Hello and welcome back to a new post my friends! For today’s addition to the blog, I’ve decided to focus on a video game called Detroit: Become Human. This game is one that can be viewed through a “choose your own adventure” lens, where throughout the course of the game, one shifts between the storylines of three different characters in a fictional future Detroit, set in 2038. In this future, androids are the new hot tech on the market and can be found in any home or business; however, many androids are beginning to revolt and claim they are gaining a sense of consciousness, deviating from their intended programming, becoming what is come to be known as “Deviant.” The overarching story takes you through the lives of three different androids living in this new reality: Kara, a caretaking android whose goal is to save a child from her abusive father; Markus, the leader of the android rebellion; and Connor, a detective android tasked with discovering the cause of the deviation and aiding to stop it from occurring. There are ultimately many different endings to this game from any of the three perspectives, but for the sake of clarity, I will be mainly focusing on what is considered the “true” or “good” ending. In this ending to the game, Kara successfully crosses the US/Canadian border with what has become to be her daughter, ensuring their safety; Connor has deviated himself and assists Markus, who together come to prove to the world that androids are in fact alive. At this point, it is implied there will be legislation put in place over time to ensure the rights of androids are protected and they will integrate into society.
I wanted to focus on Detroit: Become Human for two reasons. One being that this game took up a large part of my life when it came out in 2016. At this stage in my life, I was a freshman in high school and recovering from the monstrosity that was middle school. I was starting to come into my own and view the world and myself through different lenses. The messages that I and many others valued throughout this game, largely revolving around race relations and the struggles of self-identity, felt so integral to this point in my life to the extent that every once in a while when I remember the game exists, it feels as though it completely takes over my life again as I seek out literature that complements what I know this game is trying to get through to me. The second reason why I wanted to highlight this game was that I knew the perfect song that would match it: “Soldier, Poet, King” by The Oh Hellos. The song being segmented into three separate sections formats it wonderfully to focus on each of the three protagonists. That, as well as the song being pretty popular in certain internet circles within the last few months, kept it in my mind and I knew it had to be the subject of an upcoming blog. So, without further ado…
While I thought this task would be easy, I have deliberated way too long as to which character should be which. I also considered for a while not even doing the three protagonists of the game and instead focusing on three main characters from just one of the storylines. Connor is a clear favorite amongst the Detroit: Become Human community, and I am not immune to the beauty of his story and the characters he interacts with; however, I knew I had to cave and aim my scope at the main three. Connor also being my favorite made him the absolute worst to decide a role for. Instead, I’m going to start with the easiest character to assign one of the three roles to, because his was never actually a struggle at all. In case you could not see it coming from his description, Markus is the King.
There will come a ruler
Whose brow is laid in thorn
Smeared with oil like David’s boy
Oh lei, oh lai, oh, Lord
Oh lei, oh lai, oh lei, oh, Lord
Smeared with oil like David’s boy
Oh lei, oh lai, oh, Lord
I think Markus fits nicely as the king simply because he should be the poet. This may be contradictory but stay with me. When this song was gaining prominence online, many were trying to assign themselves their own role amongst the three, and many concluded that those who wished to be the poet were more likely to be the king. Markus, from the very inception of his story, in a perfect world, would be the poet. As his story begins, he is the servant to an old painter who sees great potential in Markus. One day, he asks Markus to paint an image. Initially, he simply scans and reproduces an object in the studio, but once the painter prompts him to close his eyes and simply create, he does, and this occurrence prompts both the painter and the audience to be fully convinced that there is something alive within these androids, that they have the capability to create and not just utilize patterns to reproduce some facsimile of something creative. Unfortunately, due to a horrible series of events, Markus ends up next to dead and in an unhoused android camp, filled with other Deviant androids like himself. Here, he shines and proves himself the leader the androids need to advocate for their rights and freedoms as individuals. He, with the wonderful ability to be creative, becomes a King that can lead his people to a brighter future.
Moving on, while I did make it sound obvious that Markus should be the King because of his role in leadership, it also sounds pretty obvious to make Connor the Soldier, with his role as a detective in a police department and all. On that note, here was where my issues laid with assigning these roles, because I’m going to stick adamantly that Connor should be the Poet. Even in the scenario where I wanted to write about Connor and two characters from his story, I still wanted to make him the Poet. So, he’s the Poet.
There will come a poet
Whose weapon is His word
He will slay you with His tongue
Oh lei, oh lai, oh, Lord
Oh lei, oh lai, oh lei, oh, Lord
He will slay you with His tongue
Oh lei, oh lai, oh, Lord
Connor is a fan favorite for a reason. I think part of this designation lies with the fact that while Kara and Markus deviate very early on in their storylines, Connor’s story is all about him learning about Deviants and their unique perspectives, learning to empathize with them, and eventually coming to deviate himself towards the end of his story. This idea is supported by the character Lieutenant Hank Anderson and the journey the two take together. Hank is a man who considers himself Anti-Android at the beginning of the story, feeling as though society would be better off without them; however, when Hank is assigned Connor as his partner to investigate android cases, they find themselves having to jump through many hurdles to work together. Hank becomes integral to Connor’s story, because without him, Connor will fail at both his intended objective, discovering the source of deviancy and halting it, and his unintended objective, finding his humanity. Connor’s story can often feel as if it has the highest stakes at times because one needs to balance obtaining enough androids as evidence in order to get to the endgame of the story with not obtaining so many androids that one ruins their relationship with Hank. The more times Connor chooses to let androids go and show his empathy, the more Hank comes to learn that androids have the capacity to be viewed as alive and just as cognizant as human beings, and without establishing this connection with Hank, Connor cannot reach the endgame of his narrative.
