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As part of our support for the Choice of Games Contest for Interactive Novels, we will be posting an irregular series of blog posts discussing important design and writing criteria for games. We hope that these can both provide guidance for people participating in the Contest and also help people understand how we think about questions of game design and some best practices. These don’t modify the evaluation criteria for the Contest, and (except as noted) participants are not required to conform to our recommendations–but it’s probably a good idea to listen when judges tell you what they’re looking for.

If these topics interest you, be sure to sign up for our contest mailing list below! We’ll post more of our thoughts on game design leading up to the contest deadline on January 31, 2018.

Choice of Games is strongly committed to inclusivity. Our audience includes people of many different genders, races, orientations, abilities, ethnicities, and life experiences. We want our games to immerse readers in a world that shows the same diversity, and for people from all backgrounds to see themselves fully reflected in that world.

Therefore, in our contest, inclusivity is worth 10% of the score. When we assess whether a game is inclusive, these are the criteria we use:

• Do the characters reflect the full diversity of the society in which the game is set?
• Are all types of people (especially groups traditionally underrepresented in media) treated respectfully and non-stereotypically?
• If there is romance in the game, are there equally satisfying romance options regardless of the player character’s orientation?

At minimum, if the PC’s gender is stated, then the PC must be playable as male or female. If there is romance in the story, the PC must be playable as gay or straight. Games which do not offer this do not simply receive a score of 0 for inclusivity, they aren’t eligible to be published as Choice of Games titles.

For the last criterion – how to offer good options for romanceable characters – our Author Guidelines give a lot of details and examples. So this blog post will focus on the other two points. We’ll discuss what those criteria mean, give you some best practices for creating an inclusive world, and offer some resources that will help you through your writing process.

Learning how to write inclusively is an ongoing process. We can’t possibly teach you everything there is to know about it, or cover every single detail, in a single blog post. What we hope to do here is to give you some starting points for your own learning process and some tips for how to approach the task. Keep reading; keep learning; keep listening.

Inclusive Environments

Choice of Games titles give the player a first-person perspective within the story. The PC always takes action as “I,” and the narration always addresses the PC as “you.” It’s what makes our stories feel so immediate and immersive: what’s happening to the PC is happening to you.

That means that many players like to construct PCs that match their real-world selves: the same gender, orientation, appearance, etc.  Therefore, we want to make sure that as many people as possible can see themselves in the main character. One way to do this is to include as wide a range of options as possible for the PC’s fundamental character traits. Offer names and backgrounds that make it clear that the PC can have many different potential ethnicities, races, and origins. Think outside traditional binaries of gender and orientation. ChoiceScript’s method of handling pronoun variables makes it very easy to add more options. So for gender, include the option for the PC to be nonbinary, genderqueer, genderfluid, transgender, etc. For orientation, include the option for the PC to be bisexual, asexual, aromantic, etc.

But being inclusive means more than having diverse options for the PC alone: it means having that diversity fully integrated into the world where the story is set.

To achieve this, you’ll have to think very carefully about some things that you might usually consider to be “neutral” or “default”. As Chuck Wendig recently said, “not being inclusive is also a political choice” – or, to put it another way, as Foz Meadows wrote, “default narrative settings are not apolitical.” What we consider “defaults” actually reflect deeply embedded structures of power and politics – for instance, the idea that a white character is “neutral” and characters of any other race need a “reason” to be in the story. Make sure that you’re mixing up your defaults, and including diversity in your minor NPCs as well.

Historical settings, both in the real world and in historically-flavored fantasy worlds, are especially susceptible to misconceptions. Kameron Hurley has written very eloquently about how difficult it is to overcome these preconceived ideas. Medieval Europe in particular was much more diverse and egalitarian than it’s often depicted as being. See the end of this blog post for some resources that will help you build an accurate medieval or medieval-fantasy setting.

So, if you’ve got a sword-and-sorcery fantasy game in which the PC is a knight, and the PC can be of any gender, that’s a good first step. But if all the NPC knights are men, then that’s not really inclusive. Likewise, if you include romance in your game and leave open the possibility for the PC to have a romantic partner of the same gender, that’s a good first step – but if all the other relationships that you depict are straight couples, then that’s not really inclusive. The NPCs should represent the same wide range of genders, orientations, ethnicities, abilities, etc. as the PC.

