AL-AN Doodle

He has become too pink someone stop him!!!

Orang…

Hello Bytewire, I love your analysis!, and may I ask about architects planet, all what I seen/know about it is picture in ending of SBZ, and interesting, what do you think/know about their planet? ^^

Thank you! Every bit of appreciation I get motivates me to continue posting. I enjoy knowing that people find my posts useful/interesting.

Analyzing the Architect Home World.

Not much is known about the state of the Architect's home world regarding Architect settlements and life on the planet. While the buildings we see are intact, it is not definitive towards the state of the collective. If it still exists. So, instead of this being speculation about whether Architects still operate on their home world, I will go over all the information that I can gather about their planet from what we have seen. I will also use freecam to take a closer look at details you wouldn't normally be able to view.

Let's begin with what we see in the final cutscene.

As AL-AN navigates out of the Phase Gate and through the atmosphere the ship is steered through heavy storm clouds, narrowly being guided through edifices of buildings that form what appears to be a cityscape. The ship breaks through the storm and is met with a harsh sun glare before getting a fuller view of this grand Architect city sitting on an area of high elevation. There are structures much bigger than we see in 4546B, though it's hard to discern their purposes. Despite AL-AN not having been here for a millennium—there is a surprising lack of ruin. Floating buildings supported by cables haven't fallen, multiple Phase Gates are still in operation, and there is no overgrowth of any plant life. I wouldn't necessarily call it 'maintained' but it certainly isn't in a state of desecration.

Now, let's take a look at what can be seen on their home world in freecam.

It's hard to discern the surface due to all the clouds, but if you set the game speed to zero and toggle freecam we are able to see the full skybox. This reveals a lot more information than the brief image you see in the cutscene. As you can see, there are many clouds still, but towards the bottom left they part a bit, and you can see glimpses of the terrain. It is high elevation and rocky. Fitting with the description of Architect bodies being made for navigating rough terrain. Their legs described as being reminiscent of mountain goats. It makes sense that the terrain of their home planet is rocky and mountainous.

Architect buildings seem to focus on vertical structure first and foremost. Whether it be the skyscrapers, grand entrances, or floating platforms suspended by their levitation technology and supported with cables. On many of these buildings there appears to be areas where ships may be docked. Given the ability for AL-AN to integrate himself with the ship, their vessels having the 'blink' teleportation ability, and the use of phase gates, their vertical design seems to account for ability to quickly and efficiently travel between them.

There are also a few buildings you can view that you otherwise wouldn't be able to, though these structures do not differ much from the larger ones that are seen.

The high elevation, the storms we see as we first enter the home world, and the abundance of clouds may indicate a harsh environment. It's most probable that (in the location we see) it is somewhat commonplace for their home world. Architect vessels are adapted for extremes after all.

The unusual weather most likely originates from global temperatures warming due to Architect activity rather than from their star, as the planet's distance from its star seems to be similar to Earth's. This is probably what causes the large amount of clouds. This would make things pretty humid and prone to fast weather cycles.

Their buildings having no windows may be more for practicality in that sense. It'd be a lot less structurally sound in case of extreme weather events if they were to have windows.

Around this concave structure, typically hidden by another building, and here peeking through the clouds, you can see what potentially could be plant life. It appears short, like shrubs and/or small grasses. They appear to be a warmer hue. Reds and oranges rather than green like on 4546B or Earth. If these are plants, that would suggest their star produces more green and blue light that the plants absorb. Adapting to reflect the warmer hues.

The sky that we are able to see is a colder shade of blue that fades to a more purplish color as you look up. This could be due to a higher argon content in their atmosphere, or it could be due to the way the light reflects through the numerous clouds and various gasses present. As for the atmosphere itself, it's probably safe to assume that it would be breathable for humans, but with a lesser oxygen content, partly due to the elevation, partly due to the general makeup. (I wouldn't imagine AL-AN taking Robin along if he knew she would asphyxiate lol)

Next are some small, unclear details, but ones I felt worth mentioning.

There is what might be either a distant star, another planet, or a small celestial body that orbits the Architect home world. It is uncertain, but it is distinct within the top right corner of the skybox.

Looking down towards the middle there appears to be a potential body of water. Whether it is a lake or an ocean is unclear as the clouds don't part enough to see it in full.

There are more mountains behind the second phase gate in the horizon that don't appear to have any structures near them.

This concludes the main things that I noticed. Anything else would be too grand of a speculation, and I do my best to keep my posts within canon territory.

