iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 6h

maybe related?: earlier ad flyers more commonly targeted potential arcade operators with specific money words like "high earnings" "high income" & "profit". It would've arguably been a simple process to paint the whole biz as greedy hucksters and addiction-pushers based on a lot of ad copy

Advertisement: "Turn on to BLASTO And turn on to Gremlin's newest video game challenge that really draws the crowds, and the profits!"

Another excerpt from an ad for BLASTO by Gremlin:
"Advanced players use high speed maneuvering and firing for the 1000 point ''kill'' shot. Challenge and fun at all player levels are designed in for a long earning history."

Flyer for Dogfight (year unspecified, probably early 1980s) from Bo Mak Electronics, Inc: "FLY HIGHER with BIGGER profits NOW!"

Ad copy from Starblade (Namco, 1991): "Join forces with NAMCO and lock in on stellar earnings."

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

we don't talk enough about Bryan Danielson's most unlikely videogame appearance

promo card for Sea of Thieves' bonus content, The Legend of Monkey Island, featuring a brown-bearded Guybrush Threepwood whose face reminds me a little bit of Bryan Danielson actually.

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

UMG commits immeasurable cultural harm to multiple generations every day

[YouTube embed in Discord]
user: beezner
video title: They call me sonic
"Video unavailable
"This video contains content from UMG, whi has blocked it from display on this website or application"
"<a href='https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6oRlEtFafs&feature=emb_error_woyt' target='blank'>Watch on YouTube</a>"

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

when I see a post like this in a thread that I'm not participating in, from a user I'm highly unlikely to ever have a reason to interact with organically, blocking them for it is still an exhilarating breath of fresh air~

"who cares? you gotta assume almost every game being developed now has some form of AI coding in it. I get being upset when AI art shows up, but I dont think anyone really cares at this point about Ai coding..."

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

"we gave you something you didn't ask for and we didn't tell you, but we're telling you now so that you can feel like you need it when we take it away from you again" yeah I know how this works. antivirus software has always been a racket, too

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

My current favorite detail in Petal Crash 2 is the cycling likes/dislikes for each of the characters. I, too, dislike CAUGHT

Partial screenshot of Petal Crash 2. "MIMI: A monster who loves nothing more than terrorizing innocent travelers. Adventurers aren't as common as they used to be, but she's still doing her worst! TYPE: MIMIC. LIKES: BITE. HATES: CAUGHT"

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

I did about 30 seconds of research into who these guys were

Shinji Matou: What's your opinion on gay marriage?
Gilgamesh: As far as I'm concerned, all marriage is "gay" marriage.

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

tabs now look like other buttons because who cares

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

of course I also had to see whether the Free Stars demo ran out-of-the-box on Thor/Armada, even though it's probably a bit too teensy for me.

Free Stars: Children of Infinity's combat demo running on the AYN Thor (modified to run the beta Armada OS Linux/Steam thingy)

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Warframe (PC) The "E" in "EQ" stands for Ember.

Banshee Prime from Warframe, holding a big sword (Broken War) and in a blue-greenish-cyan-ish paint job that's meant to look a little bit like Queen From Deltarune

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Terraria (PC) I taught myself how to use this game to relax when I was going through some of the worst anxiety of my life. I had a world with no progression on it that I used to cultivate a tree farm. it was a nice, calm, relaxing place to stay for a while. I wanted more games to feel like homes.

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Brain Age (Nintendo DS) I still don't know how solid the science behind this was. but I loved scrambling to write the funny numbers. (also, I tried to write them with my left hand for a while, and when I switched back to my dominant hand, I did it much faster than before.) a true learning experience

screenshot from the Brain Age tutorial with the polygonal head of Dr. Kawashima saying: "Do you see how many more areas of the brains are working?"

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Free Stars: The Ur-Quan Masters Did you know I never managed to go through this game solo from start to finish? The music and conversations stuck with me though. I've already talked about that a lot. I wonder if that would make anybody mad?

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Maniac Mansion 2: Day of the Tentacle I still try to play this every 4th of July. Maybe the only thing I do that for. Look up the tech & how they fit all of the graphics onto a 650MB CD. The remaster is great but it does kinda make you forget how notable all that tech was at the time. No dithering!

Day of the Tentacle screenshot pre-remaster, the lobby of the Edisons' hotel with the bespectacled weakling Bernard standing at the staircase.

Day of the Tentacle screenshot, fullscreen image of Purple Tentacle raising his left nub to the sky menacingly, while Green Tentacle cowers nearby

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Mega Man 2 (NES) Yeah I taped the music so I could listen back to it after returning it. It was probably the first time I'd heard a game's opening sequence call back to its previous game's ending sequence so of course that was notable to my child brain. Fuck Heat Man though fr

A picture of the Heat Man stage of Mega Man 2 with too many threats on the screen for the hero to just be mashing the fire button while aiming at nothing. Seriously who does this. I don't think this is a real screenshot

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Maniac Mansion (Lucasfilm Games, NES port) I didn't have a PC when I was a kid. I rented this version instead. Multiple times to get all the endings. It played fast, but not so fast that you couldn't control it -- just enough to beat it efficiently. and its soundtrack really had some bangers

Maniac Mansion's opening scene with Dave, Wendy, and Jeff.

