I was initially thinking the MC was a unique Re-Gene that was maybe given free will to be a better infiltrator. I’ve got to agree with that though.
Maybe simply being away from The Farm and other Re-Genes too long broke the conditioning?
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But it was the MC themselves that mentioned the AI minds. Supposedly all re-genes have them - or did I miss something?
Plus, if telepaths were apart of every team then we probably would have encountered some in the warehouse fight.
Has anyone else heard of any other Re-Gene telepath anywhere else besides the MC?
I think if the MC is a Re-Gene then I believe they are certainly not normal.
I might be remembering something else or some theory someone talked about, but wasn’t it mentioned at one point that re-genes got their blue skin from being killed then re-animated? I might just be crazy but I swear i read that at some point.
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In the point where you choose to submit to the puppetmaster or become the puppetmaster yourself, I now suspect that’s a choice in choosing which MC you’re playing as. Heartbreak or Sidestep? Until then you’re both equally coexisting in the same body until one of them cracks the whip at the other.
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The MC also calls it a “story” in their recollection.
Summary
Like robotic constructs, Re-Genes are created, not born. They are subject to none of the rights of a proper human being. Like stem cell clones, they are supposedly mindless, just a body to strip for parts with no soul to fill it.
Human ingenuity might have enabled the GeniTech Corporation to reconstruct humanoid beings from the ground up. But giving them a mind, much less a soul? That is impossible.
Circumventing this limitation, the Re-Genes that the Special Directive employ as weapons are outfitted with artificial minds: advanced AIs that can mimic the acts of people, but aren’t truly alive.
Or so the story goes.
During the warehouse fight, the MC thinks of the Re-Gene team as voids and mentions they are shielded, but the MC is now stronger than expected and able to detect them - I think the Re-Genes are shielded from telepathic interference by the telepath leading them.
You are able to do something like this with the Wolf Pack gang. Here's some stuff the MC thinks
This is going to be the ultimate test of your skill.
Theoretically you should be able to influence, if not control, all seven of the WolfPack. They shouldn’t even be aware of your presence at the back of their minds; a shout in your head is not that different from a shouted command during battle.
Choice: …look at me now! They never saw my potential.
They never saw your true potential, did they? Imagine what you could do with a trained team, what kind of an advantage you would have in a fight. It’s exhilarating, which is a feeling you need to keep under control. You can’t let yourself get carried away.
Still, you can’t stop smiling at the thought of how surprised they would have been if they had ever learned what you could really do.
Choice: …I have to admit I am good at it. Did they try to steer me in this direction?
Was this what they imagined they could turn you into? Someone overseeing others, turning them into a many-limbed, many-eyed body ready to tear apart anything that ended up in your path. Maybe. You remember early training exercises in teamwork, but you never worked well with others.
Not until the Rangers…but that’s a road that has been closed to you now.
Choice: …I’ll do this if I have to, then slink back to the shadows.
You don’t like this, but that doesn’t mean you can’t do it. You’ll fight, but you’ll do it your own way. From the shadows. Playing the puppeteer.
Yes. Maybe that’s the way you should think about this. You’re not exposing yourself, after all; that’s their job.
You’re feeling like a conductor, the smile slowly growing behind your mask as the WolfPack responds to your telepathic nudges. It’s a thrill you hadn’t expected; a few years ago, this would have been completely out of your league.
Times have changed for sure, and the Special Directive will suffer for it.
The benefit of this structure is shown if your MC is ruthless when doing this
Still, you have a lot of toys to play with. All they have to do is wear the target down. !{hench_name} is the only one who is not expendable, so you make sure to keep {hhim} away from the fight.
Instead, you push Three and Seven into advancing together, drawing the attention of the target. As expected, the Re-Gene makes a move for them, moving fast and low in the shadows before attacking.
Just what you were waiting for.
See, most people going for hand-to-hand combat rely on the fact that people generally won’t shoot if they risk harming their friends. It’s an instinct most people have. But right now, you don’t mind sacrificing a few pawns—so you brutally force Five and Six to open fire, riddling their friends with bullets in the hope of…
Yes! There it is! Six definitely hits. For the first time, you hear a cry of pain as the Re-Gene reacts to the damage and rolls behind a crate.
