We've got a bespoke e-ink interactive fiction console, running on an ESP32, with a brand new SDK - a device which does not (at the moment) support the genre's most popular formats in Twine and Ink AND it is cartridge-based As it stands, an incredibly efficient "kickstarter to e-waste pipeline" - ThreadSky

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mascott.pizza • 9 days ago

We've got a bespoke e-ink interactive fiction console, running on an ESP32, with a brand new SDK - a device which does not (at the moment) support the genre's most popular formats in Twine and Ink

AND it is cartridge-based

As it stands, an incredibly efficient "kickstarter to e-waste pipeline"

Comments

mascott.pizza•9 days ago

Do not mistake me - this looks like a great way to experience games like this, and I'm really stupid into it - I had a hacked Kindle 3 that I figured out how to put Twine games on and man it ruled

What I'm worried about is decisions being made around a great idea

mascott.pizza•9 days ago

Why are what would typically be described as game features being built directly into the OS for display?

Is art... required??? Because I'd just as happily write a text adventure that's... text.

The online store doesn't launch until 2026 on their roadmap - Cartridge only until then?

mascott.pizza•9 days ago

Realize I didn't complete this thought earlier - there IS a plan for an online store, and "we are working to include an option in the SDK that will allow users to import formats from other engines and adjust them to fit the Ink [...] format, making it easier to bring those games into the platform."

mascott.pizza•9 days ago

The more I think about it, the more I think having an open source device like this is really cool, and that it'll live far beyond the company that makes it, but putting that on the community is a tough sell

mascott.pizza•9 days ago

And every cartridge is going to cost we don't even know how much - 80 Days, my literal GOTY, launched at ~ $5 ~ over a decade ago - It feels like this is a fantasy console for a universe in which Zork was still on top of the world

mascott.pizza•9 days ago

I'm gonna buy it

I'm gonna get whatever backer tier includes two games

I'm gonna support the store and IF creators I love when it launches (s/o to Emily Short)

And I'm gonna install new software to the device when it needs it

I want it to work

But I also feel like it is working against itself

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