Synapse: Fact or Fiction?
Synapse: Part I
Part I draws on events in AI history. Here’s the background to the references in your game.
PROSPECTOR
PROSPECTOR was an early expert system developed at SRI to help geologists assess possible drilling sites. It used encoded geological knowledge to make predictions. SRI’s account credits it with predicting a molybdenum deposit in Washington State.
Chess and go
In 1997, IBM’s Deep Blue defeated Garry Kasparov in a six-game chess match. In 2016, AlphaGo defeated Lee Sedol in Go. Those matches are the real events behind the newspaper material in your game.
Jeopardy
In 2011, IBM’s Watson beat Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter on Jeopardy! The challenge included interpreting clues built around wordplay. Jennings acknowledged the result with the line, “I for one welcome our new computer overlords.”
AI art
Image-generation systems provided the starting material for the AI art puzzle. We generated the images, then added the hidden elements needed for the solve. That second step is part of the puzzle design; the hidden images weren’t something the model supplied.
AI chat
Chatbots have a long history. ELIZA used scripted responses in the 1960s; later voice assistants such as Siri and Alexa brought spoken requests into everyday devices. ChatGPT’s release in 2022 made conversations with a large language model widely accessible. These different approaches inform the game’s chat references.
Synapse: Part II
Part II takes more liberties. The research areas below are real, but the events involving Synapse and Dr. Ada Voss belong to our story. These notes describe the ideas behind the game, rather than predicting what the technology will do.
Legal battles
Copyright disputes were part of the background when we developed the game in 2025. Disney and Universal filed a lawsuit against Midjourney in June of that year over alleged infringement involving their characters. The filed complaint records their allegations; the legal conflict in Synapse is fictional.
Universal basic income
Universal basic income is the proposal that everyone receive a regular payment without a work requirement. It appears in debates about how automation might change employment. Programs testing related forms of guaranteed income have run in Finland and Stockton, California. Our story uses that debate as background, rather than treating any one outcome as settled.
Autonomous vehicles
Driverless passenger services were already operating while we developed Synapse. Waymo’s account of its 2025 operations describes paid trips in several US cities. Our fictional vehicles draw on that area of development, with the story’s events supplied by us.
Human brain study
Neural networks take some inspiration from connected neurons, but a model is not a replica of a human brain. Research in neuroscience and AI overlaps in areas such as vision and language. Synapse uses that connection as a starting point for its fictional brain research.
Video AI impersonator
Digital avatars and generated presenters are the real-world starting points for the video impersonator in the game. Systems can generate a person’s appearance and speech on screen. We used the possibility of mistaking a generated person for a real one as a story device.
Brain implants and drug research
Brain-computer interfaces translate recorded brain activity into commands for external devices. Neuralink’s description of its PRIME study explains its work on helping participants with paralysis use a computer. This is experimental medical technology, and the implant in our story goes beyond what that study demonstrates.
AI is also being studied for drug discovery and development. The FDA describes uses across that process. That research inspired part of Synapse’s story; it does not establish that AI can reliably halve the time needed to develop a medicine.
Thanks for playing. For another evening with the game’s setting, our Synapse game-night guide has food and music ideas. You can also choose your next at-home escape room game.
