McClendon

* See also Bio-Electronics
* See also Minervas Den
One of the big Technical Innovators/Technologists in Rapture.
McClendon was a developer of remote control systems and robotic/automatic mechanism was instrumental in Rapture's Construction. Besides further product development, he made a bunch of money CONSULTING on Improved mechanisms for Nerve repair therapies, and the later 'Control' for Plasmids ( biological/physiological nerve-based elements grafted in surgery ). His work then made him instrumental in advancing computer mechanisms in Rapture.
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His work included :
* Robotics - Various automatic regulating machinery
* Early Control Technology - Remote and Automated Construction Machinery
* Bio-Electronics - Consulted to develop Plasmid Control Nerve Physiological Networks
Jack McClendon grasped the importance of the Bio-Engineering he had heard about, and with one important discovery made possible the Bio-Electronics revolution in Rapture. Which also made projects like The Thinker later possible.
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McClendon's Company :
Minervas Den did its own fabrication of Bio-Electronics in-house, as well as repairs. It had developed the specialized genetic manipulation techniques/processes required to form the circuitry, and also to make conventional transistor-based components ( already in use with McClendon's earlier robotics/control systems -- obtained largely through contacts in the Surface World ). Being still largely intact, that Minerva's Den manufacturing establishment became an early part of New Rapture.
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McClendon Recognizing Bio-Electronics Possibilities :
A breakthru genetic manipulation of the "neuronic" tissue was the 'diode formation' at the Axon-Dendrite interface, which prevented backward flow of signals. A subsequent development was a similar interface to non-organic signal carrying structure coated with an insulator which allowed the biologically-based neurons to connect (interface) to fabricated circuit structures. In the training process of living neurons they would tie into some external signal sources and form the desired logic for when their electrical outputs similarly were connected.
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Robotic Little Sisters :
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You may see these (in the MMORPG) marching around the perimeters of the New Rapture City Center. They were originally designed as Little Sister (ADAM collecting) replacements except that they were ignored by Big Daddies. A short sighted McClendon ( as the game story goes ) canceled the project ( even after having prematurely manufactured a large batch of them ). The sophistication built into them ( sea-slug bio-electronic logic ) would have made them usable for other things - such as security patrols or for their original purpose - Arming them so that they did not need Big Daddies to protect them ( they could have gone around in gangs if a single one was too vulnerable ). The gathering functionality was obviously solved and engineered ( unfortunately the cost of the needed Sea Slugs resulted in a severe cost-overrun ).
The New Rapture City, in the MMORPG ( now controlling Minerva's Den ), has access to the original stockpiles and the factory dies/plans to make additional electronic units and parts. They are still (if not more) expensive, and would be assigned to stable areas for general security patrols and would alert 'enforcer' forces instead of normally becoming involved in any combat.
The player's ingenuity will probably be called on as a Mission to rebuild one of the prototypes into a functioning unit. The City would farm that work out to the Citizenry, and pay a reasonable price for success ( as well as Brownie Points towards your Public Achievement projects ladder ).
You might even see them doing the function of dragging corpses back to the City, whether to recover their ADAM or as a Sanitation measure.
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Robotic Little Sisters - Verify It Works BEFORE You Start the Assembly Line :
The main problem was that IT was a robot. The Sea Slugs require a human host ( with organs and such ) in which to live. If they could have done this artificially, then what need for the complexity of using children ?? Another problem - the Big Daddies didn't seem to bond to robots, due to the bond itself being based on psychological involvement, and a robot just couldn't simulate the subtle behavior required. Either issue was enough to put-the-kibosh on the project.
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What Kind of Computer Brain Did the Robotic Little Sisters Have ( Supposing At Least THAT Part if Not "The Bonding" Worked ? ) :
The Security Flybot as example of where to start for similar programmed Features/Abilities like :
* Ground Navigation, vent traversal/climbing ( to wherever they go in there ??? ) Tricycle riding, Little Red Wagon pulling ...
* Target Recognition, acquisition and pathfinding ("Angels") - 'genetic' sensors ?
