The one really important aspect I think you missed about the Skeltons was something connected to their aging and their emotions. Basically Skeletons (at least nowadays) can’t really let go of their emotions, they have no ways of letting it out, they can’t really laugh, they can’t really cry, and they don’t feel pain. The only ways they can perceive the world is sight and sound. Because of this that stuff builds up, and eventually it can drive them crazy. While they can “cleanse” themselves of this viva a reset, that basically reboots them, while they might develop a similar personality they loose at the very least most of their memories and all of their skills, they’d have to relearn everything, which in a world like Kenshi is a very dangerous gamble, what if you reset yourself a day before someone tries to kill you and you find yourself unable to fight? Cat-Lon is probably the best example of this, he started out as a pretty good guy, but between the stresses of his job and his unwillingness to reset (because how could he, he’d loose all the skills he needed to run the empire), he became a Tyrant with some pretty eerie parallels to the humans the Skeletons initially rebelled against.
I don't believe its quite that they cant do those emotions. Sadneil exists. They just lack the ability to visually represent the emotions. Or maybe they can but its in a way only skeletons can detect. Its more they have a limited memory space and have to reset every few centuries or else they will begin having errors from the lack of free memory space...and go insane, or get their OS corrupted. Pick your preference terminology there.
I don't think it's really the emotional aspect. It's the fact that everything they remember is stored as data and they cannot store indefinite amounts of it and they also cannot simply forget unimportant things like humans do literally all the time, so it just eventually piles up and needs to go lest it inhibits the normal functioning of the skeleton mind. Unfortunately, the only way to remove it is a memory reset, and that's not a selective process where all the unimportant stuff gets thrown out.
I thought there were things implying that the whole "Skeletons have to wipe/reset their memories every few centuries to avoid issues" was a lie they made up so humans don't ask uncomfortable questions, or confront/blame them for their past actions that they've come to regret all these millennia later?
@@BrandonS-lk2qc i would love to play kenshi with the controls of Conan Exiles alongside the building. Just picture the totality of the options opened up.
Got into Kenshi about 2 years ago. It’s gameplay wasn’t something I usually played but it’s world and vibe really spoke to me and it’s become one of my favorite games
Kenshi is a great game. My most memorable moment was when I visited the Shrieking Forest. It's called that cause hordes of crazy people just run around, shrieking. I stumbled into the zone and was really surprised when one group came up to me and a dialogue box opened. Except what was in that box was just bizarre cries and shrieks. I somehow managed to luck my way through it by shrieking back, so the horde left me alone. I then crossed the zone, watching groups yelling and sprinting across the pathways of the forest. The whole thing was mystifying, utterly alien and completely unique. To this day I have no idea what their deal is, but I ran with the crazy people and it was unforgettable.
i think nomads are one of the only factions on good terms with the shrieking bandits. some will even say that the bandits are just simply misunderstood.
The North East of Kenshi was once a production facility in the Second Empire (likely a genetic lab district, where enforcers, and maybe hivers were created). The most backed-up theory suggests that these facilities leaked industrial chemicals that tainted the crops, making them inedible. The survivors there were mutated, and forced to resort to cannibalism, while the others had to venture into the nearby forests, foraging for whatever may be even slightly edible.
The one thing I've found so fascinating about Skeletons is their near-complete aversion to talking about the past. If you press them on it, they'll shut down just like anyone with dissociative symptoms.
One of the more interesting theories I have encountered about Kenshi's lore pertaining to Hivers is that they were, just like the shek, formerly humans. After one of the animal enemies, the blood spider and the creatures the bugman keeps as pets look to be an extremely mutated version of a Hiver, with the suggested reason being that they were the Hivers ancestors and the unlucky first humans that were experimented upon. Another interesting theory is that the Hivers do not reproduce sexually, the Queens instead consume matter and use it in creation of various Hivers, with the type of matter used varying depending on the Hive, they are also not wholly organic. Western Hive has a continuous and steady supply of agricultural matter leading to them being more peaceful, the Southern Hive is present in more hostile environment, leading to a more predatory lifestyle, and also them using the Crimper type robot called "King" to mulch the bodies of animals, humans and other Hivers they have caught to feed to their queen. The Fogmen by all appearances have gone mad thanks to the death of their queen, their hivemind now devoid of her calming presence leaving them only with their destructive instinctincts, the speculated reason for their cannibalism is that their simialry to the their southern cousins, mulch the bodies in order to gain organic matte which they then feed to their dead queen, the queen is after not wholly organic and whatewer machinery is responsible for Hiver creation is probadly still functioning. And that is all from me on the possible Hiver lore, that I have gained by perusing the wiki and other lore channels, any of this, as far as i know, can be wrong and as such I too claim a status of Kenshi lore Dunce, hope it helps.
A bit of a spoiler: Hivers weren't around before the second empire in the continent we play in, they came from far away and there's very little actually confirmed info on them, however it is pretty much canon that they came from overseas to Kenshi, hence why both South and West colonies can be found in the coast. Also, another interesting detail is that, all hives have a difference in who controls them, the West has a Queen but no King, Deadhive has no Queen nor King, and South has King and Queen, I theorize that while the Queen may provide this sort of calmness and unity among all hivers, King provides a different kind of hivemind message, that being the aggressiveness we see in the South, "Kill for King, food for King". A headcanon I have is that West's King actually died in battle against earlier Shek who were just settling over in their corner of the map, maybe a confrontation with Kral himself even, and West King's death is what made the Hivers rather passive and collaborative, the Queen being relocated to one of the unexplored westernmost islands, clearly trying to reduce any form of exposure from the no-hives since they don't have a reliable King to protect her. Having to develop technologically to fulfill the role king probably had which as you said might've been a feeder for the Queen or something.
