FORMAT

FORMAT
General
Pronouns	She/Her

FORMAT is the AI in control of the entire Mindhacking facility. She serves as a guide for Doctor, the game's main protagonist.

Appearance

The wavy sensors.

As FORMAT is the AI in control of the entire building, she doesn't possess a physical body. However, the wavy, semi-transparent walls seen in almost every background in the game are FORMAT's sensors. They extend around the whole facility in order for her to maintain it.

Personality

Because FORMAT is an AI specializing in eradication of BUGs, she is always focused on efficiently completing her mission. She believes that all BUGs should be rewritten or utterly destroyed for the greater good of humanity.

FORMAT acts like a motherly figure towards Doctor, always showering them with praise even for completing simple tasks. The story is different with the other humans in the facility, though - she views the HOTFIX crew as expendable and is strict when giving orders. The AI was even more fearsome before as she lead the Sweep operation on the Class 0 BUG. Even the HOTFIX team captain is scared of her orders.

Story

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Before game events

FORMAT 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. The project was a huge success, and she would become the first AI specializing in BUG identification. Part of the development team, however, thought that entrusting every decision to a machine was too dangerous, and left to work on COM_Z, who would become FORMAT's sibling.

The two prototypes then assumedly worked together to fulfill their purposes. FORMAT focused on high-speed BUG processing, while COM_Z was a brilliant inventor and empathizer able to develop new Mindhacking technologies. 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. FORMAT insisted that the flowers were her gift, and that COM_Z was merely a proxy.

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 her as heartless and cruel. At some point the battle would end, with FORMAT believing that the FATAL ERROR had been destroyed.

The Mindhacking facility was then established, with FORMAT becoming its manager AI. Thanks to her high processing power and intelligence, as well as Doctor's skills as a Mindhacker, the facility had the highest performance. Other facilities replicated FORMAT on a small scale, but the replicas generally performed worse. It is unknown if attempts to fully replicate FORMAT were ever undertaken.

Game events

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Trivia

• According to Makiko Iwasaki, the game's English translator, FORMAT is referred to with she/her pronouns because her voice sounds feminine.
• At some point in development, FORMAT had a strict role of an AI boss.