A room in Maniac Mansion with a piano, phonograph, cassette recorder, and television, also Bernard and Michael

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Xenophobe (Bally Midway, Arcade) Back when they had that one art style. What really stuck with me though was the first time I'd ever seen a live game use context-sensitivity on its inputs (the left and right thumb buttons for doing everything depending what was nearby)

Xenophobe's control sticks that looked like a big flight joystick with a trigger for firing and two thumb buttons (unlabeled).

Xenophobe's three-player layout: three horizontal slices, one for each player, currently showing the same hallway because all three players are in it. Each player has different options being shown for their Left / Right Button inputs based on what they're doing.

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Hunt The Wumpus (TI-99/4A) This motherfucker jumpscared me so many times as a small child and I still hate him for it.

Title screen for Hunt The Wumpus that says

THE HUNT IS ABOUT TO BEGIN...

BUT BE CAREFUL...

The Goddamned Wumpus, smiling after its big stupid teeth have bitten down into your foolish body for wandering into its lair

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

I tried to stick with the "influential" thing and was mostly successful I think. my9games.com/en/s/821f5e8...

Hunt The Wumpus (TI-99/4A)
Xenophobe (Midway, Arcade)
Maniac Mansion (NES port)
Mega Man 2 (NES)
Day of the Tentacle (PC, CD-ROM)
Star Control II (PC)
Brain Age (NDS)
Terraria (PC)
Warframe (PC)

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

I don't think my Elite:Dangerous screenshots are on any of my current devices, and I don't think I have another run in me, but this is still my greatest ship name

screenshot of the INARA website with an Elite: Dangerous Type-8 Transporter named The Matthew Backinjury

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

the kids are talking about something called rumble

the vtuber eyes closed with a content look on face, captioned: "I do not see it"

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

every good rocket needs a grappling hook for steering

Rockey Jockey (PC, 1996) - a guy sitting on a pair of unguided missiles has a tether attached to a pillar to his left, allowing his rocket to "steer" to the left around it.

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

I didn't think about it but now I associate them with Charms

Assorted Charms, flat square hard candy with a circular impression

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Starting soon at Twitch.tv/ChorbySP : never heard of this before? learn about a brief history of Free Stars, and then watch us beat the piss out of each others' spaceships to a soundtrack provided by yours truly.

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

In the few years I have "played" fantasy football with my friends (locally styled as "Final Fantasy Football") I have never once understood the game and instead chosen a team of the oldest players it would allow me to draft. They are named "The Youngest Men Alive" and I give them very good nicknames

The Youngest Men Alive (named for the slogan of AEW tag team The Outrunners, comprised of Truth Magnum and Turbo Floyd). I don't know who any of them are, so don't ask me.

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

Currently slated for Thursday evening: Taking @chorby.org to his Pilot's License Exam after a brief history of the New Alliance of Free Stars and the Ur-Quan Doctrinal Conflict. Again, the combat demo for Free Stars: Battles in the Beyond is out. And you're all going to hear about it. On Twitch.

The Vtuber, in her Syreen cosplay, indicating the ass end of a Spathi Eluder on a diagram.

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

I'm slowly acclimating to the fact that Free Stars (via Children of Infinity / Battles in the Beyond) is back and that I'm a part of it?? You STILL can't convince me that the Black Spathi Squadron is in any way "real" and just saying it is won't help me adapt to this information any more quickly

Statistics for the Black Spathi Recruiter in Free Stars: Battles in the Beyond. Comes equipped with a "F.A.C.E. Launcher" (in direct contrast with the cowardly default Spathi B.U.T.T. Missile) and an "Obstructor Cannon".

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

Hey! Nobody gave you permission to give up!

The Vtuber in a shirt depicting the Blue Veyeral from The Void Rains Upon Her Heart, shouting an angry motivational speech at you.

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

she was trying to smile. also she blinked. buy a shirt

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

I knew what a ditto was but I didn't know what the other one was. apparently it was this. it does not have a longer tail like the one in the clip, because that was a ditto

Meowscarada is a humanoid lynx Pokémon with light green fur covering most of its body—stopping just above its long, dark green legs—and a short, fluffy tail. (from bulbapedia.bulbagarden)

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

nope. I won't use this account like I used that other one. I've never been so tempted to setup an alt just to refocus that energy out of my direct field of vision

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

Greetings from Rusty Lake~ @chorby.org and I are back for one more tour of service. Servant of the Lake happening now at twitch.tv/ChorbySP

me standing in front of the Rusty Lake Hotel wearing a shirt that says YAY.

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Sooz (ghost in the machine ooo~) @soozwave.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

I do not have an album for this yet, but I have most of an album cover (see if you can guess what it's made from?)

A scattered array of blue dots on a 2:1 image. I'll only say that I chose the image aspect to be that of a compact disc insert. I'm not spoiling what it actually represents here! Nice try, though!

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