NAVI (technology)

Gung Ho NAVI (left), Yukikaze NAVI (center) and DNAVI (right) lament their inability to drink sake.

A NAVI, short for Navigational-type computer, is a kind of shipboard artificial intelligence used in Maximal and Predacon starships during the Beast Era. NAVIs possess more autonomy than "dumb" computer systems like Sentinel and often display what might be termed an excess of personality. NAVIs form strong attachments to their ship's crews and, though programmed to execute orders as received, can boast definite opinions which shape how they choose to interpret said orders.

NAVIs are consistently designed to have the voice and intonation of young women, though their personalities can range from saccharine sweethearts to exacting taskmasters. Ambulatory NAVI units such as the one designed by Skywarp can sustain a NAVI's existence even after the ship housing its data banks has been destroyed. NAVIs can likewise have their programming uploaded into full-fledged transforming robot bodies, though such instances are uncommon.

Fiction

Japanese Generation 1 cartoon continuity

Beast Wars cartoon

The Predacon computer on board the Darksyde was referred to as "NAVI-ko" by Megatron and the other Predacons.

This is true only for the Japanese dub, in which the computer demonstrated a decidedly different personality than in the English version.

Beast Wars II cartoon

NAVI was the computer for Lio Convoy's space craft, the Yukikaze. She originally had no corporeal form but was given a small, hovering LED screen for a body.

Beast Wars Neo cartoon

The NAVI for Big Convoy's ship, the Gung Ho, was virtually identical to the NAVI of the Yukikaze, save for having different colors for her LED body.

The Predacon ship, the Dinosaur, on the other hand, had DNAVI (short for Devil NAVI).

Yokohama Decepticon Secret Base

NAVI-ko acquired her own Transformer body with a dolphin beast mode (which she used to travel through time and space). Yokohama Decepticon Secret Base

2006 IDW Beast Wars continuity

White Propionica used a computer called "Navi". The Hot Rod

Shattered Glass

Jetstorm's ship was equipped with a NAVI assistant. When Emulator demanded that the rest of her human parts were taken out, Jetstorm began drawing up designs with NAVI. Not much later, Jetstorm and his colleagues were ordered back to the Underbase and Jetstorm ordered NAVI to activate the engines. As they were now stuck on the enemy ship, Emulator and Rick hid themselves inside one of NAVI's floating monitors. Just as they were meaning to leave their hiding place, Jetstorm grabbed the monitor because it displayed a warning of the approaching Annex. They got out when he left to deal with it. Coalescence

Known NAVIs

• 
  NAVI-ko
  (Beast Wars)
• 
  NAVI
  (Beast Wars II)
• 
  NAVI
  (Beast Wars Neo)
• 
  DNAVI
  (Beast Wars Neo)
• 
  NAVI-Q
  (Timelines)
• 
  B-Navi
  (Timelines)
• 
  R-Navi
  (Timelines)
• 
  NAVI
  ("Coalescence")
• 
  Navi
  ("The Hot Rod")

Notes

• Although not confirmed, it is likely that the term "NAVI" is derived from a line of dialogue from Megatron in "Beast Wars (Part 1)", when he asks the Darksyde computer: "Navigation! Is this the right planet?" Japanese regularly abbreviates words and the abbreviation of "navigation" is navi, so it appears that the Japanese production staff misconstrued or perhaps deliberately repurposed Megatron's declaration of "Navigation!" as the computer's name.
• Although not a NAVI, the human-made Martian emissary has similar design aesthetics to the NAVIs and his programming is compatible.