DROD is weird. When you stumble on a website that looks exactly the same as you remember it looking 20 years ago, usually you'd assume it's a fun piece of preserved history, something to look at akin to a museum exhibit and move along. This site isn't that, though. Yeah, it looks the same as 20 years back, a nostalgic reminder of the past, but it also manages to remain actually active. This
does not happen. It just... doesn't. There's no other single location on the Internet that I can think of like this.
20 years ago is no exaggeration by this point, I think. I have found a copy of Journey to Rooted Hold on a CD in a literal bargain bin someday, and I fell in love with the game right then and there. I don't remember the exact emotions or thoughts anymore, of course. And I didn't even manage to get very far in the game -- but, as kids are wont to do, I replayed the first 3 levels or so over and over. It was also around this time that I got my first Internet connection, and the Caravel site (then still accessible under its "
drod.net"
domain, though it was a mere redirect) was one of the first websites I ever ended up visiting (I don't think it was
the first, that would have to have been my e-mail provider of the time, but it was very close). It looked exactly as it does now. Yellow progress bar stuck at 99% for some project or other included. This was where I mainly lurked for usermade holds, and eventually discovered both AE and the TCB demo. TCB was genuinely enthralling, the amount of worldbuilding stuck into the first hour or so of the game felt incredible and I was once again stuck on a replay loop. I have got the full game eventually, but I don't think I actually made any progress past what was in the demo until much later. I liked the extra visual styles for custom holds, though.
I didn't register on the forums, back then. See, the only context in which I ever saw the word "
register"
up until then would have been various shareware games, where it meant "
buy the thing"
. So I assumed that this forum registration deal would ask me to pay, or submit some sort of serial number that should have come with my CD and didn't. Now of course, it does none of those things and if I just clicked the stupid button I would have probably realized that, but it was
obvious that it would so I didn't even bother trying. And now here I am, with a play history of 20 years and a post history of, like, five messages, unable to relax and bring myself into the correct rhythm for the slower forum format in this neverending high-speed stream of information that is the modern web.
And that's the thing, everything just moves by so very, very fast. The speed we gained in our communications is certainly worth a lot, but... Game websites are now a picture and a (usually broken) embed of some twitter feed or other. Buying games is now "
go to this big publishing platform where every store page looks exactly the same"
. Everything else on the Internet changed, or got destroyed and replaced. Most games I used to like have mutated as well -- especially ones native to the PC platform, which is my home as far as gaming is concerned. The few that have fared better were through community efforts -- sure, the likes of the open-source
Doom are still alive and well, but not thanks to the original creators or the current owners.
Meanwhile over here, I jump on and I see the same familiar faces I saw in my first years online. The original Caravel staff is still all here, still working on the games and caring about both them and the community. Hell, you lot still have the same bloody profile pictures -- no, scratch that corporate no-fun-allowed term --
avatars that you had back then (well, skell has a Temmie now! That's new!). It's just that instead of a couple games you now have somehow managed to produce twenty (with two more coming out soon!?), like some sort of underground shadow of Shanghai-Alice. All without chasing trends, platforms or fancy "
monetization models"
, all without changing what the games are. Not merely at their core, but in their presentation and feel as well.
So: Mike, Erik, Matt and those captains of Caravel whose names I have failed to learn. All the Architects and all the Broadcasters. All the people still capable of slowing down to write something on these boards. Thank you.
Here's to 20 more? Eh, as long as your hearts are in it