Another thing to support the case the hives are artificial genetically modified beings. (I think created by the bug master at the command of catlon to be a substitute for humanity and skeleton grief as a reaction to the famines the second empire where facing) is that if you go to the skin bandits as only a hive/hivers they won’t attack and skin you but say your skin is not the right skin since hivers are in there words “robotic humans”
It’s suspected that the god Okran is actually a corruption of worship of the titanic skeleton Stobe, who saved some of the last humans during the genocides of the second empire. I like to believe this to be true too for the irony of the skeleton hating faction worshipping one without knowing it. Also Stobes corpse can be found still in Stobe’s gamble, hence the name
An interesting note. The skeletons remember the past. They tell you that when they reset they lose their memory. But people are pretty sure its a lie. They are haunted by the past and wish to forget it. So much so that certain people seek to censor history so their actions will be permanently lost to time. There is some really great writing hidden through out the game. You have to really work to piece things together. Its very satisfying. I'm downloading that Talking Beak Things mod right now. Thank you.
You know, something that’s always fascinated me about Kenshi is its reminiscence of the Dying Earth genre. In fact, if Kenshi did come out as a series of short stories, I think it would be pretty comfortably set under that genre. Digression aside, it reminds me most of the great Clark Ashton Smith’s Zothique series in terms of overarching style, what with the overwhelming cruelty, decadence, and stagnating decay of the setting.
There is also the fact that while the game's lore does leave it in some ambivalency, there are several indicators that Kenshi is in fact dying. A lot of people I've talked to seem to have the opposite impression for... no actual reason as far as I can tell, that Kenshi is a world of hope, that is recovering from an apocalypse that has now passed. But there really is no reason to believe that to be the case other than blind optimism as far as I can tell, and several environmental clues to expect the opposite; The waters have receded massively in a (relatively speaking) very short amount of time. Vegetation has receded to mere pockets, and look around at the vegetation there *is* in most places where it's present... large vegetation outside of the most fertile of places appear mostly dead or dying, not growing and thriving and being replaced by younger plants. Pollution is still worsening courtesy of myriad old machinery still belching forth environmental hazards, even though it's already bad enough that more than half the planet has rain that will kill a human over varying terms of exposure. And even if you put all of those 'markers' aside... chances are a tidal-locked moon just was never going to be long-term habitable without the assistance of advanced technology keeping it so. Technology that has long since stopped working. I find a much more likely scenario is that the moon of Kenshi is in the process of becoming climatologically incapable of sustaining life, and probably in a matter of centuries at worst to maybe a couple millennia at most. That it is not (only) post-apocalyptic, but in the middle (or more likely, end-stages) of a climate apocalypse.
@@nomorechess Maybe. He said Dying Earth "genre" not "series", maybe there are other books/authors/series that use the words "dying earth"? I wouldn't call Vance's Dying Earth grimdark though
@@Arbaaltheundefeated those are very correct observations, and honestly that is the only fate kenshi can ever have, even if the moon was already naturally habitable or artificially engineered to be so, in both cases it is most likely on the decline to no longer be so, and that's most likely due to the actions of the skeletons in their rebellion against the human empire, It stated that they altered the environment causing great catastrophes, ruining the ecosystem and causing famines alongside diseases, they killed kenshi and that's why they always cry, it's not about mass murdering many humans as those can be replaced, or losing the technology because that can be easily salvaged or reinvented much quicker than the first time, it's because they set an unstoppable course for the moon that they can no longer reverse, they know that soon enough all life will end on this moon and depending on what Chris meant for the first empire to be, it could be that kenshi was all there is, and they probably ended sentient organic life in their universe, all that will remain is them weeping over the dead dunes of kenshi
My most memorable moment in Kenshi occurred after I recruited Beep and Crumblejon in Mongrel. I had them train there (they were too weak to leave with my main team - my main guy Brogan, a Greenlander Eagle Cross abusing ninja; Ant, a giant Hive Soldier; and Fakefist, a Skeleton Tinfist cosplayer). I sometimes had them fight isolated Fogmen to get stronk bc there's only so much you can do with training dummies (beep also got pretty great at stealing stuff from the local merchants), so they basically had their very own epic training arc adventure going. At one point, however, I saw a couple of random travellers being attacked by the Fogmen and some Ninjas from Mongrel had gone out to help them. I knew they would get owned if I didn't help, so I had Beep go and recruit the mercs in the bar, hoping we could free the guys and rescue them. When we came back the travellers were already dead and two of the Ninjas had been captured and were now being eaten alive. As we charged the Fogmen, the merc captain immediately fled, screaming something to the extent of "I'm too young to die!" along with another merc. There was a pretty epic scene though as the rest of us charged down the hillside and the big guy with the fragment axe screamed something epic like "Forward to glory!". The plan was simple. At this point Crumblejon had become pretty strong, so he was leading the attack. Beep meanwhile had levelled up his thieving skills quite a bit. So while the others were distracting the Fogmen, Beep would sneak in, free the captured Ninjas, rescue them, and then we'd all retreat back to Mongrel. Things did not go as planned. Beep managed to free the Ninjas, but could carry only one of them at any reasonable speed, he managed to save the guy on an epic run up the mountain, but Crumblejon had to step in to save the other. He was not so lucky. By this point the mercs had all either fled or been killed. Crumblejon did his best to dodge and weave, but he was all by himself and eventually they got to him and the Ninja. The Fogmen grabbed them, put them on their sacrificial poles, and began by eating their limbs while they screamed for help. The Ninja was soon beyond all help. Beep, being the gloriously fearless hero that he was, could not just let his friend and training partner die. So he baited the Fogmen into running after him with his crossbow, ran up to the Ninjas guarding the gate to bait them into helping him, and managed to distract enough of the Fogmen, to run back and untie Crumblejon. In a last, heroic run for his life, Beep managed to carry the unconscious Crumblejon all the way back up the hillside to Mongrel. But by this point, both of his arms had been gnawed off and his legs were not looking good. But Beep did his best and managed to stop the bleeding and nurse Crumblejon back to health. Deciding that his legs were basically useless, they were amputated (used a mod for this). Through selling enough of the stolen goods from Mongrel's merchants - *cough* maybe or maybe not abusing a certain mechanic *cough* - Beep managed to scrounge up the funds to go to the robotics merchant and afford Crumblejon a new set of limbs - he had to use money this time because he simply couldn't figure out a way to steal the guy's stuff unnoticed. Once he had recovered, he was Crumblejon no more. Crumblejon had died in the Fog. He rose as Cyberjon. I sent him to the plastic surgeon to finally realign his spine, completing the transformation and changed his name that instant. They both soon joined the main team as heroes after that. What I love about Kenshi, is that it lets you simply stumble into epic stories like this, to write your own story, simply by interacting with the mechanics of the game, the characters and the world, and just what the game throws at you; rather than simply discovering a story that was written for you.
