Robosaru

"Your new overlord sends you a greeting, and also bestowed upon you a gift: Your own loyalty COLLAR"

Robosaru is the centrepiece of all maps in OBEY. Bunnies in control of Robosaru earn 20¢ every 2 seconds, and gain a bonus 300¢ every time Uranium is placed inside the Feed Box. They also may purchase a Dropship at any time during their reign in Robosaru, for 1500¢.

Robosaru grants the Bunny in control an incremental money bonus the longer it is held. Every 2 seconds, the income from controlling Robosaru is increased by 0.075¢. This bonus is reset upon subversion. This means, for example, that after 8 minutes and 54 seconds, an unbroken reign in Robosaru will have allowed the income to double to 40¢ every two seconds.

The Bunny in control of Robosaru has far worse vision than the Bunnies who are roaming around the map. In addition to Robosaru's turret-mounted spotlight which always lights up the area he is aiming at, and the Dropship spotlight which always lights up the area directly below and infront of the Dropship, only areas illuminated by placed Lights, fires, and a miserable amount around map-born fungi are able to be seen by Robosaru. Thus, Robosaru will often be required to trust other players to OBEY when the spotlight is not on them, and to alert Robosaru if other Bunnies are attempting to subvert them.

The player controlling Robosaru loses the ability to view other player's scores or positions on the scoreboard.

Communication

Chat

Whenever Robosaru uses the chat, both their name and message is colored red, as well as being prefixed with "ROBOSARU".

Robosaru has access to a quick chat menu which can be opened by holding the Hop key, and using the listed key to send the quick chat or to open the submenu of quick chats. These messages and menus are completely customizable.

Whispers

Bunnies have the ability to whisper to eachother. Robosaru can intercept whispers by either having an unplaced Sensor nearby, or by pointing the reticle anywhere within 5 units of a Bunny when they send a whisper.

Robosaru can whisper, but only the Bunnies near the center of the reticle will receive it.

Context Menu

The player in control of Robosaru can hold the Menu key to access the Context Menu. Although the majority of the items in the context menu have no meaning and are merely to be up for interpretation for the player controlling Robosaru, the ¢ alert will drop a ¢ sign on the map that can be picked up by Bunnies. The ¢ sign only transfers the money from Robosaru to Bunny upon being picked up, so ¢ signs that despawn from not being picked up do not deduce any money from Robosaru. Additionally, the ¢ sign is owned by the player who created it, not by Robosaru itself. If a player creates a ¢ sign and is subverted before it is picked up, it will still deduct money from them when it is.

Common Interpretations:
Alert: Used for giving warnings to players, or marking areas the player controlling Robosaru does not wish Bunnies to go.
Burn Area: Used for alerting Bunnies of a burn location: somewhere the player controlling Robosaru wishes to fire upon. Also may be used as a last warning for disOBEYing Bunnies.
Money: Dropped as a reward for OBEYing bunnies, or as a way to coerce Bunnies to move to a certain location. Each ¢ directive gives 50¢ to the bunny that collects it.
Move: Usually used as a move command, but can be used as a general purpose tool to point out things of interest, and sometimes used instead of the "place" icon.
Get: Used to point out items Robosaru wishes the Bunnies to pick up.
Place: Used to indicate the location Robosaru wishes items dropped or built. May sometimes be used instead of the "Go" indicator for move commands.

Weapons

The Bunny in control of Robosaru has five direct methods of eliminating Bunnies they deem to be disOBEYing.

Primary Cannon

The primary cannon (Action key) has infinite ammo and fires extremely rapidly. However, it is also terribly inaccurate, kicks up a lot of billowing smoke, and occasionally starts small fires. This not only makes it very difficult for the Bunny in Robosaru to determine whether or not they landed a hit, it also can provide a means of hiding for Bunnies who were not involved in the original barrage. The cannon cannot deal damage to Bunnies behind solid terrain, and due to a blind spot it is unable to hit bunnies who have made it inside of the Sentry ring. The cannon can and will destroy items, so care must be taken when firing it around stashes of expensive drops.

Flamethrower

The flamethrower (Flame key) consumes Fuel at a rate of 3 units per second, which must first be deposited into the Feed Box. It is useful for eliminating approaching bunnies as the resulting fire provides terrain that is dangerous, opposed to the safe, view-blocking clouds that the Primary Cannon causes. The flamethrower is positioned far lower than the Cannon, and thus can hit Bunnies who are very close to the door. However, the flames do not damage Bunnies who are hiding in water, and care must be taken using the flamethrower around the Feed Box as Bunnies killed with flames are turned into charred Corpses.

The heat emanating from the flamethrower's spout can kill bunnies that are within a fair radius of it. This heat radius can be used to cook any bunnies who manage to climb onto Robosaru's base.

Missile Racks

The Missile Racks (Drop key) consume Missiles, which must first be deposited into the Feed Box. Missiles travel very quickly and have a large radius of damage, so they are useful for top priority Bunny eliminations. Missiles rarely leave the intended target alive, and the blast radius can be used to hit Bunnies behind cover. Missiles do leave billowing clouds and traces of fire, so care must be taken not to use them excessively near the Feed Box or other high-trafficked areas, for risk of killing OBEYing bunnies or leaving charred corpses. Missiles also destroy almost all items within its radius of effect, so extreme care must be taken when firing it.

