Something about ENOUGH, a web-based story experience by Cabbibo, brings me right back to the mystery and magic of the early web. Your mouse leaves a glittering contrail in the shifting dark; subterranean life forms follow your pointer, and pearled marinelife pulses and sings in response to your touch.
The creator says ENOUGH is an effort to capture the vitality and wonderment they experienced reading picture books as a child, and that comes through: The “pages” are alive, their laws of dimension and gravity slowly shifting before your eyes, objects rising from the surface as if in a dream. As you follow the story of a creature trying to find her purpose in an abstract marine universe, sound, light and visuals unite in harmony.
People will use the word “trippy” about just about anything that suggests pretty colors and metaphysics, but fans of psychedelia in particular will relate to the slow transitions, the spiritual rhythm of the storytelling, and the sense of awe that gently haloes every page. “Pages” are little more than a concept, anyway. For me, the whorled iridescent shapes, the delightful sense of experimentation as luminescent anemones follow my mouse, remind me of falling into the heart of the software of my childhood, some acid-dipped Microsoft Encarta CD-ROM.
Experience ENOUGH for free in a browser tab, though you really ought to let it full-screen and wear headphones for the optimal immersive effect. The creator, who calls ENOUGH “the best project of my small life”, is on Twitter.