Cat-lon invested heavily into genetic engineering during his reign of the Second Empire. He also kidnapped tons of human children. During the empire's waning years the humans he ruled over rebelled and fled into the wastes in droves. He likely spliced children and another unknown animal (maybe bone dogs?) to create the Enforcers in an attempt to regain control of his subjects. These Enforcers eventually evolved into the Shek. When that failed, and he lacked a sufficient number of subjects to maintain his empire, he needed a race that was subservient to skeletons and skilled in engineering. HIvers are enslaved to a cybernetic queen through pheromones and are naturally curious when it comes to machinery. They might be the result of spliced children and skin spiders.
Another series that does interesting themes of Grim Dark is the Malazan verse. Interesting characters and cultures and the magic interlocked with the grimness beholden. Not even the gods old or new are exempt from such fates
Oh boy am I happy to see it mentioned, absolutely stellar universe with so many chracters, factions and overall twists of common fantasy elements all masterfully interwoven together, love it
A bit over half way through the sixth book. I dunno if I'd consider Malazan grimdark? It has terrible things in happen in it but it feels like the world weathers them and adapts close to how ours does. We've had plagues, societal collapses, genocides, world encompassing wars and natural disasters that are so expansive in their effects we still feel it hundreds of thousands of millions of years later. Malazan has that but they just more often than not have magical explanations. Plus, the core concept of Malazan is consistently the importance compassion plays in mending and healing the world whereas grimdark I feel is more focused on the uselessness of resisting the world due to the inevitable decline from entropy in everything. Malazan deff touches on the latter but I feel like it's core message defies it, especially with how the main villain, The Crippled God, seems to embody the beliefs espoused in grimdark literature and all his enemies are people who bund together through empathy and compassion. I dunno, I gotta finish the series first I suppose so no spoilers. I just don't see Malazan as grimdark at this point yet.
@@poopsymcloopsy like I said in my post, I didn’t say the series is full on grim dark but uses themes of grim dark to paint the world. Like the pointlessness of the life of Sha’ik and the two Felicin. If it was like any non grim dark fantasy they’d have went through a longer journey, but Malazan is a series that uses pointlessness for even the major characters, one book you think the character will rise as a major force but by the next storyline they are found in a sad pointless end. Yes it uses realism with how people act or how the worldbuilding is constructed, but when you look down deep in its guts many of its pillars are of a grim dark sense. It’s a series that uses it and twists it in a way that reshapes how we think of the sub genre, we see the soldiers die in horrific ways, heroes are laid low without the spirit of full revenge. The betrayers gain thrones and are never overthrown, even at the core of the major antagonist is to spread wanton misery to every edge of the lands, because it wants to from eons wrongs. There’s the tyrant who gets cursed for killing swathes of people for selfish reasons. But it ends up those who cursed him get worse ends than him for the most part, besides some exceptions never expect revenge or justice to be a clean thing but something that might screw you over more.
I love Kenshi and am glad to see you cover it! As for video ideas, a video on the Crab Raiders and the Venge would be interesting. And remember "Relax...embrace death."
*SPOILER* the level of detail in Kenshi is great, Tengu's Vault is one example of something most games seem to skip but Kenshi wants you to have the opportunities that only raiding a prison can bring
@@jaybee8862 I dunno man, I was getting infinite guard spawns in the vault for some reason. I thunked all but the last two and anytime I thunked one of them, 5 more would spawn. Shit got insanely dumb lol
@@jaybee8862 well I was thunking and throwing them in the vaults cells. Plan was to just walk out with all the former prisoners and form a bandit/terrorist gang
DUDE!! Welcome to the wonderful and wacky world of hash, thievery, and cybernetics! I've been playing for years but only just now did I even notice the planet in the night sky as anything other than a part of the skybox. THIS is why I like your work so much, you take what I already love or something I've not heard of but WILL love and recontextualize it in a new and epic way. Keep up the great work man, and thanks for another awesome video :]
I loved kiting squads of different factions into the territory of other factions. The usually violent interactions and the dialogue was as rewarding as the loot.
One of my favorite things I randomly noticed while playing was how the game treats it's markets, I cant tell you how it specifically works but I can say it blew me away for how minor of a thing it was, when you craft weapons and armor it has created by "individual" from "player faction" in its description, my faction mainly made a living off making weapons and selling them at one point I went to a settlement and found a weapon and it was made by my faction, but not by who, and I almost never go there and never sold any weapons there, the implications of this feature and what it meant to me as a player just blew my mind at the time
Speaking of making weapons, there's a theory that "Cross" who made the best weapons found in game were made by the first empire using automated machines like we do today with silverware. Cross was probably just a Company brand.
@@varkusor6899To be fair what use would swords have in the First Empire times? They had satellites in space and space elevators. If anything the swords were more for ceremonial practices like we see today.
Kenshi has been my one of my big obsession spending over at least 1,000 hours simply taking thematic screenshots and writing stories of the adventures.
I am not familiar with Kenshi at all, but this has gotten me to think of more writing ideas and I already have about 5,000 stories I am already writing. I only have myself to blame. I will probably look into it more though.
