Post by Primulus on Feb 17, 2017 0:18:43 GMT -5
Yay! I love a good debate, snoells314, so I'm happy you replied.
Let's get cracking, compare notes and whatnot. I'll try to provide sources on some of the things you've questioned me about, as well.
First, I would like to point out the presence of a mysterious "DM Engine" in the short stories that is never mentioned in game (like a lot of other things). Even during this period of time before the Japanese release, translator and fan Gessenkou actually theorized this would actually end up standing for "Dark Matter Engine", and it's mentioned that the DM Engine is one of the technologies Elma helped cultivate on Earth.
A curious thing also arises in the description of the Ghosts in the short story, where it is only the "cores" which are specified as being made of antimatter, not the entirety of them. This is specified because great care had to be taken to take down a Ghost unit without disrupting the core, or else the explosion would be massive and damage the ship. This is actually concurrent with the way antimatter works in real life - if there were some way to isolate it inside a container, such as in the core of a skell, it is not unfeasible to harness the antimatter for energy, in the form of small, controlled antimatter-matter collisions. Not only do you make such an alien skell harder to destroy safely, but it is a highly efficient form of power generation. While humans do not know how to do it today, it is at least within the realm of scientific possibility for antimatter to work like that.
It's also not entirely out of the realm of possibility to, say, possibly use dark matter particles for generating energy either. I've always considered that if DM Engine does mean "Dark Matter Engine", then perhaps what Elma is recognizing isn't Dark Matter as a substance, but rather a visual effect of a Dark Matter engine at work. (Or maybe "Dark Matter" just sounds exotic and appropriate and was used without research into what it was...)
Oh, and the name changes in the short story are only from Japanese to English. Vandham was called Van Damme in the Japanese version, Skells were called Dolls in the Japanese version, and the White Whale being called the "Moby Dick" was a translation choice by the translators of the short story (the literal translation is "White Whale" even in the short story, the translator just didn't like the sound of it). No name changes between the short story and the final product actually happened, what happened were name changes between the Japanese and English versions, and the names displayed in the translation of the short story were the Japanese versions because the short story was translated by fans before the English version was released. (Also, I don't think Mei ever actually appeared in game, but I'm not sure about that. Irina is mentioned in that story separately, so she is not Mei.)
Levels are an abstract, although they do appear to exist at least partly in universe, but I am not sure it's fair to say level 150 just because Luxaar was piloting it at level 50. However, the 30% bit does check out. Once again though, in terms of Ghosts not being made of normal matter, it's explicitly only said that their cores are not made from normal matter, not their exterior shells. Furthermore, that's merely a list of skell makers that made it to Mira, but the Samaar Federation is said to have a six million light year territory (spanning multiple galaxies) and the Ganglion are actually just a "run of the mill crime syndicate" (though seemingly religiously motivated) according to the Ma-non. The sheer size of the Samaar Federation and the scope of its domain would imply that there's a lot more to this universe than what we've seen. Therefore, it seems odd if these are the ONLY civilizations that have made skells when there's a lot more out there.
When you get down to it, there is nothing that convincingly connects the Vita to the Ares and the Ghosts for me. The Ares does have design elements that are alarmingly similar to the Ghosts in concept art, so there may be something going on there, but the Vita itself looks to be a different beast entirely to me, and the Dark Matter/Antimatter thing being interchangeable has evidence against it as I've pointed out.
As for the golden skell you point out in the concept art, to me it resembles a Formula way too much to consider anything else.
The profile of its helmet and the cylindrical section jutting out from its chest appear to match up with the design of the Formula. It just happens to be gold plated and has a purple visor, and has clearly been damaged (as can be told from the bullet holes and what not). The shape of the left side of the chest next to the cylinder is also similar, although it's pulled further back and down in the concept art. Furthermore, of the golden Vita designs, none offer a round, cylindrical chest piece like the one seen in the concept art.
None have a head shape even remotely similar to the shape of the skell in the concept art you've shown, and only one (C2) even has a chest piece that matches the color at all - which is not shaped remotely like what's in the concept art. I see literally no reason to assume that the golden skell in the concept art with Lao and Doug has anything to do with the Vitas, but it does match the profile of the Formula, leaving me to assume it is just a golden Formula. A damaged one, since not only is it leaking gasses, but it also has bullet holes in its plating.
