Just Going Based Off North Who Changes Both Colour And Length Just In The Span Of A Few Chapters - Tumblr Posts

It's interesting to me that many people in the fandom seem to have decided that Alice is "stuck" in the current physical state of her YK model.

I've seen some discussion of this in relation to her having a "mind of a child", such as her "permanently having the mind of a child", but it makes me wonder what that really means and if android consciousness is even comparable to human consciousness in this way.

But exclusively regarding her hardware, what exactly is the hard limitation here? We have canonical evidence that androids can transfer their software and consciousness to at least other androids with their same model and series. An RK800 can transfer to an RK800. Maybe this is unique to the RK800 line due to the ability to upload "memories" to a server if a unit determines imminent physical destruction. In this case, did the feature carry to the RK900 line? Can an RK800 transfer with an RK900?

Regardless, assuming that the feature is possible with any android that is capable of physical memory transfer, which we see as a built in-feature with any android who can be awakened by Markus or Connor, it is possible for example that any AX400 could transfer to any AX400.

This gets interesting because though all RK800s have the same likeness, mass-produced models like the AX400 have multiple different physical appearances. Does this introduce an incompatibility? Are there differences in the structures of their memory cores, or could any two androids with the same memory architecture transfer their software, regardless of physical appearance?

This question gets into a lot of unknowns about android hardware. Does a YK model use the same memory core as an RK model for example, or did CyberLife economize on this aspect of their design? Does an RK demand different architecture than a YK, or is CyberLife working with ample processing ability and are only limited by software implementation?

Other than transferring, we are also still somewhat familiar with "morph" tech, which curiously mostly disappeared from canon.

This got its origins with the fourth protagonist Traci who would change her appearance entirely at some point in her story. In the final game when Simon Wasselin wrote the gallery descriptions he did in fact include this information about the Traci models, despite us never seeing an instance of it, and it seeming fairly incompatible with the premise of the way the Eden Club was reworked for Connor. If Traci models can change their appearances, why would neither of the deviant Tracis change theirs, considering that Connor's entire ability to discover them relies on the assumption that one of them has the same hair color?

It seems that David completely abandoned the idea that Traci models could change their appearance when he reworked this scene. Which interestingly implies that its inclusion as a detail in the gallery is yet another error, and why sources reported on this as if it was something that players shouldn't be aware of.

There is yet another instance of what I would call "morph" tech that was cut from the game. Though Kara can change her hair color, she originally grew it into an entirely different style rather than cut it shorter. The way the final game works implies that she has to physically cut her hair if she wants to change the shape it is able to form, and presumably after cutting it she would then be unable to regrow it to the length it was before. Kara's original default hairstyle was a brown bob with a shaved undercut that completely exposed her neck.

However Kara would still change her hairstyle to her familiar pixie cut, which would lengthen the back of it. Quantic Dream later changed Kara's default AX hairstyle and color to match the way Valorie typically wore her long blonde hair. I imagine that the ability for Kara to change her hair color was also something too core to David's original vision for him to properly remove it with the reworked Traci scene, so Kara's ability to change her hair color while the Tracis don't change theirs remains unexplained by anything other than hypothetical retrospective psychological rationalizations.

There is one more instance of "morph" tech, or at least something that implies a much more advanced generative ability than is seen in the final game, and that is the original design that androids could immediately heal damage to their bodies.

This concept art by Mikael Leger depicts Connor being shot in the face instead of the shoulder in "The Hostage" and the damage immediately regenerating. Presumably this established design would have meant that a lot was different about this early script. Interestingly I believe this actually ties into this scene's earliest ending design where Connor had a choice of where to shoot Daniel. Showing Connor being shot in the face to the player with an emphasis on the ability of that damage to heal would be the player's first introduction to that fact. Knowing this, choosing where to shoot Daniel would then be a test. Shooting him in the shoulder would obviously be ineffective, especially when we just witnessed their ability to heal that damage.

Despite all of this technology being mostly cut from the game, I believe it still exists in spirit, especially to David. I am unsure if the Echoes of Freedom project needed approval from anyone on the writing team, however I can easily see David approving this concept with the thought that Alice may have had something like this original morph tech, or that she was able to modify her software to get it, or that she modified her body or was able to transfer into another one.

I'm personally not really a fan of the idea that an oppressed and heavily persecuted person whose entire existence has been spent fighting for the right to it would be permanently trapped in the body assigned to her by her oppressors. Why would Alice appear physically older after spending a decade in Canada? Because at some point she wanted to.