The gameplay revolves around guiding and nurturing up to 10 alien civilizations as they grow and develop while gathering Synthesis, which is effectively the game's currency. You will frequently be asked to make a choice between three options that will influence a civilization's development, one which is beneficial to that civilization but costs Synthesis, one which won't be particularly beneficial but won't be particularly detrimental either and doesn't cost any Synthesis, or one which will be actively detrimental to the civilization but in return will grant you Synthesis which you can potentially use to prevent bigger disasters later on. As the "galactic gardener", your ultimate goal is to overcome The Fermi Paradox, although whether this results in galactic unity or a galaxy-wide crisis depends entirely on you.
Important choices will frequently come in the form of a Random Event, with each of these events containing a quote from a work, creator, or other notable figure, either from actual human history or a made up quote from the history of an alien species (and there are quite a large variety of these events). It is currently available for PC.
The Fermi Paradox contains examples of:
- A God Is You: You play as the "galactic gardener", an unseen being of apparently godlike power, able to influence extremely important events in the history of various civilizations.
- Agony Beam: One event involves a civilization developing a version of one of these, with how widespread it becomes depending on the player. In some versions it is used frequently, in other versions it is saved for the worst of the worst criminals, but the least detrimental option has the device only capable of being used on consenting participants, meaning it's only ever used for extremely kinky activities.
- A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Zig-Zagged. There are plenty of events which have artificial intelligence screwing things up, but they are just as often beneficial. However, even in a playthrough where A.I has been almost entirely helpful, if the game's final choice goes badly, it's possible for the entire galaxy to become unwitting slaves to a malevolent A.I.
- Alien Invasion: If First Contact goes badly, it can result in the civilization that has arrived from space attempting to eradicate a planet's natives and take the planet for themselves.
- Aliens Steal Cable: The radio signals sent out by a civilization can potentially be detected by other civilizations, proving to them that they aren't the only sapient beings in the galaxy and giving them a bit of an idea of that other civilization's culture...even if it happens to be woefully out of date.
- Alternate History: It's entirely possible and even likely for the history of humanity to differ greatly from how things turned out in our world.
- The Ark: One event has a civilization construct a spaceship (or possibly a whole fleet of spaceships) to transport some of them off of their planet when they start to fear that a conflict at their current tech level could result in the death of all of them if they stay where they are.
- Beast Man: The alien race known as the Kular are extremely furry and somewhat pig-like, but are still very humanoid.
- Bio-Augmentation: Once a civilization becomes advanced enough, they're able to artificially increase things like their lifespan and fighting capability to extreme levels, and this is the basis for several events in the game.
- Bows Versus Crossbows: An event has a civilization discovering the potential of crossbows, and depending on the player's choice, they can either be much too inefficient to be used in armies, efficient but not efficient enough to replace bows, or so efficient that they completely replace the standard bow.
- Cap: A civilization can only be 100% Utopia or 100% Dystopia, with it being impossible to go beyond that number in either direction.
- Character Portrait: Each species has one of these, which changes in appearance as they become more and more technologically advanced.
- Chummy Commies: A civilization becoming entirely communists is treated as the best possible option in one event, and has no direct negative effects.
- Cockroaches Will Rule the Earth: Once humanity dies out, it's possible for a more primitive, non-sapient species to evolve intelligence and become the new dominant species thousands of years later. This can also happen to alien civilizations with their animals.
- Colonized Solar System: Once a civilization reaches the Solar Age, they colonize their home solar system pretty quickly.
- Colony Drop: One potential extinction event in the Solar Age has a group of terrorists throw massive asteroids at a civilization's home planet.
- Colony Ship: These can potentially be built by a civilization once they become advanced enough. Depending on the player's choice, they can construct a single ship, an entire fleet, or the whole operation go disastrously wrong and result in no ships being constructed.
- The Cracker: One event has a group of hackers holding the files of a civilization's government ransom. While this event can end well, one particular outcome has this end in disaster, having the government end up handing over so much money to the greedy hackers that the entire economy is crippled.
- Cyberspace: The entirety of the Cyber Age revolves around this trope, with a civilization's technology becoming so advanced that they can manipulate the mind as easily as computer files, and mix the two together to create incredibly realistic digital environments.
- Deus est Machina: Once a civilization reaches the Superluminal Age, they can construct A.Is capable of making calculations faster than the speed of light, which greatly benefit them.
- Dystopia: A civilization becomes one of these when they reach 100% Dystopia, effectively becoming a ruthless hellhole of a society that's nearly impossible to have peaceful relations with any other civilization.
- Emergent Narrative: Very few parts of the game's story are definite, with the story of the galaxy's various civilizations depending on the player and what events happen to trigger.
- The End of the World as We Know It: An apocalypse can occur in quite a large variety of ways, such as a gigantic asteroid smashing into the planet, or said planet being completely exhausted of resources and rendered uninhabitable by the devastation of the ensuing conflict, not to mention global warming boiling the ocean or a black hole opening and swallowing everything...the list goes on and on.
- ET Gave Us Wifi: If a civilization develops space travel fast enough and/or humans evolve late enough, it is possible for humanity to develop our current level of technology much faster than they otherwise would, should first contact with that spacefaring civilization go well.
- Faster-Than-Light Travel: A civilization becomes capable of traveling faster than the speed of light as soon as they reach the Superluminal age.
- Fragile Speedster: One event has a civilization develop a series of small fighter spaceships capable of moving MUCH faster than anything else they have in their army. The most beneficial version of the event has the ships leaving a unique signature in their wake which makes them easy to track, meaning that war is not made more devastating, but another version of the event has them absolutely dominate the battlefield.