You don’t have to make this a major plot point; in fact, it’s usually more inclusive to not make a big deal about it. Normalizing diversity communicates to the player that the PC is part of a world that contains many other people like them – in other words, showing the player that the PC belongs in that world and isn’t an exception.

There are subtler ways to promote inclusivity beyond the types of people that fill a story. The language that we use communicates ideas about the world and its power dynamics.

Countless casual phrases perpetuate destructive stereotypes. “Man up” implies that only men are strong. Using “crying like a girl” as an insult implies that crying shows weakness, that girls are weak – and therefore, that girls are inferior. “Psycho” demeans people with mental illnesses. Describing a disabled person as “confined to a wheelchair” implies that wheelchairs are a punishment, when many wheelchair users say that wheelchairs give them more freedom and flexibility than they would otherwise have. Like those “default narrative settings” mentioned above, these phrases are so deeply embedded in our common language usage that many people don’t even realize the potential hurt that they can cause, or how they reinforce stereotypes. Being aware of the phrases you use can help you create a more inclusive environment within your game.

At the end of this post, you can find some links to useful websites that will help you fine-tune your prose to make sure that you’re using the most inclusive language possible.

Best Practices

With all of this in mind, here are some ways to work towards an inclusive environment for your game. Again, this isn’t an exhaustive list; no single list can be! These are some starting points for your thought and research.

• Think about the structures of power in the gameworld: think carefully about who’s in power and why, and about what kinds of people you place in positions of leadership. Are all the assertive leaders men and all the nurturers women? If so, you should mix things up.
• Be aware of the tropes in fiction that perpetuate stereotypes or destructive patterns of power. For example, don’t give tragic endings to gay couples, or magically cure a disability. Even “good” stereotypes can be harmful in that they limit our perception of what certain people can do, and what roles they can play in the world: don’t make your only Asian character a math genius or martial-arts expert; and don’t make your only black character a giver of folksy knowledge, or only there to assist a white character.
• Pay attention to the way you construct scenes. Try switching around the genders or races of the characters: does the dialogue still feel authentic? Does the switch reveal some unconscious assumptions? If a man is chasing another man down a dark alley, it’s a standard action scene, but if a man is chasing a woman down a dark alley, then the scene acquires a very different kind of fear and tension.
• Pay attention to the way you describe NPCs. Make sure that when you’re “looking” with the PC’s eyes, you don’t assume what the PC will find attractive or not. Make sure that you don’t assume that one race or gender is the default and another is “exotic” or “different.”
• Get a diverse group of beta readers. The more first-person perspectives you can get on your writing, the better information you’ll have about how your audience will respond to your work. You may even want to consider getting an expert reader or sensitivity reader for some more targeted feedback about best practices for representing specific groups of people.
• Listen to your feedback. If a reader alerts you to a problem, look closely at that problem and see what you can do to fix it. If you’ve made a mistake, apologize, fix it, learn from it, and do better next time.
• If you do choose to include discrimination in your game, either because of the historical setting or to create narrative drama, handle it with respect and care. Understand that discrimination is something that many players have experienced in their real lives. Seeing it represented in a game can make that game feel more authentic, but it can also stir up painful memories and emotions. Take it seriously, don’t treat it lightly, and be considerate of the players’ experiences.

Further Reading

These are some useful starting points for your research about how to write inclusively. There are many many more resources out there on the internet!

• Inclusive language about gender and sexuality: the GLAAD reference guide.
• Inclusive language about disability: the NCDJ style guide, and NCDJ’s terms to avoid when writing about disability.
• Resources for writing ethnic and racial diversity from Writing with Color.
• Resources for diversity in historical settings from Medieval POC.

We’re proud to announce that Heart of the House, the latest in our popular “Choice of Games” line of multiple-choice interactive-fiction games, is now available for Steam, iOS, and Android. It’s 30% off until November 2nd!

Destroy the evil at the heart of a haunted manor! As an orphan, you discovered your ability to commune with the spirit world and ghosts. When your uncle Kent mysteriously disappears, you’ll embark on a journey find out what really happened. With your trusty companion Devanand at your side, you make your way to Darnecroy Manor, where Kent was last seen. It is…The House.