So, I think the MC was given some basic training in this technique but wasn’t considered suitable for this role, and was moved to an infiltration program instead.
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Ok, everyone seems to be sold on the theory of MC being Regene, so I would like to present some arguments in favor of another theory. The MC is entirely human raised at the farm, maybe genetically modified or/and result of in vitro fertilization but human nevertheless.
A few months back I asked malinryden on tumblr about telepathic powers and the answer contained some key information I want to use.
“Dr. Mortum thinks telepathy is dangerous. Useful, sure, and it’s potentially the most useful of the boosted powers since it can’t be replicated with mods” - so there is no known way to create a mod that grants you even the most basic of telepathic abilities
There is also the fact that every argument made in favor of Regene theory can be applied to this one:
“You see teeth set in lipless jaws, shapes so alien they will swim in your nightmares for months. But you can’t look away. Later that night, you grimace in the polished steel of the mirror, trying to shape your mouth into the same frightening grimace.” - this one needs to be simply taken literally, there was a shark tank at the Farm and the MC decided to try replicate the look of shark with jaws open (let’s be real the image of shark teeth’s would be quiet memorable to anyone especially a kid)
“It’s not that you are bad looking, at least not with your clothes on. They made sure of that. Of course, you can’t allow yourself to look too attractive either and draw another kind of attention you are not ready for.”- the MC has scars, either from almost lethal training (the Farm wasn’t probably concerned with injuries as long as they were non-lethal and nonvisible) or plastic surgery.
"It could have been you, couldn’t it? Just doing your job, just in over your head, no idea of the sharks that had slipped into the water. You still remember being fresh out in the world, not making your own calls, just following orders. " - MC has been working for the Farm for the long time before they realize how dangerous it may be for them
Other than that, many have speculated that MC is not the only Regen telepath, but it seems unbelievable, we know that USA is using Regenes to fight wars abroad, If every team (which already is able to surpass every hero/villain on their own) would additionally had a telepath to steer them they would be able to take over the world, literally
So as I said I believe that the MC is human that was raised by the Farm either because they were aware of telepathic powers of MC or they were genetically modified and then raise by the Farm
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Neat. Cloning is a thing in this universe, although officially it’s supposed to be used for organ replacement and not creating a cadre of telepath infiltrators 
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I have one thing to say to that: ME3 Citadel
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What?!? 
, if you don’t mind me asking, where is this stated? I must have missed it…
at least in the timeline
the 1992 entry
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From the timeline:
1986: The GeniTech corporation patents the creation of lab-grown stem cell organs, revolutionizing the transplant industry.
Late 80s: Estimated birth of Redacted, later known as Sidestep.
Convenient timing 
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Dun-Dun Duuunnnn!
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Honestly, my opinion on the MC and Re-Gene thing is this: the MC is a Re-Gene, but what the public knows about Re-Genes (which is 90% of what the MC says on Re-Genes) is entirely wrong. I’m of the opinion that Re-Genes are entirely human, but are lab engineered (hence the MC not having a family but possibly having blood relations in other Re-Genes). Furthermore, the Re-Genes only look non-human because of the horrific experiments the Farm performs, as evidenced by the Heartbreak flashback where a person is killed then brought back to life, and it’s outright stated their skin is now blue. So for me, that ties into the MC’s desire to bring the truth to light - the government (of which the Farm is part of) is conducting horrific experiments on people in secret, and the MC is only one lucky enough to escape in anything near decent mental health. And that all of the dehumanising stuff we hear about Re-Genes is propaganda so people feel ok with the fact that (as far as we know) the Re-Genes are essentially enslaved.
