(A multi-spectrum introductory sequence begins, in which the sensate is transformed into an air bubble, rising stochastically towards the surface of a neon ocean. Fast-paced orchestral music swells as the sensate's anticipation rises. The bubble breaches the surface, and detonates with the force of a nuclear bomb. Radioactive dust from the mushroom cloud forms the words, “The Xax Review”.)

X: Hey everybody, I'm Xax, and welcome to the show. Today we're reviewing Ancient Ujima's latest title Earth, and we're joined by special guest [Warmth and the texture of soft blankets compose a greedy satisfaction, but the lingering ache of loneliness is what endures]. Thanks for joining us, ζ. It's a pleasure to have you.

ζ: It's a pleasure to be here.

X: Let's talk about Earth.

Earth is the latest U released from the Ancient, Ujima.

Now, he’s been talking about producing this one for actual centuries at this point, citing it as his dream project, and the only worthy followup to previous works, such as the commercial powerhouse “You Can Just Turn Into A Snake” and the sentient, awards-winning, “My Girlfriend is a Sentient, Awards-Winning Anime??”

Earth is a big-budget title—more than a trillion sophonts donated compute during the fundraising—

ζ: ...and it's not very good.

X: [laughs in surprise].

Earth is definitely...very unapologetically itself, a core example of the roguelike genre. And you can really feel the impartial brutality of the dice. Disposable characters and no way to save your progress are, of course, enforced.

ζ: Well, while I agree with you that there are genre concerns—I think it's not just the randomness that's the problem.

I mean, people enjoy slot machines and Ş̴̬̞̉̾̂́c̸̤̑̈́h̸̩́ȑ̸͍̼̠̜͛̇̈́͜͝Ø̷̧͓̩͍̮̿d̶̘̅́͝ị̷̬͚̼͛n̵̛̫̺̑͗͛͝g̴͙̘̘͔̺̊ę̴̹̺̺̋̈́̕r̵͔͓͑; the problem here is that this is some really unfun randomness that can gimp your run for no reason. Like—is it too early to talk about character creation?

X: Go for it.

ζ: The problem with character creation is that you don't get to do it.

X: Well, you can change your character during the run...

ζ: Sure, I'll do that during my character's “free time”.

X: (Sad laugh)

ζ: No, I mean there's a bunch of nightmare-difficulty starts that just never go anywhere, and the game makes you play them anyway.

Like, in my last playthrough before I ragequit and blocked it so I wouldn't go back, I...here:

[Thoughtgram begins]:

In the hushed, fearful dark, in a village so poor that a roof is wealth, a scream splits the night, a bloody cry of pain and triumph. The young mother gives birth to a child.         

        But the child is thin, so sickly-thin it hurts to see her. The young mother is told not to nurse her, or name her, so as to lessen the grief when she dies.

        She names the girl-child anyway, defiantly and in public. The young mother is angry, and disgusted, at the way the others of the village seem to accept grief and loss placidly, without a teeth-bared snarling fight against the darkness that takes and takes.

        The child lives in pain, sickly and wracked by fever. She could be cured easily by medicine, but there is no medicine. The little child could cure herself, with enough food, but there is never enough food. The village pities the young mother, for her ill-fortune, and for her commitment to this little sickly thing that will only hurt and die.

        The young mother hatches a plan, a reckless desperate plan.

        In the dead of night, she steals to the neighbor village. She brings the girl-child with her, clutched to her chest, lest someone smother her baby thinking themselves kind.

        The young mother creeps through the darkness for hours, barefoot, until she finds the pen where a rich man keeps his cattle. She selects one of these, a leathery, fly-covered specimen, and ties a rope around its neck and leads it away.

        She returns to the village. She takes a sharp stone in her hand like her grandmother taught her, and punctures the neck-vein of this cow. It bleats in pain and protest, but does not struggle; this is something it has been conditioned to accept.

        She slurps the blood greedily, hot and raw from the wound, and feeds a few drops to her child. The sickly girl-child does not yet have the iron stomach of an adult Maasai, but she must develop it quickly if she is to survive.

        The young mother walks for hours away from the village, to find a copse of trees where she might hide the cow. It will require constant attention, to keep it fed and hidden, and if her crime is ever discovered she might be killed, or forced to marry the rich man. But for now, there is a plan, a thread of survival stretching into the future.

        She bares her bloody teeth against the darkness, in defiance and threat.

I will keep you safe, she declares to the child in her arms. No matter what.

        And she holds me tight.

