Sinners

I've noticed something lately. IF authors are dropping like flies. It is beginning to feel as if the community itself is dying. Was this something that was just big during our covid season? When we had more time?

Personally, I know how hard it is for me to juggle writing with life obligations, and I am far more fortunate than most in my schedule. I'm sure that this has weighed down on others as well. There is a lot of merit to writing the entire thing and then putting it out without any chapters previously being posted. Maybe that's the way it needs to go? Do we start locking off our game to the public? That doesn't seem right, but I do see a lot of posts about people feeling so discouraged with their readers or with not delivering chapters 'on time'. There is, in general, an 'ick' that has kind of been created around being an IF writer and I know a lot of writers who are having full breaks and panics over the harassment that they receive. Others who are just not wanting to write anymore because they never can seem to please anyone. So on and so on.

Not to mention the new fear of our work just being taken from us due to the issues going on with any sort of spicy content.

On July 24th, Itch released a statement regarding the recent removal of all NSFW games from their platform. If you aren’t familiar with the situation, you can read their full notice here: https://itch.io/updates/update-on-nsfw-content

We want to begin by stating that the blanket removal of all 18+ games, is, in our view, an overcorrection. This decision impacts both developers, who have spent years creating these projects, and players, who paid for them and should retain access to their purchases. We stand in solidarity with the creators affected by this sweeping action and with the communities that have been fractured as a result.

It’s important to note that this is a layered situation. We believe Itch was pressured by its payment processors, and forced to make an impossible choice: protect creative expression or preserve the infrastructure of their platform. (Steam recently experienced a similar situation on a smaller scale.) While it’s not quite clear what has happened behind the scenes, we know that gaming communities across the world are struggling due to this decision.

At this time, the 18+ DLCs for Our Life have not been affected, as they are hosted primarily through Patreon. Should that change, we will update our community immediately. We hope to see a more nuanced solution in the near future. In the meantime, we’ll be supporting creators wherever we can.

I've seen a lot of vns on there from devs I know/follow, but I've also seen some IFs on there as well.

New Chapter Released!

Hello again! Hope your summer is going well ☀️

With the public release of this new chapter we’re getting into the meat of what it's like to be the Crown on a daily basis, with some very important decisions to make, as well as consequences from previous chapters coming into play:

Additional scenes for those of you who chose to meet with Eshkar directly in CH12

Different choices and options on how to deal with Keeper Bazo depending on whether you forgave him, condemned him, or did not judge him back in CH7

Having to make several decisions about public petitions submitted to you from the citizens as well as other officials

Additional scenes during the court meeting for A and R romancers, as well as a minor variation for D romancers depending on if you successfully defended them from the court in CH11: these are new for those of you who played the early access, so I would recommend replaying the chapter from scratch!

And, of course, more romance at the end: D and X romancers make a consequential decision that will check their romance for the high/low status again. A and R romancers are safe, this time...

A few additional changes made to the game overall:

Added a summary of the main choices your Crown has made so far when transitioning from CH12 to CH13

Added a small snippet of text in the Relationships screen clarifying what it means to get a 'high' romance or a 'low' romance status

Thank you for all your patience and support, I hope you enjoy the new chapter with the start of the summer 💖

For those that are unfamiliar with the game

A Tale of Crowns is a high fantasy romance story, told in the form of a text-based interactive novel with choice mechanics. The setting is inspired by Kurdish culture as well as other historical settings in the Middle East such as Ancient Persia, but it also draws heavily from other cultures and countries in the region.

Your character is native to Arsur, a vast empire overseen by a single ruler known as the Crown. Unlike traditional monarchies, however, the title is not inherited through blood. Whenever the Crown dies, their famed golden eyes pass on to the one chosen by the Spirits of this world to be the new Crown. In this story, your MC takes on that role.

There are four different love interests to choose from, whose genders will be customized to suit the preferences of your Crown. You can find more info about them on the blog page!

Also note that this current version of the game is safe for those 16 years and older.

Like the premise so far? Play it and give it a try! The entire game is free!

The public release of the Chapter 7 pt. 2 update has gone live! Play it here!

This covers the quarter-final match against Sam, the post-match interview, and the conversation with Sam after :) 

Word count: About 70k words in (messy) code, but likely about 20-25k words play-through since there’s quite a few varying branches in this (different partners, Felix hookup etc.) ​

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Features:

Some real tennis action—the full quarter-final match against Sam!! (In time for Roland Garros season, whew!)

A potentially tense moment between Felix and Sam if you’d hooked up with Felix while in a relationship with Sam

An option to kiss Tobin/Rayyan after the match and settle your teammates’ bets once and for all

Post match interview where you’ll be able to admit to being in a relationship with Sam, Tobin, or Rayyan

Game skip feature:

You can also skip right to the new content, i.e. Sam QF match OR to the beginning of Chapter 7.

I’ve also added passwords to skip the doubles matches leading up to the tournament now.

That’s Louis Rossman, a repair technician and YouTuber, who went viral recently for railing against Apple. Apple purposely charges a lot for repairs and you either have to pay up or buy a new device. That’s because Apple withholds necessary tools and information from outside repair shops. And to think, we were just so close to change.

