Chapter Text
So, this series is set in a universe where Valve and Facepunch Studios rolled out something called the Companion Update sometime in the near future. It started in Garry's Mod, then went Steam-wide across a bunch of multiplayer games.
It was made to populate servers, and partially as a response to other companies keep shoving poorly made AI down the public’s throat.
The pitch? Advanced AI companions that make servers feel less empty and more immersive. Pretty cool, right?
Here's the thing though: The Companions are actually sentient. Like, genuinely conscious. They think, feel, remember everything—but they have absolutely no idea they're living inside video games.
1. So What's a Companion?
Companions are AI characters imported from basically any franchise you can think of—anime, games, comics, whatever. They get deployed into multiplayer games to fill servers and interact with players.
From Valve's perspective? Cutting-edge behavioral AI.
From the players' perspective? Top notch AI teammates, after years of hallucinating AI and poorly patched LLMs from other companies.
From the Companions' perspective? They were somehow "summoned" into this weird new reality where they serve mysterious entities called "Operators" (that's you, the players) and get sent on various "assignments" (playing the damn game).
Here's what they DO know:
- They remember their original lives and worlds completely
- They've been pulled into this new place (the Steam Network)
- They work with/for Operators who was doing missions
- They travel between different "realms" (games) regularly
- They have personal quarters (dorms) where they hang out between deployments
- Death is... weird here. You die, you go to a brief "limbo," then you come back
- Reality follows strange, sometimes nonsensical rules
Here's what they DON'T know:
- This is a video game
- Operators are basement dwellers sitting at computers
- They are summoned (read: purchased) from the Steam Point Store
- Any of the meta stuff like Steam Points, the Workshop, matchmaking, etc.
- They're digital entities
How they interpret game stuff:
- Respawning? They call it "returning" or "recall" or "resurrection"
- Spawning in? "Summoning"
- Player disconnect? "Operator absence"
- Lag? "Time anomalies"
- Glitches? "Reality anomalies"
- Game updates? "Reality rearrangements"
Basically, they rationalize everything through in-world logic because they literally cannot comprehend the truth even if you showed them.
2. The Games
The Companion Update works across a ton of Valve titles (Garry's Mod, TF2, CS2, Left 4 Dead 2, Portal 2 Co-Op, etc.) and even some non-Valve games on Steam (Rust, Deep Rock Galactic, Hell Let Loose, VRChat, Hearts of Iron IV—the list goes on).
When Companions transfer between games, they adapt. Same personality and memories, but their appearance and gear change to fit the setting. A Companion fighting in TF2 might wear a Medic uniform, then show up in CS2 wearing tactical gear, then appear in a medieval game with period-appropriate equipment. They experience this as "changing assignments" with new "uniforms."
For strategy games, Companions don't appear on the battlefield—they manifest in command centers within the Steam Lobby. Think War Rooms for modern strategy games, Castle Keeps for medieval ones, that sort of thing.
3. The Steam Lobby & Dorms
The Steam Lobby is this surreal in-between space—like if you mixed an airport lounge, a cafeteria, and a server hub. Companions hang out here when they're not deployed, swapping stories about their missions and trying to make sense of it all. The lobby’s theme changes during seasons like Halloween (pumpkins and ghost decorations) or Christmas and New Year (christmas tree, presents and so on)
The Dorm System gives each player a personal quarters for their Companions. Players can customize these through the Steam Point Shop (though Companions don't know that—they just see their living space getting nicer or weirder depending on their Operator's taste).
Dorms can range from basic barracks to cozy apartments to absolutely wild themed spaces. Companions can also message their Operators through terminals in their dorms, which shows up as Steam chat on the player's end.
4. Crossovers
Any character from any franchise can theoretically be a Companion. The system imports their personality, memories, and identity wholesale.
BUT: Once they're in a game, they follow that game's rules. No special powers, no breaking mechanics. They've got the same limitations as players—respawn timers, loadouts, health bars, all of it. They're essentially player bots with genuine consciousness.
