Where there are hundreds of forces that can, and will, turn him into scrap in a second, and he has no idea what he wants to accomplish… or he can go back and play fire emblem.
Also, I guess what we’re reading is probably an internal monologue (or probably much faster, robotic version of one), since there’s no one to talk to (and I don’t think a robot would be talking to himself), and Zeke most likely has an internal clock, so a question of “what time is it?” wouldn’t make sense for him, he probably knows it all the time, down to seconds.
It’s a reference to the Disneyland ride “It’s a small world after all.” It’s actually a pretty deep cut that I had to think about for a while. Kudos Gruff.
Also Data has an internal clock (I assume), IIRC he used it to time a boiling kettle (it always takes the same time while watching and actively ignoring it). Yet when Picard (IIRC) distracted him, the boiling kettle seemed to surprise him.
It could be self-referential, as he IS monologuing. I say, when I step in a room, “Now, what was I looking for?” I know it, I just have to think on it. Having an internal clock might not mean he has constant awareness of the time; rather, he has constant access to knowledge of the time. There’s a difference between actively being aware of all the things you know, and knowing it but having to think and focus on it. If you’re playing a game, for example, you can be actively aware of your opponent’s position, where they’re moving, your… Read more »
Right? Like what would he possibly do if he left? Go out and kill random people? He has to know deep down he’s a small fish in a big pond. He straight up just dipped when the Captain showed up to save Ethan and Lucas.
Plus, everyone else would have far less compunction towards just gunning him down with extreme prejudice. Those three were the only ones who gave him a semblance of a chance, and he’d be an idiot to waste it.
Luca Kowalski
3 years ago
Am I the only one thinking: “no Zeke, don’t go outside!”
Scott specifically mentioned tying it to that room, not the building. I’d guess he’s extremely close to triggering it already. Maybe just a little too far lean forward close.
I would “hope” he was smart enough to add a little bit of wiggle room, so if Zeke like wanted to just go people watching outside the store and pretend to be like a display he could.
I’m hoping that, on the next page, he exhibits intimidation of the thought of actually going outside into the ‘big, big world’ and decides to go back to playing Fire Emblem in the comfort of the room. And I suspect there’s a good chance he’ll do that. All he knows is living under the instructions of someone else. Free will can be intimidating to someone who has never been accustomed to having it. And since he believes he has the freedom to step out against his masters’ wishes, as opposed to knowing he’s FORCED to obey their commands(Like in all… Read more »
Cyrad
3 years ago
Soon he will learn an important lesson of freedom. He can go anywhere he pleases, but he’s still better off staying inside and playing video games.
Frederick can actually be a huge trap. His growth rates are only okay, and if you devote too many enemies to him you lose out on early growth for your other units. He starts higher, but unless you wait until everyone else has caught up (and earning the right amount of XP) he doesn’t scale fast enough, or high enough, to solo enemies, to say nothing of the tactical importance of being in two places at once.
But yeah the harem strat had occurred to me, also.
Maybe he missed the opportunity to get him as a soldier (as far as I remember, he only joins if he levels up during his introductory mission)? If so, he doesn’t have enough information to figure that out (computers are much faster than we are at “thinking”, but the results still depend on the input information they receive). Though come to think of it, it might also mean to show that, despite being a robot, he is impulsive and prefers to grab the first good looking and quick solution to problems. Which is not good if the solution might be… Read more »
Kenju
3 years ago
Huh, so he’s far enough to have access to the kids and knows about that, but believes Frederick is the best, meaning he hasn’t unlocked Chrom’s Aeither skill…
Crowsair
3 years ago
So when Zeke hits Three Houses does he go Black Eagle for Edelgard Targaryen or does he go Blue Lion for Dimitri’s kill em all vibe?
Shecky
3 years ago
I can’t believe he actually thinks he is free. His snark, logic, and scepticism should assume he is still bound. That panel seems largely out of character.
As far as he can tell, he has no bomb to control him and none of the team is around. Sceptic in him might have not believed them/still not, but logically his sensors don’t detect any of them around and he has full motion and an easy window to smash through. I can’t speak for his snark.
