Zero Context

It’s over. After being incinerated, dismembered, and blown up too many times to count, Axe and Nathalie have arrived at the end of Zero Time Dilemma, the end of Zero Escape, and the end of this podcast. As the sun sets on the Nevada desert, Delta informs our hosts that every terrible decision was necessary to bring them to this very moment transmitting live to you, dear listener. That through their suffering, the world may be saved. With the final decision staring our duo in the face, we leave it up to you to decide the fate of humanity…

It’s the penultimate episode of Zero Context, which means Axe and Nathalie get to finally meet Zero in the flesh. With bloodshot eyes and cane in hand, he clues them in on the tragic truth of our favorite ball-headed boy, Mira’s bloody fate, and how he’s somehow been there the whole time just out of frame. Before our duo can process these revelations, Zero unveils new telekinetic powers and blows everyone away so he can spend a quite evening with his mom.

Through a chaotic sequence of various form of time travel, Axe and Nathalie have finally ended up at Zero Time Dilemma’s apex. They bare witness to a cabin fever love story, learn about transporter cooldown timers, and send clones of doomed babies back to the turn of the 20th century. Shifting to another timeline, they discover the facility is not what it seems, get another round of snail story facts, and finally glance at that bloody anagram before our favorite boy Carlos blows the door off its hinges…

After last week’s malaise, Axe and Nathalie have been orb launched into two bewilderingly dense fragments. Zero Time Dilemma begins to reveal its secrets, as first our hosts close the loop on the radical-6 outbreak, finding a far more familiar culprit than expected. Then, Akane’s murderous soul returns to her body and they bear witness to the worst time travel escape plan of all time. Just as the way out is at hand, the lights are cut and a boy without a name comes to end the episode for us…

Happy New Year! Returning from an arguably better videogame, Axe and Nathalie are back in the Zero Time Dilemma bomb shelter with our favorite cast of disorganized sickos. They learn about game show probability puzzles, crunch the numbers on sci-fi virus mortality rates (they’re bad), and play an actual escape room game. In another timeline, Nathalie proposes that a dog could be behind the whole thing, Axe pleads for more mid-puzzle cutscene, and the duo collectively sigh at how still nothing is happening before being put out of their misery by a mysterious assassin.

Axe and Nathalie take a break from Zero Escape for the holidays, having scored an all-expenses-paid trip to a ski lodge from a mysterious and generous listener. The time off gives them a chance to finally play the seminal sound novel, Kamaitachi no Yoru (Chunsoft, 1994) AKA Night of the Sickle Weasel, but unfortunately, the game becomes all too real as bodies start to pile up with the ceaseless snow. As frenzied accusations threaten to lock up our hosts for good, they search for a branch of the flow chart which will get them out of this nightmare…

In an eerily brief set of fragments, Axe and Nathalie must contend with poison capsules, rotating rooms, and a belligerent shotgun wielding Eric as they scramble towards some a still ambiguous resolution. They scan some brains and swing some hammers before confronting a troubling child abuse backstory and its many unfortunate connotations. After the dust settles, Nathalie unveils a new set of 9 10 predictions that just might be her ticket our of this twisted game, and our hosts look forward to a holiday reprieve from Zero as they jump to a different game entirely.

After escaping from a eerily familiar shower game, Axe and Nathalie stand before the exit ready to emerge into the humid Nevada air. Instead, they are treated to incoherent asides about alien mouths, tournament statistics, and the existential weight of many worlds. In another reality, they trudge through the worst rec room puzzle yet, bearing witness to a particularly pathetic and angry Junpei, who is just as confused about this new pacifist Akane. Just as the numbers align and freedom appears in sight, something grabs our podcasters and pulls them back in. The show’s not over yet.

Awakening from an explosive nightmare, Axe and Nathalie are thrust into not one, not two, but three deadly decision games. First, they must choose whether to save themselves and doom the others to an acid grave. Then, they play a round of cosmic Russian roulette, potentially killing our favorite boy Sigma to save Phi from a familiar death by fire. In the timeline where they miraculously make it through, they are then suddenly poisoned and must decide if it’s possible to trust the antidote sent by supervillain girlboss Akane. Could she be behind Zero’s mask yet again?

After a brief 90 minute absence, Axe and Nathalie return to Zero Time Dilemma ready to dive into the game’s first set of puzzles. Once again trapped in a pantry, Nathalie gets hung up on a sliding door diagram but eventually the pair unlocks the freezer and its gruesome rewards. Elsewhere, they fumble through yet another lesser library, unlocking a small arsenal in the process. Things quickly go south, however, when the duo comes face to face with an unexpected murderer…

Returning after volunteering on a Mars colonization experiment, Axe and Nathalie are back in the Nevada desert for the third and final (?) Zero Escape game, Zero Time Dilemma . Immediately thrust into another death game, Axe digs into the tumultuous development process, Nathalie gets trapped in a coin toss timeloop, and they both delight in how outrageous an experience they’re already having. Too bad they won’t remember this…

After what feels like an eternity within the barren halls of Virtue’s Last Reward, Axe and Nathalie escape into a world they scarcely recognize. With little time to process what’s occur, they are funneled back into the facility where the facts of this diabolical game are finally disclosed. Is Akane as twisted as she seems? Who is the worst dad among us? Does anyone really care about being tortured for science? No? Sorry? Hey, put that knife awa—

Returning to the director’s office, Axe and Nathalie use their months of nonary knowledge to finally hack into the lion computer, finding no puzzles and fewer answers. Unmoved by Phi’s pleas to take our BP and leave, we abandon her in the elevator for another date in the garden with Robo Luna. She clues us in on some mysterious plans within plans, murders she didn’t commit, and teaches us how to build a faraday cage before disintegrating in our arms. Surely, this was all for a good reason…

After a long sleep in the cryogenic pods, Axe and Nathalie are thrust back into Virtue’s Last Reward, the final end just out of reach. They fumble with dice in a neglected archive, spilling milk all over their hands, but manage to make it back to the garden with both arms attached. Alas, Luna crushes their robot dreams, revealing them to just be normal podcasters before everything explodes.