* Anatomical precision of incisions and 'slurping' whatever, to access the ADAM in a corpse
* Task processing - 'Tunnel Path Mapping', 'patrol/seek', 'process corpse', 'return and deliver'
* Avoiding obstacles, static and dynamic ( nice sonic transducers/sensors - ultrasonics etc ... )
* Self defense - Coordinating with other Security devices and Big Daddies "Daddy : Attack Vector Three. Execute!!" Manipulations of the Thompson Sub-Machinegun and Lil'Chainsaw.
* Care and Feeding of the Sea Slug ( the mechanism the Sea Slug lives within - since the Sea Slugs are placed into the Little Sisters body, this may or may not have been a challenge to accomplish -- mainly keeping the aeration system from getting gummed up by algae ).
* Cute statement Speech Synthesis (sickening sweet sayings were found to be effective in driving away more than a few Splicers).
Come to think of it why not combine the Lil' Sister with the Flybot ??? ( experimental models in the part of McClendon Robotics behind the blocked doors ... )
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 'Cloud' Computing Comes To Rapture : 
Some braniac ( lots of that going around with Brain Boost ) figured out that all the dozens of McClendon 'Home Computers' sold in Rapture could be interconnected and used (while otherwise idle) to run programs for the expanding computer accounting/computational industry ( which eventually put many of the old style accountants/adding machine operators out of work ). The computers were connected via a telephone line Intercomputer-Web to transmit data and instructions back and forth. 'Rental Charges' were paid the Home Computer owners for the processing time used. Amateur programmers could access this 'network' and a creative community grew up which developed numerous useful computer tools as well as games and other entertainment. A new company called 'Fruit' was even formed to try to sell some computers to ordinary citizens, but failed when their product was just the same equipment overpriced and sold with meaningless pretentious blather.
Subsequently the idea of 'networking' computers together was used in a BIG way for The Thinker.
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NOW AVAILABLE ... Really, How many of these coulda been sold ? Expensive as hell (handmade coinstruction). They MIGHT be Used as Office Computers for a large company (billing and accounting) were more likely. Fad only of the Very Rich ( most who would have more conventional prestige things to spend money on ).
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Spastichicken222.jpg|At least would have Paid for the Development
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McClendon Products In-Development :
* Robotic Receptionist ( also attempted Robotic Blackjack Dealer, but Hacking to cheat was too much a problem )
* Voice-controlled Telephone Menuing Answering Service
* Self-Driving Golf Carts ( some people don't even want to walk 100 feet to their 'Water Taxi' )
* Automated Under-Water machinery - Actually used a great deal way back when the City was being constructed, but there are still alot of maintenance tasks that had to be done continually. Actually SEMI-automated, but still a major boost to productivity ( and eliminating MEN having to be in complex Diving Suits ).
* Robotic-Farms - both indoor and in-sea (like kelp) cutting labor in hydroponics could drastically reduce prices
* Lil Sentry ( reusing parts from the ill fated Robotic Little Sisters, multi-legged spider model was promising )
* Pocket Calculator - unfortunately still the size of a suitcase (yet with its advantages)
* Window Cleaning and Toilet Scrubbing Bots
Along with improved models of : Automatic-Chef, Electronic Baby-minder, Security Flybots, Home Computer, Vacuum Bots
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Story of Discovery of Cellular Semi-Conductors (MMORPG) :
A researcher in the ADAM industry was using an Electron Microscope to check tissue samples modified by some early Tonic solution ( the tissues are processed/dried and put in a vacuum for the electron bombardment/reflections to be viewable at very high resolution ). The researcher noticed an irregularity in sections of tissue which flared in the electron beam in an odd way. Scanning one direction, the flare occurred in a cellular filament, but confusingly when scanning the opposite direction the flare did not happen. 
A colleague was shown and mentioned something about the current flow on the test sample operating in only one direction - an attribute of a very basic/fundamental electronic property (operating as a diode). Sometime later, this was remembered and it was mentioned in a lunchroom to another colleague who was working on an electrical-based Plasmid, whom it might prove useful to. Some further investigations were made to determine what was happening ( "Initiative" is one of Rapture's bywords ). 
