Blog

In spring 2022, it came to light that, under a pseudonym, M.A.R. Barker, the late creator of the Tékumel universe, wrote an antisemitic novel and served on the editorial review committee of a Holocaust denial journal.

When Choice of the Petal Throne was published in 2015, neither the author nor Choice of Games was aware of this work by Barker, or of his antisemitic views. Neither the author nor Choice of Games included any antisemitic content in Choice of the Petal Throne.

We condemn antisemitism in all forms. We condemn the denial of the Holocaust.

As a company, we are committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion. We believe that the rising rate of antisemitism in the world today is extremely dangerous, and we will continue to do everything we can to combat it.

We have agreed with the Tékumel Foundation that no further revenue from Choice of Games or Choice of the Petal Throne will go to the Foundation, Barker’s estate, or any organization connected to Barker. We will not publish any additional works set in the Tékumel universe or any other setting created by Barker.

Instead, Choice of Games, the Tékumel Foundation, and Danielle Goudeau, author of Choice of the Petal Throne, have agreed that all revenue from Choice of the Petal Throne from the beginning of 2022 onward will be donated to Jewish Family Services of the East Bay, specifically to their Holocaust Survivor Services program.

To celebrate the 10th Anniversary of Heroes Rise, we’ve commissioned brand new game art for Heroes Rise: The Prodigy, new line-art headers for the original Heroes Rise trilogy, and placed all the Sergiverse games on sale until July 21st! We’re proud to publish author Zachary Sergi’s reflections on this occasion below.
***
The year was 2011. I was one year out of college, trying to find my footing in Los Angeles as a TV writer. I had hustled my way into a Disney Channel original movie think tank, a process that introduced me to my first (short-lived) manager. This matters because that manager did one thing for me: he told me a new company called Choice of Games was looking for fiction writers to pitch ideas for interactive novels.

I had studied fiction all through high school and college, and had written contemporary novel-length works before. Far more importantly, I grew up loving to invent my own RPGs with my action figures and obsessing over pathways in the Goosebumps: Reader Beware…You Choose The Scare CYOA-style novels. I even tried my hand at constructing my own interactive stories in elementary school: a teen slasher called Killer Central and a superhero team-up called The Mega Force Saga (lol).

A lifelong Marvel Comics reader (X-Men, specifically), I also always had a super hero world in my head, one based on an American Idol style competition that funneled into The Avengers, but that was also queer and diverse (having grown up as a gay teen on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, this kind of inclusion felt mundanely everyday to a naively-younger me). While I kept building this superhero world in my mind, I had never actually written about it—my high school and college classes demanded contemporary fiction only, at the time.

Heroes Rise was one of a few pitches I submitted to Choice of Games, expecting another rejection to add to my growing pile—but they bought it. Now, at age 23, I had agreed to write a full length novel, in a genre I had never written in before, in a format that didn’t really exist in a way I could find at the time, in a coding-format language I didn’t understand, for a brand new company, which would publish exclusively digitally on an app. For context, I still had a Blackberry then. I didn’t really even understand what an app was, and in those days it was kind of unfathomable that anyone would pay for one, since virtually all apps came free.

Basically: I thought there wasn’t a chance in hell anyone would actually read this novel. The pressure was off, in that way. I was free to just write what was in my head, without worrying if it was commercial or sellable or fitting within any typical genre confines.

The learning curve was steep, but I found I really enjoyed writing in this coding-formatting, half-game, half-novel style. My brain swam in both lanes faster than I expected. Choice of Games had developed a very clean language and an even cleaner vision for choice pacing/styling (which has evolved over time, but the core remains equally pristine). I also felt free not having to live within the perspective of a static main character—that had always been the weakest point of my early fiction writing, but the second person MC openness meant I didn’t even have to worry about that. The perspective had to be weak, to allow the reader to fill in the cracks.

The biggest challenge was trying to outline an enticing story full of plot twists and interesting characters, but that also allowed for some degree of reader control/flexibility. I saw my primary job to tell the best story possible, and my secondary job to build compelling choices and game structure within that story. I found the choices that mattered most to me were defining the Main Character, navigating their relationships, and encountering morally-loaded sociological dilemmas. The choices were designed to make the reader stop and think, not necessarily have vast control over the story. (This has become a cornerstone of my own particular interactive style, which is subjectively loved and hated).

