ASCII Art & Games

ASCII gives characters codes. People realized those same characters could also become pictures, maps, interfaces, and entire game worlds.

When characters became graphics

ASCII tells the computer what a character means. ASCII art uses those characters as visual building blocks. Rogue took that idea and made the text itself the game world.

Screenshot of the BSD version of Rogue showing an ASCII dungeon made from text characters — Rogue, BSD version. Screenshot by Thedarkb, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. View original

TRY IT

Move @ to $. 0 moves

Arrow keys or WASD work too.

Real ASCII art from real game guides

These are short excerpts copied directly from the linked walkthroughs. The point is to see what people actually made with plain text.

Super Mario 64 CWALL · GAMEFAQS · 2005

                  ___  _
                 /   \| |  _ ____ ____  ____    ____     ___
                /  /\/| | | |  _ \  __||    \  / ___|   /   |
                \  \_ | |_| | |_|| |_  | |\ | | |____  / /| |
                 \   \|     |  __/  _| | |/ | |  __  \/ /_| |_
               __/   / \___/| |  | |___|    / | |__| |____   _|
               \____/       |_|  |_____| |\ \ \______/    |_|
                 __    __    _    ____ |_|_\/
                /  \  |  \  / \  |    \|   |  ____
                |   \/   | / _ \ | |\  |   | /    \_
               /          \ /_\ \| |/  |   |/       \
               |  |\  /\   \     |    /|   |  /\_    |
               |  | \/  \   |__  | |\ \|   |  \_/    |
               |__|      |/           \|___| \_____/

This is the actual opening logo from Christian Wall’s Super Mario 64 walkthrough.

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Halo: Combat Evolved THUYKER · GAMEFAQS · 2003

,o##o      ."";.         .'@%;          .,"##@O'.           .;'"Oo""oOOO%";.
 '##o      .###"        .""O##%;          '###O            'o;.        .;O#@"
 '###@oooooO###"      ,;"ooo@###O,        '###O          .oO.    ,@@O;.  ,###';
 '###O     .###"    ,o##%,    "@##o,      '###O        ,.      .      .;"@#@o
,"@##@",   ."@@o  'o@#@O;      ,%@##";, .;"@##@OOOOOOOO%,     ;oOoOO%@#@%o'.

The guide credits this opening Halo ASCII logo to Dark Phenomenon.

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Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas ROBERT_CARR · GAMEFAQS · 2004–2006

           ____                   _              _
          / ___|  __ _ _ __      / \   _ __   __| |_ __ ___  __ _ ___
          \___ \ / _` | '_ \    / _ \ | '_ \ / _` | '__/ _ \/ _` / __|
           ___) | (_| | | | |  / ___ \| | | | (_| | | |  __/ (_| \__ \
          |____/ \__,_|_| |_| /_/   \_\_| |_|\__,_|_|  \___|\__,_|___/

This title art appears at the top of Robert Carr’s San Andreas walkthrough.

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Pokémon Emerald SHINIGAMIMIROKU · GAMEFAQS · 2005

The author used a simple Poké Ball made entirely from text characters.

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Each excerpt above comes from the linked guide itself. No substitute drawings or “inspired by” versions are used here.