Jumping all the way back up the termite mound, Axe and Nathalie finally enter the cyan door, a choice they maybe should have made at the start. They learn about Schrodinger’s Cat, Erotic Units, Prime Decomposition, and several other Wikipedia pages while reveling in the impeccably designed garden puzzle. Unfortunately, they are once again betrayed and forced in the last act to contend with deflating 3D models and gender roles no amount of annihilation energy can destroy.

After the last bewildering lock, Axe and Nathalie take the long way down to warehouse B and finally get some answers. They learn about inflation with Tenmyouji, fend of Clover’s advances, and come face-to-face with the termite architect himself, Zero. Unfortunately, not even root beer can lessen the sting of a friend’s betrayal…

After a brief taste of freedom, Axe and Nathalie plunge back into Virtue’s Last Reward, running headfirst into a lock before much of anything happens. Desperate to move on and (hopefully) get some answers, they fumble through a poorly arranged lab, detail the mathematical effects of Radical-6, and once again wish better for Clover. Exhausted and possibly infected with anime sickness, they close out the episode struggling to think of any reason to put cults in videogames.

After weeks locked in the Virtue’s Last Reward lounge, Axe and Nathalie finally step through the 9 door, only to discover a barren desert awaiting them. With nowhere left to go, they ponder the broken logic of the prisoner’s dilemma, why they have all these gold files, and who gets to use the big rock. Before fully crumbling under the weight of so much cursed knowledge, they stumble upon a transmitter and receive a message from what remains of the outside world.

Axe and Nathalie groggily awake sometime after the start of Virtue’s Last Reward, only to discover they’ve been locked inside a cryogenic pod! Struggling against limited oxygen, they race through a blur of incomplete discoveries. As the hallucinations set in, Nathalie discovers a set of additional rules that might just let her escape this twisted game if she can predict how it all ends.

Axe and Nathalie venture further into Virtue’s Last Reward, getting trapped waiting for the password reset email as murder abounds. The workplace comedy death game continues to expand absurdly outward, treating our hosts to even more thought experiments, cryptic anagrams, and anime sicknesses. Will the nineth lion eat the sun? Could a child be behind it all? Can we ever escape The Chinese Room of our mind? Voting closes in 3…2…1…

Welcome back, espers! Axe and Nathalie awake up from their slumber to once again find themselves trapped in the twisted hands of Zero Escape. This time they’ll be forced to navigate the crudely rendered halls of Virtue’s Last Reward (Spike Chunsoft, 2012), the second game in the trilogy and a notably larger one than 999. Will they manage to solve the infuriating infirmary puzzle? Is Zero III a v-tuber? Will Clover ever stop winking??? The podcast doors will open in 3…2…1…

Happy holidays from Zero Context! Bridging the gap between 999 and Virtue’s Last Reward, Axe and Nathalie reconvene for a very special episode, live reacting to the VLR promotional OVA. Zero Context will return in the new year. Don’t forget to leave cookies for Santa.

We emerge from the gaming mines into the Nevada desert. It’s over. We’ve finished 999. As we depart in our Zero Escape promotional SUV, we reflect on our experience playing and replaying the game, now able to see it in totality. Did the mystery payoff? Is Zero morally justified? Did Nathalie get any predictions right? Next time we meet the snow will have fallen, our hair will have grown, and we will have have shed our tattered socks. But know this, listener: I will never forget you.

The end of our 999 playthrough draws near as we stumble into the last (for real this time) bad ending. We finally get some answers about who’s been knifing everyone, discuss how the game begins to assert itself as an independent actor, and lament Clover’s continued degradation. Also, where’s Santa??

The last Bad End is here and it sure lives up to it! Axe and Nathalie continue their playthrough of 999 , working through the ax ending and all its disappointing conclusions. Elsewhere, they discuss the different mechanics of mystery vs puzzle box media, continued disappointment at who Lotus could have been, and Nathalie makes a lot of predictions that are all true (even the ones that contradict each other).

We’ve made it to route 2 of our 999 playthrough, not far enough to escape the Nonary Games but able to glimpse the sub just out of reach. This time, Axe and Nathalie went through doors 4-3-2, leading everyone to a terrible end but a terrific route to get there. We dig in to what it means for this to be a failure route, lament frustrating character tropes, and get owned by bad puzzles.

Welcome to episode 1 of Zero Context, where we kick off our Zero Escape playthrough with the trilogy’s first game, Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors. We dive headfirst into the game’s lore-heavy exposition, speculate on how 999 fits within the death game media landscape, and, like all good podcasts, issue some corrections from episode 0.