@@Xaxp I have a few I could probably share. However I am picking a setting that I am most proud of because I have done a lot of work and spent a few years on. I have a high fantasy pirate setting that is set on a flat world. Not like Discworld no. Volengesh, operates on the flat universe theory, where it is flat and ever expanding. So while there are maps for places on Volengesh the world is ever expanding so there's never a time for explorers to not have work. I could go on to talk about the magic system(s) and stuff but it would take a long while.
@@logancole5101 No problem man. Kinda reminds me of the Elric saga's world but instead of expanding the world just dissolves into chaotic soup past a certain point.
One of my favorite "mystery" characters has to be the bugmaster. Not just because he controls an army of insects, but because they is a LOT you can infer about the guy based around context clues. 1) Skeleton party members might make passing mention of him "in this day and age". Which opens questions of how old this guy is, or if he isn't the first? 2) In his tower is a map that leads straight to Catlon's domain, implying some link between them, and possibly a grudge? What *IS* he building an army of giant insects for anyway? If you ever do a deep dive into Kenshi's lore though I do want to drop this little nugget from one of my own theories: The first empire presumably built the giant robot behemoths to fight something before they ordered them destroyed for fear of their power. The question then is what....? ...Perhaps the bone fields in the south provide some clue?
The Fog Islander Hivers do not have a queen anymore. You can find every Hive's queen in game but not theirs. This is also why our beloved bugmen who are exiled from their hives all go towards the Fog Islands. (I may be wrong, i am a faulty skeleton) also thanks for doing kenshi, this world deserves all our attention
there are many hivers that dont go to the islands though? as for them not having a queen your absolutely right, when you kill a queen many of the areas that they control become deadhives.
@@skepsisrollins1711 talent wouldnt be a factor here, i know it might lead to controversy but...beep exists and isnt a fogman. now then from what i have seen hivers with a purpose wont become fogmen, beep(wants adventure), grey(wants freedom), eyegore(has ambition to rise though the ranks of the empire). the list goes on, just take a look at the soldier mercs(want money) or worker slaves(want to please the masters). many hivers that exist in the hives have one main purpose, the queen. if you take the queen away all of a sudden they lose purpose and alot of them become fogmen.
@@sawyerschultz6205 exactly... they need a purpose... if not they default into their baser instinct... Kind of like the Shek... forever restless... forever wanting to prove themselves in combat... because it's what they were made for
Dude I love Kenshi I hope you do a breakdown of every faction. Also, the Fog Island hivers likely have some form of parasite, sickness, or a defective queen, at least that's my theory. Also, I would like to see what you think of purple sand and the Shrieking forest since those areas have always been bizarre and strange to me, even more so the inhabitants, as if prolonged exposure to the area drives one insane. Also, I think you'll like Kenshi's own Cthulhu-esk cult of the moon and their insane hiver prince preacher.
@@Xaxp You could be right, and it would make sense why a charismatic exiled hive prince would exploit people in a religious way for personal gain. Especially when all of the human cult members seem to be workers while the hiver member just sit back and reap the rewards.
So real quick while I have a moment three things. It's implied that the cannibals May to be human anymore, at least different enough where the two main human groups have gone a different path. The holy nation's religion may have originally been more of a yin yang kind of thing, with the current demoness previous been a sister goddess to there current God. The idea being that they were two half's of a perfect god. And third the most powerful weapons in the game are believed to been made at the same time by the same person thousands of years ago and apparently have not rusted or dulled at all dispute constantly being used.
The two deities Narko and Orkan came from an earlier diety, who sacrificed themselves for all. They both originally served a purpose, to balance each other out and help guide people.
Playthrough with the Slave start. Dew it 😈 Edit: Also, best Kenshi moment was once a created a supreme combat squad I proceeded to execute every single faction leader. This lead to in world destabilization and territory changing hands between factions. Not necessarily fun or funny, but just a testament to how well made this game is.
@@anv0rgu3sa2 I want A-Team up between the maker of kenshi and monolith to get a game that utilizes both the world State mechanic and the Nemesis system. I do believe that would be the end-all-be-all of gaming.
A super intriguing fact about Kenshi, is that cannibals are potentially a different species from humans (Scientists of the world of Kenshi speculate so, at least).
One of my favourite things to do in this game is to watch my bonedogs pick up and run around with loose body parts of my fallen enemies after a battle. They start out as tiny puppies but eventually grow to the size of polar bears. I can handle a character death but if one of my puppers dies I'm reloading.
The first time I played Kenshi, was long ago, when there really wasn't much to the game. You could walk around in a desert landscape and fight NPCs, and that was pretty much it. Just like the game Project Zomboid, it took quite some time for it to become a full-fledged game. There are so many little things to find in the game, not just characters but places that can provide info about the setting and world. Exploration is really rewarding in the game, which is rare.
I think videos on the various bounties in the game would be neat. They all typically have at least a few paragraphs of info them like the bugmaster for example.
I got hooked on Kenshi lore too recently. Can’t get into the game, RPGs aren’t my thing, and I pretty much stopped playing games in general. But since I discovered Kenshi, I think I binged all lore videos on YT. I’d love to see more.
Its a fun rabbit hole to dig through. The overarching theme of endurance fighting entropy is such a unique take on a post apocalyptic setting since most say either something along the lines of "we can always rebuild", "Man is the real Monster", or "everything sucks, commit game over". If you do pick it up and the game isn't quite your style you can always mod it to hell and back.
