Beginner Ideocartography

In-Fiction Description

Welcome <INTERN NAME> to the Department of Ideocartography!

On the display, we have preloaded the "Beginner Ideocartography" cartridge. This is a standard introduction to ideocartography, and is widely considered to be mostly safe to perceive.

Your task is to investigate, within a limited range of colors and textures, for the presence of active entities. As you use the arrow keys to explore your layer of <REDACTED>, please record short descriptions of the images you see, and please note any feelings you experience. Most of these entities should be rendered inert via compression into two dimensions (plus time). If not, press Z to capture a still photo, or X to capture a moving gif, and report immediately to <REDACTED>.

Author's Notes

This is "Beginner" ideocartography because it follows an intern's first assignment at the Foundation. In the fiction, this person advances through their career, interfacing with increasingly dangerous artifacts. As the series progresses, they begin removing restraints on these beings—at great personal risk, perhaps without fully realizing it. In the headcanon: they were isekai'd into this role. It's not optional once you're there, if you want to survive. Once these things have seen you, they don't forget.

This piece is a favorite and the entry point to the ideocart system. It shares a universe with the Vestiges series.

Some outputs from this generator were reinterpreted using AI in the Ideocartography Realized project on Teia.

Discussion and development thread: Pico-8 BBS