In the discussion on the motives of the Ghost faction, do we really know exactly the nature of this war to begin with? Perhaps the Ghost faction does not even consider the Ganglion to be their ultimate aim. Rather, perhaps, if it is true that the Ganglion is just a "run of the mill crime syndicate", then the Ganglion are trying to stop the Ghost faction from doing something, but the Ghost faction end goal is not the eradication of the Ganglion (at least, not directly). This would be consistent with the idea that the Ghosts have machines far more powerful than then Ganglion to begin with. Perhaps the Ghosts simply don't care about the Ganglion directly, but the Ganglion see the Ghosts as their greatest enemy. Of course, this is just conjecture, but considering the way the battle over Earth went, it looked like the Ghosts had more than enough of an upper hand.
Next, the Black Knight skell.
The title header on page 268 reads "BLACK KNIGHT'S DOLL" when literally translated, and the kanji used for "Black Knight" is identical to the kanji used for, well, the Black Knight also shown off in the artbook. Therefore, it can be properly assumed that what we see here is the Black Knight's skell. It bears no real similarity to any other skells except maybe the Wrothian skells to a small degree.
Furthermore, the notion that the Samaar Federation and Samaarian race are from putting together the words of the Ma-non in chapter 5 and the words of Luxaar in chapter 12. We know from these two chapters that the Samaar Federation is utterly massive and spans multiple galaxies, that the original Samaarians came and established the Samaar Federation from some unknown place of origin and that they have disappeared or gone away for some reason (this is explicitly spoken of by Luxaar in chapter 12). Humans appear to be the descendants of the original Samaarians, not simply a direct creation, but something more than that - a "failsafe" as Luxaar describes it. Reconciling these details implies that there are two contexts to the "Samaar" - that is the Federation, and then the original Samaarian founders who have since disappeared.
Further examination of the "Samaarian witch" line in its original Japanese reveals that the original line spoken by Elma was to call Goetia a "Barbarian of Samaar" - and this follows after Elma was informed by the Ma-non that the Ganglion are part of the Samaar Federation. The information that the original Samaarians that created the Ganglion and were the progenitors of mankind did not come until much later, and seems to be a surprise to Elma as well as everyone else. Thus, it seems improbable that Goetia is actually a Samaarian in the context of the original Samaarian race (but Goetia is part of the Samaar Federation).
As far as the Lifehold being in low orbit is concerned, that is another issue too, however the issue with low orbit would more so be that it could be at constantly varying distances rather than always too far away. In fact, low orbit is often close enough to the planet's surface, that if Mira is supposed to be Earth sized, then the Lifehold Core could probably maintain orbit at a low enough altitude that the distance from it and the surface would be much shorter than the distance between the Lifehold Core's landing spot and NLA. Something the size of the Lifehold Core can probably maintain orbit around an Earth like planet a couple hundred miles up, which is alarmingly close if Mira is supposed to represent an Earth-size world (and if it doesn't, its size is actually closer to an archipelago on Earth which raises a lot of questions about the game's story).
If the Lifehold Core's orbit matched Mira's rotation, however, it could maintain a distance from the planet and be located relatively close to NLA - closer than when it ended up in game, in effective terms. Of course, this is also unlikely, as Mira implicitly appears to have a rotation similar to Earth's... aside from that the sun rises and sets in the same direction, anyway.
It doesn't matter how long ago or how recent these conclusions were reached, however. Many of these conclusions were reached on what I see as false premises, including misunderstanding the name changes from the short story to the localized version of the game and not making the connection between chapter 5 and chapter 12, among other things. However, I hope you do not take my refutations personally, as I am merely pointing out flaws in your logic or otherwise inconsistencies. I've learned some things from you, particularly in that I didn't pay the Rose Garden (the "space station") any mind until now and have been in a slow process of trying to translate some of its text. It definitely appears to be something in orbit of Mira, though what it does or its connection to anything else is currently unknown. (Again, the Black Knight isn't mentioned at all in its entry, so it's not associated with him as far as I can tell.)