At the very end of the game, Connor comes face to face with another version of himself at an android facility. Connor’s goal is to awaken and free all of the androids and lead them to support Markus in their fight for freedom, while the other version of Connor is there to stop his plans and take down the android uprising. The fight culminates in the two Connors facing Hank, aiming a gun at them both, trying to decipher who is the real Connor. Here is arguably where the entirety of Connor’s story leads up to – if one messes up this interaction, Connor’s storyline ends and his efforts are for nothing. The only way for Connor to prove he is the real version of himself is to prove his capacity for empathy which has grown in his time with Hank, something the other Connor does not have the ability to do. At this moment, we receive the full backstory as to why Hank claimed to hate androids: one night, he and his son were driving home when they were hit by a drunk driver and he died because an android doctor was unable to save him. Connor assures Hank that the entire incident was not his fault, and that he is still a good man that deserves to live his life without the crushing guilt of losing his son. Meanwhile, Hank reveals he has come to realize the error of his ways, that it is truthfully the error of human over-reliance on technology and drugs that took his son from him, not an android who merely tried the best they could to save his son. At this, Hank shoots the not-Connor, and Connor manages to march these androids to Markus, securing an android victory, and promising a better, brighter future for androids. Overall, Connor’s story matters the most when he drops his soldier persona and uses his words to connect with the people and androids around him. Without his efforts of communication, support, and understanding, androids would simply be viewed as unruly machines needing to be destroyed, and he would be dead and worthless.
Some often find Kara’s storyline more boring than the others because it does not immediately concern the fight for android freedom, but without Kara, there would be no Detroit: Become Human. Her construction was the first beta test for the concept of the game, and without her conception, none of the game would have been built around her. For her value in the game itself, Kara provides a necessary perspective into the life of everyday androids and their struggle to simply live. Kara’s plight is that of a mother hoping to provide for her daughter in any way possible, saving Alice from an abusive home, leading her to android safehouses to provide her food and shelter, and hoping to get them both to Canada where anti-android sentiment is not as high and they’d be able to live in relative peace. At risk of sounding a tad cliché, who is a greater unrecognized Soldier than a mother?
There will come a soldier
Who carries a mighty sword
He will tear your city down
Oh lei, oh lai, oh, Lord
Oh lei, oh lai, oh lei, oh, Lord
He will tear your city down
Oh lei, oh lai, oh lei, oh, Lord
Throughout the course of Kara’s story, it becomes abundantly clear that Kara would do quite literally anything for Alice. It becomes obvious quickly in the beginning of the story that not only does Kara deviate solely for Alice in an attempt to protect her from her father, but has done so repeatedly in the past, only to be put out of commission and sent back to a factory to be reset. Kara also carries the burden of being an android mother with a human child, which garners a lot of questions concerning whether androids and humans can truly coexist in this way; however, the story lays down many hints and eventually reveals that Alice herself is also an android, an android child her father bought as a replacement for the child he lost in the divorce from his wife. This revelation is clearly a lot for Kara, particularly because when this truth is revealed, the player has the option to have Kara abandon Alice. Truthfully, there are many points in Kara’s story where you can choose to give up on Alice and abandon her, I was just generally unaware of this for a long time because most people typically feel bad about being mean to fictional characters. Regardless, this option allows for an interesting internal dialogue for Kara, such as did she only care about this child because she was a more helpless, human child that absolutely needed saving, rather than an android that seemingly may have been lying to her? Through all their trials, however, Kara has come to view Alice as her own daughter and continues to risk her own well-being for that of this child, regardless of if the world chooses to care about either of their struggles.
To this day, Detroit: Become Human continues to stick with me. Amongst the relations of these main characters and the more nuanced issues concerning many of the side characters, it feels as though there is always something to view and discuss concerning life and what it truly means to be alive, as well as how to prove oneself to others. Making oneself and the problems of whole communities visible on a national scale continues to be a pervading issue in today’s world, and while the messages of a weird old video game certainly cannot help in many ways that may ultimately matter, displaying these struggles so openly in media that today’s youth consume helps to add layers to their perceptions of these current events so that hopefully they may also take on the sentiments to uplift those who are trying to be silenced.
-Lauren Lotarski, Blogger.
Lauren Lotarski – Asst. Managing Editor, Poetry Editor, Layout Editor & Blogger: Lauren is a Junior at Lewis University majoring in Psychology and English with a concentration in Literature and Language. When not in class, she can be found working at the university library or engaging in her various hobbies, such as reading, drawing, or knitting. Some of her favorite authors include Leigh Bardugo, Charles Dickens, and Neil Gaiman. She hopes to improve upon her writing skills and knowledge of literature during her time at Lewis in order to apply it to her future endeavors.