I also know that, during that year, I was reading the 4th-7th Harry Potter books for the first time. I had read the first three when they came out, but literally couldn’t carry the larger hardcovers on the subway with me. Looking back, I think you can see the more whimsical spirit in that first Heroes Rise as a result. I was also really miserable in my personal life the first couple years out of college, graduating into a recession and living in a city where I didn’t have many existing friendships. So much of my drive for a big writing career, a big love, and a sense of belonging in Los Angeles was infused into The Prodigy. Even though this novel wasn’t real-world contemporary, so much of who I was and what I knew was still infused. Grandma was based on my own, Jenny was inspired by my dearest friend at the time, Chelsea. I was living with my parents (who I adore), but needed some self-defining separation from. And then the orphan, Jury, and Victon vibes came straight from Harry Potter. Then, as always, there’s X-Men social allegory and The Avengers fame fun.

It was a genre-blending brew—turns out, that’s another cornerstone of what I write. The final element came straight from college, where I took a class purely studying utopian literature (and discovered my then-much-lesser-known favorite novel, The Handmaid’s Tale). Writing about societal constructs via utopian/dystopian themes was also something I always intended to explore. Looking back, Heroes Rise: The Prodigy was a mad explosion of myself coming together for the first time, empowered by a company that didn’t edit me into any corners (to their infinite credit), and from a space where unafraid to fail—because to me back then, failure was already implied. I remember saying to my mom late one night: “No one will read this, but if I die tomorrow, I at least got to write something fully and wholly me.”

Naturally, absolutely zero people in my life understood what I was doing, literally or career-trajectory wise. But I was 23. I was allowed a year to write a passion project, especially one that was paid. Life would go on afterwards.

Sometime before the July 2012 release, I got an iPhone (so I could buy the book, mostly). I was also blown away when the cover drafts came in—it was the first time I had ever seen a character I wrote brought to life visually. That one detail emboldened me enough to try and treat this like a traditional book launch—I made social media accounts and planned a little book launch party at the writing office I used then. People came to the party, but no one understood what the book was. Is it a game? Is it a novel? Wait, it’s an app? It’s about superheroes, but it’s not Marvel or DC? And it’s about societal allegory and fame culture? Well, thanks for the free cheese board…

I was right about one thing: to this day, the majority of my family and friends haven’t read Heroes Rise. But do you know who did? All you readers who somehow found The Prodigy (I still don’t quite know how that happened). Reader emails and messages started coming in. Fan art of the characters started popping up (mind fully blown every time, with that one). People from other countries were somehow reading it. I even got some hate mail and awful reviews—but I was thrilled. People cared enough to do all that? Turns out I was very wrong about no one reading this thing. I was so startled that this interactive novel on this new platform reached anyone, especially something that was so idiosyncratically me. It was a revelation, one I’m grateful for to this day.

I guess I should say, even though I didn’t expect this outcome, I did hope (and plan) for it. I had designed Heroes Rise as a trilogy, in typical Young Adult fiction style. (Oh yeah, I started calling my stuff Young Adult too, because it was easier to “sell and pitch” myself in the various businesses. I still don’t know if Heroes Rise is really YA, but I also don’t think it matters). I didn’t pitch The Hero Project in the original Heroes Rise because I didn’t want to potentially give away my best idea to an unknown home. But this home had made itself fully known.

Thankfully, Choice of Games agreed. Not only that, but the founders of the company saw the ravenous need for queer, diverse, and inclusive representation in superheroes and gaming. This was years before those things became “trendy” marketing talking points—and I still wish we were further into this movement, especially amidst all this recent queer book-banning.

Mostly, I tried to listen to the audience, thankful for having one to begin with. I knew I needed to evolve the overly-simplistic gaming structure and choice style (especially now that I actually knew what I was doing). In the decade since, I’ve made huge steps forward (and sometimes backward) working out ways to expand interactivity—while still meeting the publish-once-a-year deadlines. I also wrote so many storylines requested by you readers: romances with Jenny, Jury, and Prodigal (which never would have occurred to me). I also remember posting screenshots of homemade strategy guides, then getting dozens of emails from blind readers asking for text-versions so voice-assistive technology could read them aloud. We had blind readers? Time for representation in that community (hello Weaver, among others).