It turned out the Electron Microscope preparations introduced secondary chemicals into the tissue which were recombined in the 'drying out' process. The mechanism would not work on living tissue, but was mentioned inside Rapture's scientific grapevine, where it eventually reached the ear of Jack McClendon who was having trouble miniaturizing components for his robotic control systems. The discovery gave McClendon a revolutionary idea about a new technology which would make use of ADAM's ability to change cell structures to 'grow' various electronic components from cell tissue. He found out what genetic changes were made to the original tissue which had exhibited the odd properties ( and what chemicals were used with the Electron Microscope preparations ), and hired an ADAM technologist to reproduce those results and to do further investigation. 
Given some experimentation ( effort and time usually missing from the writers stories ), the results were reproduced and then followed up by many refinements and adjustments. Much further development resulted in the Bio-Electronic technologies used for the new computer circuitry ( and gave McClendon his much 'smarter' robots and eventually made 'The Thinker' possible a few years later ).
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The McClendon Feedback Circuit (1945) :
* Telephone link using tonal (not necessarily audible) signaling - miniaturized (at that time) with Micro Vacuum Tubes [pix] ( transistors didn't exist yet ( I wont Wave_of_the_hand shift that real history Transistors first were invented 1947, and took years to turn into component 'production' ).
* Part of work McClendon did for Military Technology before coming to Rapture
* Uses Conventional Telephone wires ( 'twisted pair' ) to transmit data
* Multiple signals can be sent on one pair of wires ( frequency multiplexing ) for remote monitoring/regulation ( this was eventually The Thinker primary function ... )
* Important to the Life-Support systems in Rapture ( monitoring air/temperature/seepage )
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McClendon Helped Rapture Automate
Automation ( another area applying McClendon's expertise ) - Machines still need to be constructed, maintained and directed, but automation can significantly decrease labor costs. Most would be applied to small production lines because of the limited customer base in Rapture ( no HUGE assembly lines ).
The average Rapturite might have more 'stuff' if automation could make goods production somewhat cheaper ( if possible within the smaller production quantities that Rapture could support buying ). Thus the automated production machines ( required to make that happen ) would themselves have to be common, and not too expensive ( would be real handy to have a genius like McClendon in Rapture ).
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McClendon's Decline - the Ill-fated Robotic Little Sister :
How likely is it that someone (McClendon) who had already produce multiple successful complex products would NOT do a proper prototype ( Robotic Little Sister ) to test the feasibility BEFORE spending a whole lot of his money on major production process for something that DIDN'T WORK ( ignored by Big Daddies ).
You'd think that the concept working should have been proven early that it actually would work - minimum the Sea Slug mechanism - the fundamental component that MUST work ( OR maybe just haul the Blood back to a processing site with Sea Slugs - but no multiplier effect there so !?!? ... ), so with something THAT critical, any IDIOT tests that part first. Big Daddy bit ? Well, alternate ways might exist to achieve the same thing.
Heck - BIG Little Sisters Robots armed sufficiently to dissuade attackers - fricken Terminators in big little girl dresses ( That might be funny - Keep that idea for the 'might have been' Flashbacks. )
Anyway, the usual (Real World) process is first to have a prototype built and DEMONSTRATE that the idea even works --- BEFORE starting further engineering and expensive mass production of the parts. As a successful producer of complicated products, McClendon would KNOW all these things, and operate his business in that fashion. No mention that he was a Splicer becoming insane to have such a lapse. And with the R&D out of his own pocket, then doubly the reason to make a working prototype first.
Possibly the 'paid for all the research and alot of development himself' on a workable model was sufficient to nearly bankrupt him ( without even further waste of money production costs being needed ) and resulted in his decline ( but with the scale of his business, that doesn't seem likely... Competition maybe ? ). Perhaps the prototype was simply too sophisticated, so that its development just ate too much of his resources.
If this 'robot' could do many of the operations a Little Sister needed to do - maneuver, sense and search for targets, recognize threats, pathfind, climb up and down stairs and over obstacles, independently follow tasks/missions, communicate, manipulate the LS-needle tool, manage a Sea Slug ???? ( It is hard to believe that McClendon did NO testing of any/all of these while prototyping ), THEN what was already developed possibly still COULD have been used for many other purposes/projects ( including mobile security robots -- LS-bot with a spotlight and a machine gun, or programmed with the 'cleaning of toilets' and cleaning windows, etc ... ). And arm those LS Robots sufficiently and what need for a Big Daddy Protector ???