- Golden Ending: The best possible ending of the game has every civilization unite together to form a harmonious galactic community, whether through opening a portal network that allows anyone to visit anywhere in the galaxy, or by inventing a device that allows communication with anyone anywhere instantaneously.
- Grey Goo: Once a civilization reaches the Singularity Age, they are able to easily create a self-replicating nanobots. Normally, these nanobots work fine and are very beneficial to that civilization, being mostly used for cleaning up trash and the like, but it's not completely impossible for them to go wrong...
- Heroic Dolphin: If Dolphins evolve to sentience, they're a naturally noble and balanced species that live in harmony with nature. That said, after evolving, they can become as much of a warlike hell species as anyone else.
- Holy City: One can develop in a certain event. In some versions of the event it leads to enlightenment for the civilization that event applies to, but in another a dangerous cult appears which begins worshiping the city itself rather than what it is associated with, driving people away and having no positive effects on the civilization whatsoever.
- Human Notepad: One early event has a civilization become so obsessed with tattooing that they write down all of the information that they learn on their skin.
- Humanoid Aliens: The Kular, as mentioned previously, have the same basic body shape as humans but are clearly not human, having pig-like features and thick fur.
- Human Popsicle: One event involves important members of a species which were previously cryogenically frozen being revived hundreds of years later.
- Individualism vs. Collectivism: A theme in this game, with the game tending to be on the side of collectivism most of the time. In one event, it is possible for a society to become fully collectivist, and the game treats this as a very good thing.
- Insectoid Aliens: The V'kai are described as humanoid insects and while they have a humanoid upper body shape, their lower body makes the resemblance to arthropods clear, with lots of tall, spiky legs covered in a thick carapace.
- Intelligent Gerbil: Dolphins or dinosaurs can evolve to become the dominant species on Earth instead of humans, and it is possible for a new species to evolve after the previous one on a planet has died out, with even the ones that don't originate from Earth heavily resembling Earth creatures.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: One of the questions that a civilization can ponder is: "Are we all living in a computer simulation?"
- Lizard Folk: The Wondor qualify as this, being sapient grinning lizards, but they start out nicer than most other Lizard Folk by default, beginning as 20% Utopia.
- Luck-Based Mission: Even if you do extremely well at fostering the galaxy's many civilizations and have almost all of them at high levels of Utopia, there's still a chance you can get a bad ending simply by getting unlucky at the game's final choice, and while it is technically possible to reduce the odds of failure to 0%, it's extremely difficult.
- Machine Worship: One event for civilizations that have reached the Superluminal Age involves groups forming which begin to worship the hypercomputers running the stock market as gods, and whether this means good or bad things for a civilization depends on the player.
- Monster in the Ice: Another event has gigantic creatures from a primal era that were frozen in ice thawing out because of warming temperatures. They can potentially wreak devastating havoc, but if the player has enough Synthesis and is feeling merciful, these monsters can be domesticated as pets.
- Multiple Endings: The ultimate fate of all the civilizations in the galaxy depends on the player, how much Synthesis they have, the current state of every civilization, and how lucky they are. Whether they die without knowing others like them exist, wage interstellar war or anything in between, it's all up to you...
- Octopoid Aliens: The ocean-dwelling Frenner are technically squids, at least according to the game's description, but their numerous tentacles resemble octupi much more.
- Pig Man: The Kular, mentioned above, bear a heavy resemblance to pigs in terms of facial features, and are described as pig-like by the game's narration.
- Plant Aliens: There are quite a few unique varieties of these in game, such as the Bautir and the Dorloth, resembling all sorts of flora from beautiful flowers to clumps of weed.
- Playful Hacker: One variation of the hacking event mentioned earlier involves the hackers turning out to be benevolent, using their ability to hack into the government's databases to expose injustices to the world and forcing the government to make changes for the better.
- Resources Management Gameplay: Part of the game's core gameplay involves making sure a civilization doesn't run out of resources, in addition to making sure they don't become too much of a Dystopia (if you're aiming for the good ending that is), the amount of casualties caused by wars and disasters is minimized, they're reproducing at a healthy rate, and that they're on track to gaining more advanced technology soon.
- Robot Soldier: Whole armies of these can be constructed once a civilization is advanced enough, and several events revolve around them.
- Robots Think Faster: The previously mentioned hypercomputers can think faster than the speed of light itself, a trait they are revered for.
- Sapient Cetaceans: It's possible for dolphins to evolve to be the dominant species on Earth rather than humans, and they're a more peaceful, balanced and intelligent species than humanity as well, starting out 20% of a Utopia and making technological progress faster.
- Speculative Fiction LGBT: One particular event has a civilization developing technology that allows them to effectively change their sex at will, allowing for a much wider range of gender expression. How accepted this is depends on the player, with the best possible option being for it to be widely accepted and the worst possible option is for it to be shot down immediately by politicians who want to preserve the old ways.
- Stepford Smiler: One event has a company develop which pays people to go to places that the company wants people to buy from them and act happy. The worst possible version of this event involves them paying those in poverty low wage in order to spend time around places they can't possibly afford and act happy, which has a very negative effect on their mental health.
- Take That!: A parody of The Simpsons called "The Simpletons" is described in the game as having gotten very boring and stale, frequently using celebrity-glorifying cameos and making references devoid of humor. It being permanently is considered the best possible option by the game, whereas it continuing forever and being made mandatory to watch is considered a cultural descent into decadence.
- Thirsty Desert: The entire planet of Gliese C qualifies, with water being such a valuable and limited resource there that entire wars can be potentially fought over it.
- Utopia: A civilization has officially become one if they reach 100% Utopia, with life as part of it being essentially paradise.
