The gaming industry has recently started using algorithms for the generation of 3D game environments. The game “No Man’s Sky”, not yet released, attracted attention since its first announcement in 2014 because of its procedurally generated online environment. I will draw on the work of Roger Caillois, who has looked at the ways in which we make sense of the relation between nature and ourselves. His ‘diagonal’ approach to the rationalization of nature and life, which brought him to work within the Surrealist movement in the late ’30s in France, could provide an alternative perspective on the practice of using algorithms for the reproduction of living environments.