Heart of the House is 360,000-word interactive Gothic novel by Nissa Campbell. It’s entirely text-based—without graphics or sound effects—and fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.

Within the manor, you’ll encounter the master, Lord Bastian Reaves; his mysterious servants, Oriana and Loren; and the thousands of spirits teeming around and in this haunted mansion. But will you shatter the power that binds the ghosts to the House, or claim it for yourself? Can love bloom in a haunted house? Most importantly, how will you escape, when the House comes for you?

• Play as a male, female, or non-binary; gay, straight, bi, ace, or poly
• Explore the halls of the House, even as they seem to shift before your eyes
• Encounter ghosts, spirits, and echoes, as you search for your lost Uncle Kent
• Fight against an ancient evil or embrace its demonic gifts
• Indulge in steamy, chaste, sweet, or provocative romances, or go it alone
• Exploit the secrets you find for self-serving ends or use them to help your friends
• Defeat your greatest fears in bone-chilling moments of terror…if you can.
• Choose whom you can save, if anyone, from the horrors the House contains

For some, there may be no escape from The Heart of the House.

We hope you enjoy playing Heart of the House. We encourage you to tell your friends about it, and recommend the game on StumbleUpon, Facebook, Twitter, and other sites. Don’t forget: our initial download rate determines our ranking on the App Store. The more times you download in the first week, the better our games will rank.

Destroy the evil at the heart of a haunted manor! As an orphan, you discovered your ability to commune with the spirit world and ghosts. When your uncle Kent mysteriously disappears, you’ll embark on a journey find out what really happened. With your trusty companion Devanand at your side, you make your way to Darnecroy Manor, where Kent was last seen. It is…The House. Heart of the House is 360,000-word interactive Gothic novel by Nissa Campbell. I sat down with her to talk about Victorian gothic goodness and skittering creatures. Heart of the House releases this Thursday, October 26th.

Heart of the House is a perfect Halloween release. Tell me about the world this game is set in.

The larger world of Heart of the House is Victorian England during the 1870s. Not terribly unlike the real one. It’s poised on the edge of a great deal of social and technological change, and still clinging to the ghosts of days past.

Here, most superstitions are entirely practical. Ghouls and specters really do linger all around us and curses are painfully real. As an occult investigator, you travel by coach to Wyeford, a small English town that few people ever visit and no one seems to remember. It could be a welcoming place, but it’s also a strange one, and the manor that watches over it is even stranger.

The manor certainly haunted (what old manor isn’t?), but ghosts are far from the only dangers within its walls. Once there, you find yourself caught up in ancient mysteries and the tangled dynamics of a makeshift family, both of which could be quite hazardous for your health.

Did you have a favorite character to write? I confess Loren is near to my heart.

I’m so glad to hear that!

I adore my characters, every one of them. But Heart of the House is the story of people who are trapped in myriad ways, and while Dev’s constant concern, Oriana’s sharp tongue and Reaves’ Byronic aloofness were fun coping mechanisms to write, I could never stay away from Loren’s irrepressible good cheer for long. Surrounded by so many secrets and so much danger, it’s relaxing to spend time with a person who seems so kind, open and genuine. Even while writing them.

And I loved, loved, loved having the opportunity to write a satisfying romantic arc for them. I’ve read and played more than my share of romance, and people like Loren don’t get happily ever afters nearly often enough.

What did you find most challenging about writing this game?

I expected to struggle with writing in ChoiceScript, but as it turns out, I’m not a very linear writer. Working with branching logic was a natural fit, and ChoiceScript itself is super intuitive.

No, the most challenging part was stopping. In every scene, it seemed like there was always more I could do, more branches I could explore, more choice I could offer. In a novel, you have to commit to a single branch. Here, I could play out all kinds of ideas. Knowing when to say “that’s enough,” with so much freedom is certainly a learning experience. I just hope I struck the right balance between offering everyone satisfying choices and actually finishing the game so they can play it.

On a more personal note, there were certain things I felt strongly about portraying in Heart of the House – like mental health issues and certain elements of gender and sexuality – that are particularly challenging in a Victorian setting. Not because the Victorians were unfamiliar with them, but because the vocabulary was often absent, and social norms were so strict. A panic disorder could be considered an embarrassing but acceptable nervous affliction (if you were fortunate enough to have money and family support) – and at the same time, not meeting society’s ridiculously stringent requirements for gender presentation might well be considered a sign of madness.