Let's get cracking, compare notes and whatnot. I'll try to provide sources on some of the things you've questioned me about, as well.
First, I would like to point out the presence of a mysterious "DM Engine" in the short stories that is never mentioned in game (like a lot of other things). Even during this period of time before the Japanese release, translator and fan Gessenkou actually theorized this would actually end up standing for "Dark Matter Engine", and it's mentioned that the DM Engine is one of the technologies Elma helped cultivate on Earth.
A curious thing also arises in the description of the Ghosts in the short story, where it is only the "cores" which are specified as being made of antimatter, not the entirety of them. This is specified because great care had to be taken to take down a Ghost unit without disrupting the core, or else the explosion would be massive and damage the ship. This is actually concurrent with the way antimatter works in real life - if there were some way to isolate it inside a container, such as in the core of a skell, it is not unfeasible to harness the antimatter for energy, in the form of small, controlled antimatter-matter collisions. Not only do you make such an alien skell harder to destroy safely, but it is a highly efficient form of power generation. While humans do not know how to do it today, it is at least within the realm of scientific possibility for antimatter to work like that.
It's also not entirely out of the realm of possibility to, say, possibly use dark matter particles for generating energy either. I've always considered that if DM Engine does mean "Dark Matter Engine", then perhaps what Elma is recognizing isn't Dark Matter as a substance, but rather a visual effect of a Dark Matter engine at work. (Or maybe "Dark Matter" just sounds exotic and appropriate and was used without research into what it was...)
Oh, and the name changes in the short story are only from Japanese to English. Vandham was called Van Damme in the Japanese version, Skells were called Dolls in the Japanese version, and the White Whale being called the "Moby Dick" was a translation choice by the translators of the short story (the literal translation is "White Whale" even in the short story, the translator just didn't like the sound of it). No name changes between the short story and the final product actually happened, what happened were name changes between the Japanese and English versions, and the names displayed in the translation of the short story were the Japanese versions because the short story was translated by fans before the English version was released. (Also, I don't think Mei ever actually appeared in game, but I'm not sure about that. Irina is mentioned in that story separately, so she is not Mei.)
Levels are an abstract, although they do appear to exist at least partly in universe, but I am not sure it's fair to say level 150 just because Luxaar was piloting it at level 50. However, the 30% bit does check out. Once again though, in terms of Ghosts not being made of normal matter, it's explicitly only said that their cores are not made from normal matter, not their exterior shells. Furthermore, that's merely a list of skell makers that made it to Mira, but the Samaar Federation is said to have a six million light year territory (spanning multiple galaxies) and the Ganglion are actually just a "run of the mill crime syndicate" (though seemingly religiously motivated) according to the Ma-non. The sheer size of the Samaar Federation and the scope of its domain would imply that there's a lot more to this universe than what we've seen. Therefore, it seems odd if these are the ONLY civilizations that have made skells when there's a lot more out there.
When you get down to it, there is nothing that convincingly connects the Vita to the Ares and the Ghosts for me. The Ares does have design elements that are alarmingly similar to the Ghosts in concept art, so there may be something going on there, but the Vita itself looks to be a different beast entirely to me, and the Dark Matter/Antimatter thing being interchangeable has evidence against it as I've pointed out.
As for the golden skell you point out in the concept art, to me it resembles a Formula way too much to consider anything else.
The profile of its helmet and the cylindrical section jutting out from its chest appear to match up with the design of the Formula. It just happens to be gold plated and has a purple visor, and has clearly been damaged (as can be told from the bullet holes and what not). The shape of the left side of the chest next to the cylinder is also similar, although it's pulled further back and down in the concept art. Furthermore, of the golden Vita designs, none offer a round, cylindrical chest piece like the one seen in the concept art.
None have a head shape even remotely similar to the shape of the skell in the concept art you've shown, and only one (C2) even has a chest piece that matches the color at all - which is not shaped remotely like what's in the concept art. I see literally no reason to assume that the golden skell in the concept art with Lao and Doug has anything to do with the Vitas, but it does match the profile of the Formula, leaving me to assume it is just a golden Formula. A damaged one, since not only is it leaking gasses, but it also has bullet holes in its plating.