[Thoughtgram ends]

X: Wow.

ζ: And then a year later I die of fucking malaria, for no reason!

Like...what??

X: Yeah.

[Reluctant acknowledgement] There have been a lot of balance complaints about rural Africa. And about the “dis-eased” mechanic feeling like random bullshit in general. Ujima claims that these things are part of the story ve was trying to tell.

\

ζ: But what story?? If there's a main plot, I never found it.

Or any plot, really.

I guess I kinda see what ve was going for? Like, there's this immeasurably vast and beautiful world going on and you're dropped into it as this...terrified powerless creature with no idea what's going on—

X: It's like being new.

ζ: [enthusiasm of being understood] Yeah. I think ve was trying to recapture the first few kiloseconds of existence, where you can sense that you're so small and everything and everyone are so, so big—

But ve does it without the hug. You're just sort of alone and no one has answers.

X: Maybe ve's trying to show us we should be grateful for one another?

ζ: Maybe? And I respect that as an expressionist piece, but...

Like, this could've been done as a game, or a sim, or a thoughtgram? Why does it take years to die senselessly?

X: Yeah.

ζ: Why the poop??

X: There has been a lot of confusion about the shitting.

ζ: [Exasperation] All the mechanics just feel so arbitrary. Like, I need to keep my character full of water? Water?

At least use something that makes sense, like joy.

X: [Amusement] Awright, awright...let's take a new track—what do you like about it?

ζ: [Impatience with the rote upside-seeking of polite society] There are many things I like about it.

Uh, sunsets are pretty, petting dogs is good—

X: [Excited remembering] Oh yeah, dogs!

ζ: I've really enjoyed milk.

And I like the epic visionary craftswhatever of it, I guess, but...

Ugh, can I just rant about the cessation mechanic for a bit?

X: [Fond surrender] Sure.

ζ: What the hell is with the cessation mechanic??

X: Well, within the rules of the U, they don't have cloud backups or dust reassembly, or the Akashic, or version control. So when a player is dead, they're actually, literally, totally gone.

ζ: [Confusion, indignation, and a lingering disquiet]  …

That just seems more grim than is even fun?? And, I really do hate to say this about the person who made You CanJust Turn Into A Snake, but this just seems like...juvenile edgelord bullshit.

X: Honestly, Ujima reported this project has been in production for eight centuries. This might actually be from his dark teen poetry stage.

ζ: Yeah…

[A sudden jarring moment of empathy and perspective] It's weird to think that an Ancient had a teen poetry stage.

X: [Distraction] Hm, wanna read Ujima's statement on it?

ζ:  ...literally “read”?

X: Yep. No immersion or emocues.

ζ: Sure.

Most Ancients have chosen to forget. And the new children of this bright age do not understand. They cannot.

This is for the best. There is no need, now, and those few who could comprehend our old lives would weep for the knowing.

Let them laugh and play. Humanity is ageless, eternal, and innocent — this is what we fought for.

But. I have made this monument for us, to honor what we used to be.

It was not good, but neither was it all rotten.

The Earth deserves to be remembered.

ζ: ...

X: ...

ζ: More inscrutable Ancient bullshit.

X: [Disappointment] Yeah, looks like.

Well, if Ujima isn't gonna shed any light on what the hell ve was going for, then I've got no choice but to rate this one four tendrils kata.

(A multi-spectrum sequence, in which the sensate, who is embodied as a disparate cloud of interstellar dust, spends accelerated millennia coalescing into a hot-burning dwarf star.  That star is plucked like a fruit and swallowed by a void giant, who wears a t-shirt bearing the words “The Xax Review”.

The giant turns to the viewpoint and frowns, disappointed. Four of its tendrils tesseract through three-dimensional space to gesture katawards. )

X: Anyway...I guess that's all the time we've got today on the Jax review. [Warmth and the texture of soft blankets compose a greedy satisfaction, but the lingering ache of loneliness is what endures]— thank you again for coming on the show; I always appreciate your perspective.

ζ: Anytime.

X: (Directly addressing the sensate)

So, if you want to play Earth—maybe you're in the mood for a weird, kinda existential experience, or maybe you like Hokto's other titles and want to give it a chance—I strongly recommend picking up a couple mods.

At minimum, you’ll want Stats Made Visible, Save State, and Give Me Quests, in order to make it feel less like you're bouncing around purposelessly in a vast unknowable cosmic sandbox just eating, screwing, and waiting to die.

Please remember to Like, Rate, and Subscribe.