Sentries

Sentries (Next key) are small spires which are located in a circle around Robosaru. Activating them enables them for 15 seconds and consumes batteries, which must first be deposited into the Feed Box. While sentries are active, they will automatically fry any Bunny who moves too closely, or who happens to be already too close. Bunnies wearing a collar are immune to the Sentries' shocks. Sentries are usually placed close enough and have a large enough radius to prevent uncollared Bunnies travelling between them. Sentry lightning arcs require an unobstructed path to their target: they will not fire if blocked by terrain, constructs or dropped items.

Detonating Collars

The Bunny controlling Robosaru possesses the ability to manually detonate any Collar that is on the map with the Next key. If a Bunny is wearing or holding the Collar being detonated, they will be killed.

Subversion

Entering the door at the base of Robosaru subverts the player inside. This does multiple things:

• The player being subverted is killed. They respawn on the map, or inside the Dropship if it exists.
• The subverting player is now placed in control of Robosaru
• The subverting player is refunded the ¢ value of all the items they carried into Robosaru
• The subverting player is immediately awarded 300¢
• All other bunnies are automatically equipped with Collars, (or have it dropped infront of them if they already have 3 items) and receive an automated message from the subverting player.
  • If a bunny is already holding or wearing a collar, is inside the Dropship, or is within range of a Sentry (but not necessarily in line of sight), then they are not given a Collar.
• The Sentries at Robosaru's base are activated for 15 seconds. This automated activation does not consume a charge.
• If the minimum player requirement for a server has been fulfilled, the server has enabled Dropship on start, and a Dropship has not yet been granted this round, a Dropship will immediately spawn.

HUD

① Robosaru control streak bonus
② Sentry Charges
③ Zoom Level Indicator
④ Buy menu
⑤ Reticule
⑥ Missile Ammo
⑦ Flamethrower Ammo
⑧ Rotation Indicator
⑨ Door Gap
⑩ Door Burn Indicator

As the Flamethrower is offset to Robosaru's left side, the red notch on the orientation ring indicates the area Robosaru needs to face when looking directly down in order for his Flamethrower to burn and kill Bunnies at the door. The timer in the centre of the Rotation Indicator displays how long before a Dropship drop occurs.

History

The original working title of OBEY was 'Robosaru'. Robosaru means 'robomonkey' in Japanese as the robot is a take on the Japanese giant robot/monster theme. In English, the name is intended to also be misread as 'Robosaur'

The original title graphic, when the game was first programmed using Ogre3D

In this older version of the game, Robosaru had a different model which took inspiration from Mechagodzilla.

Concept art for the most recent iteration of Robosaru

Design

"The design of the robot is intended to represent illegitimate power. The halo embodies one of the worst forms of this: the merging of religion and nationalism (both illegitimate forms of influence on their own) typically for the justification of aggression. It is also the source of the light beam (fear) that malevolently watches over others (literally and figuratively). The robot's shape is meant as a Christ figure / totem pole emphasizing the religious aspect of anachronistic and plainly false explanations of reality that influence the present. The robot is gold colored, a giant golden idol that everyone wants to own, yet is the fulcrum of their trouble and that players also hate or envy only when it isn't theirs. It is also adorned with trite symbols of peace and love: cheap attempts to conceal it's true and obvious nature, as is often the case with most examples of illegitimate power. The main cannon is a giant phallus. It is the main instrument of control in the game and represents patriarchal and misogynistic systems used to justify all manner of violence, coercion, and injustice (and not without irony in a video game).

Robosaru also takes the form of a simian. Ostensibly the most intelligent branch of life on Earth, in this case the top of it's head is cut off. It's brain replaced with something else, something tiny that controls it instead, and for it's own purposes. Robosaru's face was also inspired by the monkeys in the 'Dinner of Doom'. Even though that ref was mostly lost as I worked it, I still think the metaphor is apt. One thing I usually don't talk about is that I try not to refer to Robosaru as 'him' or 'he'. It is neither. In fact, Robosaru was designed with feminine parts to not only emphasize sexual power/influence (besides the gun) but also to a lesser degree parental influence (which can sometimes take the form of illegitimate power). Note that Robosaru has 'breasts' and also the entry door is red and like a vagina (with a light above it like a clitoris), and the base supports sort of like open legs. It isn't as literal as the gun, but it is something I was thinking about when I designed it. When you gain power in OBEY, it isn't just meant to look like a tiny sperm taking power over a body, or a symbolic penis entering for the pleasure of it's owner, but also like the player is regressing to the womb in a sense. We are infantilized by the things we think we want. Consider about how often power leads to self destruction. (How many celebrities destroy themselves with drugs or financially after being able to get anything they want? Consider the Khmer Rouge wrecking what remained of Cambodia after realizing power and as an indirect result of that, themselves. Same with the 3rd Reich. Or repeated again with the hell created by ISIS's attempts at an Islamic Utopia.) There are many examples.

But yes, in effect, you have basically a giant monkey-faced, brain-dead, gold-plated Christ with an enormous phallus that players use to coerce each other in the game."

~dez