Caraway County

"What I am is what im not! This phantom skin is weird to live in; so find me a way out, if you love me at all." 🍎 Mod Flower // Sunny He/Him 🍏 Mod LJ // Kyle They/Them

[thereaderslistpod]

Welcome and a Howdy-High-Ho, readers! ❤️ This project is directed by @mersonnotperson and @flowermist7432 and brought to you by ArsonHouse Studios! [https://arson-house-studios.itch.io/]

The following discusses the game's description, any additional information, edits, tags, and what to expect. Thank you and have a wonderful day! -🍎 Mod Flower

Caraway County is a first person point-and-click psychological horror game about a coming of age story, starring a plucky and jolly scarecrow named Stanley! You'll come alongside him on his adventures with the cast of friends that live in his colorful neighborhood, who originate from their old children's book series written by the late Edith Flowers, which itself is being revitalized into a modern video game by the developers of The Readers List!

After springing to life, Stanley yearns to learn as much as he can about the world and what that life has to offer him! That is, until he discovers that the humble little homestead he lives in has a lot more secrets than he'd expect, waiting to be found rotting, just beneath the rural dirt roads.

Caraway County uses a slow burn meta-narrative to convey its story, and as so, we use many forms of creative and artistic expression to tell it! Music, literature, and gameplay. While our narrative is mostly self-contained within the bounds of the actual game, we still encourage some ARG elements by providing additional content outside the main content.

We also wish to inspire healthy and open discussions of media literacy! And thus, while the reasons for this project's initial existence were spurred on by a lack of meaningful and earnest content in the mascot horror genre (with the exception of a few gold nuggets that also inspired us! <3) We understand that creating a project with a mean spirited intent to make fun of the entire catalogue just ain't constructive, and instead fight to make a piece of art that utilizes tropes and themes with a genuine and earnest purpose.

This'll be my first game I'll be directing, so I hope to take on any future criticism with enthusiasm, aye! I hope to see y'all soon!

~ 🍎 Mod Flower

[nigelgraz]

Artists making OCs be like hi look at this guy i made up he looks a lot like me and i gave him all my quirks and trauma responses and i'm making him go through the worst pains imaginable everyday. I won't be unpacking this

[quixoticanarchy]

the author’s poorly disguised unchallenged ideas about how the world works, what is natural, what should go without saying

[helenvaughans]

[itsmistybitch-deactivated202605]

These posts are sisters

[flower-do0dles-dump]

Ever since getting one of my Welcome Home merch orders finally delivered- Ive been wanting to do the most self indulgent thing in a while and draw these two- I think they'd get along quite well!

[thereaderslistpod]

Programming done by admin @mersonnotperson

Art done by admin @flowermist7432

[financeprincess]

Sorry to break it to you but you literally have to face your fears and slaughter them. Otherwise you will live a small life that you do not want. You literally have to view your biggest fears and attack them head on. You have to fall into the abyss to find your way out. The easy path does not exist. There is no get out of jail free card. You have to allow yourself to die a spiritual death over and over again in order to reinvent yourself into the person you are actually supposed to be. And you have to be painfully honest with yourself and the people around you. It’s horrible but it’s truly the only way.

[cogneartive]

when the persona you made eats you; when the performance youve been putting on eats you; when the name they gave you eats you; when the image people made of you eats you; when the role you were assigned eats you; when the you that other people see or even made for you or you made for them takes over the you that you know and eats you alive.

[thereaderslistpod]

You are what you eat

[candyskiez]

The fact that people don't think friendship is enough to justify characters doing insane acts of love for each other baffles me. Like have you never loved your friend so so much you want to live in their ribcage. Have you never been really weird about a friend. Have you never wanted to bite your friends parents or shove them down a staircase. Have you never wanted to be buried in the same grave as a friend. Have u never. How do u people live like this.

[taiey]

The curtains were blue because everything in the room was carefully colour coordinated, reinforcing the character’s stylish and controlled characterisation. The curtains were blue because everything in the room was a different colour, reinforcing the character’s eclectic and globe-trotting personality. The curtains were blue because the character is elsewhere established to hate the colour blue, subtextually implying that their deceased spouse was responsible for that decoration choice.

The curtains were blue because throughout their filmography the director consistently uses cool tones to mark moments of distance between characters. The curtains were blue to tie the events in that room into the broader oceanic motif of this particular novel. The curtains were blue because the assonance evoked a contrast with the following stanza of the poem.

Even the curtains looked expensive: floor to ceiling velvet drapes, in a flawless royal blue. She tucked the saucer up on the windowsill and tied back faded blue curtains with a loop of string. The narrow blinds were the same navy blue as the pinstripe suit of the man who served eviction notice that sent them to this office.

The curtains were blue because the author’s childhood home had blue curtains, which they discussed in their letters related to their feelings of comfort in that place. The curtains were blue because the author’s childhood home had blue curtains, which they discussed in their letters related to their feelings of grief in that place.

The curtains were blue as an allusion to the contemporary joke about literary criticism, an extension of the author’s autocritical approach that will be further discussed in section seven.

The curtains were red, as a pun on;

The curtains were read.

[thereaderslistpod]

"im just so exposed, and Id hate to impose! Perverted vulnerability, soaked in your own clothes"

[thereaderslistpod]

Toolbar UI + Livingroom Concept-art

[thereaderslistpod]

Concept Art for the of Catherine's house! As usual, going for a Toon-Town esk proportions and design for the game's areas! More to come soon 🙏❤️

[thereaderslistpod]

...I just think she's cute...

[thereaderslistpod]

The Scholastic Bookfair just rolled into your elementary school in early September, the air still smelling of wet grass and pavement from the morning rain an hour or two before- And when you stroll into the library before first bell, you peek a particular lone paperback sitting on the table stacks with no other copies beside it, one for a series you've never seen it before.

Do you take it?

[thereaderslistpod]

In your persuit to sound more profound and quoteable rather than speaking earnestly in your own voice, you will end up giving up your own value and insight in favor of flat and insincere thoughtfulness.

On that note- Stop writing your Diaries like someone is watching you. And stop creating your works like you are trying to impress an audience that isnt even present yet. Breathe!!!