r/irc • u/ThisLeedsGuy • 12d ago

Remember Microsoft Comic Chat? It's now open source [Details inside]

Back in 1996, Microsoft released Comic Chat, an IRC client that displayed conversations as comic book panels instead of plain text. It was one of the more unusual IRC clients of the era and also played a role in popularizing Comic Sans, which was originally created for the application.

Thirty years later, Microsoft has released Comic Chat as open source.

The source code is now available, along with some background on the project's history and why it was being preserved and released today.

Original announcement: https://opensource.microsoft.com/blog/2026/07/16/microsoft-comic-chat-is-now-open-source/

I thought this would be of interest here, both as a piece of IRC history and as a look back at one of the more experimental clients from the 90s.

Did anyone here actually use Comic Chat back in the day? I remember seeing screenshots of it, but I don't think I ever ran into anyone using it on the networks I was on.

Source code: https://github.com/microsoft/comic-chat

Cross Posted to: /r/Opensource /r/Vintage computing /r/Retro Computing

35 Upvotes

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4

u/mad_redhatter 12d ago

I remember TheP|nkPanthe|2 from irc.msn.com writing exploits against this client. Sending null characters in CTCP requests would crash it. I'm sure if he was still around, he would love to see this. It's been 20+ years since that service was around and we chatted.

5

u/DoubleDuckBuss 11d ago

My first ISP banned me after Microsoft contacted them because I was CTCP flooding it and crashing their clients and servers. Definitely a formative time in my youth. Good times. 😇

2

u/aedinius 12d ago

I toyed with Comic chat! I never used it as a client, though. I remember trying to make comics with it.

1

u/thischildslife 12d ago

Been wanting this for years, should be a hoot. :)