In the discussion on the motives of the Ghost faction, do we really know exactly the nature of this war to begin with? Perhaps the Ghost faction does not even consider the Ganglion to be their ultimate aim. Rather, perhaps, if it is true that the Ganglion is just a "run of the mill crime syndicate", then the Ganglion are trying to stop the Ghost faction from doing something, but the Ghost faction end goal is not the eradication of the Ganglion (at least, not directly). This would be consistent with the idea that the Ghosts have machines far more powerful than then Ganglion to begin with. Perhaps the Ghosts simply don't care about the Ganglion directly, but the Ganglion see the Ghosts as their greatest enemy. Of course, this is just conjecture, but considering the way the battle over Earth went, it looked like the Ghosts had more than enough of an upper hand.
Next, the Black Knight skell.
The title header on page 268 reads "BLACK KNIGHT'S DOLL" when literally translated, and the kanji used for "Black Knight" is identical to the kanji used for, well, the Black Knight also shown off in the artbook. Therefore, it can be properly assumed that what we see here is the Black Knight's skell. It bears no real similarity to any other skells except maybe the Wrothian skells to a small degree.
Furthermore, the notion that the Samaar Federation and Samaarian race are from putting together the words of the Ma-non in chapter 5 and the words of Luxaar in chapter 12. We know from these two chapters that the Samaar Federation is utterly massive and spans multiple galaxies, that the original Samaarians came and established the Samaar Federation from some unknown place of origin and that they have disappeared or gone away for some reason (this is explicitly spoken of by Luxaar in chapter 12). Humans appear to be the descendants of the original Samaarians, not simply a direct creation, but something more than that - a "failsafe" as Luxaar describes it. Reconciling these details implies that there are two contexts to the "Samaar" - that is the Federation, and then the original Samaarian founders who have since disappeared.
Further examination of the "Samaarian witch" line in its original Japanese reveals that the original line spoken by Elma was to call Goetia a "Barbarian of Samaar" - and this follows after Elma was informed by the Ma-non that the Ganglion are part of the Samaar Federation. The information that the original Samaarians that created the Ganglion and were the progenitors of mankind did not come until much later, and seems to be a surprise to Elma as well as everyone else. Thus, it seems improbable that Goetia is actually a Samaarian in the context of the original Samaarian race (but Goetia is part of the Samaar Federation).
As far as the Lifehold being in low orbit is concerned, that is another issue too, however the issue with low orbit would more so be that it could be at constantly varying distances rather than always too far away. In fact, low orbit is often close enough to the planet's surface, that if Mira is supposed to be Earth sized, then the Lifehold Core could probably maintain orbit at a low enough altitude that the distance from it and the surface would be much shorter than the distance between the Lifehold Core's landing spot and NLA. Something the size of the Lifehold Core can probably maintain orbit around an Earth like planet a couple hundred miles up, which is alarmingly close if Mira is supposed to represent an Earth-size world (and if it doesn't, its size is actually closer to an archipelago on Earth which raises a lot of questions about the game's story).
If the Lifehold Core's orbit matched Mira's rotation, however, it could maintain a distance from the planet and be located relatively close to NLA - closer than when it ended up in game, in effective terms. Of course, this is also unlikely, as Mira implicitly appears to have a rotation similar to Earth's... aside from that the sun rises and sets in the same direction, anyway.
It doesn't matter how long ago or how recent these conclusions were reached, however. Many of these conclusions were reached on what I see as false premises, including misunderstanding the name changes from the short story to the localized version of the game and not making the connection between chapter 5 and chapter 12, among other things. However, I hope you do not take my refutations personally, as I am merely pointing out flaws in your logic or otherwise inconsistencies. I've learned some things from you, particularly in that I didn't pay the Rose Garden (the "space station") any mind until now and have been in a slow process of trying to translate some of its text. It definitely appears to be something in orbit of Mira, though what it does or its connection to anything else is currently unknown. (Again, the Black Knight isn't mentioned at all in its entry, so it's not associated with him as far as I can tell.)