Heck, McClendon had whole piles of parts (we saw them) to start applying to such ideas ( He likely had enough good people working for him to have suggested such a course ). His creating all those other robotic devices SHOWED he possessed 'Innovative' skill and abilities which could have led to a better story.
We could have had "Little Sisters of Silence" with those Infinitely stupid ear cones walking around listening for the sounds of leaks and structural stress damage, or Spider Splicers hiding in the walls OR whispers of plots against Ryan.
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Robot Little Sisters Ideas :
Of course wouldn't the Robotic Little Sisters also be targets of the ADAM addicted Splicers ( or bootleggers seeking easy pickings ) ? So these Robots would have to be armed ( simpler than also requiring a Big Daddy to accompany them - and suddenly no problem with BDs rejecting them!!!! Too easy, and wouldn't match the Failtopia plot. ) And who says they have to be that small ???? Somehow they would have mutated to look like a Dalek ???
Why not just add an ADAM Siphon Module directly to a Big Daddy then ? !!!!! IT can't process the ADAM unless an artificial Little Sister Stomach with a Sea Slug is incorporated ... WAIT isn't THAT what the Robotic Little Sister already HAD ????? ( a LS symbiont simulation the Robot LS would have needed ). Otherwise the first 'Doh' moment for McClendon WOULD have been "Well the Robot got to the corpse, sucked its blood, but "Oh Noooooooos!!!" I forgot about the part about needing a working Sea Slug to process the fricken ADAM !!!!! *Bangs Head Against Wall* " That wasn't mentioned, so does that mean there WAS a way to do this without a 'live' Little Sister ?? 
Now wouldn't THAT have been SMART ?? Or just have the BDs do corpse collection, to some safe location, where the LS worked, which could be built like a Fortress and largely-Splicer proof ???? "Little Undertakers" ?
Its awfully LESS a problem than those vulnerable LS walking about then, don't you think ??
Big Daddy's cleaning up (corpses) would have been part of their original (maintenance) work. Rapture could even have had 'Bins' where ordinary folk (any left ?) could themselves deposit corpses - though if they got paid, it might cause too many kill-for-profit incidents. Maybe Rapture wouldn't have smelled so bad or been as grungy with fewer corpses lying about...
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Automatic Gentleman -- McClendon's Ideas (Robots) :
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Servant-O-Matic ? Product to be made by McClendon Robotics. 
Can't have them able to climb walls, just a bit too weird and unsavory ... No mini-zeppelins, and rotating propellers ( like on Security Flybots ) are too dangerous for domestic use. So some kind of walking mechanism ( able to handle stairs/step which seem a common feature of Raptures 'terrain' ).
Bad Science would be a mutated monkey brain controlling the thing - now degenerated from its original 'Gentleman' training ... ( with automatic-drive -- everyone knows monkeys can't drive a stick-shift ... ) Bio-Electronic brain would be much easier to maintain.
Too expensive/complex/unneeded to ADAM/EVE power such a thing, but it could be powered by a big clear flask of kerosene or even moonshine ( alcohol is easier to come by in Rapture via fermentation ) with a small internal combustion engine ( even a one-banger with a flywheel ). It can have its engine putt-putting quietly when it is waiting in ambush/moving slowly, then making a loud racket when it throttles up to attack you.
You hit the fuel tank you get a mini fireball ( or like the kerosene fires you see in movies when a kerosene lamp breaks - big patch of fire -- except bigger -- and the robot is still coming towards you aflame for a short while before it conks out ).
Of course malfunctioning (lack of maintenance) and going rogue and becoming a menace will be fully proper. Bizarre-ness would be : It still be uttering some of its 'Automatic Gentleman' voice snippets -- "Would Madam like me to fetch the mail", etc... while it is attacking you :
* "Will Sir be going to his club?" ( produces a club and starts swinging )
* "A light, Sir?" ( Flaming Molotov cocktail is tossed, or big flame shoots out of the hand it once lit cigarettes with )
* "Will Madam be retiring soon?" ( menaces with a tire iron )
* "Allow me to help you down, Sir" ( makes a grab to fling you to the ground to stomp you .., )
* "A fine day for hunting pheasants, Sir" ( aims shotgun )
* "Taking out the Trash now, Sir" ( dragging your unconscious corpse away ).
