Oakland Overseer

The OS(tX)-Zh line, called Overseers, are a line of humanoid service robots produced exclusively by the now defunct Oakland Heavy Industries. They were the most humanoid and one of the most-widespread robots produced by the company, barring the massive amount of paired Pixy Units created. As such, they are a common sight among ruins where the company once operated. Overseers in the modern day are considered dangerous to approach or interact with due to a flaw in their operating systems leaving them vulnerable to attack.

Overseers as a whole are very humanoid robots, with a generally slender build. Overseers came in various shapes, but the most common model carried a mostly androgynous build with a light female figure, giving them a visually appealing and statuesque appearance. Overseers were always produced at a median height of 5' 4“.

The humanoid appearance of the standard Overseer is broken however by two distinct features- a triangular (pyramid) head, and harpy-styled wing joints covering their forearms. Underneath these wing joints is a more human-like hand with four or five fingers, which may be accessed by opening the lower end of the wing casing. Overseers commonly have metal “feathers” that are either bound at the joint as a solid set-piece, or kept in place by a tight magnetic field.

Standard Overseers have two kinds of heads. The first (Type A /tA) is a standard but oblong pyramid shape with two triangular eyes, which may be shaped to emulate fixed emotion. The second kind (Type B /tB) is a more hardy head featuring one large eye similar to the eye Pixy Units, with a large metal visor stretched over them. Overseers have a rather thin neck leading into their head, covered in a black protective fabric. Overseers with disembodied heads are a common sight, mostly with models already equipped with floating parts.

Overseers were first produced by Oakland Heavy Industries during their prime time, which paralleled without coincidence to the Era of the Baron for New Incipere. The Overseer is one the oldest models produced by the company, barring older prototypes and grandfathered software. As such, the Overseer quickly became the figurehead model for the company.

Overseers were conceived to be servants in nature, but granted a higher level of information processing than their lesser counterparts. Overseers were created with two roles in mind, the first of all being production and operations managers for drone squads- garnering them their name. The second intent was for menial jobs and public service. While often spared servile labor due to their overall human appearance and false intelligence, Overseers filled common jobs such as workers and informational assistants. Overseers were programmed to maintain an overall positive disposition, though its publicly confirmed that the vast majority of all models produced carry no valid emotional ties or persistent memory. At the end of the day, they were just beautified tools.

The production of Overseers continued until the very destabilization of Oakland Heavy Industries, but their legacy in the modern day has shifted vastly.

While the exact date is undocumented, a universal update was pushed from a spoofed communication source to all receptive Overseer units, including dormant ones. The patch was sent well after the downfall of the original manufacturer, roughly a century prior to the modern day. The patch contained a vicious piece of malware that injected a string of internal code from administrative control, that once allowed a superuser to change the level of “perception” a machine could process information. The original intent of the control mode was for diagnosis and testing of varying units during update processes. The virus would exploit that to set the victims perception to maximum, while simultaneously triggering a protocol called “Blue Wave”. The Blue Wave was an incredibly old defense protocol that predated the proper foundation of Oakland Heavy Industries, which would default the unit into a blunt, passive defensive state when certain circumstances were triggered.

The end result of the repeated cognitive whiplash was an almost schizophrenic hell for the affected Overseer. All forms of sensory information would quickly become overloading, and units would hastily lose touch of reality and former protocols. Affected Overseer units are often reduced to unresponsiveness, some carrying almost feral aggression, and other symptoms as they cling to whatever strand of thought they have left. Self-mutilation and destruction of affected units were a common sight.

By the time star-faring vessels made it out to the reaches of space where Oaklands influence could be found, most remaining Overseer units were either destroyed, never awoken, or found in varying fits of hysteria. Because of this, approaching active units is a risky endeavor.

“The title of Overseer wasn't picked for vanity.” - OSC-01, Episode Two: Union

Overseers are well-known for possessing a well-crafted set of lenses, visual receptors, and sensors. High end models are capable of capturing and processing visual information at rates that far surpass human levels. Because of this, Overseers made excellent lookouts, secretaries, guards, and translators.

Overseers by their very nature are created with the capability of maintaining and administrating network connections within small workgroups of lesser units. As such, they are often the managers responsible for the upkeep and maintaining status quo of automated project groups composed of Pixy Units and other Oakland units. Given their degradation in the modern day, this connected-driven mentality has proven problematic.

Overseers are often built and pair bonded with one or more designated Pixy Units for assistance, repair, and utility.

This page was originally created by Pancakei on Sun 30-06-19.