I also learned how to navigate the tricky waters of writing about societal and political constructs, sometimes favoring my own beliefs unfairly. This is how I came to define my mission statement as a writer: to always empower readers; to expose you to new worlds & ideas and let you decide for yourselves what to think & believe. Additionally, I always focus on LGBTQIA+ representation and exploring issues of intersectional inclusion, funneled through a (usually Young Adult) genre-mashing blend of humor, action & drama.

Looking back on these early days building out the Sergiverse (as social media coined it, and I wholeheartedly adopted) via the Heroes Rise Trilogy, The Hero Project Duology, and the Versus Trilogy, I mostly wish I had the stamina I did in my 20s to write 150+ thousand words a year while also developing TV shows. (Now in my 30s, my body and brain require a lot more care). There’s so much I’d handle differently with the benefit of hindsight, but mostly I’m proud of what we all built together.

Having now finished the eight-part epic I dreamed up in my 20s last year with Versus: The Deathscapes (that warrants its own essay, let me tell you), I’m lucky to have gotten the chance to help establish another interactive precedent. I wrote Heroes Rise: The Prodigy when I was 23, and ten years later at 33, I got to publish a first-of-its kind hardcover Interactive Novel, Major Detours. And next year, my first-ever Hosted Games project will publish on January 5: Fortune the Fated, where I’m experimenting with yet another totally-different (for me, at least) interactive plot structure.

Exactly a decade later, I also have another superhero world bubbling and half-written. It’s in the same spirit at Heroes Rise, but with a focus on allegory for professional sports (if you’re thinking The Hero Project: The Legend of Korra meets Friday Night Lights, you’d be right). I’ll hopefully find a publishing home for that project soon, but it strikes me now, how I feel compelled to return to this spirit of storytelling a decade later—kind of like a call to come home.

Truly, every inch of this started with Heroes Rise: The Prodigy and the visionary founders of Choice of Games. Those same founders have been gracious enough to create a special 10th Anniversary cover for The Prodigy, one that captures its spirit perfectly. I think it’s maybe time I fully re-read it, myself? As always, I have the same question: Will you take this journey with me?

Hosted Games has a new game for you to play!

The War of Three Brothers, which took place ten years ago, changed the unknown fate of Rhivenia. The Sword chose Prince Charles to rule; however, his brothers dared to go against its choice. Prince Charles gained victory over his brothers, who were the victims of their greed. Executing all the traitors, he strengthened his reign and became the rightful king of three kingdoms. He’s been living a peaceful life with his two wives and four children until an unexpected enemy shows up. It’s 30% off until July 14th!

You play as one of the heirs, who may be chosen by the Sword once King Charles dies. Are you worthy of the throne? Or do your siblings deserve it more than you do? What kind of heir will you be?

“The Sword of Rhivenia” is a 750,000 word interactive medieval fantasy novel by Ayan Mammadli, where your choices control the story. It’s entirely text-based—without graphics or sound effects—and fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.

• Play as prince or princess.
• Customize your appearance and personality.
• Build friendships and make enemies.
• Be chosen by the Sword or stay as prince/princess.
• Betray your kingdom or be loyal.
• Get married and start a family.

Ayan developed this game using ChoiceScript, a simple programming language for writing multiple-choice interactive novels like these. Writing games with ChoiceScript is easy and fun, even for authors with no programming experience. Write your own game and Hosted Games will publish it for you, giving you a share of the revenue your game produces.

Hosted Games has a new game for you to play!

In this unsettling, mature story with a set main character, help average office worker Ash gain the confidence to make new friends in an exclusive nude painting group. The Gray Painter is a 145,000-word, 20-chapter interactive novel. It’s entirely text-based, fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination. It’s 25% off until July 14th!

You can select Ash’s sex, gender, and orientation. Ash begins the game in a relationship with Harper, a gender-selectable partner. The option to break up with Harper becomes available in Chapter 9.

Praise for the Gray Painter:

• “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.”
• “I came in without expectations and was pleasantly surprised. The characters feel deeply flawed but still understandable. My first impressions of everyone were all totally wrong.”
• “What just happened, I was utterly not expecting that, stop messing with my head!!!!”

