If there were humans on Oddworld, how do you think it would affect the universe?
 

In my opinion, humans aren't as greedy as the glukkons. Even with all the modern factories, there are many ideas to keep the nature alive, such as use of ethanol. I think there would be industrial humans as well as native humans. Even today, there are many indigenous tribes that never go out of their territory to interact with the outside world. With Oddworld, which is 10 times larger than the Earth, and there are more natural features that a native tribe would prefer, there is a large chance that some humans would just live in their territory, hunt scrabs and paramites, and not even know about the glukkons. They would probably have their own small villages, like the villages in the Neolithic Age, with meep farms, and houses made of the same trees that Splinterz cuts down. I think that some of them would be enslaved or used as a Rupture Farms product, just because glukkons would treat them as unintelligent beasts, but they would be harder to enslave than mudokons, because they are not a superspecies. The remaining humans, though, wouldn't attack the glukkons, because they simply wouldn't know about them.
On the other hand, many humans would be willing to join the glukkons to make profit. Making profits is the most important goal in the real world, so I'm sure that if humans would be given a choice of killing the wildlife and living in giant castles with 698 king-size beds, or protecting the animals that might kill them and living in hiding and poverty, they would choose the former, and the industrial world would become even stronger with those humans' alliance. These humans would even have an organization, like the Magog Cartel and the vykkers' conglomerate. I can imagine humans making factories like Flub Fuels, where they make fuel for different vehicles. It would be just like the gas factories in the real world, except much more violent. I think the industrial humans would also be the only industrial species that enslaves its own kind. But it would also be the only species that would be on both sides of the great native vs industrial battle.
I'm not saying that humans on Oddworld is a good idea. But if it happened, there would be results. Post what you think these results would be in this thread.

The Universe would most likely be unaffected by such a small change to one planet.

I'd say that they would have wiped out most other sentient species, with only a few remote tribes hanging on, similarly any animal species that poses a risk will have been persecuted to or past the edge of extinction. Pretty much the same as has happened on Earth already.

Interestingly, I foresee the Gabbits continuing to thrive, though at a vulnerable/near threatened level.

What's interesting about the Oddworld series is that there is already a lot of human-like characters there. Although their roles are more clearly defined as seperate species (like a food chain).

I suppose the humans would try and become the jack of all trades, but it depends on how resourceful they are. In retrospect there would probably be humans in all roles and on both sides of the native/industrial divide.

I think there is a high chance that the Gabbits will live on, considering most of the endings for the heroes have been positive. I think we will see at least one more Gabbit character by the end of Oddworld's Quintology.

Not so sure what to say about a Gabbit and its future.

But humans on Oddworld would likely be similair to the Oddworldians themselves. Giving some perspective, there is no good or bad sides on Oddworld. Natives merely fight for their living, but so do the industrialists. We would have humans living tribal and possibly shamanistic lives (It would be very awesome to live like some of the ancient Native Americans). Then we would have humans who MIGHT try to climb higher up the caste ladder by either tricking, maybe even enslaving, Gluks or just by kissing the many asses of all Oddworldian Khanzumers.

Considering most sapient Inhabitants could be considered caricatures of humans...

Some would be like glukkons, some like mudokons, some like sligs, some like worthless no good grubbs, some like etc and so on

Needless to say humans wouldn't fit convincingly into Oddworld's usual categories of racial profiling



Can't fathom why people would think humans would slaughter the other sapient species with language. Maybe they think the humans on Oddworld would be nazis?

Have you never seen Planet of the Apes? :D
Intelligent beings would still attack each other, for the right reason. Most Sci-Fi media prove this!

Humans on Oddworld would probably find a way to screw things up for everyone. I can see them trying to take over the planet, dropping bombs on all the sentient beings that fight back...Basically what Bullet Magnet said.

Are we talking humans as they are now or humans having evolved alongside everything else?

I'm talking about them evolving, at least culturally, alongside everything else.

We destroy that which is different. By the time we become more enlightened, the damage has already been done.

Glukkons will probblery make us into slaves OR we would get eaten by Scrabs!

Unless humans decide their Gabbiar is a delicacy like the Glukkons did, and damn the Mongo River (or any other Gabbit breeding rivers), similar to what has happened to the Sturgeon.

Would humans really be as askewed as either natives or industrialists, or form their own collective opinion that's more inbetween, like our current ideals. Perhaps they'd try to convince the Glukkons and other industrial races to create laws for 'sentient rights' (covering all sentient species, as opposed to only 'human rights', 'Mudokon rights' or the like), but also try to be friendly with them, preferring them as an ally to an enemy. Native Mudokons and Grubbs may begin seeing education and other resources from humans, if they feel they require them. Various species would become protected under human law, again trying to be friendly with the industrialists. The vykkers, separate from most industrialists, could end up being persecuted if they don't comply or pay out enough moolah. If all Oddworld industrialism is similar to that of Glukkons (since they do not appear to be at the top of things), humans may be possessing superior technology and wealth, particularly in the weapons department, and would have an obvious advantage in any way, hence why eradication of the other species is a possiblity.

