As a person who has been knee deep in financial services software for the last 5 years, why didn’t I think of this?
Tax Heaven 3000 is a visual novel dating sim briefly available on Steam (& later pulled) that actually ends with a 1040 filled out you can submit to the IRS: (The Polygon link is SFW, but any clicks beyond that are at your own risk. Mostly jk.)
The “manifesto” posted on the direct Tax Heaven 3000 site has some real biting (and accurate) commentary in it so be sure to check it out as well:
“TurboTax, per its own internal documents, is built on the “Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt” that ordinary people have about their taxes. Against this, we pit free software instead built on parasocial desire for intimacy and benign horniness!”
I’m not sure I totally agree with them that parasocial desire and horniness are always benign, but it sure is funny and an accurate description of the tax prep software industry.