The Gray Painter depicts drug and alcohol use, smoking, inferred suicide, explicit sexual content, horror, and high-impact violence and gore. The story also features themes of body insecurity and dysmorphia. This is a story for adults aged 18 and up.

• Play as straight, gay, bisexual, pansexual, asexual, or all of the above.
• Meet seven complex, flawed, human characters.
• Immerse yourself in the sprawl of New Jersey in 2012.
• Turn a mild-mannered accountant towards a life of sex, drugs, and rock & roll.
• There are no secrets in this game. And if there were any secrets, it’s best not to look for them.

William developed this game using ChoiceScript, a simple programming language for writing multiple-choice interactive novels like these. Writing games with ChoiceScript is easy and fun, even for authors with no programming experience. Write your own game and Hosted Games will publish it for you, giving you a share of the revenue your game produces.

We’re proud to announce that Social Services of the Doomed, the latest in our popular “Choice of Games” line of multiple-choice interactive-fiction games, is now available for Steam, Android, and on iOS in the “Choice of Games” app. It’s 25% off until June 30th!

They have magic and fangs. You have red tape! In this epic conflict between fantasy and bureaucracy, will you save your city, or sell your soul?

Social Services of the Doomed is a 400,000-word interactive urban fantasy novel by Fade Manley. It’s entirely text-based, without graphics or sound effects, and fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.

As an employee of the Department of Supernatural Social Services, it’s your job to mediate when a dispute breaks out between vampires and werewolves. Which is pretty often, these days. Tensions are rising in your city: not all supernatural citizens think that they have to abide by the law. Flocks of harpies are crowing prophecies of doom; wizards are slinging fireballs; trolls aren’t just having peaceful chats about tunneling technology anymore; there are demons in the werewolf dive bar; and something is up with the ley lines. Sometimes it feels like you’re the only one standing between the supernatural factions and a city in flames.

On the other hand, some factions are willing to cut a deal on the side, so if you really want the city to be in flames – and if you feel like that civil-servant paycheck isn’t stretching as far as you’d like – you could make that happen. Every faction knows that you could be useful to them.

How will you handle it? Will you sneak, fight, negotiate, confuse, or just whip out some obscure county regulations? There’s always more paperwork to be done, and if you fall too far behind, your boss might call you in for a chat about your monthly metrics. (Also, your boss might be a constellation. Don’t ask.)

• Make your way through the city as a demon, troll, wizard, or completely mundane human.
• Play as male, female, or non-binary; gay, straight, bi, or asexual.
• Advance your career, sink your rival’s career, or try to play nice with all your coworkers at once.
• Romance a troll, a demon, a werewolf, a vampire, or your office rival. (Who’s a snake person.)
• Chase demons out of the cubicle farm before everyone gets back from lunch.
• Thwart the dastardly plans of Hell’s minions, or sell your soul to them…or just flirt with a cute demon.

Demons and trolls, vampires and werewolves, wizards and harpies… and you’re standing in the middle with the most fearsome thing of all: paperwork.

We hope you enjoy playing Social Services of the Doomed. We encourage you to tell your friends about it, and recommend the game on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and other sites. Don’t forget: our initial download rate determines our ranking on the App Store. The more times you download in the first week, the better our games will rank.

“Vampire: The Masquerade — Out for Blood” price will increase soon!

Though we still don’t have a release date, we are nearing the completion of the “True Faith” patch for Out for Blood. This will be a free update to everyone that owns the game, allowing new playstyles and new ways to vanquish the vampires of Jericho Heights.

The price of Out for Blood will be increasing to $11.99 on July 1st. Buy it now—including the upcoming “True Faith” patch—before the price change.

Hosted Games has two new games for you to play!

You are a recent member of The White Company, a mercenary guild on the far side of the law. Your job consists of hunting artifacts and roaming ruins that the Church has forbidden to mention. One of your expeditions, however, leads you down a path that is much deeper than you ever anticipated.

It’s 30% off until June 9th!

The Golden Rose: Book One is a thrilling 1.2-million-word interactive fantasy novel by Ana Ventura, where your choices control the story. It’s entirely text-based—without graphics or sound effects—and fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.

Juggle friendships, new alliances, and flames of romance in this epic adventure that will take you to a Europe where History took a different turn.