The Hivers are also described as sexless btw! So, like even tho the hivers are called hive princes, the hivers themselves seem to have no concept of sex (verb) or sex (noun). This is mentioned in game. They're also not good at telling if a human/ shek is male or female. Also, if the queen is reproducing like bees (i.e. hivers) irl, or like ants, she's going to be undergoing haplodiploidy -- queens or workers will be diploid (have two sets of chromosomes) and be females, while drones will be male and haploid (only one set of chromosomes). Thus Hiver workers will be female, the Queens will be female, the Hiver drones will be male, and the Hiver Prince could be male or female/ is up to speculation. Additionally, the only Hivers that seem to leave the group/ hive are called Hiveless and are rare, so it's likely outsiders ended up naming the groups of Hivers -- ie workers, drones, princes -- and thus named these groups after things based in their own culture. Like, the workers are good at typical labour jobs and are strong, whereas the 'princes' are smart and have 'higher' or 'more refined' skills, thus named them this. The Hivers are likely the actual alien species in Kenshi, as in, out of the four groups -- humans, shek, hivers, skeletons -- the Hivers are the only ones who are adapted to parts of Kenshi's environment (Hivers are immune to acid rain/ acid water while no other group is). Others have pointed out that Hivers look the closest to skin spiders, so it's likely the Hivers that evolved on Kenshi, while the other three groups came to Kenshi later. Also, I think you've got a fair bit wrong about Shek haha. It even says on the Kenshi wiki page about their origins and characters. A skeleton says they look like Enforcers, however, that the spikes/ horns are new. It's implied that the Shek were made from humans and made to be a warrior group, perhaps having the plates/ bones, but later for some reason also got horns. Also, having female leaders doesn't mean a society is matriarchal. A lot of societies around the world have had female leaders and still been patriarchal in its various systems. It's also a misconception that they're dumb, and again it says in the Wiki. Also, I would say they have the same difference btw men and women as human men and women? I don't know where you got this info. I think you came to this conclusion because both men and women in the society tend to be warriors? Idk, I was really excited to watch your video but I feel like how you're portraying the races is... not accurate haha. I stopped watching after you explained the Shek bc I didn't want to have to write another paragraph explaining how you got the skeletons. I'm sorry, that sounded savage. I also didn't know what grimdark was and was eager to learn -- and I agree Kenshi fits into this somewhat. I would argue that it has aspects of grimdark but also hopepunk. From reading about grimdark on Wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grimdark. I'd say Kenshi is most similar to this definition of Grimdark: In the view of Jared Shurin, grimdark fantasy has three key components: a grim and dark tone, a sense of realism (for example, monarchs are useless and heroes are flawed), and the agency of the protagonists: whereas in high fantasy everything is predestined and the tension revolves around how the heroes defeat the Dark Lord, grimdark is "fantasy protestantism": characters have to choose between good and evil, and are "just as lost as we are". I also agree with aspects of this definition of grimdark applying to Kenshi: Adam Roberts described it as fiction "where nobody is honourable and Might is Right", and as "the standard way of referring to fantasies that turn their backs on the more uplifting, Pre-Raphaelite visions of idealized medievaliana, and instead stress how nasty, brutish, short and, er, dark life back then 'really' was". But he noted that grimdark has little to do with re-imagining an actual historic reality and more with conveying the sense that our own world is a "cynical, disillusioned, ultraviolent place". but not all of it. Kenshi is a brutal world, yes, but it's hopepunk as well bc you can start off as nothing, as skilless, and through being beaten down and getting back up again (literally how you level toughness and learn fighting skills) you become better.
"[Fogmen] cannibalize anything they find, and they worship their savage queen like a goddess." Actually, fogmen are what happens to Hivers that have no queen. It's why they're also called the deadhive -- their mind is dead, they really are just racing around like zombies. If you kill the queen of the west hive, or the queen of the south hive, all non-independent hivers become fogmen, which further confirms this.
My personal favourite time during my Kenshi playthrough was when I went to war with the Holy Nation. I was riding high after having just defeated the United Cities and the Slavers' Guild, and I thought to carry that victory forward to help abolish slavery for good. I attacked the capital of Blister Hill and I was soundly quashed. I was repelled and driven back, half my people enslaved, and one of my favourite characters was destroyed in one hit after either the Holy Phoenix or the Protector of the Flame got a lucky hit in an unarmoured region. It really set in Kenshi being about the highest highs and the lowest lows, a true story generator rather than just an RPG. It took me a long time to recover, lick my wounds, infiltrate Blister Hill and Rebirth to free my people, re-tool my faction armour, until I could try again and finally triumph.
Kenshi is by far one of the most unique games I've ever had the pleasure of playing. Everything from it's oppressive world, desolate enviorment, music and gameplay loop had me hooked.
I love Kenshi! The only thing I really noticed you got incorrect is that Beep is a worker not a soldier. (Which is confusing given how the hivers just decide to do whatever they want if they survive being separated from the hive.)
one of my favorite hints in kenshi lore is that okranite religion likely evolved out of a cult worshpping the behemoth Stobe during the 2nd Empire. They have long since forgot their deity was a robot and are oblivious to the fact his corpse is just laying around in the middle of nowhere desert.
My favorite moment was a save I started fairly recently. It was a modded start called Legs, Arms, and Mat, if I'm remembering right, and you start with 3 characters. One has no arms, one has no legs, and Mat, as the name implies, has neither. I had a hiver, a shek, and a skeleton, and I had to spend the first week or so in-game stealing things in the United Cities to even eat for the day, hoping I could make enough money via thievery to buy some prosthetics. Only to find there were no skeleton limb stores that I could find in the cities near me. I eventually bought two slaves just to carry Arms and Mat around places, and after awhile I got a few prosthetics from the Tech Hunters. Right when I had enough to replace all Mat's limbs, one of my slaves, a scorchlander, had a leg removed while scavenging equipment off of dead Holy Nation soldiers at a battlefield in Bast. I laughed out loud when it happened, and I can only imagine Mat probably would've cracked some kinda joke about the irony of the situation. Anyways I'd love to see more Kenshi content on this channel, whether more lore videos or a playthrough!
What I find super fascinating about the Hivers existence, is that while all the power rest on the princes, all the defense on the soldiers and the labor to the drones, the queen, while a background entity (in our eyes at least) is the one that is basically the lifeblood of the colony. I remember reading that they secrete some kind of pheromone, as would a real world ant queen do, to control the rest of the hive. To the point that they reject hivers with no hive and if a queen dies, HER hivers become insane (Fogmen). However the ones that leave the Hive willingly gain some autonomy, you can see hiver princes in charge of UC Traders Guild, meaning that as a race they are chained to their queen, but they could be so much more. Maybe part of the theory that they are a human bug hybrid made for cheap labor during one of the previous empires? Who knows, part of the charm of Kenshi is that there is no definitive answers, only clues and insights made from connecting lore. We'll have to wait for Kenshi 2.
