#crosshollow

[manonamora-if-reviews]

Neo Twiny Jam - bite-sized review

The Neo Twiny Jam (@neo-twiny-jam) is an interactive fiction game unranked jam where participants could not write more than 500 words per entry.

You can find every submitted piece on the jam's Itch Page.

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Please Don't Take This The Wrong Way by Crosshollow

Entry - More by Crosshollow - @townofcrosshollow CW: Frank discussion of self harm

The things we want to say to empty our hearts A personal piece about wanting to talk about the past and trauma without judgement or pity. About feeling seen without making a bit deal out of things.

[townofcrosshollow]

Welcome to Crosshollow

My name's Jasper (he/it), I'm a 25 year old genderqueer professional artist (allegedly). I originally started making IFs on here back in like 2020, before I even realized there was a community for it, and like all of my hobbies I've struggled to keep it up. This is now a personal blog.

Some of my projects include:

UNNAMED WESTERN

Status: I'll uh... I'll get back to it

After the assault and subsequent death of his sister, a young Ebenezer Osborne seeks out infamous (retired) outlaw Abel Wright to take revenge on the corrupt sheriff who started it all. When the ashes settle, what will be left behind?

Read it here.

SIGNAL HILL

Status: HIATUS

A hedonistic romp through a strange, post-apocalyptic city. This caravan job was meant to be your ticket to a better life in the big city- instead, you were robbed outside the gates and nearly met your end in the ensuing slaughter. After being nursed back to health, you're free to roam the streets of the big city, make your fortune, have some questionably moral fun, and maybe figure out what dark secrets are hiding in the neon-lit streets of Signal Hill.

Demo | Intro Post

13 LAUREL ROAD

Status: COMPLETE

Your cousin needs somebody to pick something up from their old house. You're the only one with a pickup truck, so that means you.

Nobody's been back there since it happened.

You don't believe in ghosts, but you do believe that places can be haunted.

Play it on itch.io

FOUNDATIONS

Status: INDEFINITE HIATUS

You've wandered this Earth for centuries, an immortal spirit tethered to human bodies after being exiled from your own world. Alongside your most recent tether, Tobias, you seek refuge in the remote mining towns of Colorado. You're being pursued... and he's getting closer. Unbeknownst to you, however, dark things are unfolding in the mountains- things you're about to be pulled into.

Demo | Intro post

RE-BREAK MY BONES

Status: Finished

A young man discovers that the bad boy he was obsessed with in high school is in prison and suspected of murder. On a whim, he decides to bail him out.

Read it here.

[townofcrosshollow]

Last night I stayed up waaaaay too late but managed to finish almost all of my outline.

At first it was looking at close to 20+ chapters, which was Not Okay, but (remembering also that IF readers tend to prefer longer chapters) I managed to condense it a bit. I've still got a bit more condensing to do, and planning the chapters scene-by-scene. I'm hoping to end up with 15 or less chapters.

Interestingly enough, the distinct routes start getting introduced midway through Act 1, they become massively distinct during Act 2 (oh no), and then by Act 3 they all but go away. I'm hoping to make this feel a bit more like "everything you cared about has been lost and this new situation will do nothing to accomodate you" and not "I was too lazy to write 3 vastly different Act 3s." It'll still have different endings depending on what you chose.

Oh, and I also added a single Bad Ending (morally questionable good ending?) at the end of Act 2 because I know for a fact most of you will want that particular ending. I also want that ending. It's not canon, though (as it would instantly decanonize all of my other games lol).

[townofcrosshollow]

Divine Customs - Names

This is going to be the first in a series of posts about the Watcher’s home culture. Because their past will mostly be seen in the form of short flashbacks, I want to share a bit more about their culture and what their life before Earth was like.

Like most things in divine culture, names are fluid. Your name is not just a way to clarify who is being addressed, or to establish bonds between family- it is a living document of an individual. You can tell more from a person’s name than from their clothing and abode combined.

A name is generally composed of a series of common words, including titles an individual holds, symbolism they are associated with, locations where they live or grew up, traits they posses, things they value, and things they have accomplished. This list can grow and change as they grow older, with new words being added and old ones getting left behind. For people in high society, or those with a lot of accomplishments and job titles, names can get pretty ridiculous in length (like 30+ words).

Of course, you can’t be expected to remember an acquaintance’s 15-word-long name, and calling your best friend a name that’s the length of an average sentence whenever you talk to them wouldn’t be very practical. Because of this, people use different shortened versions of their name in different contexts. Most people naturally know what “nickname” is appropriate for the situation, in a way that’s hard to qualify- similar to how the average English speaker can’t name proper adjective order off the top of their head, but can still tell that “the red tall three buildings” isn’t right. It isn’t taught or spoken about, just picked up through learning the language.

Using the wrong shortened form of someone’s name can be a serious faux-pas. Using too few words to address your superior or somebody of equal societal standing as you would be pretty embarrassing, probably a subject of gossip, and in some cases could result in reprimanding from a superior. Kind of like calling your boss “mom.”

In their new life, the Watcher probably would have initially used their old name translated into human languages. Like any other being in their culture, they would have picked up new names after this significant shift in their life, and would probably have dropped a lot as well. Nowadays, their name might be entirely divorced from what it used to be. Or they might have stuck with their old name, a vestige of the person they used to be. It’s really up to you.

[townofcrosshollow]

I haven’t written 1k words yet but I do like some of what I have written quite a bit. Needs refining, but nice.

[townofcrosshollow]

After a few months of work, the demo of Foundations is finally being released! This initial demo includes the first two chapters of the game and several lore entries, adding up to about 20k words in total.

In this initial demo you can...

Customize your name and appearance

Meet your tether, Tobias, and many other major characters

Remember your life before Earth

Enjoy the Rocky Mountains scenery

Spy on suspicious strangers

Go job hunting

Play a game of chess

Get a little bit too drunk

The first two chapters focus on introducing you to the world, your tether, and your powers. It features hand drawn artwork and a custom user interface created by yours truly.

Note: As of right now the game is not optimized for mobile. It should generally still be playable on most mobile devices, but I would highly recommend using a computer (or tablet) rather than playing on your phone. Options for font and font size are available in settings.

Go play the demo now!

[townofcrosshollow]

I already posted this alongside other old art a couple months back but I want to repost it on its own cause I think it's so dang cool.

It's a drawing from like 3 years ago of a scene in the story that would end up becoming 13 Laurel Road! Fun little memento, and a reminder of just how long I've been stewing on these ideas before I finally managed to make something out of them.

[townofcrosshollow]

05/21/2021

Fancy new update graphic! Fun!

The past two weeks have been quite big! Well, technically, they got off to a really bad start, but eventually they became big!

I was pretty damn sick for the first half of the first week, and took a little bit of a necessary break from writing. After I got over that, however, I managed to power through the rest of the final scene and finish chapter 2!

After finishing chapter 2 I put up my request for beta readers, who I’ll be getting into contact with by the first of June. Right now I’m taking a bit of a break from the project so I can distance myself from it, and once I’m finished with that, starting next week, I’ll be editing the whole thing.

I still don’t have a set date for releasing the demo, but I’m very excited with the progress I’ve made thus far. Speaking of which, here’s my word count:

With code: 17,121 -> 21,044 (+3,923) Without code: 16,153 -> 20,266 (+4,113)

Uh... it happened again. I have no context for why the “with code” count increased less than the “without code” count. Must be a mistake with how I’m counting, but I swear my method for getting word counts hasn’t changed.

Weird! Anyway, thank you for tuning in, I’ll see you all for the next update in the next two weeks!