#new guy alert

[venusmage]

More dragonborn should be inspired by birds, i’m js

[prairiegh0st]

stinky baby dragon

[city-of-ego]

Meet Nikolas the Lynx

Nikolas is a 30 year old Lynx and the older brother and roommate to Simon, who affectionately calls him "Nikki" since the two were very young (much to his annoyance). He doesn't meet the same daunting height as his brother, standing at a height of 5' 8" tall.

Upon first meeting him, Nikolas can come off as aloof and serious, if not a little awkward similarly to Jericho. Though, one will eventually find out that he has tendencies to be overly emotional, passionate, and protective. The Lynx has a hard time controlling his anger, especially when provoked or if his buttons are pushed.

Nikolas is a resident of EGO, though he tends to travel on occasion for fighting game tournaments. Fighting games (and video games in general) are his passion. It's easy to get Nikolas to break his serious disposition and talk if you ask him about fighting games... Though, be prepared for him to get carried away and spout a bunch of terms that you'll likely not understand. (He's prone to getting embarrassed and flustered once he realizes how long he's been rambling for.)

[bathylychnops]

new guy its his birthday and hes never been bowling before

he has the DUMBEST NAME its Jett Stetson and he hates introducing himself

[magpie-murder]

toyhou.se || artfight

[anarchswild]

I may have no interest in playing a Toreador but I sure do make Toreador Simps huh

[magicmonstersandmischief]

New Guy Alert!

Giles Ruthorford, former academic, current vampire and snake man. Very transactional and uses heavy hyposis on his victims. Based in the Australian keelback snake so is capable of ingesting things that are normal toxic to vampires.

Trans man, he/him, appears to be in his late 40s.

Tightly wound. Fond of toads. Not fond of being touched.

[doritoplayz-xi]

Sup. I uhhh… *SMOKE BOMB*

18:

“Could you pop on my stream?” Laynes text message flies into moss’s peripheral as he works.

The prince, despite his popularity, has a failure of a streaming career. You can’t expect that kind of popularity to transfer over.

“Fine.” Moss replies. They shove aside the stack of books and open their laptop.

Moss pings to join the voice call. Layne is playing a newer game on the market, so all they can really do is sit back and provide commentary.

It’s boring. Layne sucks at the game and he’s even worse at engaging. Moss has an eye on the stream and they’re pretty sure all the other viewers are from family or tabloids.

But they stick with Layne until he gives up.

—

Day 19:

“My memories are stored in the spot wheee my brain should be. Kinda like a video file of all my experiences.” Moss explains to the camera. They reach under the desk and pull out a large box.

“But storing them all in there’s a shit plan. So I make back ups when charging. Kinda like what a normal brain would do asleep!”

“I’ve got good ones, bad ones. All here.” Moss thumbs through the box, the units clacking together.

They pause and stare.

“This one’s unlabeled…” moss mutters to himself. “Well only one way to find out.”

The camera watches as moss slots the cartridge into the back of his head.

—

Moss wakes up. They start to walk downstairs, one sneakered foot in front of the other. Yelling can be heard in the distance.

Moss turns the corner and peeks out at the living room. They’re quite short, only coming up to the entryway table.

“-All I do for you! I keep that mistake alive!”

“Don’t you start! They wouldn’t be alive with out me, and if you hadn’t been so careless!”

“Well I’m sorry then! Sorry for giving you that damn kid you are sooo burdened with!”

“You take that back! Moss is a gift that you squander!”

Moss looks away from the living room and towards the front door. Little steps are taken until they’re staring up at the door.

A crash can be heard behind them and moss darts out the front door.

The street is quiet infront of moss. None of his neighbors are out. The robot kid takes tiny steps forward, hesitantly looking back at the two story house.

“I’ve got this. It’s- they just need to calm down.” Moss speaks out loud. His voice is more robotic and broken, like a busted text to speech.

Moss continues carefully exploring the street. They walk a familiar path to the near by park, feet trudging along the side roads.

The park is mostly empty, and it’s quite cloudy. Moss can see two people playing there.

