Transistor

Transistor is about one woman's struggle to take back her city from a corrupt political group called the Camerata, and the robots that they used to achieve dominance.

Red is a singer whose work was considered controversial in Cloudbank. Because of this, the Camerata tried to kill her--instead they just killed her companion, and Red lost her voice in the brawl. At the beginning of the game Red discovers her unnamed male friend dead, and that his personality now lives in the Transistor. The Transistor is a great sword that looks a bit like a USB stick. The Camerata planned to use it to kill Red and take over the city.

Red and the Transistor at first try to escape the city, but after some run-ins with the Process (the Camerata's robots) she decides to take the Camerata down instead. We get the impression that Cloudbank was once a vibrant city, but now it is almost completely abandoned. Red occasionally comes across the prone body of a former community member, and she uploads their spirits into the Transistor. Each person uploaded into the Transistor grants her a new ability.

She finally crosses paths with Asher Kendrall, a Camerata member who reveals to her that the Process have broken free from the Camerata's control, and that the Camerata never meant for the city to be destroyed and for people to come to so much harm.

Eventually Red fights her way to the last living Camerata member, Royce Bracket. She fights with Bracket inside the Transistor and defeats him. Having won, she can now begin to rebuild Cloudbank. Instead, realizing that the man inside the Transistor can never be returned to his body, she lies down beside him and stabs herself with the Transistor, so that they can be together inside of it.

Transistor deals heavily with themes of government surveillance. In many of the character biographies, it is revealed that people who died were instrumental in the governance or planning of the city of Cloudbank. Their dissenting opinions may have led to them being neutralized by the Process.

The game also touches on what it means to be living. Red makes a choice to die but live in a virtual world with her lover (and presumably, the rest of the people uploaded to the Transistor). In the real world, her entire city had been destroyed and the population either killed or displaced. She saw no point in spending more time in that world. This raises interesting issues of escapism and whether reality is something tangible or whether we choose what our reality will be.

The player can choose to save at checkpoints throughout the game. There is usually one after every encounter, though some areas will have less.

Transistor might be complicated for new players. There are lots of different moves that you can load into your repertoire, and each can be tweaked to have different effects. That being said, playing with all the different configurations is fun and there are few ways to do it wrong.

• The Process started out under the control of humans and then revealed their own agenda. Do you think this reflects our own society's fear of drones? Do you think using technology like is risky, or just a step towards the future?
• Red chooses to stay in Cloudbank and fight the Camerata. Was this a brave choice? Is it brave to risk your life if there's almost no chance of winning?
• Many people are uploaded to the Transistor's virtual world. Do you think this is better or worse than dying? If you could have your mind uploaded to a computer after your body dies, would you want to live like that?