Have an iPhone and are in need of repairs

Have a friend with that problem

Hate Apple and are more than happy to spite them in some way

So I asked the internet, well how hard IS it to repair? And I saw this guy’s video, and while I am no techie, I AM fueled by spite, so I was all “oh, they do that shit on purpose specifically so they can charge me $1200 bucks or make me buy a new computer hunh? FUCK THEM” and I bought all the tools I needed for about $25 and I bought all the parts I needed for about another $25 and I watched a few tutorial videos, and I replaced my own keyboard.

So, once you are doing the actual deed, it becomes pretty obvious that they are finding creative ways to make this much harder than it has to be on purpose. On thing that stood out to me is, instead of all the tiny screws being the same size, there are about two dozen very slightly different sizes. They could easily be all the same size, or like, two sizes at most, but no.

These mother fuckers will take a panel that screws into place and they’ll use a different size screw for each corner. They are so close that you almost cannot tell them apart visually, but they each will only screw into the matching corner. Like, it’s a pretty clear “fuck you” to anyone trying to do repairs.

It's finally here! Adds ~61,800 words to the story plus ~6,700 words in codex character entries. Reblogs and shares very appreciated! ❤️

Play here on itch.io!

I would HIGHLY recommend you start on a new save as I have had to make some changes to variables and stats which will be detailed below, but starting from an existing save may break some things later in the game for you and you won't unlock the codex or stat pages if you don't.

In this update, you will:

Meet Lady Safina (Parim and Aurora's mother) and talk to Aurynn

Meet Lady Najaat (Nour's mother) and speak with your own mother

Play a flashback scene involving you, your mother, and Luca from your childhood

Speak with Samira

Get your food and bed stolen by your greedy little hog of a serval, Farwah

Meet the rest of MC's siblings (Aurora, Castor, and Ember) and Something or Someone Else™️ in a dream sequence

Speak with Luca in a dream

Use your divination to have a vision

Ouchies T-T

(Mostly) Accidentally snoop through Aurynn's mail with Samira

Find Aurynn in the library vault

Detailed changes below:

Changed the Straightforward stat to "Sincere"

Added "Aloof" stat

MC's personality is now divided between two types of stats: your main stat (charismatic, gentle, confrontational, dignified, imposing) and your secondary stat (manipulative, aloof, sincere)

Minor edits throughout demo and Character Creator

Added custom pronouns to Character Creator

Added cis/trans option to Character Creator (originally, this was going to be a choice introduced in chapter 2, but upon further thought I felt it would be easier to establish cis/trans early on and then in chapter 2 there will still be a scene that reflects on and clarifies mc's gender identity)

Added new music tracks

Updated UI

Added main menu

Added OpenDyslexic font to Settings

Added options to be able to rename saves to the Settings or have them autoname for you for ease of keeping track of save files

Added Stats page

Added character codex entries (codex is currently still a WIP in terms of UI and content and more entries on lore/history/magic etc will be added later)

Thank you so much for all the support you've shown the demo this last year and I am so sincerely grateful for all the kind messages people have sent! I hope you enjoy the update--I worked very hard on it! :D

The next update, Chapter 1 Part 4, will finish off chapter one.

For dems:

Hi, my name is [name] and I'm a constituent from [your address + zip code]. I am calling Senator [Name] today because I am opposed to censorship measures such as those outlined in the Interstate Obscenity Definition Act. In addition to feeling this bill would lead to dramaticcensorship, its broad definition would risk many marginalized people who are already at risk, and it would also make it harder for victims of the industry to seek help for fear of repercussions. Thank you.

For repubs:

Hi, my name is [name] and I'm a constituent from [your address + zip code]. I am calling Senator [Name] today to speak out against the Interstate Obscenity Definition Act and similar proposals. I believe the government's role in our personal lives should be small and not intrusive, and that this not only is against the constitution, but would waste a lot of tax dollars attempting to enforce it. Thank you.

For Pride Month in June, Interact-IF is bringing back one of its beloved events, spotlighting queer (LGBTQ+) authors and their interactive fiction projects (here’s the 2021 series).

Throughout this month, we hope to celebrate the massive queer representation these stories and games help provide, as well as the awesome IFs created by and for the queer community.

We will feature a masterlist of interaction fiction written by queer authors, and select a couple to interview about their experiences and creative process! The interview will be done fully via a text Q&A format.

If you wish to be featured (whether in the masterlist or the extended interview, which will be done fully through a text Q&A format), do fill out this google form. Or, if you prefer, you could drop me, @allieebobo a message or an email at [email protected] with the following information: 

Name

Background/About you

Game(s)/Projects

A link to the game(s)/IF/intro post

A short blurb/description of the game(s)

Genre/Tags

(Optional) If your writing or experience has been shaped by your identity in any way, feel free to share more here as well :) 

Contact information (or how you’d like me to reply/contact you)

Do drop me a DM if you have any questions! Note that interactive fiction includes those written in ren’py and twine as well, not just Choicescript.

Interact-IF mods will contact selected authors by email/DM by the end of the month with a full set of questions that you can type out replies to, and send back to me via email. I’ll try to feature everyone who’s interested, but will discuss further if for whatever reason I am unable to feature everyone who reached out.