hpowellsmith

[hpowellsmith]

btw the H in hpowellsmith stands for Harris these days! My pronouns are still they/them as usual.

...and it's starting to get updated in some places which I'm very excited about. If you see my old name in official-looking places please let me know once we're past 6th May (timing because it takes time for various storefronts/apps/websites to fully update).

It feels good to finally take the plunge and share this more widely!

#personal #I am floored by how nice people have been about this #I have dust in my eye ok

[hpowellsmith]

btw the H in hpowellsmith stands for Harris these days! My pronouns are still they/them as usual.

...and it's starting to get updated in some places which I'm very excited about. If you see my old name in official-looking places please let me know once we're past 6th May (timing because it takes time for various storefronts/apps/websites to fully update).

It feels good to finally take the plunge and share this more widely!

#personal

[hpowellsmith]

put an ominous chime on top of a distressing scene and I'm sold

#feeling in a silly mood today

[hpowellsmith]

Thicker Than - Public Demo Update

Happy full moon everyone! I’ve had a really good month and got a ton of writing done (almost 50k!) which you can read right now for free here:

Thicker Than - Updated Demo

I really hope you like it.

Side note: I also announced a book deal for a not-interactive novel I wrote back in 2022 this month. Of Monsters and Mainframes is going to be published with Bindary in 2025!

I'm ridiculously excited. I'm also going to be a bit busy next month editing that, so the vampires are going to have to take a bit of a back seat. I hope that's okay.

In regards to Thicker Than, I have finished Chapters Eight, Nine, and have started Chapter Ten. Chapter Ten and Eleven are both much branchier chapters, so may take a little longer to write than Chapters Eight and Nine did.

There’s a few fairly major plot points/twists in this update, and I’m a wee bit terrified to hear your reaction to those.

In Chapter Ten, the romance scenes are mostly unfinished with the exception of Marcel’s (totally finished) and Tracy’s (half finished).

As always, thanks for your passion and enthusiasm (and fanart! It's been so motivating to see so much love for these characters!).

Double thank you to the people who've supported me over on Kofi. I couldn't do this without you. I couldn't do this without you. 💙

-----------------------------------------------

Thicker Than as of the 23d of April 2024

Chapter Eight and Nine are complete

I’ve begun work on Chapter Ten

Additional Words: 48,897 (excluding commands)

Current Word Count: 294,010 (excluding commands)

[hpowellsmith]

OKPsyche by Anya Johanna DeNiro

An amazing short novella which incorporates the changing world of a trans woman as she navigates a world perhaps slightly weirder than our own.

An unnamed trans woman is looking for a sense of belonging, a better relationship with her son, and friends that aren’t imaginary in this playful and aching short novel. As she navigates the many worlds she belongs to she wrestles with her many anxieties and fears about the world around her. Her son and ex live in another state. Companion robots are popping up. Environmental disasters are being outsourced from the coast to the Midwest. And at any time anyone anywhere might turn out to be a new friend or an enemy.

#this is on my to-read list! #I highly recommend Anya's IF #especially Solarium which blew my mind when i played it back in the day

[hpowellsmith]

Isaac Fellman wrote about Disco Elysium and I liked it - you might enjoy it too

#also you should read Dead Collections because it's brilliant

[hpowellsmith]

Honor Bound Chapter 5 update!

I’m pleased to share Honor Bound Chapter 5 today, on dashingdon and itchio! There are some minor changes and fixes here and there earlier, but you can skip to the start of Chapter 5 if you’d like.

If you have the time and energy, I always love to hear what you think, whether here or on the anonymous form - I read everything that comes through and often make edits to the demo and to later chapters based on player feedback as it’s incredibly helpful to hear how people are finding the choices and characters.

The demo is now around 227,000 words - just over 50,000 words added! Things you may encounter in this chapter:

drama among students, town, and families

locking gazes over a desk

holding someone’s hand very intensely

kisses, if you want them

a road trip

some really nice food

a breakup, if you play your cards right (or wrong)

Chapter 6 is also currently up for £6+ subscribers on Patreon!

Read more about Honor Bound on the forum thread

Play the Honor Bound demo on dashingdon and itch

Give feedback

Wishlist on Steam

#interactive fiction #interactive novel wip #dashingdon #amare games #honor bound #creme de la creme series #romance games #text games #if wip

[hpowellsmith]

stargazersasha & Moira Campbell present:

stargazersasha & Moira Campbell present:

☀️✨🌙 THE TRANS ORACULAR JAM 🌙✨☀️ A MULTIMEDIA ART JAM FOR TRANS ARTISTS MAY 1 - JUNE 1

☀️ MAKE IT FLASHY ☀️ ✨ MAKE IT ARCANE ✨ 🌙 MAKE IT YOURS 🌙

join the jam on itch (submissions open in 10 days!): https://itch.io/jam/transoracular

join the jam community on discord: https://discord.com/invite/rBFYk5fa4m

[hpowellsmith]

Careful there, Hannah. As the community has been showing these past few days, you put an idea for a Cremeverse game out there, we're gonna go crazy with the We Want It tm Syndrome and try to strong arm you into making it. ;) 😉😅😂

Haha! I am delighted and feel very lucky indeed that there are people out there feeling enthusiastic about even hypothetical things of mine that don't exist (yet...?)

