Artificial Intelligence

Artificial Intelligence, known more commonly as A.I., is the act of replicating human-like intelligence in machines and computer programs to allow them to "think" for themselves. In the Meta Runner universe, the field is much like that of real life but with more advanced programs focused mainly on anything videogame-related due to the series' high amount of influence on videogames in general.

In the Meta Runner series
The series heavily focuses on futuristic style of machines and programs mainly for videogame purposes. The idea of A.I. is heavily consistent in Silica City due to the its culture revolving around videogames in general, so A.I. programs are usually involved in most aspects of the city's culture, such as A.I. for characters and functions, like Kizuna AI whose purpose is to help navigate those who play the online anime dating sim, Pocket Gakusei or A.I. that are meant to assist gamers such as Sheridan's idea for Project Blue to help revolutionize the gaming world.

Known Artificial Intelligence Programs
Despite there being many A.I.s in the series, only few have exhibited some form of awareness and emotion.

Tari/T.A.R.I.
Tari, the main protagonist, herself is actually an A.I. and was described by Derek Lucks as the world's most advanced A.I. program housed in an "artificial body". Originally, Tari was known as T.A.R.I. (Turbo Artficial Rapid Intelligence), an artificial intelligence program created by former TAS Corp. scientist, Dr. Sheridan in his experiment known as "Project Blue" which was meant to revolutionize the gaming industry.

Tari's sole purpose was to optimally complete any game presented to her and once successful, Sheridan began searching for a human host, a Meta Runner, who T.A.R.I. could be downloaded into in order to prove her ability to enhance the subject's gaming skills exponentially. However, he couldn't find a willing partcipant to be the test subject for the project until he was approached by one of TASCorp's very own, Lucinia Porter.

Desperate to have herself noticed by Lucks, Lucinia began wandering around the science labs of TAS Corp. in order to find something to help herself become more relevant as compared to Masa Shimamoto and Belle Fontiere and was accepted by the desperate scientist. According to Sheridan's video journals, Lucinia's skill skyrocketed thanks to a basic version of T.A.R.I. and decided it was time to update Lucinia with a more advanced iteration of T.A.R.I. as part of the experiment, but as the program was being backed up, an accident resulted in an explosion that wounded Sheridan and fragmented Lucinia's mind, with part of it being lost in the TASCorp server and another part merging with the T.A.R.I. program, to make the "human" version of Tari who was somehow implanted in a human body.

Theo/"Coconut Boy"
The playable character of the platformer, Ultra Jump Mania, and the deuteragonist of the series, is an A.I. that Tari met when she first warped into the game following Belle's failed speedrun. Despite being a simple videogame character, he is sentient and highly adaptive to the point of being far beyond a normal program as described by Lucks. He's capable of learning glitches, including one where he immediately figures out how to escape a room on his own using a stool, but he isn't very good at performing frame perfect actions on his own. Due to Tari's warping ability, he is able to somehow manifest in the physical world. However, he has a key weakness: if the thing holding his character data is destroyed (formerly his game cartridge), he'll die permanently unless the data itself is preserved.

Bot-Boys
Bot-Boys are robot characters who are commonly seen as "employees", working for big companies such as TAS-Corp, or even performing simple tasks such as making ramen. Some even appear in video games, one being Beach-Bot in Ultra Jump Mania, whose job is to make Theo clear puzzles or pay for DLCs. There are also Bot-Boys who live like normal "citizens", such as the first one Tari meets when she first wakes up and a few who live on the streets and get in fights. In general, they aren't very bright, as they usually only desire to do their tasks and get upset if they aren't able to do so. However, some have been shown to have other interests like the one working in TAS-Corp's shop, who seems to have a small crush on Belle Fontiere.

Elder Tomato
While he's been shown in Meta Runner to be capable of only reciting the backstory of Simpleflip Island, in the Ultra Jump Mania series pilot, a different Elder Tomato in the MD-5's Ultra Jump Mania cartridge is shown to be more intelligent, being capable of saying anything other than his scripted backstory speech and constantly struggling to keep his world's Theo, who is significantly lazier than the main Theo, on task.

Kizuna A.I.
Kizuna A.I., who prefers to be called "Ai-chan", is an A.I. that serves as the guide for those playing the dating simulation game, Pocket Gakusei. She, like Theo, appears sentient to a lesser degree and is capable of showing emotion such as excitement and disinterest during her time helping Tari around the game in her search for Lamar's profile to get into contact with MD-5. She is perfectly capable of understanding when someone asks her something absurdly ridiculous, as during a desperate Tari's attempts to find her friend, Tari searches "XXBodyPillowBossXX", which Kizuna understandably responds with an unamused face.