PLEASE NOTE: I am unable to personally vet fundraisers. -- The Northern Passage is an 18+ horror fantasy CYOA, where you play as a Hunter sent up north to investigate a series of missing people along the border and in the port cities of the Blackwater. Working with your Watcher, Lea, you will travel north and discover that things are far worse than you ever could have imagined, and that there is something powerful lurking out in the deep, dark sea… Play the demo here! | Tags | FAQ
It's cold, so cold - your head aches, your ears pop, water chokes your throat and nose, and all you can do is watch as the sky gets farther and farther away from you. Clawed hands grab at your ankles, your legs, your arms, pulling you down, tearing at your clothes and piercing your skin.
You convulse violently, your body struggling to expel the water from your lungs as more floods in.
Staring up into the fading light, you feel your body grow weak, giving in, sinking now, your blood churning all around you in the water. A hand grabs at your throat, caressing a thumb over your pulse, pulling you down as the dark water turns red.
The Northern Passage is an 18+ horror fantasy CYOA, where you play as a Hunter sent up north to investigate a series of missing people along the border of your home country and in the port cities of the Blackwater.
Working with your Watcher, Lea, you will travel north and discover that things are far worse than you ever could have imagined, and that there is something powerful lurking out in the deep, dark sea…
The Northern Passage
An interactive horror novel, features include:
Horror. First and foremost this is a horror story. Content warnings are listed in the demo.
Heavily character driven. This story relies on character interactions!
Impactful choices that alter your story.
Character customization – name, appearance, gender, weapon preference, pronouns, your horse’s name.
Choose your relationship with your Watcher, your family, and your mentor.
Romance any of the four main cast: the alchemist, the bard, the captain, or the healer.
Read the demo! | Tags | FAQ | Tip Jar
Cover art by the talented @forystr
Last update on 09/25/24: Chapter 1 Rerelease
The Cast
THE ALCHEMIST
Your Watcher, Lea Chen (gender selectable). Lea is the legacy child of a famous hunter family, and a powerful alchemist. Despite being paired together for almost five years now, you don’t really have much of a relationship, due to your tendency to argue over just about everything.
Description: Lea is tall, standing at 6'2" with an athletic build from years of training at the Black Iron. They have long, muscular legs from horseback riding, and strong, defined arms from archery and swordsmanship. They have black eyes, a prominent wide nose with a hooked bridge, and long, dark hair that they usually style in their signature bun. Their skin is adorned with beauty marks, with two rather distinct ones just below their left eye, as well as two long scars, claw marks that cut across their cheek and down their jaw. Lea also has various alchemical tattoos, mainly on their hands and arms, for ease of brewing potions.
THE BARD
Clementine, a rather curious bard you met on the road (they/them). You can’t help but feel a little suspicious about this Clementine character, who seems to be a long way from home.
Description: They are the shortest of the group, standing at 5'3", with a warm and welcoming aura. They have short, thick, curly brown hair, a distinct grecian nose, dark green eyes, and a rather colorful and questionable wardrobe consisting of pinks, blues, purples and golds. Having spent years dancing down in the capital, they have the usual lean muscle of a dancer in their chest and arms. Hidden beneath their large, gaudy jacket, they have a soft stomach and thicker thighs, and various gold-ink tattoos that they may reveal to you later.
THE CAPTAIN
Captain Merry Harlowe (she/her). A refugee from your home country of Gael, she’s been stuck in Blackwater since the start of the plague. Aggressive and brash, the Captain is still a bit of a mystery to you.
Description: She has long and wavy dark auburn hair, and freckled, tanned skin from years spent out on the water in the unforgiving sun. She’s an imposing figure at 5'11", a sharp brown eye and a sharper smile with a gap between her two front teeth. She wears a red bandana over her right eye, with angry scars that just peek out beneath the fabric. She’s lean, with wiry muscles but broad shoulders. She has various tattoos, most notably the name Ronan tattooed on her neck, as well as dueling snakes on her chest.
THE HEALER
Noel Lykaon, another Hunter, like you (xe/xem and he/him). Noel is from the south, from the Flood stronghold, though it’s apparent he’s been out north for some time. Xe’s also a powerful healer, and has made a name for himself in Blackwater. Xe seems to be out here all alone, leaving you to wander where exactly xir Watcher is...
Description: Xe has deep brown skin with dark brown eyes, the golden rings around xir pupils startlingly bright. His brown hair is short and locked, with golden thread and cowrie shells adorning a few of the longer locs. Noel has a thick, athletic body, with strong arms, a broad chest, and a thicker stomach. Noel is about average height, at 5'7", though xe wears tall, white, heeled boots that give xem a little boost. He also tends to wear shimmering makeup, painting his eyelids distinct colors and favoring white eyeliner.
🎉 It's live! You can already play LtGBtK on Steam/Itch!🎉
LtGBtK is now available on Steam and Itch.io!
It's time to go back to Opala and experience it with all the Sprites, new CGs, expanded scenes, and 2 exclusive short stories that you'll only find in the game! ;)
I decided to bring the release forward a few hours, just in case you all find any bugs/crashes. I hope you won't find any xDD but if you do, I'll be here, so just let me know! ♥♥♥
Don't know what LtGBtK is?
Two children raised together. One, a future King. The other, his whipping child.
Their relationship? It's up to you to develop.
Love the Guard, Be the King is purely a Fantasy Visual Novel game focused on Romance and/or Friendship, written and developed by solo dev Ligia Nunes, author of "Bear in Sheep's Clothing."
This is a game with extensive LGBTQ+ representation in which you can choose to play as straight, gay, bi, pan, ace, etc. In this first game of the series, you only have one Love Interest, Mathias.
