Invasive Species

In high school, I attended an assembly I remember vividly. Some biologist or researcher came in front of us to talk about ethics in science, and she brought up the fact that in Iceland, almost every fetus found to have Down's syndrome is aborted. I looked up the latest stats, and as of 2026, only 2-3 babies with Down's syndrome are born annually. Iceland has one of the lowest rates of Down's syndrome in the world.

The guy next to me, who always wore a cross on his neck, whispered, "That's so fucked up."

I like science, science fiction and thorny philosophical questions surrounding transhumanism, and Invasive Species offers some interesting questions to chew on. The game is set in an Earth 20 Minutes into the Future, where AI assistants are commonplace and an alien empire has come to Earth promising to uplift humans (biologically modify them into their desired forms) as long as the humans promise to (Spoiler - click to show)incubate the eggs of the alien species, and raise them when they hatch, in return. Also, it may or may not be an imperialist scheme to make the uplifted humans more politically and personally dependent on the alien species, extracting reproductive value from them while offering resources that are easily provided by the alien species but difficult for humans to accomplish (i.e. the alien capability to genetically modify and uplift human beings).

The bit I played was alright, so I was disappointed when it ended abruptly by saying that Interlude II and Act III are currently unfinished, and you should join a mailing list for updates. I would've vastly preferred to play through the whole game in one sitting, especially since I played on mobile. Which, due to how Twine saves work, erased all my progress the moment I fully closed and reopened Safari.

The game suffers from the lack of ending, because it means the story's toughest questions have no resolution. What ultimately happens to the people who are uplifted? What are the full moral complexities of the situation and how each faction perceives it? What are the eventual political consequences? We don't have the full story, so it's hard to write a full response.

Due to this, it also feels like the toughest questions aren't explored as much as they could be. The game cites Octavia Butler as an inspiration; the first Octavia Butler story I read was Bloodchild, and it's an unapologetically vicious story, no holds barred, exploring the full implications of alien imperialism in a way that parallels human imperialism. Invasive Species feels tame in comparison. The writing is a little rough, with some errors here and there. The style wasn't much to my taste because it was rather plain. I chose to get all the cognitive upgrades, which should theoretically have a great effect on how a person thinks and perceives the world, but it felt like my decisions on that front didn't really add anything besides some throwaway paragraphs here and there.

Back to the topic of human imperialism. There's another situation I thought of while playing this game: the famous North Sentinel Island, home to the uncontacted tribe of the Sentinelese, who have solidly resisted any attempt at contact. Some people online are horrified by their situation: "You mean that if I'd been born here, I'd be stuck in a primitive hunter-gatherer lifestyle with no internet access?"

But if some enterprising explorer were to assimilate North Sentinelese Island into modern society, the Sentinelese wouldn't instantly become rich white-collar workers enjoying the full benefits of technology. Historically, the neighboring Andaman peoples experienced mass epidemics and population loss from British colonialism; the Great Andamanese suffered extreme demographic collapse and only a few dozen remain. If contacted, there's a significant chance that the Sentinelese would die from epidemics, their land would be taken, and their culture and traditions would be wiped away as they are forced to participate in wage labor.

The Sentinelese have been historically kidnapped by passing seafarers and taken as slaves, and captured and killed by the British, so this wouldn't be outside the realm of their expectations. It happened to the tribes nearby who got contacted, after all, and to indigenous peoples across the world, including in the US. (We can assume this story takes place in the US, since The Johns Hopkins Comprehensive Uplift Center Informed Consent Form mentions US law.)

Should the Sentinelese remain uncontacted? A lot of Sentinelese might die desperate and hungry anyway. Modern medicine could help them, if the proper precautions were taken. Science and technology could do wonders if they were applied with safeguards. But this assumes a perfect world where said safeguards exist. As things currently stand, contact is likely to just make things worse. The Sentinelese remain isolated, and this won't change anytime soon. From the late astrophysicist Stephen Hawking: "If aliens visit us, the outcome would be much as when Columbus landed in America, which didn't turn out well for the Native Americans."

I'm surprised this story didn't delve more into the implications of an alien empire visiting our species. It didn't mention any indigenous groups or any real-world colonialism or imperialism. It takes place on an Earth quite close to our own, but in a distant, hazy way that steers clear of explicitly discussing real ideologies or history, and I think that makes the story weaker. Isn't it incredibly ominous that the aliens call themselves an "empire", given what real empires have done? But the only meaningful resistance to the empire's activities so far comes from other aliens, not from humans themselves. I want more news articles about the aliens and their "uplift" scheme from various groups with various political leanings. I want snippets of philosophical articles and journal articles set in this world, from a variety of academic disciplines. I'd take long essays on disability rights and how the idea of "disability" is conceptualized in our world, and how that ties into the aliens claiming to cure human imperfections. Actually, what is life like for aliens in the space empire? What kind of society do they inhabit? I want to know all these things and more. I want more.