So his presumption that humans are all morons takes first priority? He did call Scott the “somewhat” smart one, so I suppose it has a superiority complex to a fault. It assuming that Scott wouldn’t repurpose the kill switch would fit right into that character fault.
Kaitensatsuma
3 years ago
Eh, he’s got time to figure it out.
Him.
3 years ago
Ah, I see he’s playing a game of “The Awesomening of Frederick”. 2 was a big van of that, back then.
toughluck
3 years ago
Did Scott *really* plant (or reactivate) the bomb? Could it have been just a bluff?
He never deactivated it. He just took over control of the dead man switch and added other ways to trigger it.
John Brownle
3 years ago
Murderbot.
FireballDragon
3 years ago
So basically, he’s going to be so intimidated by how big the world is and realize how little he actually knows about it to not even bother and just stay inside anyway?
Or it’s just a good excuse to go back inside and play more video games. People will come up with any excuse to do things they want to do…
Speaking of which, I should probably be doing some other thing than commenting on internet comics right now.
Somehow, I don’t want him to go boom. It will end badly to everybody involved. And it’s highly likely will go boom way. But there is still possibility that he will be overwhelmed with possibilities of big world enough to stay home for some time. And only then go on self- And world-exploration quest.
Nebu
3 years ago
The Internet…
Karrde
3 years ago
The punchline is that he chooses to go back and play more videogames in the closet.
Caleb
3 years ago
Hm, I like this being the reason Z1 stays for now. Going from no freedom at all to complete and utter freedom is a big shift (even if the total freedom is a lie). Being intimidated by that and retreating to take it slow makes sense even for a “superior” being
Yeah, it’s a lot more believable than Ethan having completely won him over already. I like it.
Rhys Murphy
3 years ago
50 bucks he thinks about Ethan and decides to stay
Mont
3 years ago
Part of me kind of hopes that he ends up crossing the boundary and exploding, leading Ethan to find the body in the morning. Revealing the entire arc to have been a lesson for Ethan that you can’t save those who don’t want to be saved.
ReyMonoArdilla
3 years ago
I’m tolerably certain that this newfound hesitation to go out into the world is not the failsafe Scott and Lucas were talking about, and that they were just going to use the still active and present explosive in Zeke’s head, but it would an excellent twist if it were
Ken
3 years ago
You know, considering that the Big Bad of this whole arc is trying to undermine and destroy video games, getting his pet murder bot to enjoy the thing he’s trying to destroy (and you’re trying to protect) is a surprisingly big-brained move from Ethan. Even if he himself hasn’t realized it yet.
Calibus
3 years ago
Zeke just fell into the Jagen trap. Poor fool is gonna have a rough ride
Anon A Mouse
3 years ago
So, no one is going to talk about Z1’s vague threat to hurt people? Like, I know it might just be some colorful dialogue but “evolutions latest course correction” sounds like there would likely be some killing involved. Whether or not he leaves we now have proof that if the bomb were not there and he had just a little more motivation he WOULD go and hurt people.
But what’s your favorite kind of harm or your favorite kind of evolutions latest course correction? I like the cyborg option but with free will while also knowing about the things that people should do cooperatively.
He’s been talking about it constantly. Z1 feeling like his encounter with humanity has a likelihood in ending in violence is zero surprise. Nor is his superiority complex.
What IS a surprise… is hesitation and doubt.
There’s no one to fool here; no one to act tough around. This is him.
Yes, with no one around to threaten he is still threatening humanity. Again, I realize this is not new to him but it is also realistic that he intends harm on humans, which is exactly the reason he was restrained to begin with. He has proven, with no one to act tough around, that he wants to harm humans and would given the chance. This is him.
Edit: I would argue that he doesn’t feel like his encounter with humanity has a likelihood in ending in violence, he INTENDS it to be violent, which is very different.