Thankfully, since the game takes place in an isolated community with its own unusual norms, I could give my characters much more room to breathe and be themselves than might be realistic in a story that takes place in, say, London during the same era.

Are you a fan of interactive fiction in general? What are some of your favorites?

Absolutely! When I was a kid, my dad kept our PC well-stocked with Infocom’s hits, so I grew up on Zork, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and – my favorite – A Mind Forever Voyaging. I didn’t really pick up on AMFV’s political stance when I was seven, but that game holds up surprisingly well.

Porpentine’s work really pulled me into modern interactive fiction, particularly With Those We Love Alive. More recently, Localhost is a deeply unsettling experience that I adore. Max Gladstone’s Deathless games are wonderful (as are the Craft Sequence novels they accompany), and have outrageously good worldbuilding. Does Kentucky Route Zero count? I feel like it counts, and every act that comes out could be my GOTY. And there are some amazing IF games coming up: Where the Water Tastes Like Wine, Southern Monsters, What Isn’t Saved (will be lost)…

It’s an exciting time to be an IF fan, especially if you like your fiction on the dark side.

What are you working on next?

My game backlog! Honestly, I’m taking some time off large creative projects for the sake of self-care and to clear my head, but it’s already filling up with new ideas. An anthology of games about falling in love with classic monsters. Maybe an extremely human story about being an AI. The necromantic romance novel that I’ve had sitting on the back burner for a while. Planning a Blades in the Dark campaign – it’s been a year since I played in a tabletop RPG, and I’m withering away without one.

But all that waits until I can say farewell to Heart of the House and its inhabitants, so maybe not quite yet.

Short answer, Bernard Pivot-Style 

Favorite color? 
Teal. Teal and pink, teal and red, but always, always, teal.

Favorite word?

Eldritch. Accursed. Cyclopean. Stygian. I have to admit, the words currently obsessing me all have a distinctly Lovecraftian flavour. Ooh, tenebrous.

Profession (other than your own) you would like to attempt?

Therapist. Working with Take This has shown me how much good mental health professionals can do, and people are endlessly fascinating. It’s fortunate for everyone involved that I can’t just wander into that job on a whim. Given how much I torture my characters, I probably shouldn’t be trusted with real human psyches.

Profession you would never want to attempt?

Pest control. As you might notice in Heart of the House, I have a bit of a thing about all the squirmy, skittering things that are probably lurking under our floorboards right this very moment…[Interviewer’s Note: I love them, but do not google “house centipede” if skittering critters terrify you.]

Are ghosts real?
As literal manifestations of the spirits of the deceased? Not in my experience. But a figurative haunting is still terribly troublesome, and we all have ghosts of our own.

We’re proud to announce that The Superlatives: Aetherfall, the latest in our popular “Choice of Games” line of multiple-choice interactive-fiction games, is now available for Steam, iOS, and Android. It’s 30% off until Octobet 26th!

Lead a superpowered team of “Superlatives” to defend 19th-century Victorian London! Battle a Martian warship, clockwork monsters, and nefarious inventors.

The Superlatives: Aetherfall is a 260,000-word interactive novel by Alice Ripley. It’s entirely text-based, without graphics or sound effects, and fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.

The prestigious Society for the Advancement of Individuals of Superlative Talent and the Protection of the Queen has invited you to become their newest member! But on the very day the Society plans to initiate you, unknown Villains destroy the Society headquarters and kidnap your colleagues! As the sole remaining full member of the Superlative Society, you must initiate new recruits to investigate the abduction.

Meet your team: Nimble—faster than lightning; Wailer—a “banshee” with sharp blades and sonic shriek attacks; Arturek—the gruff Martian warrior; Tua—a Venusian who commands the power of plants; and Black Orchid—a strangely familiar new recruit. Your efforts are bolstered by your faithful Clockwork assistant, Gatsby, and your always-butting-in rival, Hallow.

Will your gain your team’s trust and convince them to work together, or will they fall apart under the pressure? Will you cut a deal with London’s Villains, or even turn the Society into Villains yourself? Will you trust the mysterious Dusk and Mr. Ink, who offer you help, or will you uncover their many secrets?

