Kiwen Kon
A downloadable game
ike la, sina li moli! 👻
pona la, sina kepeken kiwen kon la, sina ken kama e moli ala!
ike la, kiwen kon li pakala...
musi lili ni li kepeken e sitelen pona. ona li pali taso lon ilo musi Playdate.
2023-02-11: sina ken musi e ni kepeken toki Inli lon linja ni.
2023-11-06: sina ken musi e ni kepeken ilo musi GameBoy lon linja ni. musi pi ilo Playdate la, mi pona e nimi e lawa sitelen.
Download
Install instructions
tenpo ni: sina ken musi e ni kepeken sitelen Lasin. Kiwen Kon kepeken sitelen Lasina li pona anu sina sona e sitelen pona la, Kiwen Kon kepeken sitelen pona li pona mute!
Comments
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This is a really interesting little game. I'm still learning Toki Pona, and this has been a nice exercise in translation (the latin alphabet version, specifically). I have to go slowly, but I'm getting enough of it to know what I'm doing. I had an especially triumphant moment when "lava lamp" clicked for me. I'd welcome more like this! Maybe add-on stories for a token fee? I'd be cool with that.
I'm glad you're enjoying it! I'm really pleased that so many people have been interested in such a niche game.
I'm not planning any additional stories in the world of kiwen kon, but I do have (very rough) plans for a second Playdate Pulp game (completely unconnected to this one), which I plan to make available in English and Toki Pona (Latin and SP) from the start. No idea when it'll be released, but it will almost certainly be free.
I do have a browser game that's playable in Toki Pona: https://billsmugs.itch.io/late-for-school - it's not available on Playdate, but should work in any browser (including phones). It's shorter and much more linear than kiwen kon though.
I've only just learned about Toki Pona a couple of weeks ago, so this was a surprise to see! Still learning, but I'll tuck this in the backlog for later.
My friend and I are Toki Pona fans, and Playdate owners, and I'm really shocked this game exists. I guess weird little consoles and weird little languages have the same audience! thanks for the Latin version.
I've been pleasantly surprised by the cross-over too, as I say below I was slightly worried I might be the only member of the target audience! So far 29 people have downloaded it, which isn't a lot, but it's well beyond my expectations for something so niche.
musi ni li pona mute li suwi mute a! The Playdate is so charming that it feels like a perfect fit for a game in toki pona, I'm glad I'm not the only one who had the same thought!
I'm pretty bad with sitelen pona, so unfortunately I found it very slow to make progress with the game. I'd love to see a version in the Latin alphabet, but I appreciate that it would be a lot of work to make a second version - if you'd be willing to share the source, though, I'd be interested in taking a crack at it myself? Regardless, what I did play was splendid, and I'm still going to find the time to persevere with it somewhen.
You should post this on the Playdate and toki pona Discords (unless you have already and I've just missed it), it'd be great to see more overlap between the two communities - games like this could be a really fun way to introduce people to toki pona!
mi pilin pona mute a, tan sitelen sina!
Thank you for commenting! I was a bit worried that the combination of Toki Pona speaker and Playdate owner might be a niche that turns out to be just me! 😄
Doing a full conversion to the Latin alphabet would be a bit tricky, but doing just the dialog (i.e. leaving the splash screen, "tutorial" text and all the places in the environment where sitelen pona is displayed) should be quite easy. I'll try to look into it this week. It won't be perfect, but should be enough to make progressing through the game a lot quicker for anyone who's not that familiar with sitelen pona. Because of the way Pulp works, it'll be a separate download rather than an in-game option.
I was going to post about the game on the Toki Pona subreddit today (although might wait until I have a sitelen Lasin version ready), not sure if it's maybe too niche to post to more general Playdate communities? I've signed up to the "ma pona pi toki pona" Discord, but never actually posted - I'm more used to traditional forums so Discord is a bit intimidating - it feels like I'd be a stranger jumping into an ongoing unrelated group chat to advertise my game!
If you're a member of any communities you think would be interested in it, feel free to post about it - if you want you can link to my site where I've posted (in Toki Pona) about both this and a Bitsy game that I've made that's playable in Toki Pona (as well as an excellent Toki Pona Bitsy game that I haven't got anything to do with but strongly recommend called "Soweli Mu"): https://toki.pona.billsmugs.com/lipu-tenpo/2022-05-08-musi-pi-ilo-nanpa/
I'm so glad you'd be happy to make a sitelen Lasin version, thank you! I think as long as the main dialogue is translated, that would definitely be enough, yeah.
As far as posting to Playdate communities - in my opinion, as far as Playdate games are concerned, the more niche the better; the whole idea of the console is to be a little quirky and unusual, so I think the general community would definitely be receptive to you posting about the game! And ma pona pi toki pona is a really friendly place, don't worry - the #pali-musi channel is specifically intended for people to share their projects, so don't feel like you're spamming or anything.
And thank you for the recommendations for the Bitsy games - I haven't come across either yours or Soweli Mu before, so I'll be sure to check them both out.
I've uploaded a basic sitelen Lasin version - I've given it a quick test, but let me know if you spot any problems with it.
Thanks again for the translation - I just finished it now and I didn't spot any problems whatsoever. akesi toki lili li suwi mute a!