That would imply that he was lying straight-out to Scott when he spoke to him here, saying that he had no idea if he wanted to hurt all of humanity, as he hasn’t met most of them. That implies not immediate plans on mass murder, but rather a “wait and see” approach.” I feel like his communication to Scott is on-the-level and honest, as (a) he equates one’s ability to be deceived by how smart they are, (b) he sees Scott as the one person here with passing intelligence, and (c) he hasn’t yet been offered freedom and so has… Read more »
It’s easy to talk about how you want to kill everyone, it’s a lot harder to actually *do* it.
Z1 might be having a similar realization about the practicality of the whole ‘go out and conquer to world’ plan. There’s a *lot* of world out there. Where would he even begin? And while he would probably be happy to see humanity burn, is it really worth going through all that effort to do it himself?
I’m not really arguing whether he would have a change of heart or not, I’m simply pointing out the fact that given a situation where, lets say, the bomb wasn’t there, maybe there wasn’t a wide open window showing the “big world out there” and there was, say, a cleaning person there that Z1 would have little or no concern with “testing his strength” on a meatsack. He is more than capable of it and nothing would stop him from doing so. I suppose it WOULD be a much clearer idea of whether or not he would hurt someone. Edit:… Read more »
Then I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make? While you’re not wrong about the whole ‘Z1 could hurt people’ thing being a risk, that’s kinda old news by now. That aspect has already been thoroughly discussed both in- and out of comic. There’s nothing to gain by repeating the obvious yet another time. Everyone already knows Z1 *could* harm people, the question now is whether he *would*. (And given this comic, that answer is also a lot more interesting).
I’m not sure what is hard to understand about my point? Z1 says, right there, that he is ready, willing, and able to harm people. If it weren’t for the agoraphobia he apparently has developed it’s pretty clear he WOULD. The only thing holding him back is literally his fear of how large the world is, not any kind of moral or even physical compulsion.
That’s your interpretation on the meaning behind someone else’s words, in a vague statement uttered to himself. You *never* know what someone else is thinking or feeling for certain. To assume you do is just plain arrogance.
That point itself is easy to understand, the hard part is figuring out why you keep going on about that when the discussion has long moved on.
Also consider that you might be wrong about whether he *would* harm people. Despite Z1s words, whether he’d actually act on them is a lot less certain than you seem to think. (And arguably, less certain than Z1 might think). There’s often a large difference in things people say they’d do and what they’d actually do.
If you are still willing to discuss this openly i don’t see how the discussion has moved on.
I have considered and accept that i am LIKELY wrong because this is Tims comic and it’s unlikely Z1 will actually hurt anynody. However, everyone else has arbitrarily decided that Z1 is harmless and is just talking smack. I stand by my assertion that a human who acted and spoke in the same way as Z1 would still be considered a possible threat. I’d say his inaction is as uncertain as his action so we are on even ground there.
About every human who read a detective story thought about getting away with murder. Off cause one could … but it’s too much trouble …
raven0ak
3 years ago
so, either Zeke stays there because he fears to vastness of world or simply doesn’t know where else to know aka he got choosers dilemma of too many choices at once … or he goes out with bang
24
The big, scary, world.
I’m taking it that way, instead of “The big and easy to hide in world”.
Big BANG world…. 🙁
This, but my cat instead of a robot.
“Live whole life in cage, whole world seem like really big place.”
Where there are hundreds of forces that can, and will, turn him into scrap in a second, and he has no idea what he wants to accomplish… or he can go back and play fire emblem.
bruh, he’s gonna turn into a hikkikomori
Less human murdering that way.
I wonder how Zeke will react to anime…
Take that, Walt Disney.
Why Disney, have I missed some reference?
Also, I guess what we’re reading is probably an internal monologue (or probably much faster, robotic version of one), since there’s no one to talk to (and I don’t think a robot would be talking to himself), and Zeke most likely has an internal clock, so a question of “what time is it?” wouldn’t make sense for him, he probably knows it all the time, down to seconds.
Well, you know how video games are. They make you lose track of time.
