this will be a very long post i think
first thing i hear are those telephone dials for dial up this is going to be great

for some reason there's pacman included like an emulated version of the NES pacman just built into the thing i think this zip file had a few programs included tbh

yes it is stretched like that in the actual dosbox window

beyond that however the first thing i noticed is dragging windows and how it seems to lag spike whenever you grab one. i don't know if that's a dosbox quirk or an actual win 3.1 thing but that's interesting

i think i got this ui down, based on my assumptions basically everything on your computer is inside this program manager.

there you have your folders and obviously programs. this is done this way to make a more convenient exit out of the windows experience and onto dos since windows was not really your main operating system at the time, it was dos. although minimizing it you can see something beyond just nothingness, all your open tasks are all laid out there for you to restore, this would be the equivalent of the taskbar and how it contains every window you have open even if you minimize it. that's neat.

i have to use a program called trumpet winsock to use the internet apparently but no matter what i can't get it to work probably due to the fact it's not 1992 anymore so we don't use dialup maybe there's a workaround but i'm too dumb for it instead i'm going to see what are the builtin stuff for win3.1

this is eudora light. it is just a program for e-mails, not too different from g-mail or whatever other email service you use nowadays. what i'm more interested in is the designs of the buttons and how it clearly shows the skeumorphism design philosophy that would be very integral to computers and later on smartphones throughout the 90s and 2000s. look at how the icons clearly represent physical mail, this design choice is a huge contributor to how ubiquitous the usage of modern computers, phones and the internet as a whole is nowadays. it makes it easier for the average user to understand what this program is. it's mail, but digital! comparing it to modern email services shows just how far we've moved from this philosophy nowadays. but not entirely, the symbol for attaching files is a paper clip still, and it still represents a real life object and what it's usage is. paper clip, attach stuff, but online! although we have simplified it (i think a more skeumorphic way of showing it would have an actual graphic of a paper clip attaching something to the mail) it still retains aspect from this era of graphic design, and i think that's neat.

ah, mirc. i have used ircs before. pesterchum is an irc, if you're a homestuckie and used pesterchum, you've used an irc. although i have also used other irc programs, most notably, mirc. just not the dos version, the version they have available to download on their website right now. so everyone who ever says "reject discord, return to irc" can finally put their money where their mouth is. i'm of course kidding as you can complain about something but still use it because of whatever reason, for discord it's obviously that's it's what everyone else uses, and you're not going to try to make everyone use irc, you'll look like a dork, unless everyone else in your friendgroup are nerds, then it's a fun time, totally recommend. anyways ircs are neat i like them truly where you go to when discord goes down.

ok shut up nerd can you talk about fun stuff

ok its time to look at the few remaining programs and games starting off with the one the only mspainti i mean paintbrush. which looks like this.

i drew a cat! a very ugly cat, but a cat nonetheless, his name is xanax the wise, named after one of my favorite wizards
all joking aside, xanax is very fucked up. that's because i couldn't really use the brush tool, or what i'm assuming is the brush tool, given that the what i assume to be eraser tool(s) also don't work. who knows maybe what i thought was the brush tool was an eraser tool. the right eye of xanax isn't drawn on, it is the brush cursor, i have no idea how the black spot in his left eye formed, i am scared of him.
anyways without brushing or erasing i had to make him out of shape tools. which work differently from the mspaint ones but i won't bother comparing them because this is NOT mspaint, this is paintbrush.
i tried to cut xanax in half, i was pretty sure he was a half demon. unfortunately this happened instead, i don't know what he's doing. i am very afraid.

ok this post is way too long lets speed this up

the calculator and clock programs are boring, clock is a program because there was no taskbar yet so checking the time was its own program. it just shows the time, that's it.

the calculator is a calculator, not much to write home about, it does the exact thing that computers were made for.

fun fact computer was the name of a job title back in the day people had other people just checking math all day as a job because there was no computers able of perfectly doing math a bajillion times faster than a human.

we have sound recorder a video recorder and a media app all of which i can't use since i don't have a mic, camera or media.

ok time for the goddamn games ive already touched on the fact there's pacman for some reason here but lets go with the inbuilt ones

not even trying this one, it's solitare, everyone knows solitare, few know how to actually beat it apparently, i do know how to beat it but it's really boring and requires too much of my tiny brain so i won't try rn

minesweeper. with that classic design that lasted up to 98 i think. i have a continued joke i play with my friend group of loathing minesweeper and calling it a game for nerds because it's too hard. this is the first time i am acknowledging it as a joke which may remove the fun but lmao (hi maddy if you're reading this! i can still call you a nerd for playing minesweeper though)

anyways i can play minesweeper (not really expert minesweeper with the larger board but i can play intermediate minesweeper at best lmao) i couldn't when i was 10 but i can now lets see how far i get in one attempt on beginner

ok that was unlucky as shit but one attempt i guess

ok so hearts i know basically nothing about card games so lets see this
so the goal is to have the least amount of hearts ok

so basically i got rid of all my hearts early on and then we had to play our cards a lot for some reason and i ended up winning i guess??? didn't really understand that ngl probably makes more sense if you know the rules and also aren't playing a watered down windows 3.1 version with bots

freecell i'm not even going to try i have memories of trying it in like windows 7 or something and not getting through it as a kid because card games are hard and id like to continue to live in ignorance i don't feel like learning a card game right now (hearts was an exception just because it was so fucking easy for some reason)

but now its time for the final program

THE GOAT

ski free is so fucking fun guys also fun fact microsoft edge's "dinosaur game" equivalent is a ski free clone lmao
this game is so simple but it works so well you just ski and hit tricks and get points and it works so well
it controls well enough for it to be fun! and you don't even get punished that harshly for slamming a tree at 300 miles per hour you don't die but you don't want to do that the games makes you want to always keep your speed up and it makes you want to get faster and there's also 3 different modes for you to try this is a peak fucking game to include out of the box on this version of windows.

windows kinda had a rough fall with built in games especially after windows 7 but this is the standout of windows 3.1 built in shit, much like 3d pinball is windows xp's thing. and for very good reason, it's a VERY good game.
id want a return but windows is practically done with built in games which is sad also the fact they didn't go full ski free on the edge easter egg kinda makes me feel they have copyright issues or something? idk anyways this is def on my top 3 windows built in games the rest are card games so i don't care about anything but this top 3

WOOOO and we are DONE with my thoughts on windows 3.1 written live while i was using the machine i straight up was alt tabbing this shit and i had this window open for like an hour now i wonder if all this white will burn on the screen or burn my eyes anyways sure was an experience yippeeeeeeee

also might i add this entire os with built in software and games and PACMAN is only 27 megabytes what are we doing nowadays tbh

kiwi

@kiwieta

silly catgirl person thing

using windows 3.1 for the first time, ever.

ok shut up nerd can you talk about fun stuff

THE GOAT