Infinite Craft is the latest in a long line of oddly popular web game concepts, allowing players to essentially create the universe however they see fit. You can, for example, make humans, Godzilla, or Peter Griffin, and the only prerequisite is that you know how to reach these terms.
Indeed, “reaching” a term (or an element, as it were) means understanding its semantics and leveraging Infinite Craft‘s on-board AI model to ensure the desired result. In practice, it often means throwing elements onto the board to see what wacky combinations might come up as a result. That is, in truth, the entire gist of Infinite Craft: you’re just putting things together and seeing what comes of them. The way it works is still plenty fascinating, though, and it could provide you with hours of fun.
Infinite Craft explained
It should come as no surprise at all that Infinite Craft is an AI game. Considering the sheer number of wild combinations that can come up from its baseline of four elements (Fire, Earth, Water, and Wind), and its surprisingly inventive conclusions, there’s virtually no other way for this concept to work.
The gameplay is delightfully simple: combine any two previously unlocked elements to create something new. Like, for example, if you put ‘Earth’ and ‘Fire’ together, you get ‘Lava’. Then, combine ‘Lava’ with ‘Water’ to get ‘Stone’. It doesn’t take much time at all before you’re twisting the intricacies of the system to come up with Shrek.
By relying on Together AI, a generative language model, developer Neal Agarwal could introduce a virtually infinite element of reactivity to the idea, making experimentation the name of the game. And if we’re being reductive, experimentation really is all there is to Infinite Craft, but it’s such a load of fun that it’s hard to use this as a critique.
Infinite Craft is, at the same time, devilishly simple and infinitely complex. It is also rather easy to learn and come to grips with, so no matter how much or how little experience you have with games, it won’t take long until you’ve unlocked a whole suite of wacky elements. Heck, if you’re lucky, you may even get a First Discovery or two, which is particularly neat.
Check out other Neal.Fun games
Naturally, Infinite Craft is not Neal Agarwal’s first game. Agarwal has made a bit of a name for himself by producing free-to-play web games, such as the infamously unhinged Password Game, and they are all readily available on the Neal.Fun website. We recommend checking it out, even if only for novelty’s sake. Here’s a few notable examples of browser games Agarwal has come up with, disregarding Infinite Craft and The Password Game:
- Asteroid Launcher: launch custom-sized asteroids onto a realistic depiction of Earth and see what happens.
- Absurd Trolley Problems: the Trolley Problem led to its (il)logical extreme.
- Design the Next iPhone: slap an Apple logo smack-dab in the middle of the screen, why not?
- Rocks: stack rocks!
- Spend Bill Gates’ Money: precisely what it says on the tin, except you get to choose what you spend it on.
- Space Elevator: explore Earth’s atmosphere and leave the planet behind, simply by scrolling upwards.
And that’s just a taste of it. There’s a grand total of 32 unique web games available on Agarwal’s website at this time, and many of them are delightfully inventive in their own right. The Size of Space, for example, truly helps illustrate just how big the universe actually is. Agarwal’s work is, therefore, often designed to make the player think, and though it’s not your usual run-of-the-mill AAA gaming experience, we recommend giving this stuff a fair shake.
With experiences such as The Password Game and Infinite Craft already under his belt, it’s going to be very interesting to see what else might Agarwal come up with in the future. Clearly, the man is happy to think outside the box, and relying on AI for certain functionality could open a whole new world of possibilities for web game development. With that in mind, it may pay off to check back in with Neal.Fun every so often: if for no other reason than just to see what other madness might Agarwal come up with down the line.