• Play as male, female, or nonbinary; gay, straight, bisexual, asexual, or aromantic
• Draw power from your preternatural nature, alien heritage, or genius gadgets
• Protect the Earth from torrential aetherfalls
• Keep your identity secret from your nosy landlady, Mrs. Rathbone
• Negotiate with minute Mercurian monarchs (Mercurians stand only four inches tall)
• Push your teammates to transcend their origins or pursue their destiny
• Foil the Nefarious Clockwork Contraptions of Dr. Eisengeist and discover his origins

Don your mask, take to the skies, and God save the Queen!

We hope you enjoy playing The Superlatives: Aetherfall. We encourage you to tell your friends about it, and recommend the game on StumbleUpon, Facebook, Twitter, and other sites. Don’t forget: our initial download rate determines our ranking on the App Store. The more times you download in the first week, the better our games will rank.

The prestigious Society for the Advancement of Individuals of Superlative Talent and the Protection of the Queen has invited you to become their newest member! But on the very day the Society plans to initiate you, unknown Villains destroy the Society headquarters and kidnap your colleagues! As the sole remaining full member of the Superlative Society, you must initiate new recruits to investigate the abduction. The Superlatives: Aetherfall is a 260,000-word interactive novel by Alice Ripley. I sat down with her to talk about the world of Superlatives, and more. The Superlatives: Aetherfall releases Thursday, October 19th. 

What kind of world is Superlatives set in? It seems to me that it’s not steampunk, but more a magical setting…with an overriding scientific basis for this magic!

There is definitely a steampunk influence to the game, particularly with the gadgeteers, but the focus is more on the superlative abilities. Everything is powered by aether—which historically refers to the substance that fills space, between the stars and planets, and in the Superlative universe is both a physical substance and an energy that flows through every living being. The characters can observe and study it, but it follows comic book science rules—whatever is the most fun is the most probable answer! And on top of that, I channeled some Jules Verne, and definitely drew on Edgar Rice Burroughs to create a solar system populated by sentient Venusian plants and Martian warriors and tiny, excitable Mercurians. The overriding principle of the Superlatives universe is that it contains the things I find delightful (and hopefully you do, too!).

There’s a huge cast in this game. What character did you enjoy writing most?

I’ve gone through many favorites, depending on my mood and which part of the game I was working on. The aliens are fun to dig into, especially trying to work out how their perspectives and opinions are distinctly different from the human norm. I’m also very fond of prickly Wailer, and finding her points of insecurity and vulnerability that make her more complex than she’d like you to think she is. And Dusk gets the best drama. I never could resist a mysterious, shadowy figure.

What did you find most challenging about writing in ChoiceScript? Or was it more the elements of how game design works?

I have some game design background and some experience coding, so there weren’t too many technical challenges, though there’s always a learning curve to a new system and design style. The hardest thing for me was falling into a rhythm with the writing itself. Normally, I build up narrative momentum and get into a groove where the story begins to naturally build on itself; there’s a creative sweet spot that I hit most days, where things just start to flow. That momentum is much harder to generate in a branching narrative, when you have to pause and create choices and consider different contexts, tones, and decisions for each micro-scene.

It can also be difficult to predict ahead of time how long a given set of choices is going to get, if you haven’t outlined down to a very granular level. I tend to work with high-level outlines, and make granular decisions on the fly, which means that I was never particularly close with my word count estimates—which in turn makes it difficult to schedule tasks and gauge deadlines. Lesson learned: more outlining!

Are you a fan of interactive fiction in general or are you more a straight literary fiction reader? What have you been reading in your (ha!) spare time?

My first real job was writing for an narratively intensive video game all about branching storylines. It didn’t end up making it past the “episode one” script, but it hooked me on the concept. I’m intrigued by the use of branching and choice in games, and I tend to prefer games with some element of player-driven narrative.

Outside of games and interactive fiction, I read very widely. I’m in a bit of a history and military memoir kick right now (recommended: The Coldest Winter, about the Korean War). Over the summer my standout favorites were The Bear & The Nightingale, which is a gorgeous take on Russian mythology, and Megan Abbott’s You Will Know Me, which is sort of a crime novel but mostly a very dark and intricate look at a family driven by obsession with their eldest child’s talent.

Short answer, Bernard Pivot-style:

Favorite color?

Some shade of red.

Favorite word?