I hope that this was helpful information about their home planet! I can also cover more Architect-specific parts in another post if wanted, but I tried to focus on the planet itself while also discussing the Architect—well—architecture. Just like the rest of the info about Architects, their home world is shrouded in ambiguity.

I have been peer pressured into making subnautica OCs. This is AL-AY, I will post its lore another time :)

Love his little head movements

AL-AN stretch

All your photo dumps and gifs of AL-AN has helped me so much gathering references to draw a character inspired by him, thank you for your service 🙏

I love to post AL-AN’s animations and such so I’m glad it’s appreciated. I started my blog because I got frustrated of AL-AN clips either being in low quality or having the HUD on, so I went in game and recorded a bunch myself!

References you say…

AL-AN BLAST

A bunch more under the cut. For all of your possible reference needs.

Various angles

Various colors

Walking animation

If you have anything specific things about AL-AN such as animations, lore, databank entires, or voice lines you want me to post, just ask. I’m pretty much always willing to do requests. As long as they pertain to AL-AN or Architects.

Yes! I assume for shock absorption considering how dense Architect vessels are. Perhaps utilized when they do their blink ability?

Here is the same animation from a different angle

Here’s a very adorable animation that AL-AN has in the early-access original story!

I do prefer the final story, but this is so cute. I think they should’ve kept this animation in the final release. It gives him more personality.

He is so shaped

Are Architects Smarter than Humans?

The way AL-AN talks mixed with the fact that Architects are more technologically progressed than humans in the Subnautica universe leads him to seeming ‘smarter’ than the average human. He has a wide range of knowledge and despite his lack of experience with human social cues he is able to articulate himself extremely well. He also has access to tons of information due to his prior position as a scientist, but also because of what comes with existing as an Architect in the first place.

I mean, if your brain had direct access to all information available currently, you'd of course seem smart, but is that just you retelling what things have already been discovered or is this you being ‘smart’?

In that case you are only as smart as Google allows you to be (and the proverbial Architect GoogleTM is damn good). If you took an Architect never connected to the network and a human with no access to the internet how would they compare with their baseline intellect?

Wait a minute—what does that even solve? You could also argue the fact that because Architects are (usually) always connected to the network that this hypothetical is entirely unfair because it strips Architects of something that defines how they function. Being connected to the network is their normal existence, which would indeed imply that they are smarter than humans, yes? As they normally should have access to this advantage.

The average Architect has all the available knowledge that their species has learned available to it at all times while the average human has to rely only on things they’ve learned and how well they can research a certain topic. Again, being connected to the network for Architects is like if your brain was connected to Google and also literally everyone that currently exists and those that existed in the past. Just because a singular Architect may not have learned something for themselves doesn’t mean they can’t implement and use that knowledge. Just like how humans don’t need to have been the one to discover something for them to learn about and understand said thing.

Except then we go back to the issue of are they smart or do they just reiterate things they have available information on without actually having had studied or learned about said things? Even that fails to acknowledge the fact that they’re a hivemind! Trying to measure just one Architect is pointless when the only Architect mind that exists singularly from the rest of the network is AL-AN—besides he was never supposed to exist individually in the first place… and we have gone back around in a circle.

How could you even begin to compare the two species at all when they are so inherently different? Architects have senses that humans cannot begin to comprehend as we have never experienced them and vice versa. Their perceptions are very different from ours. Differences that make them seem so otherworldly to the other that it’s difficult to ascertain where you begin to measure which is ‘better’ and which is ’worse’.

To complicate things even further you would have to consider what each species considers to be intelligent at all, and then both would have to agree on these requirements. Is a fish lesser than a human just because it experiences existence in a way unfamiliar to us? What even is ‘smart’ or ‘intelligence’ and who decides what that means? It’s always going to be biased when the beings who created the definition also makes the rules and the criteria that must be met to fit that definition. An IQ test would mean nothing to a species that evolved under entirely different circumstances and whose minds work in entirely opposite ways to our own. Just as whatever they use to measure intelligence might not apply to how our brains work…

…Oh my god, it’s a loop that never ends. I can’t even remember which side I was arguing for, or if I was ever even arguing for one at all. Quite honestly, there’s no answer to my original question. I’ll be frank with you I cannot come up with one anyhow. I tried, but the more I kept writing the more I realized that each point contradicted itself again and again until we end up here. Back at the beginning.

“Are Architects Smarter than Humans?”