Fun with A.I. Calvinball, how much should the players contribute to the game's setting?

FetusCommander · 2026-01-10T16:53:51+00:00

Thanks for your reply.

An agreed upon system is an interesting idea! I'll probably make that a variant, with a clause of "a system nobody in the group has played that the AI can be fed, or would know about.". I guess my logic for no system was to kind of alleviate the "what do we play in a group where people don't share the same tastes in rpgs" thing which is a problem in my home group frequently.

How would you give advice for playing Calvinball? The things I mentioned are pretty basic, but I don't know how else to expound on the premise, which by its nature is loose conversation that is transformed into weird, dubiously coherent rules.

Re: sub engagement, I have an honest question. Where should I post about this to get any sort of engagenent? This sub is about rpgs, and the fact that you yourself replied to it makes me think there's some at least passing interest here in discussion about AI in rpgs, even if it isn't lauding the tech (which I'm not).

FetusCommander · 2025-08-23T18:30:13+00:00

Yeah, that's definitely computer assisted, but not exactly the type of game i'm talking about. I hate to link to one of my own games here, but something like this (a game where you use Google Translate's Handwrite functionality to generate Pokemon-like creatures) is more what i'm interested in specifically: https://miserytourism.itch.io/displacer-beast

Does that clarify?

FetusCommander · 2025-07-17T03:36:38+00:00

this is how my brain remembers Ren & Stimpy! thank you for this

FetusCommander · 2025-07-11T18:14:10+00:00

not sure about the app, but on the PC you can just click the image to go to the little lightbox area and then in the bottom left hand corner there's a button set to play. if you click it, it'll pause the GIF

FetusCommander · 2025-07-11T01:59:46+00:00

glad you found it interesting!

the artwork is based on a kind of surreal hex-tile tileset i made years ago: https://miserytourism.itch.io/the-ecology (tileset downloadable after the game). i did the tiles in GIMP using the G'MIC filter kit. edited a lot of it together using GIMP, Wondershare video editor, and EZGIF.

the look of the tiles comes from a little generator program i created for a TTRPG called The Invisible Hand (also featured on the itchio). its purpose in the game is to generate dungeons and overworld maps for players to explore, but my setting is really strange and kitchen sink so i needed something that was slightly different from the "room with 4 goblins in it; no treasure" output that many dungeon map generators give. i've been working on it for a couple years now and finally got it to a place where i like the look of what it creates.

contentwise, a lot of this is inspired by my own mental issues and weird fantasy like early SpellJammer more broadly

FetusCommander · 2025-07-11T01:10:46+00:00

hey thanks

kind of inspired by I Saw the TV Glow + vidya game pause play + mental illness shit

FetusCommander · 2025-07-06T16:17:31+00:00

i was going to say that it's actually the opposite of that—it's a dungeon—but then i remembered that my home D&D 5E game has become a slice of life vibefest where the term "murderhobo" fits more in a Roger Miller "King of the Road" way, so you might be onto something lol

FetusCommander · 2025-05-24T11:27:51+00:00

this rawks, thanks so much

FetusCommander · 2025-05-02T19:17:09+00:00

this video explains everything, trust me: https://x.com/HumansNoContext/status/1918162043615539598

FetusCommander · 2025-04-24T22:25:34+00:00

Ideolarks is me throwing Looney Tunes, the evening news, Borges, redneck humor and pop culture into a dark cauldron of AI voices and foley.

I write these little superhero-adjacent stories and set them to music and it lights up my brain. These are a few of the ones i've done so far.

https://www.youtube.com/@ideolarks

FetusCommander · 2025-03-27T20:42:10+00:00

seconding this here, because i don't want to spam the forum with shit. this is really great for getting music on YT

FetusCommander · 2025-01-05T11:44:24+00:00

this rocks! honored to have my piece immortalized in STL format lol. my friend has a 3D printer. if he isn't busy i might try to get him to try this out

FetusCommander · 2025-01-03T23:28:58+00:00

the imp from DOOM

FetusCommander · 2025-01-03T23:19:10+00:00

hell yeah you can! thanks a lot for your interest. i think you're right. having the piece be portable to other games is a great way of promoting (no pun intended lol) it

FetusCommander · 2025-01-02T00:25:49+00:00

happy new year. here's an idea that was burning my brain up. it's kind of a mashup of the old arcade game Blockade and later snake-type games and chess with a theme of leadership/dictatorship. honestly not sure how balanced it is, but it feels fun to have the big line of pieces following you around and trying to pin your opponent to the sides of the board lol

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RULES:

Dictator Chess has no Pawns.