Too many good ones. I like words that have music, and words that have artful precision. You can discover amazing words and accidental poetry by reading Wikipedia articles about obscure subjects. Mycology has the best phrases: the “adnate lamellae of polypore-like fungi” and “various basidiomycetes” and “Gomphus has false gills.”

What profession other than your own would you like to attempt?

I loved both writing and visual art from an early age, and I could have leaned toward either one. But I knew I would only get as good as I wanted to be by letting one of them become my obsession and my complete focus, and I chose writing. I still draw and paint when I can, but I’d love someday to have the dedicated time to obsess over my art for a while.

Which would you not like to attempt?

Anything involving sound design. As I discovered trying to choose sounds for a mobile game I was a designer on, listening to repetitive noises makes my skin crawl and gives me anxiety. And for the life of me I could not tell the difference between those sixteen different types of “sproings” and “doings” and “boops” and “bonks.”

If you were yourself a Superlative, what would your ability be?

Telekinesis.

Coffee or tea?

So. Much. Coffee.

We’re proud to announce that Choice of the Cat, the latest in our popular “Choice of Games” line of multiple-choice interactive-fiction games, is now available for Steam, iOS, and Android. It’s 30% off until October 5th!

Knock things over. Take a nap. Enslave humanity. Power, fame, and catnip are yours for the licking!

Choice of the Cat is a hilarious 600,000-word interactive novel by Jordan Reyne, where your choices control the story. It’s entirely text-based, without graphics or sound effects, and fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.

It’s the biggest text-based cat simulator ever written; play it many times as different kinds of cat! As a rescue cat, looking for a family to love and obey you forever, you find yourself sharing a home with a family on the brink of divorce. You’ll learn to manipulate your owners, their neighbors, and even their other pets to get what you want. (The humans think they’re in charge! Aren’t they cute?)

Show your new family the meaning of unconditional love, rule by fear alone, or play them against one another for your amusement. Become a YouTube sensation when videos of your lovable antics go viral, or meddle from behind the throne as your owner family begins to take over the government.

Who’s an adorable, tyrannical kitty? YOU ARE. Will you sharpen your claws and mete out feline justice, or melt their hearts with purrs, meows, and cuddles?

• Play as male or female, or dispense with gender constructs
• Enjoy over half a million words covering cat lore, how to rule the planet, and what to do with a dead fish
• Save your owners’ marriage with kindness, or rip them apart with your tiny little claws
• Delve deep into the psyche of man’s second best friend, or become their first best friend, if Bene the dog lets you.
• Take revenge on those who cross you or your allies, or rescue the innocent using clever, quieter tricks
• Become a hero among cats, or pick on humans, and ruthlessly destroy a troubled marriage
• Enjoy luxurious carpets, curtains ripe for shredding, and belly rubs from your owners
• Shred and steal things, mark your territory stinkily, and cause fires
• Mess with vital political phone calls–or opt for clever calming tactics so your humans reach their goals
• Help your owner earn a recording contract from the music mogul next door, with the help of his cat

We hope you enjoy playing Choice of the Cat. We encourage you to tell your friends about it, and recommend the game on StumbleUpon, Facebook, Twitter, and other sites. Don’t forget: our initial download rate determines our ranking on the App Store. The more times you download in the first week, the better our games will rank.

Hosted Games has a new game for you to play!

While investigating a murder in a small Scottish town, you’ll find yourself embroiled in a world of secrets, cultists, and abyssal horror. What are you willing to do to solve the case? And what will you do when you don’t like the answer? It’s 25% off until October 5th!

Highlands, Deep Waters is a 340,000 word interactive horror novel by Fernando B Neves and Lucas Zaper, where your choices control the story. It’s entirely text-based—without graphics or sound effects—and fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.

• Play as an insightful Detective, a resourceful Criminal or a mysterious Scholar.
• Gather and interpret clues with the Deduction system. Will you solve the case?
• Face the hidden truths that derange your mind with the Sanity system.
• A carefully crafted town including hand-drawn maps, unique history and peculiar inhabitants.
• Play as a male, female, gay or straight. The Abyssal Ones treat everyone just the same.

Fernando B Neves and Lucas Zaper developed this game using ChoiceScript, a simple programming language for writing multiple-choice interactive novels like these. Writing games with ChoiceScript is easy and fun, even for authors with no programming experience. Write your own game and Hosted Games will publish it for you, giving you a share of the revenue your game produces.

