Here are 5 special Westworld voice command cheat codes to control hosts

HBO’s latest drama is a heady mix of sci-fi and the Wild West with a healthy dose of a robot uprising in the making. The show is a remake of the original 70’s drama that featured a fictitious theme park set in the Wild West, circa 1890s populated with robots that the guests are at liberty to maim, mangle and ravish as they will. The current day remake sports a lavish A-list of actors with the likes of Anthony Hopkins and Ed Harris as part of the cast and features the same premise though with a few twists to the plot.

What is Westworld?

The robots that populate Westworld in HBO’s remake are dubbed as ‘hosts’ and are essentially human for all intents and purposes and, as the show is constantly wont to show, built with all the plumbing intact as many act as pleasure bots. When shot at, they’ll bleed and even go through a charade of dying though they’re back up and at them when their creators haul them into the deeper levels to resurrect them in a gruesome, almost clinical process. The show is still set in a fictional recreation of the Wild West though this time the show weaves together a tangled plotline that has had fans speculating on just what the heck is going on with everything from alternate converging timelines to a paranoia-laden horror fest with fingers pointing at everyone being a robot ‘host’.

Five episodes in, it’s clear that the show has built sympathy for the lot of the hosts in Westworld as the depraved human ‘guests’ that keep dropping by unleash their worst desires on the hosts in the park every time they drop by. Dolores Abernathy, the female host dolled up like a Disney princess experiences a Groundhog Day experience of being a damsel in distress doomed everyday to being ravished or, more unlikely, saved by guests. It’s enough to drive anyone bonkers but the hosts’ memories are wiped every day, their injuries repaired and then reset into their narrative loop one again as if nothing has happened.

 

* SPOILERS AHEAD*

 

What are the Westworld voice commands?

Sometimes, things really go south in Westworld and you have a bunch of angry robot ‘hosts’ on your hands. Unlike any piece of machinery though, the hosts are so sophisticated and look so human that they lack an ostensible off switch. That is, unless you know these handy Westworld voice commands that the staff that run Westworld use in case something goes pear-shaped. Most of them are literary quotes from famous writers and poets. Remember them well, they’ll come in handy. Westworld airs weekly on HBO Asia . For more details swing by their site here http://hboasia.com/HBO/en-my/shows/westworld

 

Westworld voice command #1  – “These violent delights have violent ends”

Effect: Unknown. Seems to activate advanced reverie and self awareness in affected hosts.

This was first whispered by host Peter Abernathy to Dolores and from her to Maeve. The effect is identical, almost akin to a virus or trojan horse in that it triggered self awareness and the ability to remember past roles as hosts and memories from previous loops. Presumably if used on a host, it may give them an existential crisis or a nervous breakdown as what happened to Peter though it may take too long for it to take effect if you’re in danger. This is a quote from Shakespeare, specifically Romeo & Juliet.

Westworld voice command #2  – “Soon this will feel like a distant dream. Until then, may you rest in a deep and dreamless slumber”

Effect: Pull the plug and put a host immediately into sleep mode

This is used several times in the show and is used by Elsie the Delos engineer to put Dolores into sleep mode when she is still active in an scenario loop and again when she is in Pariah at the parade. Saying this to a host instantly makes them unconscious which comes in handy.

Whether the effect is to target all hosts in audio range is unclear but the keywords are ‘deep and dreamless slumber’ that seem to trigger the effect. Still, it might come in handy to pack a megaphone when you go to Westworld in case you need to knock out an entire army of hosts like a bunch of angry gun-toting Union soldiers rather than laboriously having to shoot them all one by one. Just saying.

 

Westworld voice command #3 – “Analysis mode”

Effect: Activates diagnostic backend mode in host
This is used several times throughout the series and immediately disables any personality or emotion that they have displayed at the moment, turning them into emotionless robots that respond to diagnostic queries. This is the effective equivalent of the command console for a host and allows engineers to ask technical queries and questions that they would otherwise not be able to ask or that they would dodge if their personality was ‘activated’.

Dolores, when asked in analysis mode was able to give the exact time that she last met one of her creators down to the hour. When ordered to do so, a robot child host was forced to admit that they were lying when they gave a statement.

 

Westworld voice command #4 – “We must look back and smile on perils past”

Effect: Instant healing of target host

When Dr. Ford meets the Man in Black and Teddy in a bar, he notices that Teddy is the worse for wear; no surprise seeing as he was hanged on a tree to die, had the stuffing beaten out of him and was nearly at the robot equivalent of death’s door if not for a blood transfusion with a pale face and a look that resembles twenty hangovers combined into one. He is virtually dragged into the bar by the Man in Black.

All it takes is for Dr. Ford to say “Mr. Teddy, we must look back and smile on perils past, mustn’t we?” for him to instantly regain his vigour, empty his shotglass and get up and at it. The quote is from a poem by one Walter Scott called the Bride of Triermain. Presumably, the key words above instantly reset the health meter of any host you indicate though it seems that Robert Ford indicated this with a touch on Teddy’s shoulder or the whole room of hosts would have benefited from the effect.

 

Westworld voice command #5 – “Turn the other cheek”

Effect: Gets a child robot to open up their face in a terrifying fashion

When Dr. Ford visits a recreation of a moment in his childhood populated by robot host recreations of himself as a child and his siblings, parents and family dog, he utters this command to get his creepy child self to open his face up like a terrifying robot hookworm to reveal the robotic skull and innards beneath the ostensibly human exterior.

Presumably this is for diagnostic or repair purposes though seeing the specific nature of the command the fact that it is intended for first generation hosts that are robotic ( current day hosts are described as being organic to being near human in nature), it’s unlikely to work though it’s still worth a shot.