genuinely who the fuck is doing this shit. as if there aren't enough podcasts in the world??? why would you listen to a fucking ai podcast about living on mars like it's actually going to supply you with any useful or even mildly interesting information. we truly live in the age of infinite slop
Ready to time travel to 2021 Hermitblr/Trafficblr?
Bogwaters Demo out now on itch.io!
A hand to hold until the end. A hand to hold because we're friends.
A hand to hold until the end. A hand to hold because we're friends.
June 2021. The experimental Minecraft series Triple Life SMP has just aired its finale and you're obsessed with the dynamic between the Minecraft YouTubers Benbog and Mars OfTheBigWaters.
Problem? The fandom still hates shipping. Solution? Start an underground Discord server to quarantine your shipping activities. To avoid being cancelled, you'd have to scour your social media to find potential members who are secretly open to shipping.
ABOUT
Bogwaters is a free, text-based, interactive fiction browser game. The game is a parody of the Third Life SMP fandom in mid 2021 that is focused on Treebark (the romantic ship between Rendog/Martyn InTheLittleWood) and its fandom relevance.
This is a demo version (prototype) meant to test the limits and feasibility of this game.
You play as the owner of a Discord server named Bogwaters. Your goal is to invite 4 people within 7 days, from June 1 to June 7.
Full "how to play" guide can be found within the game.
This is the author's first interactive fiction game so it may be wonky. Constructive feedback is appreciated!
Word count: ~10k
Estimated play time: 30 to 45 minutes
FEATURES
3 endings
5 NPCs you can attempt to invite
Friendship levels for NPCs
Fandom enjoyment meter that can increase or decrease based on your actions
New Tumblr dashboard for each of the seven days
Tumblr, Discord, Ao3, DMs
Special events on certain days
Light/dark mode
CONTENT WARNINGS
MCYTshipping (hermit and traffic)
2019-2021 type ship discourse
2019 Hermitblr
2021 Hermittwt/Traffictwt
Canon-typical innuendos
Swearing
Written in Ink by Inkle Studios.
Original inspiration post here (May 13, 2025) (Yes I wrote this in less than two weeks)
I had a lot of fun making this and I hope you enjoy it too if you play it! Please talk to me if you have any thoughts and opinions, I'd love to ramble :D
interactive fiction idea: it’s 2021, you play as a new barktree shipper emerging from the hot new mcyt series triple life. your task is to sus out who else on your dash is also a secret shipper and invite them to your “controversial” shipping discord server without being cancelled. you’ll have to dig through ao3s, abandoned twitter accounts, old rpf fics from a pseud they no longer use, general posts, youtube comments, which username clipped this shippy moment between benthebog and martin ofthebigwaters
gameplay mechanic: you can choose to send out one invite per day because your discord server is very skittish. you can skip an invite if you think there’s no one suitable. your goal is to gain a certain number of members so you can start the bogwaters ship week. fighting against you is the fandom enjoyment meter— it drops every time you see anti mcyt shipping sentiment (which occurs daily) and rises every time you recruit someone or when something gay happens. if it drops completely, you leave the fandom and it’s game over. being cancelled is also a game over.