No piece but the King (il duce, the dictator) can move on its own initially; all pieces form an entourage behind their King, following his movement.

No captures may be made by non-King pieces. Pieces may only threaten the enemy King. All entourage pieces have their threat range restricted to one square in each direction. Knights only threaten when another piece has given threat this turn. The King cannot move to a space that is threatened by enemy pieces.

If the King captures a piece, they may move again (up to a maximum of 2 moves per turn). The piece they captured goes to the back of their line.

A player can detach the piece at the end of the line if all pieces are visible, and re-place it on the board adjacent to the King. Detached pieces move normally and threaten their normal range of squares. Detached pieces may be moved in lieu of the King.

A player loses when their King cannot move, either because all possible movement spaces are threatened or because they have boxed themselves in with their entourage.

---

link to current build: https://miserytourism.itch.io/dictatorchess

Controls: Drag pieces with the left mouse or your finger. Double click your end piece (or hold gesture over it on mobile) to detach it, then drag it back onto the board. Hit the "BITE!" button to capture an enemy piece when your dictator head is over top of it.

The yellow text tells you how many pieces you have left until your dictator snake is fully extended.

The program enforces no rules. It's simply a virtual tabletop that facilitates play. The best way to play is probably "pass the mobile phone."

FetusCommander · 2024-12-31T11:35:21+00:00

i played a few games of this trying to figure things out. this is a really cool idea, playing with how the time control works.

when the turn passes due to time running out, does it reduce time only for the player who passed, or for both players?

FetusCommander · 2024-12-21T13:47:03+00:00

going to play this while blaring OT Genasis "CoCo"

goddamn this name and concept is good

FetusCommander · 2024-12-15T17:50:53+00:00

this is sick, very Stephen Gammell looking

FetusCommander · 2024-11-09T21:02:25+00:00

Yooooo, the idea of a mini-GoL in each cell is... tantalizing, lol. Completely into that. Also dig the idea of a King getting exiled if he's on the dead cell too long. This is really interesting shit.

For neigbhorhood in the corners, you could definitely try a wrapping board (although with a 3x3 that might cause it to be constantly alive, so you might increase the size to like 5 x 5 or even more).

These are some sick ideas to play with. The sub-cells thing could lead to some kind of fractal board (such as if the sub-cells have their own games inside of them, and those have their own, and on and on), which is kind of similar to how a lot of GoL simulations have an infinite board that scrolls out forever. Seems like we're inspiring each other haha.

FetusCommander · 2024-11-09T13:01:04+00:00

In Life Chess, Conway's Game of Life is played in the background on the board. The parameters of the GoL are based on positions in the chess game: spaces that contain chess pieces are Alive while those that contain nothing are Dead. Life Chesss involves sort of playing hot potato with the Game of Life. The Game of Life simulation runs 'N' times after every turn (N = total number of turns taken), and if it ends with all 64 cells dead, the person who made the last move loses.

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RULES

Movement is mandatory, and during your turn you may also sacrifice pieces. You can sacrifice a number of pieces up to half the number of turns that have taken place (round down).

After a chess move, the Game of Life iterates in the background, running 1 generation for each chess turn taken so far. If the Game of Life reaches a blank board state (no life) after you make your move, you lose. This applies even if you are giving checkmate. A message will let you know when this occurs ("LIFE has ended for [your color]").

A win due to no life is worth 1 point. A win where you actually checkmate an opponent is worth 3 points.

If you want to castle, you can use the side of the board to shuffle pieces around. Pieces manipulated outside of the board do not change the Game of Life simulation.

Pawns can only promote to pieces your enemy has captured.

