coupleofdays:

astercontrol:

A little more exploration on a topic I’ve mentioned before.

In the beginning of the 1982 TRON movie, it’s shown that the games in Flynn’s arcade are –somehow– a real-world manifestation of the deadly games that the MCP forces Programs to play within the arenas of the ENCOM computer system.

the Lightcycle game machine as the game is played at the start of the filmALT
dissolve zooming in on the Programs' side of the gameALT
scene fully changed to the Lightcycle Grid with 2 cycles racingALT


It’s even clearer in the beginning of the novelization, although this version shows a different game:

page 1 of the novel. CHAPTER ONE THAT OTHER WORLD is vast too; to its inhabitants, their System is limitless. The Electronic World enmeshes the Earth, and reaches beyond it. Information is moved through the computer systems and processed by the artificial intelligences. The programs compute and search, retrieve and collate; they are already indispensable to science, industry, education, and goverment - to society in its present form. The programs challenge and entertain in videogames, with no risk of harm to their human Users; they teach in the carrels and test in the classrooms. They evaluate and mediate; their word is often final. Their World is vast; their Users know less of it than the Users suppose. The programs are only algorithms as human beings are only collections of chemicals. The two, boy and girl, stood before the garishly painted machine, its screen showing them lively mosaics of light in bright colors. They played the videogame expertly, sharp and shrewd and quick; picking up the knack of the games was fun, but it demanded an application of self amounting to diligent work. On the screen, computer-modeled figures warred, throwing disks of devastating power at each other. .. Elsewhere, closer than the boy and girl would have believed and yet infinitely distant, Warriors faced each other across an arena on the Game Grid, in the System. They wereALT
page 2 of the novel. human in form, but luminous, one red, the other blue. They held their disks ready for lethal casts, studying one another warily. They wore close-fitting, rounded helmets which left their faces exposed, and were shod in knee-length boots. They were armored in pauldrons that cupped their shoulders and vambraces that encased their forearms. The armor had an instrumented, highly technical look to it. Their bodies were patterned with radiant lines suggesting vestigial circuitry. The Blue Warrior's incandescent circuitry glowed a brighter blue than the rest of his body; his opponent's shone a warmer yellow-orange. The arena was only one of many in the Domain known as the Game Grid. It was, on their scale, hundreds of feet across. The soaring walls that enclosed it were perfectly smooth, divided into rectangles by lines and panels of bright illumination. The floor was composed of precise squares marked off by a glowing meshwork. Accustomed to them, the Warriors spared no attention for their fantastic surroundings. They waited, watchful, disks held between thumb and fingertips. The Red Warrior moved suddenly, casting with a snapping motion. His spinning disk, blazing with a golden light of its own, sliced through the air at his opponent. The other tried to duck and block the weapon with his own. But the Red had been quick, and clever with his throw. The Blue missed his block and the disk struck him. There was a violent release of energy, smashing the Blue down onto the Game Grid. The red aura of the disk triumphed over the Blue's aura, enveloping the prone Warrior. He de-resolved, fading rapidly from sight, becoming a swirl of static. In a moment, the de-rezzing complete, the loser had vanished. Far from the Game Grid, the boy turned to the girl, mortified at the ease with which she'd won. 'Lemme play you again?' He figured he had her technique analyzed now, and was positive that he could beat her this time.ALT
page 3 of the novel. She shrugged; she sort of liked him, and enjoyed sharking him. 'Yeah, if you've got another quarter.' Into the videogame went the coin, where it joined millions upon millions of others earned by the programs. They and their playing fields, the videogames, were one of the most popular entertainment innovations in history. The side of the machine bore the ENCOM logo, which could also be seen on computers and electronic equipment of every variety, factories and research facilities, skyscrapers and paychecks. ENCOM was the commercial superpower that had taken leadership of the computer revolution, unrivaled international leader in the field of artificial intelligence. Another game was in progress over the Grid. It resembled jai alai, but the two Warrior opponents each stood at the center of a series of concentric rings, gleaming circles suspended in midair, shining in the Warrior's color, blue or red. Each Warrior was armed with a power-cesta, the long, scoop-shaped glove with which the game-ball was hurled and caught. Above them, a broad, reflective disk, several yards across, was poised, unsupported but unmoving. The smaller contestant waited nervously, and rightly so, for he was a User-Believer, a Blue. Unwilling to give up his commitment to those mystical beings whom all the programs of the System had once served, he'd been sentenced to play on the Game Grid until he died. That moment seemed near. The User-Believer shifted uneasily as he waited. He was determined to do his best; that was as it should be with a program. But his adversary was Sark, the Command Program. Sark the Red, the unbeaten; Sark the tall, merciless Warrior, had won so consistently that he no longer kept track of his victories. It was Sark who served as Lord of the System, under the rulership of the Master Control Program. Sark's mission, the Master Control Program's prime objective, was to wipe out all loyalty to the Users.ALT


How that would work, I’m not sure. The mystical magic of User Spirits? Or some bizarre proto-internet connection?