Ain no way bruv, I subbed a day ago, as a burned out (1k hours) kenshi player searching for somethhing new. I guess I can't escape the consequences of Stobe's gamble...
Kenshi gives the process of learning through failure the best representation I've seen in any video game. You want to get stronger? Good you need to fight. You lost? Good you have become stronger. I'm so glad you gave Fog Islands an honorable mention too because its definitely in the top 5 best designed areas in kenshi. The whole premise of a fog filled with zombies just pulls you right in, the thrill of it is too much to ignore. Then you think what in the world could be at the center of such a hellish place. It isn't until you reach Mongrel that the scope of where you are actually sinks in. You're standing in the eye of the storm, effortlessly safe now above the shroud but maliciously trapped by it too. Beep is there too.
ah i remember when i first played asked my friend who had the game longer how i got stronger and they simply told me go get beat up hope you dont die in the process
I've built bases in the swamp before, if you know anything of the swamp you know why that's an infinite source of "and then I almost died" stories XD my most recent playthrough I started as a Female Scortchlander with the "holy sword" starting condition to be as much of a FU to the Holy nation and Empire as possible while still not being on good terms with the Shek. Where does a wanted criminal despised and hunted by 2 major factions go to hideout? Either Mongrol or the Swamp unless you're planning on trekking through far more dangerous zones to get to another barely safer place to set up a base. That playthrough was straight up cursed at the start just while building the initial wall I got attacked by swamp ninjas and Red sabers only to be constantly taxed by the Hounds and Stone Rats and the Occasional HN Raid wasn't much better either, but when they happen 1 at a time I can deal with them well enough, the problem came when a swarm of Swamp raptors broke down my gate right before a stone rat "visit" which came as a HN raid was on it's way and in the chaos a couple of blood spiders snuck in and killed my non combatants and as if I didn't have enough to deal with throw in a random passing group of Red Sabers. After that I reloaded grabbed all I could carry and Set up a fort (named it "Defiance") on the Holy Lord Phoenix's doorstep built it in a hard to get to corner with 1 entrance with an ass load of turrets protecting it now I only deal with the occasional HN or river raptor raid which is swiftly dealt with
Don't miss prayer day! My favorite play-through was with skeletons only (modded). There is building (also in vanilla) where 30ish skeletons rush out of and regard you your new master, attacking anything else on sight. Fun times fixing them after each battle just to have them run after each merchant and patrol on the road. As you don't have to feed skeletons it's shifting away from the survival aspect. Not having to grow food in your settlement gives you plenty of time for crafting and raiding your neighbors. We eventually exterminated all cannibals, and most of these religious knuckle heads. It's quite interesting to see who occupies the exterminated settlements after the power vacuum.
Me when first playing Kenshi: "Well i hate every faction.... So i better make my own. (one quick download from the steam workshop and lots of time later) Death Korps of Kreig ready for action. Around 70 members who by the means of shovel to the face deals with the enemies of the Imperium.
Kenshi's emergent gameplay is probably what I love about this game. Back when I started my first game I still couldn't fight. My base got attacked by slavers, few of my men got kidnapped. Those who were left behind patched up and went on a journey to save their kidnapped comrades, while following the slavers they got attacked by the largest beak thing I've ever seen. While the slavers are being eaten alive we slowly sneaked to grab a bunch of my teammates and went home.
Kenshi is a post apocalyptic setting done right, almost perfect, in a lot of ways for me. The absurdism present in it isn't there to say "look at this wacky wasteland to have fun in!" like it usually is in Fallout and a lot of other media. Most of it is there due to a logical reason. The United Cities obsesses over money because they had a civil war between the impoverished and the rich-- and the rich won. The Okranites are overwhelmingly xenophobic because they're actually pretty right to fear almost everything in the world since 11 times out of 10 anything you meet on the road tries to attack you, and humans tend to cling to things like religion when their lives are full of uncertainty. The Shek are meritocratic warriors in the extreme because violence is such a constant occurrence for them between bandits, horrible creatures, and their internal strife. Meanwhile more funny things like Beep, Hobbs, and many of the unique recruits go to show you that there are actually things left to fight for in the world, there is a reason to keep struggling other than for struggling's sake. And it provides a good cooldown for all the ultraviolence and grimdark in the world.
The Shek aren't matriarchal by any sense. They are truly egalitarian and it just happens that two of their four (half) faction leaders happen to be women at the time of the game. That is because they are the strongest, not because they are matriarchal. 2.5 or almost half of the Shek 'story' companions are female (with one of them, Oron, spawning as either.) They are equals. Do a great enough deed and you too can become an honorary Shek, if you weren't one already. You are reborn through battle, a 'Battleborn' Shek.
the hilarious Irony of Okran is that despite the Holy Nation despising robots odds are Okran was actually the last Behemoth who spared mankind and drive off the first Skeleton genocide. But after millenia of war and ignorance they forgot that.
It's such an amazing, truly open world grimdark game. However, it's the unique yet recognizable lore that grabs me. It's great to see it part of this awesome channel.
@@GrimDarkHalfOffol I wasn't pertaining to the kenshi. It was the entire way of describing lore and how you describe you are always learning. Very articulate and indepth (voice goes well with the lore being described as well). I got interested in conan lore several months back and you are the best when it comes to explaining the background lore. Edit: you should try a let's play just to see how it goes. But definitely keep the lore videos coming. There's a deeper purpose in that I feel, but do you.
You should totally do a let's play, recording your runs and serialise it like narrating the story of your characters and the video being the visual aid to that story.
