The Pale City

Hi everyone,

I haven’t gone out much this year, but instead I’ve been obsessively working on a new game, “Home: A Quarantine Story,” which will be on Steam and RMN on September 25th—for free! It’s the story of a young woman who, visiting her family for the first time in four years, accidentally infects them with COVID-19—and then finds herself trapped there.

Like To the Moon or Gone Home, the game has no combat or puzzles. Instead, the player explores her family home, gets to know her family members, and watches old tensions unfold. The story is built on relatable, real-world themes, and (because of my background as a professional novelist) emphasizes a text-heavy approach that recalls literary fiction.

I haven't written much fiction over the last few years because I've become so obsessed with making games, so I've sort of considered this new project (which is much shorter than The Pale City, probably about 3 hours) a test of whether I would keep going or switch back to focusing on fiction. I've worked on it for most of the last 5 months, and I feel it's smoothed out a lot of the rough edges from The Pale City.

Anyway, here is the game's page on Steam, which has more information and a trailer:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1339750/Home_A_Quarantine_Story/

And RMN: https://rpgmaker.net/games/11613/

The game is due out in a few weeks, but it's completely ready now, so I'd be happy to send out review copies to anyone who was interested. Feel completely free to PM and I'll get a copy your way!

I'm really grateful to anyone who played The Pale City, and if you liked it, I hope you'll enjoy this one as well. (Though, actually, it's much less horrifying and nihilistic, so I'm hoping it would appeal to some who didn't like The Pale City as well.)

Stay safe out there!

Kyle