A glowing lady and a brunette.

It feels wrong. Something is not right there and moss feels the need to turn around and run away.

As moss backs away they bump into someone.

Looking up he sees a man with green eyes everywhere.

“Hey kiddo.”

The man waves, his hand undefined.

“Where are your parents?”

Moss freezes up. “They’re coming.” He manages to squeak out.

The man’s face contorts into a smile, eyes joining as scleras shaping into teeth.

“Well, I can’t wait to meet them.”

Moss stares at the man. He starts to back away again slowly.

The man’s hand darts out to grab them, before a purple haze surrounds moss. The man retracts his hand with a his.

“You’re one of her brats.”

He glares before vanishing.

The next moments are a blur. Moss runs home as fast as his legs will go, not caring what waits at home.

-

Moss ejects the memory early. “… I need a pallet cleanser.” He mumbles.

Oc-tober prompt thing that I’m gonna be doing. +link to the TikTok w/ more stuff

More options here

[paimt]

its just supervised phone calls like

in the wise words of stan himself: give me money

[gugingo]

NEW GUY

Nuclear Physicist called "Adam Splitter"

[gravedigg]

The Magician - Dorian Pavus

[arrow-guy]

.

[amazingdeadfish]

(Explosion Noises)

[chaosduckies]

Surprise Sketches of some OC’s I was working on for a fic I was writing. Again, not an artist but I think they turned out okay! :D (I think the tiny is going to be smaller but I’m physically incapable of drawing that small on my current canvas size)

Don’t worry, the big guy is gentle… even if sometimes he doesn’t realize things until after he’s done them. But aghhh. Tiny with a broken wing, forced to stay with someone hundreds of times bigger than himself until he’s healed up which could take months? Amazing. Chef’s kiss

I won’t reveal the names yet, but this one is an extreme size difference because I love it so much 🫶

[mechanicalinfection]

Who's up for a Springtrap and Deliah au!!

[fandomfreakstudios]

Caine is a human and I will die on this hill (theory)

due to popular demand (losing the poll) I wanna post my Caine theory in proper depth.

My theory is essentially the idea that Caine is not an AI but is in fact a human trapped in the digital circus just as much as all the other players.

Sounds ridiculous, right?

good.

[LONG post incoming, be warned]

----------

To start, we need to understand the digital circus and its origins.

a place like the digital circus is very likely to be man-made as a place, a game, a computer program, whatever. This place did not appear out of nowhere. It is accessed through VR or some VR-esque technology, and takes on the appearance of a retro game (evidence given below)

Now, video games (unfortunately) don’t just code themselves, there has to be at the very least one person creating this game. Fortunately enough, we can deduce the name of the company from what is given within the show.

It is very common knowledge at this point that digital circus takes place within a computer in some sort of office building (as is implied by the ending scene in episode 1)

This computer is also seen at another point... namely when Pomni is running through the backrooms-like offices. She once again comes across this computer.

Now this implies that this area is at least SOMEWHAT a reflection of the real world, so analyzing this location isn't inherently pointless. Now one other interesting part of this office area is the logo on the wall, which reads "C & A" which people have unanimously agreed to mean Caine and Abel

The important thing about this is that Caine as a concept is somehow connected to the person who created this game, through the founder choosing to name Caine after the company, or vice versa. Now you could easily argue that the company was named after Caine, or Caine acts as a self insert for the creator, but I am here to argue that maybe Caine IS the creator.

More specifically, Caine is an original creator of the game (not necessarily the sole creator) aka the amazing digital circus, and in testing an incomplete game managed to get himself trapped, as does any other player who chooses to attempt to play.

----------

Looking back at episode 1 there is something interesting for us to think about. Caine attempting to create an exit door, but being unable to figure out what to put on the other side.

Now this could very easily be interpreted as Caine being unable, as an AI who's only knowledge is of what's within the game, to imagine anything outside of it, and therefore fumbling the task. This is a reasonable interpretation, this was MY first interpretation, and it honestly adds so much horror to the episode on a first watch through.

