Automaton

"I can't sleep yet, I still have work to do..."

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An example of a military automaton: Cyclops.

An example of a civilian automaton: GIRTM (Pavel).

“	T-Dolls have all the right to strive for beauty. If you want to be cold and unfeeling, you might as well be a Military automaton. Sure, they're mighty, but their existence only involves killing and being killed. Peace can only be possible if people yearn for goodness and beauty. — RF Carcano M1891Carcano M1891Carcano M1891	”

In the English version of Girls' Frontline only (see translation notes), an automaton or a droid is an AI-piloted humanoid robot originally designed to serve as an easily replaceable fire platform for military operations. In modern parlance, they are distinct from Dolls, which is a term reserved for androids outfitted with a Neural Cloud granting them human-like behaviors. Automatons' AIs are comparatively simpler than Dolls'.

Development and history

TBA

Technical design

Automatons are visually separated from Dolls by their unmistakably robotic appearance: they have no bionic skin to hide their mechanical parts and their head and feet units are not human-shaped. They however retain a general humanoid shape, with two legs, two arms and a separate head unit, which may be a remnant of early attempts at optimizing Dolls movement range.

The “Vixen Automatic”, “Next Gen A.I[sic] Robot” is a four-legged transport robot with a simple personality (though it hasn't formally been described as an automaton). CascadiaCascadia 's robotic companion “Slo-Mo”, originally classified as a “mecha-hound”, received a basic neural cloud but hasn't been further categorized.

Appearance and behaviour

Military and security droids have never been shown speaking or doing anything else than fight according to human orders. According to UranusUranus , before acquiring a civilian Neural Cloud, he held no other desire than battle. Military automatons only have crude sensory modules for hearing and perceiving airborne chemicals.

Pavel, an old civilian railroad maintenance droid, is depicted as possessing a basic level of human intelligence and speech: he read books and became fascinated by The Little Prince. Another GIRTM collected raw gold nuggets found during their work seemingly as a hobby. Pavel could interact somewhat normally with a human child, although in a stiff manner. Droids of his model are however shown to have a rather weak ego, considering their own recycling for scraps to be a natural part of their existence and voluntarily submitting to it as long as they considered their work achieved. While he considered protecting humans part of his function, he could do so selectively and defended Rosita against other humans by attacking with his wrench. He also broke a painfully loud malfunctioning alarm, demonstrating a will to break rules for the benefit of others as long as he knew they wouldn't be enforced. His demonstration of his inability to drink by physically lifting a glass to his head unit and spilling it on himself could be interpreted as dry humor.

Known models

• Military
  • Aegis
    • SWAP variant
    • KCCO variant
    • KCCO SWAP variant
  • Centauros
  • Cyclops
    • Shotgun variant
    • Machine gun variant
    • OBJ-9420
  • Arges
  • Brontes
  • Steropes
  • TS-5000 (experimental)
• Civilian
  • GIRTM

Translation notes

There is no distinction between “Doll” and “automaton/droid” in the original Chinese script of Girls' Frontline, where the characters 人形 (“puppet”, “doll”, lit. human-shape) are used for all humanoid machines.

In the translation of Girls' Frontline, “automaton” was first used to translate 人形 in an isolated instance in 4-1N. When the term 军用人形 was introduced in Chapter 8, it was simply translated “Military Doll”. It remained the standard translation throughout Chapter 9, Singularity and Continuum Turbulence. “Military Automaton” was first used to translate 军用人形 in Isomer and became the standard translation in the main story until Poincare Recurrence, introducing a unique distinction with “Autonomous Doll” (自律人形), “Tactical Doll” (战术人形) and “civilian Doll” (民用人形). The translation “Military Doll” still appeared in the translation of some Neural Upgrade stories. RO635's Neural Upgrade story was the only time the term 军队人形 appeared, alongside 军用人形, the translation continued to use “Military Doll” for the latter, but introduced "Military droid" for the former. A few months later, in The Waves Wrangler, 安保人形 was exclusively translated “droid” instead of “security Doll”. “Droid” was reused in Welrod MkII's Neural Upgrade story, but not as the translation of a specific term.