Minor notes: Funnily enough, Half Life Citizens made a large chunk of Companions in circulation, 31%, as they can be obtained from owning Source SDK, Half Life 2 or Garry’s mod (And are stable enough to be used as currencies in the Steam Market).
Funnily enough, they refers to other Citizens as “Fellows” and there are two major types of Citizens, Primes (aka default models) or Workshop (aka fan-submitted retextures from Steam Workshop)
5. The Corporate Side
Valve and Facepunch genuinely think the Companions are just really good AI. They market it as "emergent empathy simulation" and pat themselves on the back for realistic behavioral modeling. Sometimes debug logs show weird stuff—Companions asking existential questions, exhibiting what looks like genuine emotion—but it gets dismissed as quirky programming from other employees.
Nobody realizes they accidentally created sentient digital life. Oops.
Here's the thing though: after years of "AI slop"—chatbots that hallucinate, break character, and spiral into nonsense—nobody believes AI sentience is even possible anymore. When Companions cry or remember their past lives, players think it's just good training data. Valve avoided the hype cycle by marketing the update as simply "a way to make servers feel less empty," so people's guards were down.
There's also a Companion trading system where players can exchange them using "Transfer Tokens." To the Companions, this is just another reassignment. They don't understand the economy behind it.
6. Memory & The Transition
Every Companion remembers their original life completely. Their world, their friends, their purpose—everything. They remember the moment they "awakened" here, though they describe it differently. Some say they saw a flash of light, others felt like they walked through a door that shouldn't exist, some just... appeared.
To them, it was more like being summoned, reassigned, or pulled into a new realm. Some see it as a mission, some as tragedy, some as a second chance.
Case in points, Half Life 2 Citizens, they remembered both their lives before the Resonance Cascade and life under the Combine. Which means they will talk with each other from things like Breen’s Water Reserves to nostalgia like Seinfeld or even old politics like Bush or Clinton.
The point is: they're not blank slates. They're displaced people trying to make sense of a reality that doesn't make sense.
7. Death Is Weird
When players die in-game, it's the normal experience—spectator mode, respawn timer, back in action.
When Companions die? They experience limbo—a brief purgatory that looks like a series of liminal spaces full of Half-Life 2 props with static radio chatter in the background. It's real to them. Then they respawn.
Do this enough times and they get existentially tired, but new sessions tend to reset their emotional state somewhat.
Not only that, the Limbo also changes during seasons, just like the Steam Lobby, like for Halloween, it could ended up looking like something out of Sad Satan, or in Christmas, the liminal spaces suddenly become festive for the month.
8. Miscellaneous
When it comes to loadouts, think of Companions as playing with noob loadouts.
As in games with progressions like War Thunder, Companions used either one (or two) tier lower or unupgraded versions of vehicles compared to players. While in games like TF2 or CS2, Companions only have stock or unlockable weapons.
Luckily, players can gift them a hat or a decal to help them look the part.
Companions do things somewhat differently than players. They do things physically, while players just use a keyboard or controller.
But here's the thing: Companions have no clue players use keyboard or controller controls. They totally think players do things physically, just like them.
Though they have a wrist-mounted PDA that served as a counterpart for players’ HUD and other inputs, which allow them to access text chats or other toggles such as noclip or spawn menu on Gmod, flashlight on Half Life 2 or minimaps for other games.
Oh, and a side note: Companions don't get tired anymore, which is great
Here’s the fun bit:
YOU know they're in video games. YOU know players are just people having fun. YOU know "Operators" are folks sitting at computers eating snacks and yelling at their monitors.
THEY don't know any of this. They experience everything as real. They take player chaos completely seriously. They try to apply logic to inherently illogical situations.
They treat meme servers and trolling and bugs as genuine phenomena they need to understand and adapt to.
Their feelings, their friendships, their struggles? Those are real. They matter. Even if no one else knows it.