Conflics would happen at first, but usually alliances are formed after a certain period of time. I also think that humans could fill any of the roles that are currently filled by other sentient races.

So you're saying the entire human race can die because of a nearly extinct, unintelligent species?

I think he's on to something there

Someone finish off the Siberian Tigers before it's too late

Mudokons are pretty much humanlike anyway, except that they have their powerful chanting.

And they're hairless? Their skeleton has a number of largely significant differences, aside from the same basic bipedal structure? They are a superspecies that hatches from eggs as opposed to a placental?

Why would humans necessarily join a necessarily existing faction, or have the sum total of their species split between them, or all in one of them? Most likely seems some in industrial and some with the other humans, and less who leave ordinary human society for a native lifestyle, if they can succeed/legally.

Scrabs and Siberian Tigers are unintelligent all of a sudden?

Do scrabs have the technology humans have?

Scientists believe that Siberian Tigers have the intelligence of a six-year-old human child.

No way, parrots are smarter than tigers, and they're permanently in the terrible twos.

Pfft. Optimist.



If the Glukkons were to enslave humans, you have to understand that they'd be put into something practical reflecting their body. Since we have more mobility than Vykkers, and more precise fingers, we'd probably be the factory mechanics and that sort of thing.

Just because parrots usually behave like a two year old, doesn't mean they're as intelligent as one. I could act like one if I felt like it. I suppose it's different talking about a species, but nonetheless.

Vykkers aren't enslaved by Glukkons, though. They only do any work because they get paid extortinately for it, thus they can get more tools etc. for their twisted habits. They also have four limbs, and the clawed tip will be a more precise point than between two squidgy fingers. They have sorted out many other problems with technology, such as the eye lenses.
Humans might do some of the Vykkers' tasks since they'd be cheaper, but I'd suspect it difficult to have a largely intelligent human scientist working efficintly for free, as well as somehow being kept otherwise ignorant.

Do dolphins, chimpanzees or, say, any other animal? Irrespective of intelligence? Dolphins could probably use a number of our tech to some degree, or maybe create it, but they obviously don't have the physical capability. Some humans don't even have access to most technology, such as still living native tribes. Most animals don't have the physical capability to create or use technology, and if they're not intelligent enough to anyway, that does not render them unintelligent. You wouldn't call a dog that, exactly.

BlowCo, I would have read all of your post and made a full contribution if you had used paragraphs. Really, please do. I'm not having a go at you, but it would be much easier to read your post.

I don't think things would be that affected. Really, Glukkons are humans (or at least represent the worst of them), so I think that they'd either hate each other and fight, or love each other and work together. Both are just as likely - either two evils will wipe each other out, or nature is twice as doomed.

Keep nature alive by drinking ourselves to death...?

It's crazy, it's just crazy enough to work!

Yes, but it is mostly a cultural thing, really. A glukkon raised by native mudokons would hardly be greedy. Trying to evaluate humans by cultural variables is somewhat pointless, IMO, and their place in Oddworld should be more judged by their physique (for example, humans have bodies similar to mudokons, so they could replace mudokons as slaves). Apart from that, since there is, for obvious reasons, no established canon on the place of humans on Oddworld, they could be anything that is defined by culture, they could just as easily be an industrialist, a scrub or a native, which would be the case with mudokons, sligs or clakkers, for example, if we didn't already know the cultures that the members of those species happen to possess on Oddworld.

Paramight are smarter then Scrabs as they can talk so we will be kill by them instead

We’ve had a good opportunity to see Paramites’ group behaviour in Abe’s Oddysee and Exoddus, but Scrab group behaviour, only glimpsed in Munch’s Oddysee, remains unexplored. They could have vocal communication that rivals Paramites’ in terms of complexity. They may also communicate in non-verbal ways.

Paramites—possibly—having higher intelligence than Scrabs wouldn’t mean we were more likely to be killed off by them. One of the biggest wildlife threats to humans are mosquitoes, but they’re hardly smart. Intelligent creatures like apes and dolphins don’t pose much of a threat to us, although the former might do in our (alternative) evolutionary history—we certainly put an end to our hominid cousins. I think a ferocious apex predator like Scrabs stands just as much chance of wiping us out as Paramites.

Unless we wipe them out first. Damn megafauna.

If we are permitted to achieve a similar civilisation level as many other species (and nothing disastrous happens like the Toba catastrophe that nearly wiped us out in RL) then we're golden. While the other sapient species are very good at what they do, and tend to take those aspects of culture further than we, none of them do anything that humans are and have been capable of, and none are as versatile and adaptable as we. If we got over our xenophobia early enough, we would simeultaneously be the best friends and worst enemies of probably every species at once. If we don't get over our xenophobia, we'll wipe out a good majority of sapients and spread to nearly every continent.

Except in regards to reproduction, I fail to see how humans are more versatile than Mudokons.

It's complicated, especially when we haven't seen what the consumer mudokons are like. But reproductive success alone is enough to out-compete them.