This somewhat empty and sterile system was reformed and enlivened by the "Rediscovery of Man", the backdrop against which Smith's novel Norstrilia and the majority of his short stories, covering thousands of years of fictional time, are set.
The cycle does not come to a final resolution; in 2010, Frederik Pohl — who, as the editor of Galaxy, made the initial decision to purchase and publish the stories — said that Smith had told him of losing the notebook in which he wrote down his ideas for more Instrumentality material:
[2]Algis Budrys in 1965 praised Smith for creating "a completely consistent phantom universe", in which stories are not sequels to each other but "tesserae in a mosaic".
In the light novel series Log Horizon, the animal-like Werecat, Wolf Fang, and Fox Tail races were created by what was called the Norstrilia Project, in reference to his novel.
The anime series Fafner in the Azure is based on concepts of telepathic warfare against an unknown enemy similar to those explored in The Game of Rat and Dragon.
Furthermore, the robot piloted by the main character in the first half of the series bears the name Mark Elf, shared by another story set in the Instrumentality fictional universe.