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Dare you fight the possessed tomatoes?
Published: October 1, 2004, 4:00 AM PDT
By John Borland
Staff Writer, CNET News.com


It was like any other afternoon until the possessed can of tomatoes attacked.

Luckily, a few good whacks with a saucepan quieted it right down, and the young sauceror was able to go on with his adventures in the "Kingdom of Loathing."

So goes a typical moment in a quirky online game that has become an object of cultish adoration among the 130,000-plus people who play it. With graphics drawn in static, stick-figure scribbles, it's a throwback to the early days of computer gaming, and about as far from the high-resolution worlds of "Doom 3" or "EverQuest" as it's possible to be.

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What's new:
Quirky, stick-figure "Kingdom of Loathing" has become an object of cultish adoration among the 130,000-plus people who play it.
Bottom line:
"Kingdom of Loathing" shows continued promise of independent game-writing, even as professional game development becomes mired in multibillion-dollar budgets and strings of sequels.
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And that, say many of "Kingdom of Loathing's" dedicated denizens, is the point.

"The inspired simplicity of the stick figures and limited playing time each day hooked me the first day, (and) I haven't logged on to 'EverQuest' since," Phil Showalter, a Memphis, Tenn., software developer, wrote in an e-mail interview. "KoL takes about an hour a day, and that's it until tomorrow, which is perfect with an enjoyable cup of coffee in the morning. Not to mention it's free."

The game, now a year and a half old, is one of the brightest--and weirdest--lights of the independent game development world. As "The Blair Witch Project" or "El Mariachi" did for independent film, it is showing that a project with a shoestring budget still has room to flourish, even as professional game development becomes mired in multibillion-dollar budgets and strings of sequels.

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