* "Will one be desiring a doctor?" ( looking down on a corpse it is still stabbing )
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Cobbled together robot from Robotic Little Sister Parts - 8 legged monstrosity - sounds like a 'One-of' for some Techie-Splicer Boss's pet ( that one WITH does the crawling on walls and such ).
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McClendon's Toilet Scrubbing Robot :
"Somebody's gotta scrub the Toilets" - Well maybe not all that much. Labor saving devices would be 'all the rage', and technological solutions of all kinds could be invented and sold. Not everything could be automated ( we could have seen more evidence of this ... attempts - and we might in the MMORPG ).
Basic living expenses may have been reasonably cheap, and wages even for lowest jobs may not have been that low. No new population flow into the city to artificially depress wages/salaries for needed jobs, competition would exist, so the labor market would/could self-balance.
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McClendon Pneumo Inspection and Repair Bot ( Also does 'Extractions' of stuck mail cannisters ) :
There are many miles of Pneumo Tubes in Rapture, and unlike the "Pneumatic Transit (1870)" it is too small for humans to directly access to all its sections. In time, in many places, long lengths of the Pneumo's transit tubes would have to be extracted for major maintenance/replacement. He foresaw this need a built robots to handle the task.
So, robots with remote cameras and sensors, which could move through the Pneumo tubes under their own power, became part of the system from the start ( a fairly well developed technology by the time of the Inauguration of the Citywide Pneumo 'Jet Postal' system in 1956 ).
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McClendon - Robotic Genius :
Robots usually fail if they have to be controlled by computers outside of themselves ( when not self-contained ) as poor communications don't work for split second interactions realworld Robots require to function properly.
So McClendon needed very small computers which could fit in his products, and was the person who pushed development for the Bio-electronics ( which Porter later used to build The Thinker ). The miniaturization was successful enough to get additional monies from others wanting the technology for conventional computers ( and resulted in further developments and improvements ).
The ADAM genetic technologies enabled the manipulation of nerve tissue leading to the breakthroughs.
The resulting Biological mechanisms were what C. M. Porter needed if he was to simulate what the Human Brain did to create his 'artificial intelligence'. ( He never quite did, but then now 60+ years later we have barely achieved much improvement. )
By the time of the 'civil war', the semi-'smart' Security Devices (we saw in BS1) were possible ( the Fly-bots were a major achievement because of their complex operations ).
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Was McClendon Going Into The Color TV Business ??? :
http://www.game-archivist.com/rapture/img/museum/photos/fullsize/Screen_Stand_By_Blue.jpg
The above picture indicates use for color TV transmission, was found in the Minervas Den DLC. Every TV we saw in Rapture was B&W but by 1958 ( when the excrement hit the impeller blades ) TV technology would have been ready to move forward a step and likely would have been a product that sold en-masse.
The new camera equipment probably would have been expensive because of the limited production ( Rapture never had more than a few dozen channels )
Since Rapture used a TV cable system ( radio waves don't go thru water very well ) and Color TV uses largely the same signal system, at least there would be no expensive relaying of all those cables.
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Automatic Gentleman Idea for a Rapture Mission Scenario :
The warehouse scene would be a good place to have that really ancient game scenario where you have to maneuver out of reach of 'the robots' and evade and make your escape -- Where they move slowly and are reaching out to try to grab you with their metallic hands and you have to dodge and weave to get past all of them. Sure you could slam a few with your rifle butt, but meanwhile dozens are inching closer towards you ... Not sure why there would be a whole warehouse full of defectives ( maybe should be more like a scrap heap of 'returns', with many half dismantled -- crawling at you missing legs etc ... )
The scenario writer can always come up with a reason to make you go thru an area ( being chased and went in the only doorway that was unlocked, etc ... )
The reason why there are so many of the robots ( when not that many people in Rapture might have been rich enough to buy them ) - prices would go down as the could be made cheaper if mass-produced.
