The Newest XKCD Strip is Like A Click-and-Drag MMO

When The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim was first released I was in envy of my game journo colleagues who were already playing it from release day. Every few seconds my Twitter timeline would light up with a new discovery: here a shout-out to Minecraft, there an allusion to Star Wars, and somewhere lurked a talking dog who could join you as a companion. All these little details were just waiting for us across a sprawling virtual territory. Our games and screens were all different, but we were all citizens of Skyrim.

Today’s xkcd is kind of like that.

Within minutes of the “strip”‘s publication (I use the term loosely, as it’s actually a draggable landscape covering miles and miles of monochromatic space), everyone I knew was sharing screencaps and shoutouts of their new discoveries. The allusion to Mario (above) was, naturally, one of the first spotted, likewise an appearance by Minecraft’s Creeper, but did you find the X-Wing from Star Wars? What about the flying jellyfish? The Saturn V rocket? We need to get a wiki together to chart this baby.

Via Brendan Keogh’s Twitter.