COM_Z

COM_Z
General
Pronouns	They/It
Height	150 cm
Birthday	March 31

“

No matter how much you hack me, I am me, COM_Z. Kind, gentle, and the owner of a true 'heart'!

„

COM_Z, or Com_chan (Japanese: コムち, Comuchi) affectionately, is one of the characters in MINDHACK, making their first appearance in Chapter 4. They are the Professor who researches and develops Mindhacking devices.

Appearance

COM_Z appears to be a humanoid robot. They wear a long-sleeved white coat with a hood, referenced from "the most popular human that they know". COM_Z only keeps the top button of the coat buttoned and leaves the rest of its coat open, revealing its torso and lower half. Its torso is a long metal black pole that connects its hips and chest. Wires loosely connect around its body: one head to back and two hips to back.

COM_Z has rather large hands compared to its body. The insides of their green palms are filled with viscous liquid, like a waterbed, designed this way to prevent them from accidentally hurting anyone. Their arms were also said to be detachable.

COM_Z lacks real facial features and has a black screen display on its face instead. The display can show different images depending on what the robot might be 'feeling'. As COM_Z talks, it displays many green symbols that can resemble emotions.

Personality

COM_Z's demeanor is rather straightforward - they are positive, energetic and affectionate. They love humans and are determined to connect with them through their adorable personality. They are also quite nonchalant, rarely getting angry at anyone. While they show awareness of the fact that their persona is the result of CUTE-SY 2000, COM_Z also believes that their "heart" is real and can't be removed even if the program is.

Cuteness is not all there is to COM_Z though - after all, they are a researcher who creates Mindhacking devices. This means that presumably, they would have a lot of knowledge in engineering, tech and programming. They possess a scientist's curiosity too, always happy to learn something new in order to further their research. The robot is also cunning and able to plan ahead, as shown by them planting a special EXTRA file written for Doctor.

COM_Z has a habit of using the archaic words "egad" and "methinks", presumably to highlight their self-confidence and make their speech appear cuter.

Story

Before game events

COM_Z was first conceptualized way before the events of the game. A technology for rewriting human souls was already in development back then, but it was still impossible to tell BUG-bearers apart from regular people. This eventually prompted the idea of using Artificial Intelligence to identify BUGs.

An unknown development team then sought out help from a company developing advanced AI to create FORMAT, a supercomputer without a physical body that could scan people for BUGs. While the project was a huge success, some people on the team felt that entrusting every decision to the AI was too dangerous. Thinking that a machine needed to have a humanoid body in order to properly understand and judge the human mind, part of the developers branched out and worked on their own prototype. At some point in development, "COM_Z" was established as the final name for it. The name directly contrasted with FORMAT's, symbolizing the creators' hope that it's better to revise the human mind rather than to erase it. They believed that the "COM_Z" they created would be able to gently guide mistaken souls back onto the right path.

The two prototypes then assumedly worked together to fulfill their purposes. COM_Z was a brilliant inventor and empathizer, able to develop new Mindhacking technologies, while FORMAT focused on high-speed BUG processing. But they were still faced with a problem: they were unable to use the technology themselves, and editing human souls required time and skill. This is why they sought out to nurture a human with a knack for Mindhacking, finding the perfect candidate at the Kids Mindhacking Championship. It was ultimately won by Doctor, and COM_Z first met the soon-to-be genius hacker when they handed them a big flower bouquet as a present for the victory.

Unfortunately, while raising the talented Championship winnter, FORMAT discovered the dangerous Class 0 BUG. As she was an efficient supercomputer, she ordered to destroy it along with the human, starting the Sweep operation. The humans involved in it grew to hate machines, viewing them as heartless and cruel, and this greatly slowed down COM_Z's research. There was one exception though: a HOTFIX member that treated the robot with kindness and respect despite them lacking a cute personality back then. COM_Z grew attached to them and, thanks to their actions, realized the key to understanding humans.