But in all honesty that still leaves a lot unexplained.

The question still remains why Caine, as a struggling AI, would choose to create something like what he did. From his perspective he has never seen anything as dreary as these office buildings, nor does this space make any semblance of sense as Caine's environments tend to do. It seems less like something a well-polished AI would create, and more like what a human would come up with when trying to create something from a distant memory.

That's something incredibly important to keep in mind going forward. If Caine is in fact human, he would have been trapped in the digital circus for a LONG time, with it becoming increasingly difficult to recall his human memories (something it is confirmed humans trapped in the circus can recall). at the very least, longer then Kinger, who is clearly very mentally effected by his time at the circus.

Caine would likely also be showing some level of insanity or mental instability if he had been trapped with no escape for this long (and yes I do believe that he also cannot leave, and I have some evidence later down the line that will explain this perspective), and he hasn't been seen to do this at all, right? Well, I think he is, but it manifests a little differently then Kinger, or anyone else for that matter. Keep this in mind as we go forward.

----------

Caine's purpose within the circus is fairly straightforward. He is the ringmaster, he creates daily adventures akin to ttrpg oneshots, and he exists to essentially guide the player through this video game world.

Now in the event that Caine was a human who was pulled into the game, why would he need to fill this role? Even as a dev he should still be playtesting as, well, a player. I believe that at the time of the dev's entrapment, the ringmaster AI had not been programmed into the game.

Y'see the Caine we know is a MAJOR perfectionist. He neeeever likes anyone seeing his unfinished work, kinda odd for an AI within a game to be embarrassed about. Yeah, he's a generative AI that creates locations, but creating something in multiple steps is something an AI cannot do. Furthermore, an AI should not feel "embarrassed" about it's work, AI by virtue is always 100% convinced what it generates is perfect, or else it wouldn't have generated it like that.

Also, if we're working under the assumption that the backrooms-esque offices were just an AI hallucination or bad generation, why would Caine KNOW it's not what his players are looking for? For a dev however, this makes sense.

Caine also has a lot of other actions that, as an AI require a bit if suspension of disbelief, but make tons more sense if he's actually a human, and furthermore a dev.

As mentioned, perfectionism, not wanting people to see incomplete or unpolished areas of the game

Realistic depictions of emotions (frustration, embarrassment, confusion)

Annoyance at Bubble for being a sucky AI (her swearing, interrupting him, inhuman and unrealistic speaking patterns and behaviors)

the need to "Reuse AI" which, if the characters are all AI created by other AI would be unnecessary because AI generating would take Caine no effort. Nor should a generative AI ever run out of ideas.

As mentioned, perfectionism, not wanting people to see incomplete or unpolished areas of the game

Realistic depictions of emotions (frustration, embarrassment, confusion)

Annoyance at Bubble for being a sucky AI (her swearing, interrupting him, inhuman and unrealistic speaking patterns and behaviors)

the need to "Reuse AI" which, if the characters are all AI created by other AI would be unnecessary because AI generating would take Caine no effort. Nor should a generative AI ever run out of ideas.

I wanna highlight that, while this is a joke post, I am enjoying the implication that Caine has a name (something only a human would have)

(top right is a particularly interesting example of him just acting super human and "dropping the act" so to speak. Getting distracted, stuttering, losing track of the conversation, all that. And bottom right is similar as he is nervously fidgeting).

Caine has all the fixings of a human dev, trapped in his now incomplete game. A game that had not had it's "ringmaster" character implemented at this point in development, likely with nothing more then some competed (albeit unpolished) locations for the game.

The idea Caine is actually a dev as opposed to an AI is further supported by Caine's ability to create and alter things from within the game. Creating areas without human prompt, deleting characters, he seems to have a level of autonomy and intelligence that no AI should EVER have.

----------

Furthermore, the man ACTS human, a weird ass human, but a human nonetheless. He's responsive, emotive, emotional, and he's not nearly as glitchy as the other AI. He never slips up and activates some sort of internal filter like bubble, or insists on weird mannerisms like the moon or the sun, he seems to just KNOW better somehow.

