The 8th Race Speculation

So I've started up this thread in hopes of sparking speculation about the mysterious 8th race, defaced (literally) from the Ark's gate and seemingly long gone...
What we do know is that previously, they were represented by an eye on the gate, seen in early images of it. Some think this means they were the tentacle beasts, but others like me have another idea that comes from the fossils:

These guys. The "???" Fossil, which is obviously redacted for a reason.

They have room for a single eye, check, and...
Hold on, what's this? Look in its hand. This is the only fossil which is holding something, and what does it look like?
Well...

While the altars don't look like this in the current nightly (they are missing the orb and replaced with a sort of glowy animated particle effect thing instead) these are the current images on the Starbounder wiki (which means in the future they may no longer show the orbs so if the orbs aren't there, there used to be orbs). Notice how they're the same size as the one being held? While all the artifacts on the altars look like these orbs, the Master Manipulator is different - perhaps it was made to replace the original sixth key - shown above, ancient, broken, still held by its last owner?

Of course, all of this is speculation. I don't know anything more than anyone else who's been looking at the nightlies and been trying to piece stuff together.
But while making this, I noticed something interesting...
Anyone remember these guys?:

Or rather the ones who wore these? Big scary wings, angry at everything, eyeswords, all that?
Well, notice the eye's height above the head. While the head shape doesn't match, the eye is the right height on the hat to make up for the creatures' extended necks. Perhaps taking into account a slightly different angle, it would fit? Perhaps these are the remnants of that civilization? The more likely expaination is that these guys worship the above aliens, who are, or were, in cahoots with the Ruin (tentacle beast), which is why they were wiped out, their key deactivated, etc. etc.

Maybe.
Could all be a coincidence.

So tell me, do you think these guys are the missing 8th race? Do you think that might be the original sixth, or maybe even an extra 7th key in its hand? Who were they? Why aren't they around anymore? Why was their face removed? Are they connected to the Eye Cultists?

Please post any speculation or ideas you have about the 8th race below whether or not you agree with my ideas!


Also, on a side note, if anyone who happens across this thread is any good at pixel art, I'd love to see your interpretation of what that fossil would look like with skin. (If you want, of course - I'm not telling you to do it)

 

I think there is a strong possibility of that being a fossilized ancient race. Also a bit off topic, I think that the ancient race had more motives to save the Avian race and create the Glitch race then it seems. In the Avian lore it states that the Glitch and then the Avians were the first races to make contact with the Floran. Interestingly enough it seems the Floran might have much darker origins, well other then being murderous plants. In Greenfinger's codex on Floran biology he redacts information on their root system, and in a series of codexes he has the Ring of Thorns murder his best friend, who was an Apex scientist, for discovering the secret of Floran biology. Also in the Floran hunting party mission on stable there is ancient cave art depicting the tentacle monster.
All the racial descriptions of it seem scared and gloomy and the Floran description even says, "Floran never wantsss to sssee this again." So maybe it's not a coincidence that the ancient race created the Glitch and saved the Avian, and those were the first two races to have contact with the Floran. Only the next update will tell!

 

So Florans could technically be a subspecies of the tentacle monsters? Just when I thought I'd never be interested in that race...

 

Well chopping down tentacles on the old tentacle planets did give wood for a time...

 

If they are some type of subspecies or a mutated variant of the Tentacle monsters it would explain their violent behavior and the need to consume everything that is not like themselves. Another theory I thought of is that at some point, there may have been some type of cold war or uneasy truce between the Ancients and the Tentacle Monsters. Instead of the two powerful forces going head to head they may have tried to spread their ideas and ways of thinking to other races to carry out the war for them. While the Tentacle monsters spread their ideas of consumption, violence, and barbarism to the Florans, the Ancients spread their ideas of conservation, peace, and advancement to the Glitch and Avians. Although both of their plans ultimately went awry, the Avians worship a dead bird, the Florans befriended the Glitch, and the Glitch are...glitched. Your theory is most likely the correct one, but in either case it shows the tentacle monsters do posses some form of intelligence.

 

The Glitch so far are the closest to perfect humans we have. I'm posting a great topic about Greenfinger soon, who I assume created the entire Floran race and is a more central character than most players realise.
My summary of the races:
Avians - worship a dead bird who forced them to lose their ability to fly
Glitch - fools as long as they follow the hivemind, highly intelligent as long as they're turned off
Apex - physically strong, intelligent, but psychologically very weak and manipulated easy
Humans - nothing different from real life humans, other than they're in the future with technology. Still act like modern humans though.
Floran - genetically engineered beings made by Greenfinger, extremely low intelligence but great physical prowess.
Novakids - cowboy era humans with great zeal(lack of lorebooks make it hard to determine their actual value)
Hylotl - oriental humans in aquatic form who value looking good above effectivity(lack of lorebooks make it hard to detemine their actual value)

 

The florans have a greater understanding of technology than they should maybe they are an offshoot of the ancients that devolved and fused with a plant species (I have heard the theory that florans are a chimera bettween a plant and an animal)
and the floran society devolved over time probably due to resoarce shortages and war due to them hiding on the floran homeworld from the tenticle beasts

 

Be careful when discussing current lore. A dev confirmed that the lore will make more sense and fix up loose ends that didn't make sense before with 1.0. So of course some of the lore is subject to change.

Just a friendly warning.

I had stated somewhere else that if they were to add a new race that 1.0 would be the perfect time due to being able to have them relate to the story. Some people disagreed with that idea though. The devs had stated that even the Nightly build had stuff purposefully hidden on a dev only build of the game so even those who play on it will have surprises when 1.0 launch.

 

@Up
New race in 1.0??
Omg yay

 

Possibly. They didn't say anything about a race specifically. I'm pretty sure the hidden stuff is mostly story stuff. Although I find the chance of a whole new race highly unlikely, especially since they have yet to fully integrate the Novakids in relation to the other races.

 

Ah, ya, I forgot about Novakid stuff xd I'm really waiting for it
Idk it's offtop or not, one time I found two Novakids (about minute of walking between them) with my boyfriend. They were naked (lol), and they were like shadow people - didn't say anything (I was a Floran, bf was an Apex)
I didn't think about joining server as Novakid :/

 

So do you think asra knox has something to do w this

 

Interesting that you found an idea of what the heck is in the ??? Fossils hand. But, I'm sure that they are not necessarily a new race because when you encounter them they're dialogue can be either human, glitch, or hylotl dialogue. However, maybe they dress up to symbolize a race similar to it, and that race may have been supportive of the Ruin. They may be the same species or group of species of the Ruin. Perhaps, the Ruin once started out as an ??? But it grew large for some reason and hungrier, and you know what happens
Next.
When the Ruin fell, this race searched for the artifacts. Who knows? Maybe the name of the race was The Occusus race.