• Play as male or female; straight, gay, or bisexual.
• Find romance, friendship, or rivalry with a cast of colorful characters.
• Hunt down the thief that stole your forbidden maps!
• Fight against bandits and city guards while trying to stray away from the all-seeing Eyes of the Church.
• Explore ancient ruins and the cobble-stoned streets of the medieval city of Tarragona. Step into a grand cathedral, a sprawling market, a multicolored harbor, the dark gates of the city, or an aqueduct that no one dares to come close to.
• Bond with a stubborn old horse.
• Choose to ally with a street urchin or the feral captain of the Guard.
• Uncover what is true in a world where denial reigns supreme.
• Start to unravel your own mysterious past.
• Immerse yourself in a world rich with characters, story, and lore.
Do you believe in Destiny?

Next up:

The drums beat, horns blow. It is time for you to dance a warrior’s dance. You were born in poverty and raised by ambition. Now is your chance to write your own legend, will it be a tragedy or a triumph?

It’s 33% off until June 9th!

Travel across oceans and through burning forests. Camp under the stars and find love. Be immersed in a land embellished in religion and customs, but scarred with fire and fury.

Be a scout, an assassin and a warrior. Through wit and muscle become a hero. Debate with chieftains, duel with champions and watch as the gods make their judgment on your people.

By Crom is a 75,000 word historical-fantasy interactive fiction by Fionn Graham, where your choices control the story. It is text based—without graphics or sound effects—and fueled by the vast unstoppable power of your imagination.

• Play as male or female; trans or cis; bi, straight, gay or asexual.
• Find romance with a combat trainer, an advisor and a member of clan royalty.
• Discover betrayals and affairs, find lost family members.
• Devise battle plans, take part in prison escapes, battle storms on the high seas and ride like the wind through forest and hills.
• Accept bribes and be part of deadly conspiracies, assassinations and coverups.
• Be a hero of innocents, or laugh as the world around you burns.

Ana and Fionn developed their games using ChoiceScript, a simple programming language for writing multiple-choice interactive novels like these. Writing games with ChoiceScript is easy and fun, even for authors with no programming experience. Write your own game and Hosted Games will publish it for you, giving you a share of the revenue your game produces.

We’re proud to announce that Freshman Magic: Spellbooks and Tangled Sheets, the latest in our “Heart’s Choice” line of multiple-choice interactive romance novels, is now available for iOS and Android in the “Heart’s Choice” app. You can also download it on Steam, or enjoy it on our website.

It’s 33% off until June 2nd!

A magical murder mystery brimming with gay sex! At this college, you’ll work up a sweat in dueling club, in the library, in the shower, and in your dorm.

Freshman Magic: Spellbooks and Tangled Sheets] is a 263,000-word interactive gay romance novel by Raven de Hart. It’s entirely text-based, without graphics or sound effects, and fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.

A magical dueling scholarship won you a spot at the prestigious Briarthorn University, one of the top magic colleges in North America. You expected a hard workload and even harder dueling practice sessions…you weren’t expecting your classmates to be so distracting!

You’ll have your pick when it comes to romance. Caleb’s a redheaded jock in the dueling club with you. Halim is a sexy rich boy with flowing black hair, an enchantment major who works in the college library. Raimundo is a nerdy tutor, quick to blush behind his large, round glasses. Or will you prefer Alistair, the bad-boy demon summoner in tight jeans? With all the sexual energy floating around campus, you’re even seeing your best friend, Noel, in a slightly different light.

But everything is not as it seems at Briarthorn. When students start disappearing from campus, it will be up to you to figure out what happened to them, who will be next, and how to save the school, and your own tail!

• Choose a magical subject to major in: alchemy, enchantment, magical theory, summoning demons, or combat magic
• Stay on the straight and narrow on the dueling pitch, or catch opponents off-guard with dirty tactics
• Decide exactly how far to go with a cast of lovers
• It’s college! Party hard with your magical peers, or keep a low profile
• Study diligently in the library, or slip into the back room with the sexy librarian
• Find the best hookup spots on campus
• Relax with a friend to wind down after a tough practice — or heat things up in the shower instead
• Lose your heart to your chosen lover, but don’t lose your life as your classmates vanish around you!

Be gay, do magic!

We hope you enjoy playing Freshman Magic: Spellbooks and Tangled Sheets. We encourage you to tell your friends about it, and recommend the game on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and other sites. Don’t forget: our initial download rate determines our ranking on the App Store. The more times you download in the first week, the better our games will rank.

