Thinking about people not liking what happened at the end of dawntrail like… hmm.
Did you not remember the stuff with the Yok Huy. Nobody is gone if you remember them. The phrase that’s been with us for nearly the entire game, “For those we have lost….” Emet Selch entrusting us not only with the legacy of humanity in general but specifically with the memories of the Ancients and Elpis.
Just because people are gone doesn’t mean they aren’t still with us.
But the people of Neo-Alexandria are kept from that. They can’t remember anyone they’ve lost because their memories were stolen and locked away in an eternal purgatory, unable to move on or be reincarnated. The quest where you go to the graves in Heritage Found was a big moment where I was like. Huh. This fucking sucks actually.
The endless are just computer simulations, and they exist because Sphene can’t bear to let them go. Can’t even let her living citizens mourn or carry on legacies.
And that’s not even mentioning the fact that she needs the souls of innocent *living* people to power this all.
I think it’s a really good metaphor for the digital age, becoming disconnected from our irl communities, uploading your entire life on social media. Profiles of loved ones who have passed on. AI chat bots providing temporary comfort but no real human connection. All of that technology requiring enough energy to slowly but surely contribute to the destruction of our planet.
It all seems pretty clear to me as an allegory but like, I guess some people just didn’t make that connection? Or maybe they just don’t think about all the AI stuff in the same way I do.
