Iji is a freeware 2008 video game featuring platform and shooting elements, developed by Daniel Remar using Game Maker over a period of four years. In the game, the player controls Iji Kataiser, a young woman enhanced with nanotechnology, as she navigates a research facility on modern day Earth in the wake of an invasion by the Tasen, an alien species. Awakening after an aerial bombardment, Iji finds herself enhanced with nanotechnology and, learning of the Tasen and their invasion, resolves to convince the aliens' leader to retreat from the planet, guided by her brother Dan via the complex's loudspeaker system. Iji was generally well received. Reviews praised the replay value, the player's ability to guide Iji on different moral paths, and that it was created by a single developer.
Iji was first released on September 1, 2008. The original version used version 5.3a of GameMaker: Studio; a major update, version 1.7, was released in 2017 that used the Game Maker 7.0 framework for better compatibility with recent OSes (e.g. Windows 10, macOs). It also added a sizable amount of new features, including new endings, more plot, a revamped upgrade interface, a new nonlethal skill tree, overhauled graphics, faster walkspeed, changes to the hacking minigame, and more interaction tracking for Iji's actions over the course of the game.
Gameplay
Iji is described by Remar as System Shock 2 in 2D. Players control the titular character, Iji, a human woman who has been enhanced with nanotechnology following the invasion of Earth by an alien species known as the Tasen. Iji must navigate a research station while being guided by her brother Dan, who communicates via the station's loudspeaker system, in order to convince the aliens' leader to retreat from the planet. Though the game's plot is linear, interactions with non-player characters (NPCs) change according to the player's actions, leading to one of multiple endings. The player's primary choice is between pursuing Iji's goal either as a pacifist, or by engaging in violence against the alien threat.
Iji's nanotech energy field functions as a shield, and players begin the game armed with a shotgun. Seven further weapons can be collected throughout the game; including a machine gun, rocket launcher and alien technology like the Shocksplinter weapon. Eight additional weapons can be unlocked by combining the standard firearms using a combining station, depending on her Crack ability. Blue nanofields that function as experience can be collected during play, when enough are collected Iji gains a level. Each level she gains allows the player to use an upgrade station to increase one of Iji's seven skills by one level. These skills include physical traits such as strength and health, as well as abilities such as close-quarters combat and computer cracking. Iji's jumping ability and armor can both be improved twice each during play if players can find their power-ups.
Plot
The player controls Iji, who in opening cutscenes accompanies her little sister Mia as they are shown around a science facility by her father. She notices activity in the clouds, and suddenly the sky is lit by beams of light. When the game resumes, months later, Iji awakens to find that she has been modified by a team of researchers using alien nanotechnology, making her a cyborg soldier. Via a loudspeaker, her brother Dan explains that the area was struck by a space-to-ground weapon called an "Alpha Strike" wielded by aliens called "Tasen". This, and an ensuing ground invasion, killed nearly every human in the facility, including their father and sister. Dan advises Iji to try to convince the Tasen "Elite" leader, known as Krotera, to leave.
On her way to him, Iji questions why the rest of the world has not responded to the attack, but Dan refuses to answer her. Later, she glimpses the outside world, and realizes the invasion is worldwide, which Dan confirms. Further on, she discovers a scout team of a different alien species, the "Komato", who Dan explains is an "interplanetary peacekeeping force". Iji encounters Krotera, but she is forced to kill him after failing to persuade him to leave (but certain circumstances can lead to somebody else killing him instead). He tells her that this was the last Tasen colony, and that they had come to Earth to escape the Komato. Dan advises Iji to continue on to a Tasen communication area nearby, in order to send a distress call to the Komato.
After Iji finds a computer connected to the Tasen communicator, the perspective shifts from Iji into space outside of Earth, where a Komato fleet is gathered. Inside the control room of a spaceship is the leader of the Komato Imperial Army, General Tor; and Iosa "The Invincible", the greatest warrior of the Komato race and Tor's long-time love. Back on Earth, Dan expresses worry that the Komato forces have not yet landed, but is cut off by an explosion. Komato troops appear and begin engaging the Tasen with genocidal intent, inflicting heavy losses. Iji navigates through the chaos to the roof of the complex and meets the Komato Assassin Asha; after she defeats him, he teleports away.
