The 5 Most Advanced Races & Factions in Science Fiction | Sci-Fi Top 5

You thought the Forerunners or the Galactic Empire were advanced? Check out these 5 races from popular science fiction which make Star Wars and Halo look like the stone age!

On today's Science Fiction Top 5 episode, we're counting the 5 most advanced races, factions or civilizations within sci-fi. Included on this list are the Time Lords from Dr. Who, the Xeelee, the Culture and more!

Like this video, and maybe one or more of these races will appear in a future Who Would Win or Galactic Versus episode!

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[nickwalker]

People tend to misinterpret the term Xeelee stomp. Usually people use it to describe a battle where the odds are stacked heavily in one’s favor, but in reality it’s a battle where one side has *no chance* of victory whatsoever.

[CatastrophicMarauder]

Xeelee ships are like: yo dawg I heard you like space, so I made you a spaceship out of space so you can travel in space in space

[SnoNotHD]

I clicked on this vid expecting to have to comment, "You forgot about The Culture." You just earned some serious points in my book.

[MeargleSchmeargle]

Reapers: We are the apex of all life.

Empire: Not if our Turbolasers have a say in the matter.

Forerunners: Filthy casuals.

Downstreamers: *Creative Mode Activate*

[bobsonmcgregory]

When Xeelee came second, my heart broke, then when no. 1 was also by Baxter, I was so relieved.

[ESFNinja]

Is sand considered an advanced race? They're rough, many in numbers, and EVERYWHERE.

[Alex.T]

I quite like timestamps sooo~

1:35 - Humanity over 100 billion years in the future fused with Multivac from "The Last Question"
3:04 - The Culture from "The Culture" series
4:28 - Gallifreyans/Time Lords from "Doctor Who"
5:18 - Xeelee from "The Xeelee Sequence" series
6:12 - Downstreamers from "The Manifold Trilogy"

[FirstPassOfficial]

I am thoroughly impressed you actually included the Downstreamers, the book series is amazing, but also not very well known. Huge props man

[javicr]

The high ground is the most advanced faction

[stevegoodson]

In the culture series, there's something way more advanced than the culture itself - whatever produced the artifact in excession, though we don't know anything about who made it or where it came from, which is kind of the point.

[BazztheBazz]

Coming from the comic book fandom, I always find it funny when people complain about Superman being "too powerful, " when sci-fi has whole civilizations like this running around.

[loganbyrd]

The virgin forerunners vs the chad xeelee.

[xyro]

But do the Downstreamers have the higher ground?

[WhatIsLove]

Based on the little that we know the precursors from halo were pretty crazy

[synthetic]

I love that two of Baxter's races made it on the list. I first found him through the anthology Vacuum Diagrams and I've been collecting (most) of his books ever since. I'm not crazy about everything he's written, but the really hard, really large-scale scifi he writes blows my mind. I think my favorite novel of his is Flux, which takes place within the interior of a neutron star (it's part of the Xelee series of stories).

At one point, someone remarks that, in ancient times, when humanity was powerful, the greatest city was huge: one centimeter across!

[lordanubis]

Grunts (Halo) vs B1 Battle Droids (Star wars)

[JZ]

I like that you included the Xeelee. It's been forever since I read about them, but I remember I thoroughly enjoyed the book. I have to agree with some others here. It's hard to not include the Q from Star Trek.

[bromo]

Kudos on including The Culture: such a good pantheon of books. Q Continuum would be the egregious missing one as its not an individual but an entire race.

[TheLordPage]

So glad you included the Culture! Consider Phlebas is an amazing novel in that series.

[DyslexicGamer]

This just made me realize how creative and imaginative science fiction books truly are compared to other mediums. I suppose it's easy being just written down and not having to show it but still