This project blew me away the moment I came across it, and the further I went down this rabbit hole, the more astounded I became. Floor796 is an ever-expanding animation scene that has been created by one guy… yup, just one guy. It shows the life of one floor on a huge space station and is absolutely packed with references from varied media forms (including videogames, which we will get to), most of which you can click on for details.
Haven't you always wanted to see Sub-Zero dancing to Gangnam Style with Mei from Overwatch? Wish granted. The creator 0x00 has already put in over 8000 hours and has been working on it for years—starting back in 2018—and is intending to add plenty more. "This is only 37% of what was planned".
0x00 posted the project on r/PixelArt on October 12 and proceeded to discuss some of the details in the comments section, giving us a little peek into how this insane gif came to exist. "First year I developed my own animation editor and website itself. Then I began to draw, element by element, block by block. I drew the first room (block) for about 8 months. Now I create one block per month." When asked about why he chose the isometric view 0x00 revealed "previously I was a game developer, so I have some experience with drawing in isometric view" and indicated inspiration from games from the 80's and 90's that used a similar look.
- The co-creator of Dark Souls' most ambitious mod resurfaces to inform me that Blighttown, source of my nightmares, was cobbled together with '10 bits of wood'
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To add another level of impressiveness to this, 0x00 also included multiple interactive elements hidden within the gif. "Btw, there are about 4 big interactive elements in this project for now: arcade game racer796, music synthesizer (you can create your own melody), board with pixel animation (you can draw small animation), change my mind meme (you can add your own phrase)." I also found a few other small clickable little interactive bits when I was having a look through. It really is the gif that keeps on giving.
After losing a chunk of time being mesmerised by the eclectic references, like Harry and Marv from Home Alone, waiting in a hospital room with the Joker to be seen by the Dark Nurses from Silent Hill… I decided to take it a step further. I thought it would be a good idea (for some reason) to go through and find all of the PC gaming references I could. I found about 35, including, but not limited to:
- A Headcrab zombie fighting Metro Police in a Half-Life hallway
- The Windows Solitaire winning animation on one of the wall screens
- Pyramid Head from Silent Hill being served a drink from Demiurge from Overload
- Chell from Portal 2 sitting in the park
- Multiple Overwatch characters spread around the floor
- Tron arcade machine
- Multiple Mortal Kombat characters spread around the floor
- Sonic on the treadmill in the gym
And on top of all of the direct videogame references there's plenty of nods to things that have made their way to gaming like a few clone troopers in there, King Kong laying about, and Gimli being kicked by Shadowfax while Legolas tempts the horse down some stairs with a carrot.
The gif is still being updated with much more to come. The replies on reddit were full of suggestions and recommendations with 0x00 confirming that "Warhammer will appear in future blocks" and "there are a lot of references" to be added. Who knows what's to come, but I'm looking forward to watching this masterpiece grow.