this begins in june 2021 after the finale of triple life. happy pride month
as the days pass, events happen on certain dates. for instance, a popular artist gets cancelled on twitter for their vaguely shippy brian/foodtimeswithstar fanart and it’s your priority to rescue them otherwise there’ll be a big drop in fandom enjoyment. benthebog and mars ofthebigwaters end up in the same macguffin championship (mcc) with riversymphony and this creates a big boost. someone brings up benbog/lakemonster69 stuff from 2019 to show shipping is okay and fandom enjoyment increases. yes there is a water theme. there’s probably a blue boats 9 reference
cast:
a solitarygamer/botmajor (“shower husbands”) shipper who just wants more triple life shipping and is going “does NO ONE see how GAY this is”
teenager who is very paranoid of shipping after witnessing cancellations and having their riverbog works misinterpreted as shipping
mysterious user who clips the ben/mars shippy moments with ambig captions and if you dig deep enough you’ll find out they were a bystander in the 2019 discourse. dig a little deeper on their old instagram and you’ll find out they were a larry shipper when they were 11
your beloved mutual who has been around longer and all your picks are vetted by them
artist who makes gorgeous art but it turns out they’re one of the untrustworthy doxxers from 2019
someone who puts “DO NOT TAG AS SHIP” on all their posts and you’re like ok much respect. a month later they sneak into your dms like 🥺 i’m consumed by CATHOLIC guilt because ben and mars are kinda… idk…. i can’t even say it… 🥺
mars otbw has an official artist and you carefully navigate around them but it turns out they draw bogwaters ship art on a side blog under a different pseud but You Recognise The Drawing Style
you post a ship fic on anon ao3 and religiously track whoever kudoses/comments
you recognise an anon bogwaters fic writer from their generous use of hozier lyrics and em dashes and recruit them on their tumblr main
a brian/mumble (bumble) shipper from 2019 who came back to cautiously post about triple life but you’re like 👀 i know you 👀 you like shipping
your reward is that you carry out bogwaters week successfully and mars otbw says “happy bogwaters week” on stream and benbog ignores his dms
every day you have the opportunity to make a certain number of posts. depending on what you post, you attract different people in the tags which furthers your connections. the more members you recruit, the more your circle increases and there’s a bigger chance of your post getting more notes -> more new people in the tags. for example if you post about how dessert duo is the enemy from the eyes of bogwarts, you’ll attract bad faith dessert duo fans (who will want to #cancel you) but you’ll also get enthusiastic bogwarts fans. posting about shower husbands will attract people more likely to be fine with shipping. appealing to the secret starian corner (often under attack) also strengthens the ship alliance.
if your fandom enjoyment level gets completely depleted the first time, you get one (1) get out of jail free card which is someone bringing up #SHIPlakebog from 2019 which raises your level to sustain for a few more days before you die or raise it high enough to survive. #SHIPlakebog is a precious trump card.
since the whole thing is water themed, finding someone to join is known as “fishing” and the members are called “fishies”. the process is described as hook (sending out bait), line (waiting for the bait to be taken/ warily pondering one’s vibes), and sinker (sending the dm).
eventually you learn the player character has some Embarrassing Fandom History they would prefer to hide, like idk writing bandom fics or x reader fics on wattpad or participating in a ship war or the general voltron experience.
sequel idea: it’s a few months after triple life ended and final life is starting in autumn. and then disaster strikes! someone leaks screenshots of your “controversial” server and your members start receiving hate mail. there is a snitch Among Us. in these Boggy Waters. your new task is to find the boogeyman (boggyman?)— while watching final life live and experiencing whatever gay shit they’re up to this time. your job is to calm everyone down before fandom enjoyment decreases and your server falls apart
the snitch turns out to be a teenager who sent the scs to their friends for fun but one of the friends didn’t like shipping so they sent it to their other friend group to vent, intending for it to private, but it spiralled and leaked. and the teen felt so bad so they never came forward. the moral of the story is that cyberbullying is bad and rpf is ok.
mars gets on tumblr during this time and things happen. final life causes pathubs (pathoslab x treedoubleo) to trend which helps to normalise shipping.
against every rational voice in my head i am opening an ink file. “why not twine” twine allows player input and better css but i’m scared and am more comfortable with ink after using it for one (1) week. fuck you [globals your variable] [makes a chain of conditionals]
This is a demo version (prototype) meant to test the limits and feasibility of this game. Your goal is to invite 4 people within 7 days, from June 1 to June 7.
That's actually how the Tiltify auctions work! You put in your max bid and it automatically out-bids until you reach that max. It took a while for me to understand during last year's auction.
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