What happened to the Androsynth?

[Timmy Hendrix]

Was it the Orz? Never knew, never found out.

Played the original way back when, very excited to see this and I hope everything goes well or most of you will end up behind a slave shield. Juppa-wuppa!

[Happygamer]

Most likely they were all killed by the Orz.

[Wildmagister]

The Orz killed all the Androsynth, because of their experiments with "dimensional fatigue" technology. Some of this is explained in Star Control 2 if you piece things together - the Arilou say that they've been interfering with human development for tens of thousands of years, and part of their work has involved making humans invisible to transdimensional horrors by preventing certain tech research. The Androsynth were created by humans, rebelled, and left Earth before Star Control 1, but the Arilou felt no need to protect them - they were always focused on humanity and Earth, specifically. The Androsynth were quite smart and engaged in DF research, but it backfired and some kind of transdimensional horror noticed and destroyed them.

According to an interview with the developers some years ago, the Orz are some kind of a... feeler organ, tendril or series of fingers from this transdimensional being. Its motivations and behaviour are mysteries, but the Orz do not like the Arilou very much, and they would very much like to get to know humanity a little bit better.

Basically, the Orz are bad news. Really, really, really bad news.

And I love them. :D

[Timmy Hendrix]

What a thorough answer, thanks!

[Wooj]

The asking about Androsynth is so *frumple* we are not happy.
Do not asking it so much.
It is better not to *frumple* or else there is so much problems.
No more Androsynth is better.

[ChimaeraBach]

Imagine you're a microbe under the microscope. You're a very smart bug, so you decide to play with the glass slide you're on to get one over your less smart bug rivals. A scientist notices you knocking on the glass and picks you out of the slide with a pipette, and you're never seen again.

The Orz is this scientist, the androsyth the smart bugs... and the Orz are as understandable and empathic to us as we are to microbes.

Pass the Lysol.

[Slim Jim's Popcorn]

Both The Orz and Androsynth would have fascinating side storys to explore in the new game being made by Paul and Fred.

[redeyedraven]

Originally posted by Bob Weasel:

Both The Orz and Androsynth would have fascinating side storys to explore in the new game being made by Paul and Fred.

Paul and Fred are working on a direct sequel to the Ur-quan-masters though, so the Androsynth already don't exist anymore. In SC2 it seemed like the Orz were currently busy hunting the Taalo.

It seems there was not much story happening between Orz and Androsynth in the first place. The Androsynth just experimented with dimensional fatigue, were noticed, pretty much invaded by things appearing out of nowhere, and eventually were exterminated because they tried to defend themselves. It must have happened pretty fast.

And despite the best efforts of the Arilou, in SC2 the player does make contact with the Orz without them knowing. The Arilou stopped observing events after the Ur-quan cast the slave-shield on earth, thinking humankind is safe. Boy are they wrong.

The implied horror about all this is simply that the Orz may appear as a strange alien race but truly are just small pieces of something more ominous that's slowly moving into our dimension, not fully done with the transition and not fully aware of all inhabitants yet.