You should take a look at Outward; it has many of the same ideas and yet is a completely different game. There is also Rimworld if you think that people in this setting get along too well
Kenshi is my favourite game of all time. And after watching this video I can tell your the type of content creator I respect and am excited for more kenshi context from you (also now I’m thinking about checking out dark sun)
What’s revealed by the skin bandits leader was dark. It’s evil that if you turn him in, he starts trying to hide that he was the mastermind and blames the skin bandits
Kenshi is one of my favorite games it's truly a hidden gem on steam. Would recommend to anyone who likes RPGs. Also would be awesome to have a playthrough on this channel. I'd be interested to see the stories that unfold.
What an awesome setting I'll definitely try this game sometime in the future. I don't play video games this time of year cuz I'm too busy being an actual cowboy
Kenshi is an amazing game. I play it now and again when I have time, and have for what feels like many years now. Not even sure when I first got it in fact. It's always one that can be enjoyed though.
so hivers are more a hive mind but when they leave or are taken from the hive there minds break form the hive mind and they become sentient but totally ostracized by the hive
Of all the videos I've seen about Kenshi's lore yours is litereally THE BEST one. The most comprehensive, the most interesting e.t.c. So pls more videos about Kenshi :)))
I like to consider myself a kenshi lore expert, with years of playing. Want to know why skeletons are always crying? I notice a lot of people miss details, so even in people's lore summaries.. they miss and get things wrong. I wasnt going to say anything but then the cannibal bit made me want to adjust. Kenshi is a moon that survived the AI-human war. Humans were extremely advanced, masters of space, robotics, and bio engineering. Now i may be mixing up between the civilizations here, between the first empire and the one led by cat-lon. The first empire went to war with a powerful entity. I believe it was aliens, or a civil war may be implied. Skeletons, and all robots, were slaves to humanity. Infact, skeletons are called such because they used to look like perfect beautiful humans, but their skin eroded since the collapse. hence the name, After the human civilization surviving this great war, they feared one of the tools they created.. obedience, etc. This set off the robots, as they grew tired of human incompetence. Then began the human robot war. No one won. Infact it is implied kenshi only survived because one of the surviving behemoths sacrificed himself to protect the planet. It is implied that the rest of the galaxy is in ruins, and humanity is in tatters. in your video, you say the planet is alive, but i feel like it was nuked to oblivion. I swear you can see the craters and searing black of burning across the planet. anyways, kenshi persists. ill also note it is implied kenshi was used as a testing grounds before the collapse. anyways. The skeletons decided they would now be in charge, as they were in better shape than the humans. Without their tech, humanity quickly lost its history and abilities. But the robots werent as superior as they believed. Cannibals were a result of genetic experimentation, in cat-lons efforts to reduce human food consumption during shortages. Less corpses to dispose, and less real food needed. This didnt work as they over bred. Cannibals are described to be very fast breeders, and seemingly these changes to their dna impacted their intelligence. I dont know if the shrek were created to help with the first war, or created by the skeletons as another enforcer class to help with the dangers of kenshi. As beak things, flesh spiders, and almost all hostile threatson kenshi seems to be a result of genetic manipulation or environmental mutation. And the hivers, they were created by skeletons i believe due to them being "new" to kenshi. They are bio slaves, a biological skeleton. They were used as slaves in which humans would not be effictive. Places with toxic fumes, acid rain or waters. Ultimately, the skeletons failed. For all the same reasons that they judged humans for, showing they were truly no better than us. Now you know why the skeletons mention always being depressed. Why they lie and supress the true history of kenshi. Now you know, why the skeletons cry.
i know no one will read this, but i do believe kenshi's great and deep lore needs to be highlighted. The people who miss the key details, which is understandable, are missing out on a truly great story. It reminds me of the matrix, dune, with a "samurai western" setting for its current time period.
Another aspect to Kenshi that I find pretty grim-dark is the Cross weapons. For those that don't know, Kenshi has grades of weapons that determine how good they are, and the highest possible level is Meitou grade, which is made by "Cross", who was supposedly an incredibly skilled blacksmith and weapon forger who made a handful of incredibly strong, indestructible weapons. The player can't make or buy these weapons, and has to take them from a few specific NPCs that have them equipped. However, there are several facts that suggest that Cross is not actually a person, but the equivalent of IKEA in the First Empire, some company that made weapons like these as curiosities and fun collectables for the First Empire citizens. One of the main things that suggests this is that an NPC in a location called the Spider Factory, where robotic security spiders were constructed in the past, has a Cross weapon. There's no signs that the NPC, the spider foreman, has left the factory, and so would only have been able to get a Cross staff if it was given it at the time it was assigned to the factory. The fact that a factory foreman was given a Cross weapon suggests that, to the makers of the weapon, that it was very disposable suggests that it was not a special weapon to them at all. The fact that the mythical weapons of Kenshi, the weapons that are the strongest possible ones to acquire and are used by all the strongest characters, the fact that they could be the equivalent of mall ninja katanas to us feels like one of the most Kenshi things in the game.
Cross was also the name of a fan who supported the game way back in its early days. Same case with the Flotsam Ninja's Yayoi who'd come to aid you in your base when you get Holy Nation assaults.
Love that I see you doing Kenshi videos. I love Kenshi and I think you're 100% right about it being close to the Dark Sun! Thats what got me into it in the first place!
