In 2019, a team of three people released a game on Steam as a kind of experiment, an unusual game about anonymously writing and receiving letters from other real people in the world. It was called Kind Words. I wrote about it at the time.

The team, Popcannibal, didn't think it would make much of an impact. Maybe 2000 people would play before it faded away. "We were wrong," co-founder Ziba Scott said in a talk at GDC this week. "It was a huge success.

"People showed up to play in their thousands right away and haven't stopped in over a year-and-a-half now. Players poured their hearts out. It quickly became very personal and dark, and silly, and just everything. All of humanity showed up: loving, angry, confused, messy, suicidal, depressed, giddy, playful - everything. And strangers diligently replied."

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Kind Words is one of the most beautiful games I've ever played - beautiful in its intent. It's a game about helping other people, about writing encouraging letters to each other and sharing worries.

It's very simple (and cheap: 4). You're a cartoony character in a warmly coloured little bedroom, adrift in a sort of dreamspace, and you sit at a desk, sending and receiving letters. They're not long letters, more like memos, and they're delivered via an adorable postal deer. Yes, a deer.

I browsed other people's letters to begin with. They're anonymous so all you know of the other person is an initial of their name (which is probably made up), and then it's up to you whether to reply. You might not have anything to say, but some problems might be exactly what you've been through, so maybe you have advice to share.

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