After several mid-pandemic years of gradual development, my first computer game, “ANAGOGIA,” is now available on itch.io! To be specific, it’s a work of interactive fiction–a “choose your own adventure” hyperlink story, essentially. It’s a little bit horror, a little bit fantasy, there’s the occasional entity, and as for who or what “Anagogia” is… well, you’ll have to journey through to find out.
In addition to the text, all of the illustrations are mine, culled from a decade-plus of photographs tweaked to fit the tale’s bleak, isolated mood. I have a particular fascination with abandoned places and “liminal spaces” (which are experiencing a bit of a surge in popularity, I believe), and I really enjoyed having an opportunity to stitch all of these quiet asides over the years into a coherent (if not surreal) canvas.
This was my first time using Twine, so things don’t get too complicated–you can’t die or lose, and there’s no complex puzzles to take notes for. It’s more about… exploration, and uncertainty. I was inspired by visual and thematic elements of a real hodgepodge of games–MYST, Silent Hill, and the Dark Souls series, primarily.
You can download for free if you like, but donations are appreciated! And who knows, there just may be some DLC or a new interactive story altogether in the future…
Notes&Sketches 