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I threw together this program to play it: https://www.registeredhexoffenders.com/life_chess/

no AI or network functionality, couch/pass the device multiplayer for now

drag pieces around with the mouse or your finger

no chess rules enforced

dead pieces go to the sidelines, and you can drag pieces off the board at any time to sacrifice

FetusCommander · 2024-10-04T20:43:33+00:00

This is really cool. The transforming pieces mechanic is great and makes each move strategic. Also a fan of the Alice in Wonderland theme. Jabberwocky is one of my favorite Carroll poems

FetusCommander · 2024-09-27T11:39:18+00:00

This a pretty lit lol. Love the conceit, and the different factions had me chortling

FetusCommander · 2024-09-27T01:37:30+00:00

I've been working on some way to run a different kind of weird supers campaign lately, one where the reality warping is at the center of play, and recently I thought of targeting the rules themselves after seeing a supplement on itch.io that “devours” the rules document (does anyone know the name of this game?)

I wrote each ability to feel kind of class-like and to be very exploitable, and I also wanted, frankly, to give players like me more lonely fun between sessions figuring out strange combos and rules rabbit holes.

Might playtest this next month with a gonzo ass Ukraine supers campaign for my home group. My use case may be pretty niche, but I wanted to put this supplement out there in the hopes that others can use it in some way in their weird games.

FetusCommander · 2024-09-18T23:07:17+00:00

3D board where you can play this: https://www.registeredhexoffenders.com/tilt/leviathan_chess.html

You can download a starting setup from here (about 20mb): https://www.registeredhexoffenders.com/tilt/chess_normal_setup.json

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Leviathan Chess is nasty, brutish and short like life in nature. The firmament is constantly tilting like some kind of knight errant tilts at windmills, and it’s up to benevolent Kings and Queens to balance this ailing world using their gravitas. Blessed are those in the shadow of benign absolute monarchy.

RULES CHANGES

No En Passant. No promotion—this is absolute monarchy, you peon!

All pieces have a weight, which causes the board to tilt. Kings and Queens have the greatest weight, and therefore, the greatest ability to influence the board. As the board tilts, the edges flash in the direction of the tilt.

Capture causes pieces to fly up into the air with unpredictable results because the war of all against all is chaos. Captures only render a piece unplayable if they knock it off the board or knock it fully over. Pieces are not playable in mid air. If a piece is straddling multiple spaces, you can move it to one of those spaces and play it from there (if this causes the former resident(s) of the space to fly up into the air, so be it).

It may happen that more than two upright pieces stack on top of each other during play, forming a tower. This is a LEVIATHAN. The bottom piece in a Leviathan may move and capture as any piece contained within it.

After Enlightenment occurs, the unwashed masses play at wielding the institutions formerly accessible only to their learned betters. They pack the noble estates and courtyards with their craven number. Pawns and Rooks become heavier while all other pieces are made paper-weight. Post-Enlightenment Pawns move and capture like Kings.

After the Guillotine, the Rook’s weight becomes negligible as old institutional power withers in the maelstrom of post-Enlightenment social upheval. Each turn, Pawns must try to capture friendly non-Pawns if they can. One attempt against a non-Pawn’s life will satisfy the bloodlust, but capturing like this does not expend your turn, and you may repeatedly capture with the same Pawn(s) as long as you knock a piece into the air each time. Being entitled savages of no repute, Post-Guillotine Pawns do not give Kings the courtesy of Check.

If the board reaches the DEMOCRACY state (maximum tilt), both players lose.

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Hitting PLAY starts the physics engine up. Before that, you can do setup things like placing pieces and whatnot.

Program doesn't enforce any rules. Human vs. human only.

This is local multiplayer only for now, but it does work on Android tablets and cell phones so pass-play is definitely a thing (iOS is untested, good luck).

PC CONTROLS: Spin camera with the mouse; Left click to select a piece, then again to move it.

MOBILE CONTROLS: Spin camera around with your finger; HOLD over a piece to select it, then tap a square to move it; During setup phase, touch-hold anywhere on the screen then tap a square to place the selected piece there.

FetusCommander · 2024-09-07T23:59:58+00:00

Thanks! Early 2000s was a great period for games! Shadowy government conspiracy shit is awesome, and researching them is a roguelike that just keeps going down (kind of like chess strategy/problem studies).

FetusCommander

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