A magical murder mystery brimming with gay sex! At this college, you’ll work up a sweat in dueling club, in the library, in the shower, and in your dorm. Freshman Magic: Spellbooks and Tangled Sheets is a 263,000-word interactive gay romance novel by Raven de Hart. I sat down with him to discuss his work, the novelty of interactive romance, and more. Freshman Magic releases this Thursday, May 26th. You can play the first few chapters for free, here.

You’re an author of M/M romance and erotica, but this is your first foray into interactive fiction, I think? Tell me about yourself and your work.

It’s not quite my first time out, but everything I did in interactive fiction was many years and two houses ago, so I’m basically fresh to the scene. I’ve been writing M/M romance for…a decade this year? I think it’s a decade this year. Longer than that, if you count my teenage fan fiction years, but I don’t have a lick of any of that still around, and no one ever paid me for it, obviously. I’ve lived in Eastern Washington state (Nope, no mountains and trees and rain here. This is a desert.) my whole life. I currently live in a rural manufacturing/agricultural town with my roommate and five Golden Retrievers. They take up…honestly most of my non-writing time. Not one of them is under fifty pounds, and they’re all lap dogs. But when I do manage to extricate myself from the big furry dog pile, I write mostly paranormal and fantasy romance, although with a smattering of contemporary as well. I’ve always loved speculative fiction, so that wends and weaves through all my work. In non-writing, I love classical trombone, and before I turned to writing, I was full-bore on culinary arts as a career path. So I have lots of opinions on food, cooking, etc, and I love to get in the kitchen and get my hands dirty (And then wash them, of course, because I’m not about that salmonella life.). I’ve also got a passing interest in geology and gemology, modern art, political science…I’m interested in a lot of things. Jack of all trades, master of none, better than a master of one, right? But I’m mostly a very boring Snake Person gay who stays at home and sits at his laptop all day.

What did you find most enticing about writing in this new format?

So, I’m not one of those authors who struggles and scrabbles for ideas. I have a ton of ideas. Writing Freshman Magic was a really good opportunity to throw a lot of ideas on the table. I’m used to telling one story from front to back, but with this, I was able to tell many stories in one project. A friends to lovers romance? Yep. A mystery? You betcha. A geek/jock romance? Absolutely. Urban fantasy? Of course! It was, in a lot of ways, the ultimate sand box where I got to play around. Plus, like, who in my generation didn’t at least sort of want to make a game at some point? I know I did. And now I actually made a game. Certainly not alone, but I made one. I got to tell five romance stories with nigh-endless variations available to them. I’m super into the whole idea of it. And then, to top it all off, there are just things that you can’t do in a mainstream, standard novel. There was a lot of room to play, pun intended, with this game.

And what was most challenging for you?

I did not fully expect how much there was to this. I work IT on the side, and I have some level of proficiency in coding. So that was a learning curve, but I wasn’t starting at the bottom of that particular mountain. But the sheer volume of words I had to put on the page was completely unexpected. I’m used to writing, at the most, 90K-100K words on a project, and I think this one ended up right around 260K words, counting all the pieces of code involved. So that took some adjustment. I also never spend this much devoted time to a single project. It took about three times as long as I would with a standard book. It really pushed against my endurance, but in a good way. It’s nice to push yourself. Obviously trying to make sure everything stayed functional and was well-balanced, and that continuity didn’t break, was a different set of challenges, and I had to adjust to them. But the biggest struggle was just the dedicated focus and the simple size of the project that really made me stretch and grow.

What do you hope your novel readers will enjoy about Freshman Magic?

So, romance readers tend to be particularly voracious, myself included. We can chew through books at lightning speed. So I think Freshman Magic is a good chance to provide a lot of stories in one fell swoop. No waiting for a whole series to come out. No trying to decide which book to read. No scouring for the rest of an author’s catalog. You play Freshman Magic and you get all the stories you need, at least for a little while. Plus I really focused heavily on some of my personal favorite tropes. I’ve mentioned geek/jock and friends to lovers, but I also wanted to play around with some bad boy and wealthy hero romance tropes. Plus one thing I’ve always, always done in my books is include a lot that wasn’t directly involved in the romance. Every now and then, I rattle off a straightforward romance book. But for the most part, whether it’s a civil war or a missing persons case or, as here, academic achievements and a mystery storyline, I always have something else going on alongside the romance. In fact, in my most recent book, it was very polarizing. Some people loved how much I focused on food and cooking, and it obviously bored some people to tears. But it’s always been a part of my particular writing style. I don’t just tell love stories. I tell stories about people falling in love while other things are happening. So hopefully, that’ll appeal to people in the game as much as it does in the books.