Knock things over. Take a nap. Enslave humanity. Power, fame, and catnip are yours for the licking! Choice of the Cat is a hilarious 600,000-word interactive novel, the biggest text-based cat simulator ever written; you’ll play it many times as different kinds of cat! As a rescue cat, looking for a family to love and obey you forever, you find yourself sharing a home with a family on the brink of divorce. You’ll learn to manipulate your owners, their neighbors, and even their other pets to get what you want. (The humans think they’re in charge! Aren’t they cute?) I sat down with author Jordan Reyne to talk cats, dogs, and the world of this game. Choice of the Cat releases Thursday, September 28th. 

Choice of the Cat is absolutely inspired, and it is our longest ChoiceScript game. Since I edited it, I know that it’s also pretty efficiently coded, so that’s really 600,000 plus words of unique text. Tell me how it is you came to write such an opus?

An exact single cause would be hard to name. I spend as much time as I can with animals, and one of the things that always makes me laugh is their looks of total confusion when human actions take them by surprise. It’s clear when you have pets that loads of our behaviours must seem puzzling or even ludicrous to them. Human beings are pretty absurd when you think about it too. We do so many things out of habit, social pressure, or internalized cultural “norms.” In western culture we also imagine we are the completely the masters of our own destiny, and of the results of them too. Whether pets see this as weird (or see it at all) is hard to know, but what they do seem to do is revel in the small things: day-to-day events like walks, or snow, or some stranger bending down to pat them. Such random things have a huge influence on their lives, and in the end we are no different. We are all part of a massive web of interconnected activity, systems and events. The cat, because it isn’t a human, can and probably does see things differently. The PC being a cat is a way to explore both these ideas: the absurdity of human behavior and the fact of small things sometimes having big results–or conversely big things having none. I was tempted to call it “feline chaos theory,” but that would just give away the fact that I have forgotten what chaos theory is actually about.

What world are we in? I had actually thought the game was set in the UK, but it’s really more a mitteleuropean nowhere, yes?

Mitteleuropa is about right. This is set in a small European country with an electoral system that has some form of proportional representation. That is important because of Claire’s character and possibilities. Under the UK and US systems, someone like Claire wouldn’t stand a chance. She part of a small political party with maybe 5% appeal. In places like Germany, the Netherlands or Sweden, these parties have some real influence and are part of the parliament or bundestag, etc, but this is not in the UK or the States. It gives parties like the Greens a voice and an effect. Fortunately, having lived in Germany for many years, and toured around Europe a bit, I have some material to call on for my cobbled-together country that does not exist.

Is it true you’re actually more of a dog person?

Yes, for all the usual and possibly anthropomorphic reasons. They are caring, loyal, and long for walks in the forest even more than I do. The bond they have with you is unconditional, and in a world where many people don’t get that stable, reliable, caring at home, dogs can keep you sane.

Perhaps Choice of the Cat was a way to remind myself I do love cats as well. A while back, my partner brought home a cat, because we weren’t allowed a dog in our flat in London. I spent several weeks resenting her for not being a dog, and even named her “Potwor” which means “monster” in Polish. She has duly reminded me of how awesome cats are, and gave me so much inspiration for the story. She is hilarious, and dogs will always be my favorite but I’m pretty much an all-round animal lover.

Tell me about your background. You’re primarily a musician, right?

Narrative has always held a fascination for me, and yes, I used to do story-telling through music because songs are a great way of adding atmosphere to tales. Many of my releases are album-length narratives, or a collection of tales done in a sort of bloodthirsty folk-rock style. I retired though, at the time I started writing this game! I was glad to. A lot of people (including me) think that being a musician is all about music, but it’s far from the truth. The industry itself is very toxic and values a lot of unhealthy things, whilst simultaneously not valuing musicians. I was lucky to have some very supportive and awesome listeners, without whom I would not have managed to release the 10 albums I have. They really got the lyric/ narrative side of things too, and the music itself, so I will still write music for them, and occasionally do gigs for them too. In the end though, I’m happy that I can switch to straight-out narrative as full-time work.

What did you find most challenging about writing the game?

