An IBM PC/AT model 5170 sits inside an abandoned room, inside an abandoned home, located in an abandoned town, totally surrounded by a large but incredibly secretive military installation. This IBM has been set to the task of playing a game of unknown origin seemingly autonomously for fifty years. This is Location Nil, and there is no place on earth quite like it. Here the computer has remained, carefully guarded. At first, it was protected merely due to scientific curiosity - later, out of what can only be described as existential paranoia. Fifty years ago, investigators working a cold case of unrelated disappearances in the vicinity of small town a expected to find nothing. Instead, they found a home in modest decay and a cutting-edge personal computer within. Officers entered the room and vanished, never to be seen again. Forty eight years ago, the abandoned home lost power, but the computer continued to play. Attempts to manipulate the state of the room or its zombie computer externally were catastrophic. Forty seven years ago, the neighborhood was quarantined, and eventually the entire town was evicted for an "infrastructure project" that promptly became a black site. As years passed, more was learned and less was understood. Persistent monitoring of the computer's monitor and game-state were established, and soon patterns arose. The game is wordless, using an entirely ASCII interface, and alternates between two main modes that hobbyists of the era collectively described as "modified Rogue" and "something like Empire" respectively. In both modes, the computer scrolls randomly and wildly across grids of thousands of tiles, playing by whatever unknown rule-set guides it. Much early research focused on the Rogue-like game, trying to discern its meaning, but it was quickly discarded in favor of the Empire camp due to how inscrutable and random the behaviors of the computer player appeared. As time went on, more and more attention and experimentation became focused on the presumed strategic layer. One day, these researchers caused quite a stir with their findings. It was discovered that the main tiles came in only four color codes, no matter how many iterations passed: green, yellow, red, and black. Based on the game's behavior, It was inferred that the goal of the game was to preserve the green tiles, while minimizing red and black tiles. It was also discovered that there were a few fixed tiles that never changed. One in the very center of the grid, a green "@," attracted much speculation. A year of analysis later, and it was proven demonstratively that the number of green tiles was shrinking inexorably. Spikes of red and black grow slowly from the edges of the massive grid, slowed but never halted by the computer's seemingly random activities in the strategic layer. Tiles changed wildly and oscillated between yellow or red or black, but never once did they return to being green. Some manner of game was afoot at lightning speeds, but whatever the game, green was losing. As ever more tiles were peeled away from the blobs of green, a feeling of dread emerged. Forty years ago, the first wave of special forces entered the room. None returned, and no clear change in the game state was demonstrated. In the years that followed, the pattern of slow and grinding losses never reversed. Two more waves of soldiers - the very best and the brightest - were deployed, with no apparent difference in outcome. All gone, without a trace or anything to show for it. Many hoped to simply ignore the IBM. They argued that the game and vanishing phenomenon could be entirely unrelated, but a cult of dread that feared "losing the game" arose among the powerful. The site was uncovered more widely and became an internationally held secret. Across the world, the matter was discussed endlessly, in the same breath as any global catastrophe - cyclones, pandemics, wars, and "that computer." The most radical options, like nuking the abandoned town entirely, were in fact some of the last alternatives struck down, perilously close to approval. Twenty five years ago, a compromise was struck. An international effort, collectively funded by every major nation, initiated a crash project to pursue alternative methods of containment, investigation, and eradication of Location Nil. You have prepared your entire life to enter the room. What waits for you on the other side?