Is writing in a fantasy/magic world a departure for you?

Far, far from it. I grew up reading fantasy novels, and before I started writing romance at all, I was writing and publishing fantasy. It’s honestly harder for me not to write with some tinge of the unreal to it. My brain just puts the weird and off-kilter and fantastical into everything that I write. If I’m going to escape into a piece of fiction, why not make sure that piece of fiction has dragons and magic? That seems like an obvious next step to me. So no, certainly not a departure for me.

What are you working on next?

I’ve got a few things in the pipeline at this point. I just had the aforementioned cooking romance, A Teaspoon of Desire, come out about a week ago. I’m partway through drafting a new urban fantasy romance about Norse demigods, plus I’ll be releasing a small shifter romance some time this summer, which I unfortunately can’t talk about too much until more details are made public. But Dachshund shifter – who can say no to that, right? And then, if the planets align properly, I might be able to get out another secret urban fantasy project that’s recently captured my attention, dealing with a magical fish and game department. I could keep going – like I said, I always have so many ideas – but that’s what’s currently most pressingly on the table for me.

We’re proud to announce that Nikola Tesla: War of the Currents, the latest in our popular “Choice of Games” line of multiple-choice interactive-fiction games, is now available for Steam, Android, and on iOS in the “Choice of Games” app.

It’s 30% off until May 19th!

At the dawn of the electrical age, can you outsmart Thomas Edison and electrify the world? Rewrite history with worldwide wireless power, alien contact, death rays and sapient machines!

Nikola Tesla: War of the Currents is a 225,000-word interactive science-fiction novel by Dora Klindžić. It’s entirely text-based, without graphics or sound effects, and fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.

The man who invented the 20th century was a queer immigrant from Serbia. Nikola Tesla dreamed of distributing free energy to all of mankind but passed away in a New York hotel room alone and forgotten. What if it had gone differently?

In the year 1886, you join the eccentric Tesla as his laboratory apprentice. Notoriously bad at monetizing his inventions, but nonetheless ingenious at building them, Tesla needs your help with making a living wage as much as your help in the lab.

Fend off Edison’s spies, Wall Street bankers, electrical industry magnates and other unsavory types as you navigate real historical adventures involving electrocuted elephants, the Niagara Falls electric plant, pigeons, and that time Mark Twain had the mishap of soiling his trousers in Tesla’s lab.

Develop your own science skills, your social life, or opt to be more business-minded. Manage your mentor’s fragile mental state while balancing your laboratory’s checkbook. Love your work, your pigeon, or pursue a risqué romance with Edison’s daughter. Will you manage to maintain enough funding and influence to prevent the destruction of Wardenclyffe tower and perform the most esoteric of experiments? Bring free power to all, contact the aliens, or accidentally flatten a city. The history of the last great independent inventor, as well as the future of society, are in your hands.

• Play as male, female, or non-binary; gay, straight, bi, or asexual/aromantic.
• Achieve fame through spectacular inventions, people skills or cunning business.
• Change historic events such as the invention of the electric chair, the Chicago World Fair, the social unrest at the turn of the 20th century, and more.
• Monetize your inventions or uphold Tesla’s ideals of working for the betterment of mankind.
• Uncover secret societies lurking in the background of early-capitalist New York.
• Meet a cast of historic characters such as Thomas Edison and his family, George Westinghouse, Mark Twain, J.P. Morgan, Joseph Pulitzer, Lewis Latimer, Charles Steinmetz, Lord Kelvin and many more.

The world awaits in darkness, ready for your electric light.

We hope you enjoy playing Nikola Tesla: War of the Currents. We encourage you to tell your friends about it, and recommend the game on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and other sites. Don’t forget: our initial download rate determines our ranking on the App Store. The more times you download in the first week, the better our games will rank.