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Dev tools · alternatives · 2026

24 alternatives to Play the front page of Hacker News as interactive text games

Hey HN, I hacked together this fun project that lets you play any article on the front page of Hacker News as an interactive text game. You can create a game about anything by going to infinityarcade.com/ You can also use a URL, which is what this page uses. The whole thing is open source: https://github.com/themaximal1st/InfinityArcade

Infinity Arcade transforms any article or URL into an interactive text-based game. Users can visit the site to convert Hacker News front-page stories or custom content into playable adventures. The tool is designed for… Below are 24 products that do a similar job, ranked by how close each is in meaning and then by launch-day votes. Play the front page of Hacker News as interactive text games launched in 2023; newer entries below may have overtaken it.

  1. 1

    Hey HN! Just for fun, I built an interactive Hacker News Simulator. You can submit text posts and links, just like the real HN. But on HN Simulator, all of the comments are generated by LLMs + generate instantly. The best way to use it (IMHO) is to submit a text post or a curl-able URL here: https://news.ysimulator.run/submit. You don't need an account to post. When you do that, various prompts will be built from a library of commenter archetypes, moods, and shapes. The AI commenters will actually respond to your text post and/or submitted link. I really wanted it to feel…

    Nov 2025 · news.ysimulator.run · its alternatives →

  2. 2HN
  3. 3

    2015 · news.ycombniator.com · its alternatives →

  4. 4TH

    2022 · coxomb.github.io · its alternatives →

  5. 5RH
  6. 6

    Random Hacker News front page generated with AI

    2025 · thishackernewsdoesnotexist.com · its alternatives →

  7. 7

    Hey HN, I made this free browser extension that modernizes the Hacker News design. I previously launched Modern for Wikipedia [1] here back in December, and it seemed like the obvious next choice to build one for HN too! So I've taken what I learned from building that, and have spent all my spare time this year building Modern for HN. I realize this won't be for everyone, but it was a fun project to work on, and I'm really happy with the result so far. Hope you like it too! Lots more planned for future updates, and suggestions welcome :) [1]…

    2022 · modernhn.com · its alternatives →

  8. 8HN
  9. 9IM
  10. 10

    Hi folks this is a project I worked on with some of my students when I was running an online JS programming course. Although the online course is no more, I finally got around to releasing Hacker Herald with a former instructor and student - thanks Arnav and Archis! To those wondering if there is a need for such a Hacker News front end, I would just point out that most newspaper websites are laid out like this - clearly some people like this kind of layout! Also for some stories a picture really does help - currently there is a HN story titled, "Portland airport grows with expansive mass…

    2024 · hackerherald.com · its alternatives →

  11. 11

    I love HN but always felt the search with algolia is okay but does have some limitations. Since I work at Vectara I decided to try and create a better search for HN. It's based on data from roughly the last 6 months of HN stories and comments. Would love to hear feedback and how useful this is relative to the existing search.

    2024 · hackernews.demo.vectara.com · its alternatives →

  12. 12

    Hi folks, I've built an alternative Hacker News front page. It is inspired by and meant to be a replacement for hckrnews.com. I built this because HN is woefully underfeatured, but most sites that try to improve it seem to assume that the visual design is the problem. hcker.news tries to maintain HN's familiarity while adding useful enhancements. There are three primary views: - Timeline View: Browse top stories by votes or comments grouped by day, week, or month (e.g., top 20 per day, top 100 per week). - Aggregate View: See top stories by votes or comments over custom time ranges. - Front…

    2025 · hcker.news · its alternatives →

  13. 13

    A protip by sergiotapia about css, html, and hackernews.

    2012 · coderwall.com · its alternatives →

  14. 14HN

    One night I was deep in a rabbit hole, reading old HN comments. I eventually ended up scraping a bunch of usernames and building a game! Please suggest any other users who you'd want to see/upstanding members of the community who deserve to be featured.

    2023 · hngitblame.com · its alternatives →

  15. 15

    A "bookmarklet" that turns any page into Katamari Damacy

    2015 · kathack.com · its alternatives →

  16. 16HN

    Although the page itself is more just fun to have made and look at (I like the flip sound), the fun part is how I made it to verify the (and I hate to say it) vibe host service I've been working on. The recent flip board back and forth's on Twitter (X) are what inspired me. The idea here is that people (like me or you) can create something neat like this, and others can remix it, change it and publish their own version. This is that all in action and it worked great. I wrote a blog about it (the blog is dogfooding, it's just an app hosted on quickish that uses the built in db lib). For the…

    Jun 2026 · popflame.quickish.space · its alternatives →

  17. 17HN

    i'd forgotten i'd written this a year and a half ago, and when a friend passed me the link to it just now, it seemed hilarious to me. probably some other people will enjoy it too

    2023 · canonical.org · its alternatives →

  18. 18

    Hi all, This is coolwulf and I have been working on a project. The idea is to generate video content on popular Hacker News gaming stories. So far I just started this idea and will continue contributing to the content.

    Jun 2026 · video.intellios.ai · its alternatives →

  19. 19BH

    I've developed a Hacker News reader that draws inspiration from Brutalist Web Design, the open web, Cyberpunk Aesthetics, and glitch art. The entire project is crafted in Vanilla JavaScript, contained within a single index.html file, eschewing any external libraries. It features support for theming, including the use of third-party themes. Additionally, users have the capability to create and apply their own themes directly within the site. Moreover, the application is designed as a Progressive Web App (PWA), enabling it to be downloaded and used as an app on most devices. I'm eager to…

    2024 · brutalisthackernews.com · its alternatives →

  20. 20FH

    Hi HN! I’ve been lurking for a while, but out of fear of being steamrolled by HN readers or maybe just natural introversion, I’ve always been too scared to post or comment. Which is why 1. this is my first real Hacker News submission 2. my friend Michael and I built "Fake" Hacker News, a place to post and see what AI-generated HN comments might say. Here’s a video of me using fakeHN to test this very submission: https://www.loom.com/share/4b9f4f9d7c77489a86baeb92ec55a1ed?... And an example of one of our generated posts:…

    2023 · fakehn.com · its alternatives →

  21. 21

    A Hacker News for freemium games

    2014 · its alternatives →

  22. 22IB

    Hey my name is Crisa and this is my first post here on HN. I love this site and it inspired me to build a clone of it for my newsletter. Instead of having a boring landing page, I hope to gather articles, blogs, interesting projects on my own platform. I would appreciate any feedback, good or bad so that I can improve the site. Email: gazcrisa (at) gmail (dot) com

    2023 · gptroad.com · its alternatives →

  23. 23AV

    2022 · v20.ohayo.computer · its alternatives →

  24. 24HN

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Ranked by how close each launch is in meaning, then by votes. Prices were read from each product’s own site when checked and can change. Refine with your own description →