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Hey #Unix folks recommend me your favorite games that can run in the terminal that aren't:

1) the most basic boring arcade stuff like snake or missile command

2) roguelikes/dungeon crawlers (love em but there's no lack of those)

3) chess, backgammon, etc., more meaty board games sure but there's already a million easy to find ways to play chess in a terminal

edit: 4) IF, I know where to find plenty of that, forgot this one

This is for my machine with no gui so when I say terminal I mean terminal not just like "text based and looks like it'd be in a terminal maybe".

#terminal #tui #linux

#Linux #Terminal #unix #tui
This entry was edited (1 year ago)

Jonathan Lamothe reshared this.

in reply to lori

Nelson Chu Pavlosky
Nelson Chu Pavlosky
• •

Have you investigated interactive fiction? The game that has stuck with me as a good introduction to the medium was Photopia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photopia

There are likely many other on-ramps to text adventures, probably newer and better games, but I just thought that one had pretty colors 😉


1998 video game

Contributors to Wikimedia projects (Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.)
in reply to Nelson Chu Pavlosky

lori
lori
• •
@skyfaller I've played a decent amount of IF! I probably should have put that in the list too as stuff I'm covered on lol
@Nelson Chu Pavlosky
in reply to lori

Ramin Honary
Ramin Honary
• •

@skyfaller I haven't tried it yet, but I have been meaning to try out VMS Empire.

I have a few other possible recommendations for you in my bookmarks, I am looking through them now...

Resource page for vms-empire 1.16

The ancestor of all expand/explore/exploit/exterminate games.
www.catb.org
@Nelson Chu Pavlosky
in reply to Ramin Honary

Ramin Honary
Ramin Honary
• •

@skyfaller
Oh shit, I just realized, VMS Empire is maintained by Eric S. Raymond. It may not be the most ethical game to play. That or the community around it is probably as toxic as he is.

Let me try to find a fork of it...

@Nelson Chu Pavlosky
This entry was edited (1 year ago)
in reply to Ramin Honary

lori
lori
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@ramin_hal9001 @skyfaller well empire i think is at least a game that has been reimplemented by a thousand people for modern machines
@Nelson Chu Pavlosky @Ramin Honary
in reply to lori

Ramin Honary
Ramin Honary
• •

@skyfaller N
Thanks to you, I now realize there seems to be a dearth of good TUI-based turn-based strategy games and simulator games. This needs to change.

  • I found a Magic-the-Gathering like TUI game on github, might be worth a try.
  • There is a 2D TUI-based portal-like game.
  • XorCurses looks like a Rogue-like but apparently it is not.
  • Intricacy is a turn-based puzzle game implented in Haskell and can has a TUI version.
  • Now that I think about it, there are quite a few turn-based strategy games, or FreeCiv-like games, that have very rudimentary graphics and could probably be more easily implemented as a TUI games.

GitHub - billionai/Magic-The-Terminal: A Magic the Gathering inspired, TUI based game.

A Magic the Gathering inspired, TUI based game. Contribute to billionai/Magic-The-Terminal development by creating an account on GitHub.
GitHub
@Nelson Chu Pavlosky
in reply to Ramin Honary

lori
lori
• •
@ramin_hal9001 @skyfaller seriously I'm sitting here thinking I need to start designing my own terminal games along the lines of the Oregon Trails or Lemonade Stands of the world, but with more depth because it's 2023
@Nelson Chu Pavlosky @Ramin Honary
in reply to lori

D. Moonfire
D. Moonfire
• •

I've had writing a Kingdom of Loathing/Fallen London style game on my to do list for years. And I wanted it text mode so I could play via SSH at work.

@ramin_hal9001 @skyfaller

@Nelson Chu Pavlosky @Ramin Honary
in reply to lori

Craig Maloney ☕
Craig Maloney ☕
• •
I've been finding solace in Boggle, though the computer totally kicks my butt at it.
in reply to Craig Maloney ☕

lori
lori
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@craigmaloney oh yeah I did add Mille Borne, I haven't played it yet but I've heard people say that Monster Maker (an 80s Japanese card game I have) is similar in the sense of trying to play distance cards to the right length and stopping other people from progressing. Just with a little more Gandalf (who in later printings got renamed to Gandawulf), so I've always meant to try that game digital or otherwise.
@Craig Maloney ☕
in reply to lori

kelbot ◖⎚∠⎚◗
kelbot ◖⎚∠⎚◗
• •

XorCurses - github.com/jwm-art-net/XorCurs…
Greed - catb.org/~esr/greed/
CurseofWar - a-nikolaev.github.io/curseofwa…
Liberal Crime Squad - lcs.wikidot.com/start
StarLanes - github.com/mmpub/StarLanes
chroma - level7.org.uk/chroma/
pokete - lxgr-linux.github.io/pokete/

There are a few different tetris, pacman and sokoban clones.


GitHub - jwm-art-net/XorCurses: A remake of Xor by Astral Software for Linux, using Ncurses.

A remake of Xor by Astral Software for Linux, using Ncurses. - GitHub - jwm-art-net/XorCurses: A remake of Xor by Astral Software for Linux, using Ncurses.
GitHub
in reply to lori

lori
lori
• •
Also man I would absolutely love more like...turn based management sim kinda games, I'm looking for a good port of Oregon Trail for Unix terminals, and I've been enjoying checking out more evolved games that came out of Hammurabi, so games like this I would love recs for. I assume there's some form of Lemonade Stand out there too if I look. Gimme all the business/city sims you can.
in reply to lori

crab
crab
• •

I believe old versions of Dwarf Fortress have an ncurses mode which runs in the terminal. Dont think its supported anymore on the steam/itch release though, sadly.

