What I fondly remember along with the ASCII art is the keygen music: https://keygenmusic.tk/#

And a little video on youtube that made me rediscover this nostalgia recently: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHgcrdv8zpM

Ahhh, RASTAFARIAN DINOSAURS from 2Stoned is just what I needed today

https://16colo.rs/pack/blndr2025b/BLENDER2025B-2STONED.ANS

I have a folder of .ANS files I’ve collected from this site, and when my terminal opens it loads a random one from the folder. It’s a silly little things but it gives me that “connecting to a BBS” nostalgia feeling every time I open the terminal.

There's a program called `durdraw` for Linux that works well for 'playing' the files. But it won't leave it on the screen afterward as far as I can tell. Also look for the Perfect DOS VGA 437 font.

durdraw -p file.ans

If you use a Gemini browser, you can visit gemini://ansi.hrtk.in/list/ and render 50k+ ANSI/ASCII images as if you are downloading them on a modem. It's terrific.

When you couldn’t afford a ps1 or your DOS pc was shit. https://16colo.rs/pack/fire-43/AVG-LARA.ANS

The bitchx irc client is probably my first exposure to ascii art. Sad to see it’s not in here

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/BitchX

Obligatory Bad Apple conversion https://16colo.rs/pack/badapple/BADAPPLE.ANS

What editor was generally used to draw these?

artist prefix: roy sparks so much joy superior art creations gots to love it.

Unrelated, I asked Grok to "Generate ANSI art of the cover of the first issue of Iron Man War Machine" (I did this back in the BBS days for a friend's welcome screen) and it repeatedly outputs:

|_______|\n |_______|\n

It's been going for a minute and still going as I submit this comment