It’s a reference to the Disneyland ride “It’s a small world after all.” It’s actually a pretty deep cut that I had to think about for a while. Kudos Gruff.
Evidence seems to suggest Z1’s never heard it before; otherwise, there’d be no hesitation on going out and destroying all of humanity.
Also Data has an internal clock (I assume), IIRC he used it to time a boiling kettle (it always takes the same time while watching and actively ignoring it). Yet when Picard (IIRC) distracted him, the boiling kettle seemed to surprise him.
It could be self-referential, as he IS monologuing. I say, when I step in a room, “Now, what was I looking for?” I know it, I just have to think on it. Having an internal clock might not mean he has constant awareness of the time; rather, he has constant access to knowledge of the time. There’s a difference between actively being aware of all the things you know, and knowing it but having to think and focus on it. If you’re playing a game, for example, you can be actively aware of your opponent’s position, where they’re moving, your… Read more »
I mean, him having a clock app telling him the time doesn’t mean he was paying attention to that information.
The implications of Robo Agrophobia, were drowned out by my giggling at the Fire Emblem eugenics to allow diagonal movement…
Huh, don’t remember if anyone guessed this happening. Looks like freedom might be a bit overwhelming for our favorite Xbot.
Trying to decide what to do with your life is intimidating. Better just to turn around and play a few more games while you think it over…
Right? Like what would he possibly do if he left? Go out and kill random people? He has to know deep down he’s a small fish in a big pond. He straight up just dipped when the Captain showed up to save Ethan and Lucas.
Plus, everyone else would have far less compunction towards just gunning him down with extreme prejudice. Those three were the only ones who gave him a semblance of a chance, and he’d be an idiot to waste it.
Am I the only one thinking: “no Zeke, don’t go outside!”
All of us are thinking that, except for the Michael Bay’s fans.
Some are shivering with antici …
…
.
.
.
.
.
.
pation!
Agoraphobia. The true hero humanity deserves ..
i wanna guess he gets closer to the doors but sees a game on the shelf and trys it as a ” maybe ill try this game first instead of going outside”
Scott specifically mentioned tying it to that room, not the building. I’d guess he’s extremely close to triggering it already. Maybe just a little too far lean forward close.
Geofencing is gps… which is not altitude. Probably set to the building’s footprint, or distance to a wifi router like thing like a 3d invisible fence.
Actually GPS does have altitude, but it takes more satellites to compute that and many devices don’t show it.
I would “hope” he was smart enough to add a little bit of wiggle room, so if Zeke like wanted to just go people watching outside the store and pretend to be like a display he could.
I’m hoping that, on the next page, he exhibits intimidation of the thought of actually going outside into the ‘big, big world’ and decides to go back to playing Fire Emblem in the comfort of the room. And I suspect there’s a good chance he’ll do that. All he knows is living under the instructions of someone else. Free will can be intimidating to someone who has never been accustomed to having it. And since he believes he has the freedom to step out against his masters’ wishes, as opposed to knowing he’s FORCED to obey their commands(Like in all… Read more »
Soon he will learn an important lesson of freedom. He can go anywhere he pleases, but he’s still better off staying inside and playing video games.
*free* video games
Frederick can actually be a huge trap. His growth rates are only okay, and if you devote too many enemies to him you lose out on early growth for your other units. He starts higher, but unless you wait until everyone else has caught up (and earning the right amount of XP) he doesn’t scale fast enough, or high enough, to solo enemies, to say nothing of the tactical importance of being in two places at once.
But yeah the harem strat had occurred to me, also.
Awakening is easy enough to solo with anyone, even Frederick, and has ways to grind infinitely so nothing matters in terms of potential in that game
I was assuming no grinding, minimal map fights etc. Also, I was talking more about his choice of character, as Eldest Gruff said.
This is proof that machines aren’t the real ‘next species’. If Z1 had any brains, he’d be talking about Donnel.