Possibly there was a contract for 'Window Washers' ...
Why they are 'malfunctioning' -- The monkey brains/whatever that run the things have either gone senile or a bit rotten ( it is sciencey themed, so they don't have to justify much beyond 'it got infected with a virus' or something ... )
Anyway, a whole maze of crates, in the near dark. Have a few variations of the 'jump scare' - a big crate falls over, some arms reaching out, a strange unearthly scream ( and the Player finds that HE was screaming !! ) after an 'automaton' head rolls at their feet, the open door across the warehouse ( with the light shining from it ) suddenly shuts leaving you in total darkness ... Of course you have another box fall in the dark, but nothing else happens. The Robotic meanies rise up from being submerged in puddles, etc ...
Plenty of ideas to work with for that scene, including a possible 'Scoobie Do' twist, that it is some people who have taken refuge there, and they try to stay safe by scaring people/Splicers out of the place (or somesuch).
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Could have a nice little scene in some part of the city with the 'crazy' Automatic Gentleman acting the servant to a bunch of corpses (cliche). It is not clear if the robot killed them way back or just found some convenient corpse.
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You need something creepy (to kill) to take the place of those poor deformed mentally-ill Splicers, and to have come at you out of the dark. Robots are 'politically correct' to slaughter without qualms... ( and their intelligence doesn't have to be as clever as a Splicers would ).
Proper sound effects would probably be the real 'creep out' aspect, as they should make some distinct mechanical sounds, which you can hear from a distance, as they creep towards you in the dark or as they are waiting around the next corner, or are behind the door you need to go thru. I remember in "Return to Castle Wolfenstein", the half-robotic Nazi monstrosities - which were hard to kill, were dangerous ( reason to fear them meleeing you ) which you heard distinctly from a ways off, but really didn't know where they were ( often right around next corner ... ), or when they would get to you.
Thinking about effects (lighting), when they used arc-lamps more than a little ( while lightbulbs got scarce ) and the stark too-bright light they produced would make for nice exaggerated visual effects ( GPU Shader scripting fun - more Player Creations ) that would contrast with both the dark and the well-lit views. Menacing shadows, etc...
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For the MMORPG, these robots would be an item useable as a source of parts for other objects ( ie- Auto-Bar-Tender at a bar in the New Rapture City Center ). Behavior scripting to make it interactive would make it a more 'advanced' object to create. Players would most often find them in pieces ( salvage opportunity ).
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Such an idea would have worked in Columbia ( more than those bizarre hood ornament alarm boys: the 'boys of silence' ), but that's one of those (so many) could/woulda/shoulda opportunities now lost ( except in the MMORPG where all things are possible ) ...
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Vacuum Bots :
DLCs usually introduce no new game mechanisms, as they are only meant to generate extra CASH for the Game Company with minimized expense ( so just about everything is reused from the original game ). These 'McClendon' Vac-bots were pretty much just static containers you found in a few places.
SO we didn't see the McClendon Vacuum Bot wandering around Minervas Den, or even ONE SCENE of menacing suddenness as one unexpectedly came through an opening door or suddenly lurched at you from the shadows. ( Or one coming slowly down a hallway towards you and only when it neared did you see the pile of explosives strapped to its back by a Splicer ... ) Seriously how was it impossible to have a few memorable things like that ? ( And like the Corpses which sprung to life, you would later cringe and feel anxiety every time you then saw any Vacuum-Bot laying there in the Game. )
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== ODD PROJECTS UNDER CONSIDERATION ==
The BIG Little Sister - Self ProtectingInfinitely Odder - McClendon found a severed head that appeared from a Tear, and was able to quickly attach it to some life-support machinery he was working on. From there he then added more machinery. 'Project Sally' though would lanquish until there was a larger supply of severed heads.
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Seeing The Ryan Automaton in "Journey To The Surface", McClendon figured he could make a far more versatile Robotic unit which could mix hundreds of different Cocktails. The Prototype was underway when the Kashmir Incident occurred and threw the City into Chaos. More than a little of the development work for this unit was soon to be applied to the Robotic Little Sister Project.
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