Beyond Loom

Thanks, Bill. Rest in Peace.

I was amazed by Bill's software seeing it on a Mac back then - MacPaint mostly, then HyperCard. I was not even 10, but I was already programming, and spent hours trying to figure out how to implement MacPaint's Lasso on my humble ZX Spectrum. (With some success, but not quite as elegant...)

If you want to experience HyperCard, John Earnest (RodgerTheGreat on HN[0]) built Decker[1] that runs on both the web and natively, and captures the aesthetic and most stuff perfectly. It uses Lil as a programming language - it is different than HyperTalk, but beautiful in its own right. (It doesn't read as English quite the way HyperTalk does, but it is more regular and easier to write - it's a readable/writable vector language, quite unlike those other ones ...)

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=RodgerTheGreat

[1] https://beyondloom.com/decker/

Is it still being maintained? There used to be a game jam, Octojam, that was stopped years ago[0]. Seems mostly out of a lack of interest? Would be cool if it revived.

It inspired me to start zig8[1], my own CHIP-8 emulator. It's not ready for prime time yet but it's getting there. When it's ready I hope it will have a visual debugger and feel good: fast, better shaders, better sound, good defaults, etc.

CHIP-8 is a neat system. If you're interested in emulation it's a great place to start in my humble opinion. It's simple enough that you can finish it before deciding whether you like writing emulators.

Hopefully interest in CHIP-8 would pick up again, it's a neat bit of history and a cool little system.

[0] https://beyondloom.com/blog/octojam.html

[1] https://github.com/agentultra/zig8

One of the most famous indie games riffing on Sokoban and playing with expectations for its gameplay is the delightful Baba Is You.[0]

If you're interested in trying to make your own variations on Sokoban-like games, PuzzleScript[1] is tailor-made for the task, with a fascinating declarative approach to describing game rules.

A Sokoban-like game can also be an excellent way to familiarize yourself with a new game engine or graphics toolkit. My own project, Decker, includes a very short Sokoban to demonstrate how one might make turn-based tile-oriented games.[2]

[0] https://www.hempuli.com/baba/

[1] https://www.puzzlescript.net

[2] http://beyondloom.com/decker/goofs/sokoban.html

I did the same like 2 weeks ago. In Rust. ^^

I'm still trying to improve it a little. https://git.ache.one/dither/tree/?h=%f0%9f%aa%b5

I didn't published it because it's hard to actually put dithered images on the web, you can't resize a dithered image. So on the web, you have to dither it on the fly. It's why, in the article, there is some artifacts in the images. I still need to learn about dithering.

Reference: https://sheep.horse/2022/12/pixel_accurate_atkinson_dithering_for_images_in_ht.html

Cool links about dithering: - https://beyondloom.com/blog/dither.html - https://blog.maximeheckel.com/posts/the-art-of-dithering-and-retro-shading-web/

Thanks for sharing that perspective! I have not delved too far into k, though I have been a few times confused and discouraged by the fact that there are different versions of the language that are not compatible with each other, and some are proprietary (if I understand the state of the language correctly). Is there a specific version that is best to learn first?

Edit: I just realized that you are the creator of https://beyondloom.com/tools/specialk.html and https://beyondloom.com/decker/index.html. I just want to say that your work is awesome! I've really enjoyed reading through your website many a time.

Some past discussions of Decker:

4 years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33377964 - "Decker, a platform that builds on the legacy of Hypercard and classic macOS"

2 years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38985409 - "Decker – A HyperCard Replacement"

2 years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40292181 - "Decker: A reincarnation of HyperCard with 1-bit graphics"

It's both native and web-based. Web version: https://www.beyondloom.com/decker/tour.html

Click File -> Cards... to see how the guided tour is constructed.