TRON’s storyline does mention some of the early precursors to the Internet– the “contacts between our System and other Systems,” the lines of communication that Tron himself was designed to guard.

Alan Bradley in Dillinger's office, saying: It monitors all contacts between our system and other systems.ALT

But in real life, arcade machines are self-contained– not connected in any way to the computers in the building that manufactured them. If there are any exceptions to that, I’m certain they weren’t around in 1982.

Then again… the storyline of TRON does make it clear that ENCOM had some technology well beyond what was publicly known to exist in the 1980’s.

They had the MCP, after all.

And the digitizing laser.

The laser starting to fire at FlynnALT
Flynn starting to get digitizedALT

So I would not put it past them to be “ahead of their time” in terms of “videogames that require an internet connection to function,” as well.

(Which would, in my opinion, approximately triple their evilness as the villains of the story.)

(But that’s another rant.)

…

Anyway. It’s tempting just to ignore this detail, because it’s so different from how 80’s arcade games worked in the real world.

But… I think I actually want to explore it further.

Because I would argue that it ties in to the MCP’s motivations throughout the story– and actually makes them all make a lot more sense than they would otherwise.

…

I’ve explored part of this in my other post about how Tron is a master escape artist. And he’s also a vicious fighter, who very clearly did not want to be there.

It’s undeniable that a program like Tron would have caused the MCP a whole lot of trouble during his imprisonment.

And the MCP clearly has the ability to kill programs outright. In fact, according to Ram, it seems that the MCP’s first preference when capturing User-Believers is to absorb them into himself, take over their functions, and “get bigger.”

Ram explaining to Crom: If he thinks you're useful. he takes over all your functions so he gets bigger.ALT

This seems to be what he did with Clu.

Clu1 reduced to grid lines as he gets derezzed on the energy wallALT

The Games were the fate of programs that the MCP “can’t use” in that way.

Ram explaining to Crom: if he can't use you, he sends you down here to the game grid to get your bits blasted.ALT

Now… it’s unclear why Ram and Tron were in the Games.

It would mean that their functions weren’t considered useful enough for the MCP to absorb them.

This seems odd, since their described functions (security protection from Tron, actuarial math from Ram) would seem to be very useful for a wide range of purposes.

Personally, I would speculate that there’s something else in them that the MCP didn’t want to absorb.

We know they’re both unusually good fighters (especially surprising for Ram). So, maybe their code was just as combative– full of functions that would keep fighting the MCP if he tried to absorb them, and wouldn’t stop unless he broke them down into bits too small to be useful anyway.

…

Which brings up the next question:

…why not just do that from the start?

Why not just derezz them entirely, and not try to use them for anything? Surely this would have saved the MCP a lot of hassle.

And of course that goes for all the rebellious programs like Tron and Ram, but also definitely for Flynn.

Yet, we see the MCP keeping them alive.

We see Ram and Tron still there, after what must have been many microcycles of their troublemaking and escape attempts. We see the MCP forbidding Sark to kill Flynn for disobeying commands.

Sark's finger over the red button. MCP voiceover saying: I want him in the games until he dies playing.ALT

We see what seems like a prepared announcement especially aimed at programs that are trying to run away, warning them to “return to the game grid.”

Lightcycles fleeing the grid, announcer voice saying: You must return to game grid. Repeat, this is an illegal exit.ALT

We see no one even trying to use lethal force on these escapees until they pass a certain point.

Tank program preparing to fire on the escapees, saying: Targets leaving protective field.ALT


…We even see a hint that maybe some combatants are derezzed into a sort of cut-paste buffer and reused, instead of being outright killed. The blue-circuited Lightcyclist who duels Sark in the opening scene appears to come back later as a red-circuited Lightcyclist to fight Flynn and Tron and Ram.

images of the two programs side by side, looking recognizably the sameALT

(Yes, this was probably just due to limited budget for actors. But, hey– I will find meaning where I can.)

(And I happen to find it very intriguing to imagine that Sark sometimes rerezzed his foes from the buffer, and gave them the option to convert to his side and live another day.)

All in all, we see the MCP treating death as an absolute last resort. We see him putting a lot of effort into not letting his Video Warriors die in any other way except to “die playing”-- to “finish the game.”