Remembering what words I have already used, and not using them again too many times! E.g., saying “you think Maddox is scary because he is scary,” is a pretty crummy sentence. In straight prose it’s very easy to avoid using the same word twice in a paragraph, but when one half of a sentence or paragraph is constructed from numerous possible states or function calls, I have to check all of them to ensure I haven’t repeated things. Maintaining style and nice-to-read prose can become difficult too, with the sheer volume you have to write to make things work. I spent almost ten years writing my first book, and it was 80,000 words. I had to manage 600,000 in around a year and a half for this project, which was pretty intense!

Are you ready to write Choice of the Dog?

That would be telling! I have choice of-ideas that I will be pitching around!

Short answer, Bernard Pivot-style:

Favorite color?
Green.

Favorite word?
Abgrund, because of the way it is made. The german prefix “ab” means to take something away. The word “grund” means several things including reason and foundation. The word itself means “abyss,” and is the taking away of reason, foundation and ground. It seems really poetic and descriptive to me.

Profession you would most like to attempt?
Furniture maker (woodworker).

Profession you would never like to attempt?
Telemarketer.

“Kitty” or “mog”? 
Doggy 😉

We’re proud to announce that Grand Academy for Future Villains, the latest in our popular “Choice of Games” line of multiple-choice interactive-fiction games, is now available for Steam, iOS, and Android. It’s 30% off until September 21st!

Congratulations! We are delighted to welcome you to the Grand Academy for Future Villains, the world’s finest evil preparatory school, where unimaginable power begins with a world-class education!

Grand Academy for Future Villains is a hilarious 200,000-word interactive novel by Katherine Nehring, where your choices control the story. It’s entirely text-based, without graphics or sound effects, and fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.

Looking for a career as an evil overlord? A mad scientist? A megavillain, a wicked witch, a final boss? You’re not going to get there without hard work, dedication, and thorough education. In the space between worlds, between genres, beyond time and space itself, the Grand Academy for Future Villains trains the bad guys that every good story needs.

You, our hero–or our villain, rather–will arrive at the Academy ready to learn, but you’ll quickly discover that there’s so much more to villain school than getting good grades. As you navigate the school year, you’ll have the opportunity to:

• Secure an internship with a prestigious heartless corporation or megalomaniacal dictator
• Seduce a hero to the dark side (Attention students: do NOT allow yourself to be seduced by the forces of good!)
• Put in the extra hours at the lab to become an actual monster.
• Pledge your family’s secret society and become worthy of–or defy–the grand destiny your family has mapped out for you.
• Pay off your student loans (in the blood of your enemies, if necessary).
• Find true love, deadly rivalry, or both at the same time with your fellow students.
• Save your alma mater, take it over, betray it, or drop out in a blaze of glory.

Our alumni have gone on to dominate worlds, conquer galaxies, break hearts, and succumb to the creeping darkness in their souls. The choices that you make at our school will determine whether you join their illustrious company.

Enroll today!

We hope you enjoy playing Grand Academy for Future Villains. We encourage you to tell your friends about it, and recommend the game on StumbleUpon, Facebook, Twitter, and other sites. Don’t forget: our initial download rate determines our ranking on the App Store. The more times you download in the first week, the better our games will rank.

Hosted Games has a new game for you to play!

Travel through different books in a quest to find your uncle! You will travel through a number of stories, seek to understand why they are falling apart, and trying to solve the mystery of your uncle’s bookshop.

Lost in the Pages is a 125,000 word interactive novel by a collection of authors, where your choices control the story. It’s entirely text-based—without graphics or sound effects—and fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.

There are over a half a dozen stories to choose from, from fantasy and science fiction, to horror or mystery. Can you rescue your uncle and restore order to the stories, or will you be consumed by the menace hanging over him?

• Play as male, female, or non-binary, with any orientation.
• Travel the seas as a mermaid, ride a dragon, explore futuristic worlds or become a detective. The choice is yours!
• Stick to tropes, or break them!
• Save not one world, but many!

Felicity Banks, Adrao, Cecilia Rosewood, and Sashira developed this game using ChoiceScript, a simple programming language for writing multiple-choice interactive novels like these. Writing games with ChoiceScript is easy and fun, even for authors with no programming experience. Write your own game and Hosted Games will publish it for you, giving you a share of the revenue your game produces.