Indiepocalypse Double Feature: A Simulated Slice of England

Indiepocalypse Double Feature: A Simulated Slice of England

CEEFAX: IN THE TIME OF PLAGUE by Ian Bousher
If, like me, your familiarity with Ceefax is, let’s say, limited, Ceefax was a teletext service from the BBC. Now teletext, for the sake of simplicity, you can just think of as a sort of extremely limited web browser but for your television. CEEFAX: IN THE TIME OF PLAGUE has you navigating that information to find what little scraps of food are still edible in your current hellscape.

For a moment I considered the idea of connecting a remote to a computer (though I wouldn’t know where to start and certainly don’t have the right remote) and going full TV mode. But Ceefax is the delivery method not whole experience. In a world mid-collapse, your only source of information being severely limited and archaic is just another symptom of the collapse.

The British Library Simulator by Giulia C Rossi
Whereas CEEFAX uses a real system as the framework to tell a story, The British Library Simulator uses the medium of games to recreate a real place. The game takes you on a brief stroll through a small slice of the St. Pancras building in London. Throughout patrons and staff teach you about the library and even provide links to various online resources provided by the British Library.

Created in 2020 during a time of lockdown, The British Library Simulator looked not to fully recreate the British Library but provide the feeling of visiting the British Library, to provide at home experience the best a short game can. In that time, I too felt closer to that space. I will likely never be in the position to visit this library, but scenes rendered in 1-bit felt like a place someone had visited many times before.

CEEFAX: IN THE TIME OF PLAGUE was featured in Indiepocalypse #8
The British Library Simulator was featured in Indiepocalypse #29