HERE! WOOO! Now to go watch it.
Thank you for what you do on this channel.. Stay Real and Original💎👍
UA-cam hasn't notified me of your awesome videos 😠. Keep it up, dude!
interesting analysis! enjoyed it
One thing that should be noted about the democracy in Cloudbank, is that it is not actually a democracy. My main evidence behind this is whenever you vote or make a comment at a terminal it always says "you comment/vote has been submitted for review"; meaning that the results of all of the polls and forums are artificially.
But great video I really enjoyed it.
Why isn't there a link to the gaming Symposium video on this?! I love all of the GS episodes! I wish you could make more!
amazing game, amazing analysis
Great vid ! Can't wait for you to get to Pyre
I’m getting the ost because of this video.
Great content!!!!!
the game has many details that delight me more then before
dude i finished the game half an hour ago and you uploaded the vid yesterday.
I think The Country is a backup server. The source code, or Trace Data, of anyone entering The Country is preserved until the next "reboot," where the Town is scrubbed and brought back to its "factory settings."
When someone decides to "retire" to the Country, it's probably because they've grown bored of the world. Their source code is preserved, and they can opt to "reincarnate" into the new iteration.
What confuses the issue is our question of permanence. EVERYTHING lacks permanence in Cloudbank, playing with our preconceived notion of "object permanence," if you will. So why would being Processed be perceived as being had, when we assume the Country is the same thing? That's because it isn't. Death by Process is permanent. The reason the surviving denizens of Cloudbank don't opt for evacuation into the Country is because, well, they've finally understood the power of choice, like Red does at the end of her story.
The studio often plays with themes of cycles in their stories, and Transistor is no exception. On New Game+, we hear Royce echoing Boxer's like of, "I don't think we're getting out of this, Red." I have a theory that the current population are descendants of the Process (or at least derived from the same source code) but have forgotten their origin. Towards the end, we see the Process adopt increasingly biological forms and functions. They'll populate and rebuild Cloudbank in their own image, and probably reach a similar point of cultural stagnation.
Echoing the ends of Bastion, this digital world restarts in one of two ways. Either the Town is rebooted, and all the Trace Data from the Country is downloaded into that sandbox; or everything is scrubbed, and life starts anew by an evolving Process.
Love your content
Even years after i played the game, watching red scrape the floor while dragging the transistor still hurts me on the inside
I think you are underestimating the role of the boxer, throughout the game he is red's only contact and before the attack someone who sacrificed his life for her.
I think that disregarding the boxer as part of red's decision is ridiculous, she wouldn't have done what she did if the boxer wasn't inside there and when she gets inside the BOTH are in the frame greetings each other starting with the boxer.
I was always so frustrated with Red killing herself. I hated that ending. But after watching this and gaining a new perspective on it... Well, it's nice to know she wouldn't just kill herself. That she had more reason to it then just to be with him. Thank you for that.
If you genuinely thought she killed herself just to be with him, you really paid zero attention to the story
I love this so much