I also think that whoever did the Heartbreak Incident was also a Re-Gene, and that they were either planted by the Farm (as a ploy to get the MC back into their clutches) or another escapee, whose experiences led them to being more obviously “broken” than the MC. I also think it’s possible that the entire forcing-people-to-kill-themselves thing wasn’t intended by them, but a possible side effect of uncontrollable telepathy. That’s also part of my theory as to why the Farm is so invested in the MC - I think the MC is either the only one or one of a few Re-Genes who has successfully controlled their telepathic abilities. I also kinda think the killing-then-reviving thing the Farm did might be part of their wider experiments with telepathy, though I’m not entirely decided on why.
Generally speaking, I think that having the Re-Genes be non-human, and thus having the MC be non-human, doesn’t really feel like it goes with the game thematically? I feel like the game (or at least my experience of it) is exploring the darker sides of humanity, and how traumatised people [read: the MC] can be and how that shows, and I don’t think the MC not being a human would go very well with that. The government horrifically experimenting on people who they’ve enslaved from birth, on the other hand? There’s both historical parallels that can be made (especially since it’s obvious the MC isn’t neurotypical) and it would fit a lot better with what we see in-game. I might be a bit biased since my MCs are pretty desperate to reveal the truth to people, and the text about that suggests the government is doing something incredibly messed up in the Farm that people (particularly Ortega, as is mentioned when the MC says they’d get themselves killed trying to stop whatever’s happening if they knew) would be horrified by, so that’s kinda what I think.
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I’ve also just realized what tries to take control of you in the course of the game might actually be The Farm somehow telepathically finding you and trying to take their property back?
I think you may definitely be onto something about the Heartbreak villain. I always believed they were another escapee who went mad and started making people kill themselves as some kind of twisted revenge but I think your idea is better: They didn’t necessarily order people to kill themselves but rather forced them to live what they lived - those horrible experiences. Maybe they wanted to connect with someone and were reaching desperately for whatever humanity they could find or maybe they truly completely lost their minds and weren’t in full control of their powers. But they weren’t true murderers, not in a sense that they actively wished death upon people. Maybe they just wished death upon themselves.
But I honestly never got the idea that the Farm was especially invested in the MC. It always seemed to me that they were “just another one”, especially since the MC’s powers didn’t really become powerful enough to be special until after the Heartbreak incident - which I personally believe was due to the fact that the MC learned from the HB villain and adapted their telepathy powers. I think the Farm is after the MC like they would any that escaped, they are their property. If they realized exactly how powerful the MC has become, however… I can see them making a true manhunt. I think the MC is probably the most powerful telepath to ever exist - right after the HB villain. But that one lost their mind.
What I can’t fathom tho is what they were trying to do to the HB villain. To kill them and bring them back to life, trying to open mysterious portals… I don’t see HOW that fits anywhere. What are those portals? How does that tie with re-genes or boots or mods or whatever? It brings a kind of (very dark) supernatural element to the story. What I wonder is if the MC knows what that was all about. I got the sense that they knew more than they let on…
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I just hope that the Farm (or someone/thing else for that matter) will not become the ultimate villain, and unstoppable power, that will conveniently trnasform the MC into an anti-hero that will rally everyone. I get that some people really don’t like to play villains and that’s fine, if there is a possibility to chose between anti-hero and villain it’s great (more playthroughs for me 
) but in a game where you’re supposed to be able to play a s a villain I hope the last antagonist will be heroes if you choose a full villain route.
I have no probleme going against other villains through the trilogy but there are already games where you end up saving the world, so I really hope the last stand will allow to put a very evil plan if you would chose so, to conquer the world or at least Los Diablos.
Since Malin talked about how he understood that many players expected many different things I’m not too concerned but since the more we talk about the Farm, the more it seems invincible, I really hope we found the way to deal with them without making them the final antagonist (if we don’t chose to be an anti-hero)
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Well at the core the Farm does seem to be the big bad of the story. I think what choices we have are everything in between.
I’m kind of hoping for a possible tragic end. A path of pure rot, decay and destruction, of the MC and those around them. It’d fit my uh, very unhinged MC more.
Relevant, as a character Sidestep reminds me of:
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I’m also really keen on seeing that
All hail Azula
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