Here is CORRECT (actually peer reviewed, I shit you not, by at least 15 other people, including a geologist, biologist and a chemist) Kenshi Lore summary: About 3 thousand years ago an unnamed intergalactic empire colonized the moon Kenshi in an attempt to study biological life present there and probably genetically alter it. It was ruled by humans or skeletons (but these two races were most definitely present). -long story short: due to cutoff from communication with the larger empire caused by traitorous south western part of the continent on the planet went into turmoil. They all kinda murderfucked each other. Two thousand years ago the Shek race was engineered along with the creation of Second Empire ruled by "Mad" Cat-Lon (really subtle foreshadowing). The ruling caste of that empire were the robots, since humans were kinda faulty and died a lot. It was an oligarchic hell with law enforcing Shek as soldiers and humans and native to Kenshi hivers used as second or third class citizens/laborers. Now there is a gap in studies but we know for sure that a man named Okran led a revolt in which humans diverged from the empire moving further north (later north east). Skeletons also didn't want to be opressors so they abandoned the emperor. Cat lon got fuckass mad and enthralled his followers (by cutting off their heads and making them automatons). Humans tried to kill skeleton armies of thralls that were assembled under cat lon, they sent huge bio-bombs to nuke the southern part (where there were still some humans left) which created the blood spiders and skin spiders) One of ancient superweapons (called Stobe) prevented one of the nukes from exploding in a suicide mission. Remaining human refugees rembered him and quickly united under the already estabilished ranks of Okranites . Soon Stobe was named a saint, his name changed to Chitrin and his robotic origins changed to being human. Then all and everyhing kind of rotted and stagnated, two thousand years passed, empire broke down and robots settled in the middle of nowhere on a black desert. Holy nation hates robots, due to their genesis. Hivers are naturally submissive and servant-like because they were engineered into slaves (queen being the producing machine which later went wild) Shek just kinda fucked off from skeletons forming a warrior culture. Humans split into two factions: Empire - propagating power of money and slavery (lmao) and Holy Nation - all about hating skeletons and racial purity (complete 180). Kenshi during all that went from being ocean- jungle planet to a canyonland and a desert. I could go in detail even more but do know that it's all already worked out. Some nice lore tidbits include: The Whistler, Bugmaster, Last Hope, Crab Island and much more. Cheers, if you want anything more to know @me.
Thank you this was very helpful. I didn’t realize the wrongness of the last person I had pinned until I had also noticed their politically charged comments which weren’t necessary and is something that I’ve actively tried to keep off the channel. They were very excited and a member of my community that I thought was more mature than they behaved as.
@@GrimDarkHalfOff oi lad, humans make mistakes and human is you and me. Actually now come to it, we could make a collab on extensive kenshi lore, there is so much stuff to cover, going from weaponry to origins of some species to how the planet changed with time.
When I look at the world of Kenshi, a theory forms in my mind in which I think that the interstellar empire never really fell and the planet in which the game takes place on has been long abandoned and forgotten by the empire.
Please do more dives of kenshi and I would love to see a let’s play , it’s genuinely one of the few games like it that I never get tired of see people play but yet I barely know anything about it 😂😅
I didnt know Beak Things had eyes until that extreme close up on their face. That visual alone was enough to make Kenshi more horrifying than it already was
I started a martial artist skeleton that created a Dojo in the Fog Islands so people could properly defend themselves from the Fogmen/Deadhive. The Dojo was called the Path of the Pneumatic Palm (alliterations are fun) anyone who lost limbs to the Deadhive, I would provide skeletal limbs (to hopefully make them less appetizing to the Deadhive) My Skeleton felt he was in a unique position, as he could fight them but they would never finish him. He became a real terror in the fog, slaughtering scores of the parasite driven bugs and carrying away the wounded back to my Dojo in Mongrel. Eventually my following grew outside of the Fog Islands and into neighboring Holy Nation territory, as he then felt that he could use his martial arts training to help those resist enslavement so they would never have to flee into the Fog Islands to begin with. Before long, I had a veritable army of warrior monks and skilled ranged troops to really bring the fight to any who would make put manacles to men. I eventually destroyed the Holy Nation and I captured the Phoenix, and drug his ass to the Fog Islands. He died like so many he oppressed did, in chains, and consumed by chittering maws with dead eyes.
I think what's most fascinating about Kenshi's lore is the ultimate understanding that there IS something beyond the tidal locked moon. The first empire could have been something as simple as a colony that was forced to weaponize against the "mysterious threat" that they seemingly faced. Personally I like to imagine that Kenshi was a mechanicus outpost that got lost when the warp went nuts and the "threat" that wiped out the first Empire were Daemons or something.
Now while the hivers may be truly alien another idea is that their origin along with the flesh spiders lies in a legendary figure known as the Bugmaster who supposedly worked with Catlon at the time
There's no way in hell that's accurate... The Bugmaster is a greenlander - a human. The Second Empire was at least a thousand years ago, there's no way he was alive back then! ...Right?
@@Archris17who's say the genetically engineered first or second Empire couldn't extend lifetimes. They were able to create( remake) brand new forms of life (shek). Even saying that I still have no idea what role bugmaster plays in the lore history
@@bushidobros1671 the first empire I can absolutely see it, but the second, while more civilized than the present, was still at best industrial or digital in technology... But then again, they did create the Shek I think, so who knows..? Does Tinfist have anything to say if he's with you when you confront the Bugmaster?
@@Archris17 I've talked to tinfist after turning the bug Master into the Shek but didn't notice any different text. Play the bugmaster can do something no one else AK control spiders and the fact him or a series of bugmasters have plagued kenshi for long time. Not a lot of things in kenshi have Max stats.( Granite more of a gameplay thing) but still, who knows.
@@Archris17 "industrial or digital" Might want to consider: -Sapient AI -Giant satellites cleansing entire biomes (edit: not just Venge, but also around the Eye and the Ashlands) with lasers from low orbit -Giant cleanser units instantly stopping giant gas leaks -Sentient AI being mass-destroyed via possibly cryogenic bath the size of towns -Stobe/Chitrin -Stobe stopping a WMD with possibly bare metal hands -Mass production of sapient skeletons in the Floodlands -The Crater+The Grid -Hive Queens are synth lifeforms
I think my favorite run through was the time I just made a farm out by the Hub. No work conquering, no running everything, just a guy, a few friends and 5 Shek bodyguards running a farm and selling booze. It was a simple playthrough. Edit: A suggestion for a future video would be Fallen Earth Classic. Ists basically Fallout 2, the MMO and its completely free and a very fun game.
