Long long ago, in the BE era of the Internet (Before Everquest), there was a virtual world by the name of Kymer. The Internet as we know it was still a toddler (y’all may not know but the World Wide Web didn’t really become a thing until 1995) so most of us were still accessing our online silliness from dialup companies like AOL and CompuServe.
We used CompuServe, and from their portal, we had access to a virtual world system name WorldsAway. WA was 256 colors and built on a platform not unlike a 2D side scroller.
We created our avatars and talked in a chat with people around the world. We dyed our clothes and put on animal heads and held fashionable/rare stuffed animals to show off.
Dreamscape and the world of Kymer took a hit after Everquest came out. WorldsAway’s platform didn’t have any MMORPG elements, although clever programmers built many third party game plugins to interface. They hung around for a long time, but the world’s limitations suddenly loomed too large, and most of us fled for other worlds, other games.
From 1996-2000 I was a part of this world, first as Catwho (the white kitty seen here), and then later as Acolyte Catherine (who was the white dragon.) I was the youngest Acolyte (volunteer GM) on staff, at the tender age of 19.
It seems like so long ago - and it was.