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How Everything contemplates the meaning of existence through exploration
K
Khee Hoon Chan
But even that itself is a gross simplification of what Everything offers. For a start, it diverges from the exploration we are so accustomed to in games, like scouring the open-world landscapes of The Elder Scrolls Online, or examining the paraphernalia of home in What Remains of Edith Finch. Instead, Everything invites you to probe at and meditate on the interconnectivity of our existence. It’s a heady topic, but the game presents this in a manner that’s both easily digestible and endlessly abstract.
For example, you may begin the game as an ice planet, but you can quickly embody another object nearby. You can do this by ascending to a larger being, such as a galaxy of a billion gaseous stars, or descending to smaller matter, like a massive iceberg. From here, you can choose to continue your transformation into a litany of other creatures as you chance upon them: a cow, a tree, or even an island. And as you roam about, speech bubbles will materialize alongside objects; they’re the introspective, sometimes mundane monologues of other objects or creatures. A daisy may tell you about its existential dread, its sheer insignificance within the colossal universe of Everything. A grain of sand may share its desire for stargazing. An ant may tell you that it can’t find its annoying brother, who’s off gallivanting elsewhere. You can collect these thoughts and use them to generate your own, which you can then share with others.
If this feels too haphazard for your tastes, the game also charts your progress by letting you archive and catalogue these forms into an encyclopedia that grows as you roam across the various planes of existence. At one point, I was driven by sheer curiosity to discover the most microscopic of lifeforms that Everything allows you to embody. I kept tunneling to the core of its universe till I reached quantum level. Here, objects such as electrons and particles made of electromagnetic waves are incomprehensibly small, such that the laws of physics barely apply to them. When I dug further, I was catapulted back to the cosmic plane: the realm of space, galaxies, stars and other astronomical phenomena. There’s an ontological slant to exploration in Everything, and the game offers a platform for discussing the way things are in our universe. It's deeply soothing.
Short, captivating clips of the late philosopher Alan Watts accompany your expeditions, offering his thoughts on the philosophical nature of being. His lectures make for a soothing soundtrack to to the game's lively universe: an inebriating ode to the complexity of existence.
Everything is available on the Epic Games Store.