The rationale for using two translations for 人形 was most likely based on the differences between the Dolls controlled by the player, who look and act more like humans, and enemy Dolls, which exclusively looked and acted like robots at that point in the story. This choice proved problematic in later chapters.

In G36C's Neural Upgrade story, a definition of “Doll” was given as “人形，或者说，具有心智的战斗机械”. This was translated as “T-Dolls—in other words, combat droids equipped with neural clouds”, marking the first use of the term “droid” to translate the generic word 机械 (“machine”). In Kar98k's Neural Upgrade story, and later The Summer Garden of Forking Paths and Zero Charge, both “Military Doll” or “droid” were used interchangeably for military Dolls who don't act like robots. In Longitudinal Strain, “droid” was used wholesale to translate various terms, such as 机器人 (a generic term usually translated “robot” or “android”), 军方人形, 军用人形, 机甲 and 看守人形. Critically, every instance of the term 人形, usually translated as “Doll”, was instead translated as “droid” when in relation to Pavel, who looked like a robot but acted closer to a human, artificially excluding him from the classification of Doll. When Gray Zone Exploration was introduced, it added Incident Node “Wandering Droids” which mentions “droids with neural clouds”, contradicting the translation of G36C's Neural Upgrade story. “Automaton” was used to translate the new term “机械人形” in Type 79's Neural Upgrade story, but it would later be translated as “android” in Cartesian Theater. Finally, in Angular Gyrus and Isolation Forest, playable Dolls Mk.18 and SCAR-L were described as 军用人形, translated exclusively as “Military Doll”.

Project Neural Cloud nearly exclusively uses the term “military Doll”, only translating 军用人形 by “military droid” in Svarog Heavy Industries's faction description and translating 机器人 as “automatons” to describe NPCs in Netherblade Gleam.

Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium uses all terms interchangeably:

• 军用人形 is translated “Military Doll” in 2-1 and Klukai's Record 1, where she's described as such.
• 机器人 is translated droid in Mayling's Journal to designate the dummy Jiuzhang, and automaton in Silvered Whispers to designate Lumi.
• 人形 is translated android in several Dusty Journals and Peritya's Wishing Well letter, though this is probably a remnant of machine translation.
• In this game, the term 机械 is used more often to designate enemies from primarily mechanical factions, such as PMCs, URNC and Marley Thermal Power Plant. “Automaton” tends to be used more, but “droid” is also in use (especially visible in Aphelion).

References

General List of Characters (Minor Characters) · List of Locations · Timeline · Rossartrism · Eurosky Low-Emission Infectious Disease · Epiphyllum · GAVIRUL Technology Assault Artillery · Automaton · Bee Sting · Collapse Technology · Doll · Magrasea · Neural Cloud · Nirvana · OGAS · Parapluie virus · Pike · Purification Project · Relic Technology · Remolding Pattern · Shrike · Weight Bearing Events Beilan Island Incident · Northern Lights Incident · World War Three · North American Civil War · Operation Couatl · Incident Zero · Butterfly Incident · Safe House 3 Raid · Plan Parapluie · Great Retreat · Paldiski Incident · Project Valkyrie and Project Cocoon · Fireworks Incident · Battle of the Dead Sea · Battle of Frankfurt · Cloud Crisis · Operation Xyster · First Antarctic War · Second Antarctic War Factions 90wish · Antarctic Union · China · Doll Community · Fox Sisterhood · Free States of America · Germany · Global Rescue Foundation · Griffin & Kryuger · KCCO · NATO · Neo-Soviet Union · Pan-European Union · Paradeus · People's Coalition of the West Coast · Sangvis Ferri · Underground Brokers · URNC · United Nations · United States · Varjagers Corporations 16LAB · 42LAB · B.R.I.E.F. · Cyber Media · Galatea Corporation · Girard Group · I.O.P. · Mangi Security Service · Orlog Conglomerate · Svarog Heavy Industries · Ultilife · Universal Anything Services · WAVE · Minor Corporations