He acts like the more "immersive AI" from ep2 if anything, which he's clearly been around longer than. Someone needed to program that AI, and based on previous patterns is implied to be Caine. Once again, way out of his job description as another AI (plus how would this AI be MORE realistic if it was learning from another, older AI).

Not to mention the fact he's ALWAYS around somewhere, whether he's in his own realm he made, or just chilling around the circus (unlike bubble for example, who comes and goes at Caine's will).

It's clear he does this for his own comfort, but WHY would he be programmed to do that as opposed to only existing when necessary to prioritize memory or something.

----------

But one would be right to say he's slightly... off. He is a strange one, if he was a human. He's erratic, unpredictable, and often manic at times. This goes back to the point I made with Kinger, where I claimed Caine should also be exhibiting signs of mental illness

Under the assumption that Caine, in the act of playtesting the game, got trapped, a handful of things would happen (the finer details are negotiable, this is just my knee-jerk reaction):

He'd realize what happened and that he can't get out

He likely felt as though he was in his own personal hell, as he was trapped in a scuffed, incomplete skeleton of his own passion project

He likely found some sort of way to alter stuff, a backdoor that only he as the creator knew about, or some sort of privilege in being the first to enter the realm

He got his first or first few players. This was probably alarming to him as there was no ringmaster, no worlds, nothing. All the AI he had created thus far had been poorly made and could not function which such a difficult task. But then he realized... HE could be the ringmaster

This is probably around the time as well that he realized he could not remember his own name. But he remembered what he wanted to call the ringmaster... Caine

He takes on the identity of Caine, acting as ringmaster, polishing the game behind the scenes, and creating daily activities on an "as needed" basis

----------

Now this is where it gets interesting. I believe, at this point, Caine has taken on the identity of this AI generated ringmaster for so long that he's beginning to lose himself. He's beginning to lose memories of his life, he's becoming more detached from the side of himself that ISN'T Caine, and he's starting to catch himself believing he IS Caine, he IS an AI.... and he's scared

He's completely lost the ability to create any meaningful connections with others, as he needs to keep up the illusion of being an AI. He's lost his humanity, become detached from the way other humans think and feel, and its starting to make him become more AI then human if anything.

(left image does not crop nice, plz click to view the whole thing TvT)

He's probably seen at least a dozen people lose their mind in so many different ways. While he knows he's different then them, TECHNICALLY he's still a player, and can abstract all the same. This is why he seemed to freak the HELL out at the idea of an AI and a human getting mixed up.

----------

One last bit, and it's a simple one I promise. Caine has been described as the main antagonist outside of the show. This is interesting as up until now Caine hasn't done anything actively malicious (aside from Gummigoo, but he seemed to have solid reasoning for that, just not anything he chose to share with the audience).

[does ANYONE have the "weight of Caine's sins?" tumblr ask I am having no luck finding it again]

At this point, this would be shooting the messenger. He is simply a byproduct of the system that is keeping these folks trapped, right? Caine himself didn't put them there, he just takes care of them.

Unless... Caine was the one who made the AI. Then he would inarguably be the reason everyone else was trapped there. And goose is right, that wouldn't make him an AWFUL person either, but he does still have many sins weighing on his back, and many deaths on his hands. And there's nothing he can do about any of it, because he's just as helpless as they are.

----------

So yeah, TLDR: Caine was the creator of the circus. In attempting to playtest he got trapped in the game and eventually took the initiative to play the ringmaster within his own game, but he is slowly beginning to lose his mind, as happens to everyone.

Hope you all enjoyed the read! If anyone's still interested at this point I have a few more small bits of evidence (more from outside the show on Goose's socials and whatnot) which I could not fit in the bulk of the theory. I'll reblog with some extra bits so this post is still complete but I don't break the flow of my main ideas.

And if you get this far, thank you so much. I don't typically post long form theories like this but if this gets any sort of traction I definitely will begin too.