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So the other day, I was listening to Crimson Glory (the '80s USPM band). All the while, I was doing a bit of research on the members, and I came across a fansite in honor of their late frontman "Midnight". On this site, there was a section dedicated to people who knew him IRL sharing their favorite memories of him. And one of them caught my attention.
According to the runner of this fansite, Midnight and two other people operated an official forum dedicated to his solo project as well as some other Crimson Glory side acts. But the way to get to this forum was pretty unique. Rather than being taken right to this forum, one would have to play through this photo-gallery-meets-point-and-click game where you'd have to click specific locations on the photos in order to advance. Thinking this kind of setup would be interesting to play through, I took to archive.org to try and play through what was archived. Obviously, the archived site is very incomplete. But I was able to make it through a bare-bones route and reach what remained of the forum without any trouble. (and I don't know if this is a bug in the archiving or some sort of weird rickroll by the forum admins, but if I try to click any of the threads in the forum itself, archive.org auto-redirects me to some bizarro "Sexy Mandarin" vid on YT. Idk. I'm starting to get off topic.)
So anyway, this little experience got me thinking about the modern web and how the tools in place for most websites don't let people build fun little games into their personal websites unless they can Code Good. Then again, I feel like it wouldn't be that difficult for someone to code a photo gallery point-and-click maze into their personal site. Only thing is, though, what if someone hid their DNI in it and chewed people out for not being able to find it before interacting with them on socmed? That'd be fucked up.
Anyway, this kinda shit is why I love the early Internet even though I didn't really use these kinda sites that much as a kid. And why I will forever have a grudge against modern tech giants for stifling this kind of creativity.
According to the runner of this fansite, Midnight and two other people operated an official forum dedicated to his solo project as well as some other Crimson Glory side acts. But the way to get to this forum was pretty unique. Rather than being taken right to this forum, one would have to play through this photo-gallery-meets-point-and-click game where you'd have to click specific locations on the photos in order to advance. Thinking this kind of setup would be interesting to play through, I took to archive.org to try and play through what was archived. Obviously, the archived site is very incomplete. But I was able to make it through a bare-bones route and reach what remained of the forum without any trouble. (and I don't know if this is a bug in the archiving or some sort of weird rickroll by the forum admins, but if I try to click any of the threads in the forum itself, archive.org auto-redirects me to some bizarro "Sexy Mandarin" vid on YT. Idk. I'm starting to get off topic.)
So anyway, this little experience got me thinking about the modern web and how the tools in place for most websites don't let people build fun little games into their personal websites unless they can Code Good. Then again, I feel like it wouldn't be that difficult for someone to code a photo gallery point-and-click maze into their personal site. Only thing is, though, what if someone hid their DNI in it and chewed people out for not being able to find it before interacting with them on socmed? That'd be fucked up.
Anyway, this kinda shit is why I love the early Internet even though I didn't really use these kinda sites that much as a kid. And why I will forever have a grudge against modern tech giants for stifling this kind of creativity.