Whatever I end up developing further and making after Honor Bound, it's really lovely to know that there's excitement for it. That's one of the things that's scary as a writer, especially getting towards finishing a project - wondering whether people will still be keen to come along for the ride.

(unless I come up with something that really grabs me, a teacher game will most likely not be the next one, though, as I'm more leaning towards a university setting next time I do something academic, but as ever nothing is set in stone)

#powell smith idea hour

[hpowellsmith]

"Game where you are a teacher smooching other teachers[...]"

Cut to my Creme de la Creme character, now a teacher at Gallatin(then moving her to Archambault), getting smooched by a visiting Jezhani teacher-

The multi-school teachers' conference gets very awkward. Pascal is there going "umm? Can we talk about registration processes please?"

#creme de la creme series #powell smith idea hour

[hpowellsmith]

A shame I can't smooch Miss Dalca!

Who said that

Game where you are a teacher smooching other teachers when......

(this is actually on my maybe-to-do-one-day list: when I was coming up with Honor Bound I had a game idea about helping run a school in Jezhan that almost but didn't quite make it onto the shortlist)

#creme de la creme #cezara dalca #powell smith idea hour

[hpowellsmith]

Does anyone remember Of Monsters and Mainframes? The novel manuscript I wrote in 2022 about a spaceship trying to kill Dracula?

Well.

I have news.

I have very good news.

Please click the link. Jaysen is more charismatic than me.

But if links are scary (and I know they are) then all you need to know is that Of Monsters and Mainframes is going to be a book in about a year.

I am absurdly excited (and also a little terrified, but in a good way).

If you have TikTok, please follow Jaysen. He's much better at this social media stuff than I am and is the one that decided to take a chance with me and my silly wee story about a sentient spaceship.

Here's a cute graphic screenshot my agent made from Publishers Marketplace:

[hpowellsmith]

I posted about the different configurations of the teacher love triangle and how to trigger them in Creme de la Creme over here, for those curious!

#creme de la creme #raphael blanchard #sinclair griffith #cezara dalca

[hpowellsmith]

I will never get tired of the thing where the parent(s) of an incredibly dysfunctional major character turn up and you get such juicy insight into why the character is Like That

#it just happened for the fifth time in how to get away with murder and it's just chef's kiss #pouring one out for when cary's dad showed up in the good wife #and the dad of tim riggins my beloved on friday night lights #delicious! #and sad #but also it never gets old #i like that in michaela's case it's a mum #i just think how to get away with murder is neat #am partway through season 4 so no telling me about what happens with characters and their families pls #yes i am catching up with a show that ended 4 years ago what of it #(watched s1 and s2 around when they came out and then lost momentum the way i usually do...)

[hpowellsmith]

Two vast stalactites, containing a third suspended between them, like an embrace. One is misshapen and ungainly, one smaller and ovoid. The third is like a knife, aimed down, down below. 

The first chapter of Firmament is here! Journey to the Roof to unravel a mystery long in the making; uncover new locations, conflicts and intrigues that speckle the Roof like the false-stars; follow fire, and save yourself from what comes after. 

 Firmament is Fallen London’s next major expansion, a main story arc that’s free to all players. It begins once you have progressed the Railway story arc as far as Ealing Gardens. 

 As part of this first chapter, you’ll also unlock the citadel of Hallow’s Throat, a new location on the Roof. Traverse the Lung and Spleen. Reshape yourself. Water your new throat at the Arms. 

To begin Firmament, look for an opportunity card in your deck. For those who’ve completed the prologue, look for the air to clear, anywhere in London

[hpowellsmith]

If there ever is a story set in Zaledo I'd really love for the MC to have three parents since from what I remember, that's legal and accepted in Zaledo

I'd consider it for sure!

(right now I can't actually remember whether marriage for more than two people has been specified to be legal in Zaledo - it is in Teran and Jezhan - but that is what "me going through and checking all my throwaway comments in each game before starting a new one" is for)

#asks #creme de la creme series #powell smith idea hour

[hpowellsmith]

"Living God" you say? 👀 Usually I'm a Godslayer, but I suppose I can drop the S if she's cute enough-

If I write about a living god they will be both very cute and very upsetting! (probably slayable also)

#powell smith idea hour #warlock-errant