Post B1oTH51dgsL2qGcIgy by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
 (DIR) More posts by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
 (DIR) Post #B1o93giEmAteaZsWbA by ozzelot@mstdn.social
       2025-12-31T12:42:06Z
       
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       @evilroda @NanoRaptor I went "How have I never heard of this deeply allegorical game... oh. it's a nanoraptor occurrence."
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oTGEITjXJhJ95V56 by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
       2025-12-31T12:02:47Z
       
       0 likes, 1 repeats
       
       I have been haunted by Mow Ringworld for 25 years. You all know it, bargain basement CD based shovelware, marked down to $10, $5, 50c... 'free bird frightener!'.The game we all saw, but never bought. Last week on a whim I bought an unopened copy on eBay. I resurrected my indigo iMac to play.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oTGKGDYr4bns4mOG by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
       2025-12-31T12:03:06Z
       
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       And I need to say this clearly before the internet decides I'm joking.Mow Ringworld is one of the best games ever made.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oTGPlb5c92sdnPUm by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
       2025-12-31T12:03:54Z
       
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       At first it plays just like you or I remember it looking. You pilot an absurdly overbuilt mower around the inner surface of a ringworld.The UI is gentle, the progress bars give a dopamine kick, the music is soft and meditative, and the sound of the mower gives surprising insight to its reliability.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oTGUzxddbb6dYS4u by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
       2025-12-31T12:04:26Z
       
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       And the star at the centre burns brightly in ATI Rage 128 flat yellow. No enemies, no timers, no stakes, just fill progress bars and feel relief. It's meditative, boring even. the kind of thing you'd tab away from to check ICQ.Then you finish the first loop.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oTGb4R3ukXwFh6sy by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
       2025-12-31T12:04:51Z
       
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       The grass has grown back, but *different*.It begins to resist. Not mechanically, but *behaviourally*. It grows around you, changes shape, reacts. Your mower's AI (in that dry slightly apologetic STTNG text) flags anomalies. The grass communicates with absence, refusal, and coordinated growth.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oTGgTmx506iKavb6 by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
       2025-12-31T12:05:33Z
       
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       There is no one moment where the game demands you're a coloniser, and must stop.It doesn't need to.You suddenly realise you already are. You came with the tools and declared the land empty because it didn't speak your language yet.Aand now it does.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oTGl0Y7DaCl5x9DU by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
       2025-12-31T12:05:59Z
       
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       As the game progresses, the grass gains technology - but crucially, only in response to you. no directed conquest, empire or war. Just adaptation.You mow more, it grows more. Faster, it evolves faster. You upgrade and it organises.You stop and it spreads to the universe.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oTGpnGK2vRbKm6hU by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
       2025-12-31T12:06:21Z
       
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       The game never offers *you* a good ending.But the game isn't about you.The final act is no boss fight or epic final win over lawn. It's a reckoning.The grass achieves spaceflight, launches starships - becomes warp capable to *leave you behind*. To deny you the satisfaction of control.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oTGulfpNcr1r4PQ0 by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
       2025-12-31T12:06:52Z
       
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       The mower's AI has one final line displayed in green Chicago text on a black background in all endings, and it resonated."Maintenance incomplete. Ownership unresolved".I stared at my screen for a long time after that.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oTGzZnww6PwUYV72 by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
       2025-12-31T12:07:17Z
       
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       In 2003, Mow Ringworld looked like a joke, a screensaver with delusions of grandeur. You could have just as much fun pretending you piloted flying toasters.In 2025, it feels uncomfortably precise.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oTH51dgsL2qGcIgy by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
       2025-12-31T12:07:42Z
       
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       - Resource extractive systems designed as upkeep.- Neutral labour enforcing power- The lie of infinite resources- The arrogance of thinking adaptation and advancement is a benefit in lieu of consent.No cutscenes, no voice acting, not even an exclamation point in the whole damned game.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oTHAT7S8I5iwVoie by NanoRaptor@bitbang.social
       2025-12-31T12:08:41Z
       
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       Best of all, it trusts you to notice.If you don't, it lets you keep mowing anyway until you have to.Mow Ringworld walked so Disco Elysium could run.✭✭✭✭✭Mow Ringworldmy 2003 game of the year, retroactively.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1oX87WvPP9HovEXzM by ozzelot@mstdn.social
       2025-12-31T17:11:54Z
       
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       @jargoggles @NanoRaptor And capable of running on my 300 MHz iBook.
       
 (DIR) Post #B1pFrebBhcaTOakY1g by adb@infosec.exchange
       2026-01-01T01:33:08Z
       
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       @ozzelot @evilroda @NanoRaptor Now that she has put Mow Ringworld into the collective zeitgeist, it is prophesied that someone shall implement it.