(I hope DF doesn't count as a roguelike or dungeon crawler 😀 )

in reply to crab

lori
lori
• •
@operand I should look into that, I've played an absurd amount of hours of DF but I've never played it in a terminal so it'd be a fun thing to check out
@crab
in reply to lori

crab
crab
• •
I think it's as simple as setting [PRINT_MODE:TEXT] in init.txt
in reply to lori

popey
popey
• •
github.com/wimpysworld/antsy-a… - a 60fps retro vertical shooter, which runs in the terminal, and written in bash 😀

GitHub - wimpysworld/antsy-alien-attack: A game, written in Bash, that is a somewhat retro-a-like shoot 'em up. Hopefully.

A game, written in Bash, that is a somewhat retro-a-like shoot 'em up. Hopefully. - GitHub - wimpysworld/antsy-alien-attack: A game, written in Bash, that is a somewhat retro-a-like shoot '...
GitHub
in reply to lori

Ben S.
Ben S.
• •
Super Star Trek (although the version you get in modern Linux is unrecognizable to me personally), and text adventure / interactive fiction games like Colossal Cave Adventure and Zork.
in reply to lori

Gemini6Ice
Gemini6Ice
• •
check out “Richard’s play by email server” for a variety of meaty modern abstract (and some less abstract) games that can be represented textually, such as the GIPF series.
in reply to lori

timorl
timorl
• •
The way you are asking you probably know about bsdgames, but I wanted to specifically recommend hunt from there as a multiplayer shooter. Surprizingly fun for what it is. Only works in multiplayer though.
in reply to timorl

lori
lori
• •
@timorl I grabbed it but haven't looked at everything in there, I'm also working on a pubnix for some local folks though and thought about putting it on there since I know it's on a lot of pubnix servers
@timorl
in reply to lori

TomGwozdz
TomGwozdz
• •
Back in the day, I played a lot of 'atc' (Air Traffic Control).
in reply to lori

Jonathan Lamothe
Jonathan Lamothe
•
@lori SDF has a pretty extensive list of games, though, I think most of them fall into the list of categories you've excluded.
@lori
in reply to lori

scrottie (he/him/they)
scrottie (he/him/they)
• •
WeeHours LPMud is telnet weehours.net 2000. Fork of AfterHours which is now gone, running basically non-stop since 1991. Ofc there's no shortage of MUDs/MUCKs/MOOs etc.
in reply to lori

rlonstein
rlonstein
• •

I think I have this in acceptable condition for someone else to try it... git.sr.ht/~rlonstein/wordwhiz-…

A rewrite of a little word tile game I first wrote in 2011 inspired by the Wordsmith game in my first Tivo.

~rlonstein/wordwhiz-cpp - A letter tile game in C++ inspired by the Tivo(R) Wordsmith game by Carl Haynes - sourcehut git

git.sr.ht
in reply to lori

joshie 🏳️‍🌈
joshie 🏳️‍🌈
• •

exceptionally cursed but: I once hacked a ncurses TUI display mode into a Gameboy emulator, using half-height unicode blocks to get 2 square-ish pixels per text character. worked badly, but worked nonetheless

unfortunately I don’t think I still have a copy I can share, but if you have the time and the know how it is both possible and very funny

Jonathan Lamothe reshared this.

in reply to joshie 🏳️‍🌈

Jonathan Lamothe
Jonathan Lamothe
•
@joshie 🏳️‍🌈 badly or not, the fact that it woked at all is pretty impressive. If you should happen to find it kicking around on a drive somewhere, I'd love to see it in action.
@joshie 🏳️‍🌈
in reply to lori

Etam
Etam
• •
There's some: linuxlinks.com/ASCIIGames/

21 Peerless ASCII Games - LinuxLinks

Text-based games are often forgotten and neglected. However, there are many ASCII gems out there waiting to be explored which are immensely addictive and great fun to play.
Steve Emms (LinuxLinks)
in reply to lori

via unreachable
via unreachable
• •
you might already know this, but if you're a Dwarf Fortress fan (or interested in trying it out), it has a curses mode!
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

via unreachable
via unreachable
• •

are you certain? It could last I checked!

[PRINT_MODE:TEXT] in data/init/init.txt

This entry was edited (1 year ago)
in reply to via unreachable

Jonathan Lamothe
Jonathan Lamothe
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@via unreachable The one in the Debian repositories can't. It looks like ASCII (actually CP437) but they're weirdly graphical tiles.
@via unreachable
in reply to via unreachable

Jonathan Lamothe
Jonathan Lamothe
•

@via unreachable I didn't have an init folder under data. I added it and got the following when I launched it, I got the following error:

Display not found and PRINT_MODE not set to TEXT, aborting.
@via unreachable
in reply to Jonathan Lamothe

via unreachable
via unreachable
• •

@me it looks like Debian moved stuff around; try editing /usr/share/games/dwarf-fortress/gamedata/data/init/init.txt

Change [PRINT_MODE:2D] to [PRINT_MODE:TEXT], and you should get curses output.

@Jonathan Lamothe

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