"A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS HIVE PARASITE" (2022), A Story Of A Lone Artist, Attempting To Carve Out

“The daily routine of most adults is so heavy and artificial that we are closed off to much of the world. We have to do this in order to get our work done. I think one purpose of art is to get us out of those routines. When we hear music or poetry or stories, the world opens up again. We’re drawn in — or out — and the windows of our perception are cleansed, as William Blake said. The same thing can happen when we’re around young children or adults who have unlearned those habits of shutting the world out.”

— Ursula K. Le Guin 

i think the near-extinction of people making fun, deep and/or unique interactive text-based browser games, projects and stories is catastrophic to the internet. i'm talking pre-itch.io era, nothing against it.

there are a lot of fun ones listed here and here but for the most part, they were made years ago and are now a dying breed. i get why. there's no money in it. factoring in the cost of web hosting and servers, it probably costs money. it's just sad that it's a dying art form.

anyway, here's some of my favorite browser-based interactive projects and games, if you're into that kind of thing. 90% of them are on the lists that i linked above.

A Better World - create an alternate history timeline

Alter Ego - abandonware birth-to-death life simulator game

Seedship - text-based game about colonizing a new planet

Sandboxels or ThisIsSand - free-falling sand physics games

Little Alchemy 2 - combine various elements to make new ones

Infinite Craft - kind of the same as Little Alchemy

ZenGM - simulate sports

Tamajoji - browser-based tamagotchi

IFDB - interactive fiction database (text adventure games)

Written Realms - more text adventure games with a user interface

The Cafe & Diner - mystery game

The New Campaign Trail - US presidential campaign game

Money Simulator - simulate financial decisions

Genesis - text-based adventure/fantasy game

Level 13 - text-based science fiction adventure game

Miniconomy - player driven economy game

Checkbox Olympics - games involving clicking checkboxes

BrantSteele.net - game show and Hunger Games simulators

Murder Games - fight to the death simulator by Orteil

Cookie Clicker - different but felt weird not including it. by Orteil.

if you're ever thinking about making a niche project that only a select number of individuals will be nerdy enough to enjoy, keep in mind i've been playing some of these games off and on for 20~ years (Alter Ego, for example). quite literally a lifetime of replayability.

Once I was caught unexpectedly in a downpour on the top of Mount Pilchuck. In the course of five minutes a bright, clear day that let me see all the way to the Olympic Peninsula turned into a phantasmagorical nightmare. I couldn't see more than a few feet in any direction, my skin was turning a sickly white, the rocks kept sliding out from under me. I almost twisted my ankle several times. If I had remained more than a few hours up there my chances of freezing to death up there would've been high, and my odds of successful navigation on my own seemed slim.

As I struggled, a great black bird appeared before me. I say "appeared" and that should be taken literally — one moment I was cleaning my glasses for the umpteenth time, trying to see through the driving rain, and the next, this incredibly solid and enormous raven is soaring up to me. I would've been scared, but I was already terrified.

The bird could easily have encircled me in its wings. In the almost total darkness, I could see nothing but its outline, outstretched, almost triumphant, fluttering and blowing about like a spruce in a pitch-black tempest, a black flag somehow darker than the fathomless sky.

My guide darted, flickered, and spun, cutting through the torrents of water as I stumbled and staggered endlessly downwards. I expected to risk falling or twisting my ankles, but somehow every time my foot fell on solid, stable ground. Little splinters and spikes of ice seemed to course up my calves, but the nauseating feeling of wrongness that I've felt every time I've twisted or sprained anything never came.

As though I had been hurled out of the forest, I crashed full-speed into the hood of my car with a dull thud. The heater core has long given out on this old jalopy, but I figured at least I could've dried myself off with the paper towels in the trunk, and huddled underneath the thin car-blankets I keep at all times.

However, before I could unlock the passenger door (driver-side lock doesn't work. I told you, jalopy), I found myself looking into a pale face framed by a wild cascade of dark hair. The rain coruscated on his cheeks and ran around his mouth and down his chin. Without the crude intermediary of speech, his intent unfurled in my mind—I must join with him and be part of his company of riders in some Other Land.

I opened my mouth to assent, but before I could make a sound, the curséd voice of pragmatism tumbled out: "I must set my affairs in order! I haven't been to a lawyer recently, my house will end up in probate! It will be hell for my loved ones! Give me a week to decide!"

A sneer curled that noble face. Before I could try to cram the words back down my throat, the strange rider had turned away, and in that motion, he became one with the darkness. The rain gathered itself up from the ground and leapt into the air. The sky brightened with a rapidity that made me stagger, and I was left shivering, soaked to the bone on a bright Summer day.

TiL (click to go to the thread, which probably has more interesting tidbits I missed).

Bonus:

ULTIMATE CATHOLIC TECHNIQUE

@official-penis-posts ?

I'll always talk up internet radio stations because I don't think the average person is aware that they're free, can run in your browser (or in any program that can connect to them), work on your phone, run better than a youtube tab, and give you a much better selection of music than you could get from a general algorithmic playlist

(also lots of them have live shows which you can tune into for free)

Tumblr polls have twelve options. You know what else there are twelve of? That’s right!

Yeah, try again and not be frustrated at first, of course, but when the podcast is mentioned, entrepeneurship comes to mind, and, just to remember it, you cant do the 100th podcast(or any entrepeneurial bullshit) if your rich parents haven't paid for the first 99