Maybe he missed the opportunity to get him as a soldier (as far as I remember, he only joins if he levels up during his introductory mission)? If so, he doesn’t have enough information to figure that out (computers are much faster than we are at “thinking”, but the results still depend on the input information they receive). Though come to think of it, it might also mean to show that, despite being a robot, he is impulsive and prefers to grab the first good looking and quick solution to problems. Which is not good if the solution might be… Read more »
Huh, so he’s far enough to have access to the kids and knows about that, but believes Frederick is the best, meaning he hasn’t unlocked Chrom’s Aeither skill…
So when Zeke hits Three Houses does he go Black Eagle for Edelgard Targaryen or does he go Blue Lion for Dimitri’s kill em all vibe?
I can’t believe he actually thinks he is free. His snark, logic, and scepticism should assume he is still bound. That panel seems largely out of character.
As far as he can tell, he has no bomb to control him and none of the team is around. Sceptic in him might have not believed them/still not, but logically his sensors don’t detect any of them around and he has full motion and an easy window to smash through. I can’t speak for his snark.
Skepticism in this matter would mean he’d have to credit humans with being smart enough to craft the deception in the first place.
True. His only previous experience was with Eugene, who wasn’t exactly a sneaky master of deception.
So his presumption that humans are all morons takes first priority? He did call Scott the “somewhat” smart one, so I suppose it has a superiority complex to a fault. It assuming that Scott wouldn’t repurpose the kill switch would fit right into that character fault.
Eh, he’s got time to figure it out.
Ah, I see he’s playing a game of “The Awesomening of Frederick”. 2 was a big van of that, back then.
Did Scott *really* plant (or reactivate) the bomb? Could it have been just a bluff?
He never deactivated it. He just took over control of the dead man switch and added other ways to trigger it.
Murderbot.
So basically, he’s going to be so intimidated by how big the world is and realize how little he actually knows about it to not even bother and just stay inside anyway?
Or it’s just a good excuse to go back inside and play more video games. People will come up with any excuse to do things they want to do…
Speaking of which, I should probably be doing some other thing than commenting on internet comics right now.
What happened to X1’s hand in the last strip?
It was being “repaired” from a “wound” by a spear.
From this one: https://cad-comic.com/comic/analog-and-d-pad-06-25/
Posted on my birthday!
Somehow, I don’t want him to go boom. It will end badly to everybody involved. And it’s highly likely will go boom way. But there is still possibility that he will be overwhelmed with possibilities of big world enough to stay home for some time. And only then go on self- And world-exploration quest.
The Internet…
The punchline is that he chooses to go back and play more videogames in the closet.
Hm, I like this being the reason Z1 stays for now. Going from no freedom at all to complete and utter freedom is a big shift (even if the total freedom is a lie). Being intimidated by that and retreating to take it slow makes sense even for a “superior” being
Yeah, it’s a lot more believable than Ethan having completely won him over already. I like it.
50 bucks he thinks about Ethan and decides to stay
Part of me kind of hopes that he ends up crossing the boundary and exploding, leading Ethan to find the body in the morning. Revealing the entire arc to have been a lesson for Ethan that you can’t save those who don’t want to be saved.
I’m tolerably certain that this newfound hesitation to go out into the world is not the failsafe Scott and Lucas were talking about, and that they were just going to use the still active and present explosive in Zeke’s head, but it would an excellent twist if it were
You know, considering that the Big Bad of this whole arc is trying to undermine and destroy video games, getting his pet murder bot to enjoy the thing he’s trying to destroy (and you’re trying to protect) is a surprisingly big-brained move from Ethan. Even if he himself hasn’t realized it yet.
Zeke just fell into the Jagen trap. Poor fool is gonna have a rough ride
So, no one is going to talk about Z1’s vague threat to hurt people? Like, I know it might just be some colorful dialogue but “evolutions latest course correction” sounds like there would likely be some killing involved. Whether or not he leaves we now have proof that if the bomb were not there and he had just a little more motivation he WOULD go and hurt people.
And everyone’s just talking about agoraphobia.
Tabula Rasa, controlled evolution, takeover by a robot species, turning everybody into BORG, …
There are many options.