✨Age suggested: 16+ for non-explicit sexual scenes, some soft swearing, and violence.✨
MATHIAS’S HEART HAS BEEN bleeding since his father, the former King, decided to punish you for his mistakes. As the youngest child of a lesser bourgeois, you were raised in the castle, between the King’s cruelty, the Queen’s friendship, and Mathias’s kindness (or supposed kindness?).
Now, more than twenty Carnivals since your arrival, the King is dead and the Queen’s sickness worsens each day. As the azure taint spreads in the kingdom and the Opalean Wars come to an end, it’s Mathias’s time to sit on the throne.
Will the docile Prince become a kind King, a violent Monarch, or a ruthless Tyrant? Will you have any say in it? And how much will your relationship change?
Develop your personality, see how your choices build, and change your bond with Mathias.
It’s time to help him choose. Will your monarch Love the Guard or Be the King?
You can already play the full version of LtGBtK on Steam and Itch.io!
i started getting into cyoa stories very very recently and yours was the first one i read. and just… wow, you set the tone so incredibly wonderfully like, i was sucked in within seconds. im super excited to see what the northern passage holds for the future!!
I am Bilal (@bilal-sala7). I have been separated from my family for years, watching them from afar and unable to reach them, yet doing everything I can to help them survive. At the same time, I have tried to support others trapped in Gaza by verifying, supporting, and sharing their campaigns to help them meet their basic needs.
After nearly 3 years, my goal now is to help two of my brothers—Ahmad (@ashammad99)and Abd Arrahman finally continue their university education. Their best chance right now is outside Gaza, so I have launched a campaign to help cover the cost of evacuation ($15,000 USD).
Although the Rafah crossing has not opened yet, there are reports that it may open soon. This has given Ahmad and Abd hope again—to leave, continue their education, and build a better future. We are in a race against time, as this opportunity may be very short.
I kindly ask my friends and everyone who knows me to help by sharing this post. Your share alone can make a real difference 🙏
Commissions Open! Click to see werewolfsink's commission menu.
I finally put my comms up on Ko-Fi if anybody wants to snag one! The shop is going to open as soon as I finish writing this short story.
Once the shop opens, you can purchase short stories and articles written by me for the low, low price of $2 USD once they're published! I'm planning to put together an anthology series to also sell on itch.io, and I'm working on a website. Such plans I have, yes yes.
People who will play as hunter who was one sidedly in love with Leah/wanting connection but after meeting Noel💕… started to resent them: yes sickos yes yes!!!🫦
honestly, this is pretty much exactly what can happen 😅
Chapter Eight has officially arrived. It has… a number of significant plot developments, which I hope you’ll enjoy. There are around 132,000 new words, spread across six routes with some common elements, as always.
Also as always, if anything seems to not work, or you have some feedback you’d like to give, please let me know! Otherwise, I’ll just keep on plodding forward, as I do.
The game is in the usual place, now with a chapter skip feature by popular demand.
Hi everyone! I'm happy to announce my Visual Novel currently in development, An Elemental Existence. 💟
An Elemental Existence is an urban fantasy GxG romance Visual Novel set in a fantastical version of Brazil, where some people can control one of the four elements.
Rainbow, our protagonist, is one of the rare few who can control all four, but grew up isolated in the mansion of her abusive mother.
When her mother disappears, Rainbow is finally thrust into the real world, experiencing friendship and romance for the first time.
Joining me in this journey is the lovely @ligiawrites, providing me with her beautiful art! <3
This is a more "casual" announcement, since the game is still in the early stages. We're aiming for a June prototype release. :)
AEE will have 4 solo routes + 1 poly one:
Sydney, a gentle Water Elemental who works as Rainbow's carer;
Dani, a flirty Fire Elemental addicted to Medallions;
Max, a grumpy Earth Elemental;
Alex, a sweet, but naive Air Elemental.
Try to guess the poly route. :P
Most of what you see above is still early-stage, so things may change.
I am planning on updating this blog a lot more, so stay tuned! I'll also be more active on:
Huh, the changes with Lea and Noel's relationship that you're talking about are very interesting.
If it isn't too spoilery to ask (I have a hard time judging), would you mind telling us if them being distrustful of each other would make it harder to be friendly with both (or romance one of them and befriend the other and what not)? My MC romances Lea but was always on friendly terms with Noel, and I wonder if that'll be a possibility now? I mean, I assume it will be with time, but like, "from the get go"?
Oh but just to be clear, I'm not like trying to push for you not to change things or anything! I think it's interesting either way! Just curious about how the relationships will be shaped now.
you will definitely get comments from Lea in the next chapter if you choose to spend the day in Blackwater with Noel (though to be fair, they make snide comments about Merry and Clementine, too)
it won't be "harder" necessarily but they'll both let their opinions be known. Lea is the more judgmental one, though 💀
Could you go into more detail on how Noel & Lea’s relationship have changed over the course of writing?
previously, Noel encouraged the hunter to speak with Lea and mend their relationship, but in the rewrite Noel does the opposite, and actually advises the hunter to lie to Lea and keep their guard up around them.
this is something that i felt i truly overlooked in the original few chapters (though it does also have to do with Noel's history, which we'll learn later) but both Noel and Lea are now distrustful of each other. Lea dislikes Noel for "going rogue" while Noel dislikes Lea for being a Watcher. their relationship is more interesting imo and gives me a chance to better explore the Order hierarchy and the differences between the north and the south.
here's a snippet i shared previously you may have missed:
Backpacking off of the other questions, how about the writing process for Clementine? I’m always super soft for them despite trying to be grouchy
Clementine is actually the one companion that has mostly stayed the same since inception. writing them is fun though because they're always scheming so it's interesting writing their interactions with everyone and specific dialogue where they say one thing while intending something else entirely. but it does make them more difficult to write, too, unfortunately.
