WMG / Hi-Fi RUSH

The world around Chai isn't moving to the beat, it's just how he sees the world

Exactly as the title says, the world isn't actually moving to the beat. It is said that the music that the player hears is coming from Chai's music player and that music player seems to have replaced/connected to Chai's heart. Because of this new addition, he is now able to find and see the beats in the world, whether it is enemies attacking or the trees rustling in the breeze, and is able to react accordingly. To opponents, he's just a random gung-ho guy wielding a scrap guitar as a weapon that is emitting music that seems pretty good at hitting people.

• After the first tutorial battle in the game, Chai realizes there's a music player in his chest and while commenting about it's various powers, mentions that "It's making everything sync up with the beat.", which confirms that the world didn't sync up to the beat before then. Unless that music player is somehow powerful enough to be a Reality Warper, it's probably just affecting how Chai views the world rather than making the entire world sync up to the beat.
• None of the other characters seem to mention or reference the beat in the world, instead it is told to the player by Chai's inner announcer.
  • SMIDGE does comment on being able to see it, but considering how invasive SMIDGE is, it's unclear if it is just synchronizing with Chai like 808 did or really seeing the world move to the beat.
• After being defeated, Korsica does curse Chai's "stupid musical robot powers" for a fight that consisted of nothing but Chai parrying her attacks to the beat, so the executives are seemingly aware Chai is able to perceive their attacks this way, and it's an ability unique to Chai.

Chai's arm isn't actually disabled

Chai is seen using both hands to put the music player in the collection bin in the beginning of the game. He remarks in the first Track that all he wanted was a 'cool robot arm'. Chai also doesn't mention being disabled or crippled when Peppermint brings up that she lost her leg when she was younger, nor does his model viewer mention a disability. The model viewer straight up says he wanted a 'shortcut' to becoming a rockstar by getting a robot arm.

• The evidence against this is that Chai doesn't know how to play any instruments and only started learning after the end of the game (also after he got his robot arm) which might be an example of him recovering from a Dream-Crushing Handicap. The other Armstrong volunteers also don't have any notable (visible) disabilities like he does (though, again, they may not be visible), so why did Chai feel like he needed to ham it up by putting his arm in a sling if he wasn't disabled? He skipped the line with his atheltics anyway, so it's not he needed 'pity' card to skip the line either.
  • The Armstrong surgery machine is also able to detect that Chai's arm should be replaced (though Chai could have stated it in the forms he handed in).
• It's possible that Chai just had middling nerve damage in his arm that wasn't completely debilitating, but prevented him from doing anything fine with it, so he played it up a bit.
• Jossed. It is confirmed that Chai doesn't have full functionality of his arm by the director him.

Any sequel that occurs will be spiritual in nature or focus on a new protagonist.

The main connective tissue will be the character seeing the world and their fighting ability being in synch with music.

SPECTRA AI!Kale will be the antagonist of the sequel/DLC

Chai's solution to preventing SPECTRA from ever coming back into being is by putting a sticky note that says 'Do not touch - Chai', which is frankly, one of the dumbest ways anyone could solve this problem, someone could very easily plug it back in by accident (or purpose, as Roquefort points out, some people are genuinely loyal to Kale). Additionally, the achievement associated with this SPECTRA ending is called 'I can't see this being a problem ever again', which sounds like this will definitely become a problem again. Talking to Peppermint after also has her saying that she has a feeling that 'it's just getting started'.

The 'deaths' of the bosses are just in Chai's mind.

Similarly to the above concept of Chai's perception of the world's beat being just in his mind, he also sees the defeats of the heads (starting with Rekka) as more cinematic than they are. The bosses are left beaten, but retired, and without their keys are no longer of interest anyway.

• This explains the Bloodless Carnage of Chai's fights, while acknowledging the potential only real boss explosion in the game and the one that actually affected Chai; QA-1MIL's iconic -destruct. More, it explains the Angst? What Angst? of neither Roxanne nor Peppermint minding their son/brother apparently dying, and even ties into why Zanzo didn't explode when beaten; he wasn't a physical threat in the first place. Those that did seem to die are just off-screen, having been removed from the story anyway.
• While Mimosa does have PSAs about the "rumoured demise" of previous Heads of Department, it's still possible Chai him didn't do them in. Zanzo did build a failure-induced -destruct into some units, and considering all bosses but Korsica had implants and Mimosa mentions that they're developing a "lineup rebrand" of them...
• It could work like Scott Pilgrim, where the bosses respawn having learned the error of their ways.

Chai's music player deliberately chooses songs that fit his emotions at the time

Rule of Cool aside, the game already implies that the music player's grafting to Chai affects more than his physical abilities and reacts to stress (like when The Rush starts playing when he's hit by the SBR-001), so it's entirely possible that this includes picking the song that would be the most personal. With the streamer mode songs, that might even include the lyrics; even before the surgery, Chai is listening to "The Beacon" which is about being rescued from a dark, lonely place (possibly his own life prospects and hope about Project Armstrong), so it could be emulating the same habits.

• "I Got This", which only starts playing after he's started his escape, is about Chai's euphoria in getting freedom and attention, and having no intention of letting his new arm be taken away from him.
• "Too Big To Fail" is similar, focusing on Chai's determination to fight anything that wants to take away his newfound freedom.
• "Captive Normals" adds an extra layer to the ableist angle that being called a "defect" seems to have on him, as it insists on not submitting to anyone just to be "normal", even if that means acting well out of line.
• "Buzzsaw" is Chai's first genuine act of teamwork instead of being mostly serving, and the lyrics reflect a need to make it count despite the odds.
• "My Heart Feels No Pain" seems to specifically relate to Mimosa's contribution to Chai joining the project. The female vocals insist it can't be a lie if he took the risks knowingly, while the male vocals have a realization that it was a mistake but it's not too late; culminating in the duet talking about Chai being truly free from her propaganda as the last bit of truth about Vandelay was fully revealed in the previous Track - not even Project Armstrong was Kale's idea in the first place, and his "coolness" was all manufactured through altering the truth about his family.
• "Surfacing" is a reply to "The Beacon", having realized that a miracle wouldn't turn his life around, and instead Chai had to make the best out of his situation through effort.
• "In a Blink" starts out mild as the music player is malfunctioning, describing a moment of hesitation leading to being manipulated and brought into a strange world(much like Project Armstrong and SPECTRA); but once 808 breaks him out of it, the song kicks in at full force, turning into using that same strange set of new rules to take revenge.
• In constrast, "Negotiation" and "Reflection" have no lyrics whatsoever or a licenced counterpart, as Chai is focusing on the task at hand fully.

The boss themes are also based on the emotions present… of the bosses.

• Rekka’s song, "Free Radicals", could be perceived as her taunting Chai: “You think you're radical, but you're not so radical- In fact, you're fanatical”. It’s simple and snappy, like a playground insult.
• Mimosa’s song, "Fast As You Can", frames the singer as dangerous and to be avoided. While the original song by Fiona Apple is intended as sarcastic and self deprecating, Elsinore’s jazzy cover reframes it as a threat- Mimosa is not to be trifled with.
• Roquefort's song breaks this trend by being both a remix of a Classical, instrumental composition and an Incredibly Lame Pun: Wolfgang Gartner's Fifth Symphony.
• Kale’s song, "The Perfect Drug", is an explicit reference to his plan to mind control as many people as possible, their connection to the “Vandelay Family” being a “perfect drug” in a sense. It ties back to his twisted desire to spread happiness.