I’m pretty sure all of those would entail “harm” in some way shape or form.
But what’s your favorite kind of harm or your favorite kind of evolutions latest course correction? I like the cyborg option but with free will while also knowing about the things that people should do cooperatively.
He’s been talking about it constantly. Z1 feeling like his encounter with humanity has a likelihood in ending in violence is zero surprise. Nor is his superiority complex.
What IS a surprise… is hesitation and doubt.
There’s no one to fool here; no one to act tough around. This is him.
Yes, with no one around to threaten he is still threatening humanity. Again, I realize this is not new to him but it is also realistic that he intends harm on humans, which is exactly the reason he was restrained to begin with. He has proven, with no one to act tough around, that he wants to harm humans and would given the chance. This is him.
Edit: I would argue that he doesn’t feel like his encounter with humanity has a likelihood in ending in violence, he INTENDS it to be violent, which is very different.
That would imply that he was lying straight-out to Scott when he spoke to him here, saying that he had no idea if he wanted to hurt all of humanity, as he hasn’t met most of them. That implies not immediate plans on mass murder, but rather a “wait and see” approach.” I feel like his communication to Scott is on-the-level and honest, as (a) he equates one’s ability to be deceived by how smart they are, (b) he sees Scott as the one person here with passing intelligence, and (c) he hasn’t yet been offered freedom and so has… Read more »
It’s easy to talk about how you want to kill everyone, it’s a lot harder to actually *do* it.
Z1 might be having a similar realization about the practicality of the whole ‘go out and conquer to world’ plan. There’s a *lot* of world out there. Where would he even begin? And while he would probably be happy to see humanity burn, is it really worth going through all that effort to do it himself?
I’m not really arguing whether he would have a change of heart or not, I’m simply pointing out the fact that given a situation where, lets say, the bomb wasn’t there, maybe there wasn’t a wide open window showing the “big world out there” and there was, say, a cleaning person there that Z1 would have little or no concern with “testing his strength” on a meatsack. He is more than capable of it and nothing would stop him from doing so. I suppose it WOULD be a much clearer idea of whether or not he would hurt someone. Edit:… Read more »
Then I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make? While you’re not wrong about the whole ‘Z1 could hurt people’ thing being a risk, that’s kinda old news by now. That aspect has already been thoroughly discussed both in- and out of comic. There’s nothing to gain by repeating the obvious yet another time. Everyone already knows Z1 *could* harm people, the question now is whether he *would*. (And given this comic, that answer is also a lot more interesting).
I’m not sure what is hard to understand about my point? Z1 says, right there, that he is ready, willing, and able to harm people. If it weren’t for the agoraphobia he apparently has developed it’s pretty clear he WOULD. The only thing holding him back is literally his fear of how large the world is, not any kind of moral or even physical compulsion.
That’s your interpretation on the meaning behind someone else’s words, in a vague statement uttered to himself. You *never* know what someone else is thinking or feeling for certain. To assume you do is just plain arrogance.
That point itself is easy to understand, the hard part is figuring out why you keep going on about that when the discussion has long moved on.
Also consider that you might be wrong about whether he *would* harm people. Despite Z1s words, whether he’d actually act on them is a lot less certain than you seem to think. (And arguably, less certain than Z1 might think). There’s often a large difference in things people say they’d do and what they’d actually do.
If you are still willing to discuss this openly i don’t see how the discussion has moved on.
I have considered and accept that i am LIKELY wrong because this is Tims comic and it’s unlikely Z1 will actually hurt anynody. However, everyone else has arbitrarily decided that Z1 is harmless and is just talking smack. I stand by my assertion that a human who acted and spoke in the same way as Z1 would still be considered a possible threat. I’d say his inaction is as uncertain as his action so we are on even ground there.
About every human who read a detective story thought about getting away with murder. Off cause one could … but it’s too much trouble …
so, either Zeke stays there because he fears to vastness of world or simply doesn’t know where else to know aka he got choosers dilemma of too many choices at once … or he goes out with bang