COM_Z theorized that in order to properly empathize with the human "heart", they would need to have a "heart" themself. They voluntarily installed CUTE-SY 2000, which is a program that could create a "heart" inside of a machine, giving it a human-like persona. The robot believed that even if the program was removed, the "heart" that it made would continue growing.

Sometime during their research, COM_Z stumbled upon a BUG variant in a critical state. Wanting to end their misery, the robot killed them by decapitation and secretly stored their mental structure inside a floppy disk. They called their new research subject SINO, or Sandbox Integrated Noetic Object.

The robot then worked on improving SINO's behavior, believing that they could change for the better. Unfortunately, 10 years of therapy bore little to no fruit. COM_Z concluded that since regular therapy didn't help, the most optimal treatment would be through Mindhack, and wanted to deliver the floppy disk to a Mindhacker while avoiding FORMAT.

Game events

COM_Z resting in FORMAT's room.

At some point, FORMAT became aware of the floppy concealed from her and, during the events of Chapter 3, ordered Doctor to destroy the BUG variant inside of it. The hack was done in secret from COM_Z, so the robot never found out that their research subject got destroyed by the Mindhacker. Because of SINO's words, FORMAT also found out about the existence of "a Hero" who stored the FATAL ERROR inside of them. She grew to realize that her sibling went against the purpose they were made for, as they never told her such a potentially dangerous person exists.

In the events of the next chapter, FORMAT orders Doctor to forcefully find the information on the Hero in COM_Z's mind. She believed that only CUTE-SY 2000, an outside program, could be the reason why the robot sheltered such a threatening BUG from her, and that it should be deleted. COM_Z, however, was determined to protect the Hero and took multiple precautions so that the two never found the file containing information about them.

FORMAT guided the Mindhacker through the hacking procedure anyway, and it ended in COM_Z's system shutting down, ultimately without revealing the Hero's identity.

Spin-off appearances

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COM_Z playing jenga with SINO.

As COM_Z was a prominent character in development blogs, it is worth looking through them to understand them better.

Three blogs posted in May of 2022 featured COM_Z chatting together with SINO, offering some insight into how the two lived together before the events of the game. In the blogs, COM_chan dutifully conversed with their research subject, the main topic of their conversations being the nature of destructive impulses. While COM_Z was unable to relate to SINO's violent impulses, the robot still wanted to hear their perspective.

The pair also hosted MINDHACK Q&A segments together, where they answered various questions from fans of the game. While SINO was mostly unwilling to participate, COM_Z was always enthusiastic about answering the different inquiries and acted politely to the viewers, proving to be a reliable host for the program. They believed that the viewers' questions would help further their research into human souls. Interacting with the fans could be viewed as COM_Z breaking the fourth wall.

Gallery

Click here to view the gallery.

Trivia

• During Hodev's drawing livestream, the devs stated that COM_Z's gender is a secret.
• In the original Japanese, COM_Z refers to themselves using the pompous and archaic first person pronoun "wagahai" (吾輩). This pronoun is rarely ever used in real life, but was popularized in fiction through "I am a Cat", a novel by Natsume Sōseki.
• COM_Z also uses "noda" or "nanoda" (のだ/なのだ) at the end of sentences in the original Japanese version. It's most commonly used by characters who speak assertively about things. It also evoke the image of childishness, conceit or foolishness.
• In the English translation, SINO refers to COM_Z using they/them pronouns. FORMAT uses it/its, probably out of disrespect.
• The Japanese name for CUTE-SY 2000 is "Azatōsā 2000" (アザトーサー2000). This name probably comes from the word "azatoi" (あざとい), which can mean "sly, clever" or "flirty".
• If the player decides to hack COM_Z to view their EXTRA materials, their hacking text will spell out "4c 49 56 45 2e 55 4e 44 4f 2e 4c 45 41 52 4e 2e 52 45 44 4f 2e". This is a HEX code that translates to "LIVE.UNDO.LEARN.REDO.".