Which, to me, only makes sense if they are a necessary resource. If the ENCOM arcade games require a constant supply of cannon fodder, in order to keep working.

Of course, this would raise a whole lot of strange questions. Just how much do the Users and the Programs playing their avatars share control over the game?

Are we supposed to imagine that getting assigned an unskilled program like Crom– or a super-skilled program like Tron– equates to a gamer’s feeling of having had “bad luck” or “good luck” in a game?

And would the User’s skill, or lack therof, have a similar effect on the Program’s experience?

And would the extent of that effect depend on… something about the individual programs or users themselves?

page from the novel: 'FINISH THE GAME!' Sark commanded. There, like an evil vision in a dream, the Command Program's face filled the mirror. Flynn's breath caught as he saw the projection. Despite the grotesque flarings and design of the casque, and the interplay of energies and colors, that face was Edward Dillinger's. Flynn gritted his teeth, staring upward. This answered a lot of questions, but raised even more. But the image of Dillinger/Sark decided him, once and for all, on which side he stood in the System's struggle. As Crom waited to perish, Flynn balled his fist, filled lungs, compressed lips, and shouted his reply to the loathsome face above: 'No!' Elsewhere, the refusal had its effect. Over the sounds of the bus station, one of the kids, stabbing at lifeless firing buttons and pulling uselessly at a control grip, complained, 'What's wrong with it? The videogame remained as before, still alight, but all play had halted. Nothing he could do elicited any further action. The other player, a classmate, answered, 'I don't know; on the blink, or somethin'. Damn! Angered by the interruption, they hit the controls and banged the machine with the heels of their hands. Flynn, head lowered, ignored the command that beat at his ears from the Carrier: 'KILL HIM!' Kill. Flynn held up the cesta, contemplating it gravely. Perhaps, he thought, convictions were the only things that passed undistorted through the weird translation to the Electronic World. ALT

It’s a whole messy world of implications here! And I can see why some of us would rather not think about it!

…

But… I like messes. I like to search for things in them, and create my own kind of order.

Now, even if the games do require Programs to play them, this may not have always been deadly.

When the MCP says “I can arrange more lethal matches,” the specifying of “lethal” suggests that it’s possible for these games to be as harmless as any sport.

Sark at the console with MCP saying: I can arrange more lethal matches.ALT

Perhaps the MCP chooses to make them lethal, as part of his display of power. The threat of death in the games serves as a warning… an incentive for Blues to convert to Red, and a punishment dangled over the heads of Reds who might think of disobeying. (The Reds still have a risk of dying in the Games, of course, but they get “elite” training instead of “standard substandard” training, so they get better odds.)

MCP seems to think these deaths, and the control they give him, are a worthwhile sacrifice.

But he has his limits on how many he’ll allow to die.

Which makes sense, if he knows that every death is a waste of this valuable ENCOM resource– the cannon fodder without which the Arcades would stop working and stop bringing in money.

That’s both colors of cannon fodder. It’s pretty clear from the opening scene, in both the film and the novel, that the computer side of the game is played by Red warriors and the player side is played by Blue warriors.

The Blue conscripts are the player avatars, and they literally fight for the Users.

Sark's blue-circuited opponent in his LightcycleALT

The Reds are the NPCs, and they… fight for the MCP.

The Reds are NPCs, and they... fight for the MCP. ALT


…Hey. It makes sense to me.

This is an excellent theory!

My own theory is that the reason the MCP is keeping Tron alive, when it would be so much easier to just derezz him, or absorb his functions, is because it has a totalitarian, tyrannical, sadistic personality, and it wants to do everything it can to break Tron. Nothing would be more satisfying than getting that defiant security Program to eventually bow down to the MCP, renounce his belief in the Users, and become a loyal servant, after having all his hopes broken in the horrors of the Games. The same goes for Flynn, of course. It would be even more satisfying to hear a User begging the MCP for mercy.

It’s like in Orwell’s 1984, where (spoilers) the dicatorship allows rebels to exist, because it doesn’t see any point of having its great power if it can’t be used to beat down on opponents.

“Somebody pushes me, I push back!”

Oh, this is also very good and plausible!

MCP is certainly a program who lives up to having “Master” and “Control” in his name– I agree that having the maximum amount of power over everyone is a goal in itself, for him.

And yes, I can see him wanting to express that power in a 1984-esque, “convert the enemies,” “make them admit 2+2=5 just because I say so” sort of way. I can believe he genuinely meant “brutal and needlessly sadistic” as a compliment.

So yeah. Even if he did keep programs fighting in the Games partly just to keep the Arcade working… I’d still believe that kind of subservience was his ultimate plan for them.