Preparation
Bulletin board systems were the places where people used to gather together and discuss new mammoth hunt tricks, as well as to play board and mammoth hunt simulation games (since it was even before the invention of war). Currently there is a possibility of mammoth de-extinction, which may also bring the popularity of BBS back.
There were MUDs (predecessors of modern MMORPGs), message boards and other messaging systems, news; pretty similar to WWW overall, including the approach: both require a thin client only – a computer terminal in case of BBS, and a web browser in case of WWW.
But enough of history. Pick your favourite terminal emulator, recall its quirks, prepare a telnet client, and let the journey begin!
The Quick Telnet BBS Listing is a good starting point. Before experimenting, recall that it is usually C-] (^], Ctrl + ]) to escape to the normal telnet escape prompt, where you can type quit, and there is tput to reset the colors: tput reset (or tput init). Some BBS will assume that your terminal is 80x24 characters (imagine how modern websites would look like in a few decades – not only they tend to assume certain display resolution range, but most of them also assume certain DPI!), so it is better to set the 80x24 mode. Most of them will ask for your pseudonym, so make something up beforehand if it takes you some time – otherwise you may get disconnected while thinking.
There is a lot of BBS, which makes it nearly impossible to try them all in a reasonable amount of time, hence one should choose wisely. The stategy we employ here is the same as for wine bottles: picking the ones with the most amusing labels. It is mostly about pictures in case of wine (always works, by the way: each time it turns out to be wine in them), and about domain names in case of BBS.
A few BBS
thearcade.darktech.org
Legends of the Red Dragon: The Inn
Runs WWIV, hosts a bunch of games (including LORD), a mailing system, conference and file exchange functionality – pretty usual, and with very few users. The time is limited to 60 minutes – as usual, too; a weird and unfortunate, seemingly legacy restriction, alas very common among BBS. Only textual messages indicate that it is maintained in this century (even in this month, to be fair).
blobster.publicvm.com
Blue Lobster stats
Runs modern Synchronet software, which provides plenty of settings, detects and properly uses some of the terminal emulator parameters, and provides access to some of its features via specialized protocols – such as POP3, FTP, and IRC.
IRC over a telnet BBS
It can emulate various other BBS interfaces, and is relatively cool, though the functionality is pretty much the same as everywhere: messages and boards, games, files. The time limit is 4 hours.
braintoys.org
A few games, forum, chat, some old-looking engine, files; another common BBS.
Blademaster: Tavern
Forum
chaoticbliss.darktech.org
One more Synchronet BBS, with “fancy” design – that is, the accesibility is poor. Nevertheless, Synchronet BBS are cool, and here is a few more screenshots:
Chaotic Bliss stats
Settings
Menu
Messages
Oneliners
telehack.com
Not exactly a BBS, but “a text-based simulation of an early version of the Internet”.
Busy and broken ones
Some of the BBS were too busy being BBS to serve us at the time of writing, and some mess up the pseudographics, or require a verification by mail, which made them unusable.
Sole journey
Now you should know what to expect, and may continue this journey alone – there is plenty of games to find, and probably less common BBS features are lurking there somewhere, waiting to be discovered.