The Muse
The Muse is a 18+ slice of life interactive fiction novel set at NYU focusing mostly on the art departments in the Steinhardt and Tisch schools. Inspired by my love for shows and movies like Felicity, Fame (the show), Skins UK, and Center Stage. This will not be an accurate depiction of school life at NYU, I'll be taking lots of creative liberties.
Content Warnings: explicit language, sexual themes, substance use, violence, mention of SA
You come from a family of artists and art lovers. Your mother is a passionate curator for a small gallery in the city and your father is a sculptor and painter with a very dedicated cult following. They met when they were just starting out and have built a lovely life for themselves and their two children, you and your older brother Cameron.
Your parents have always been super supportive of you and your brother’s dreams and ambitions. They were a great source of encouragement and guidance for your brother on his path to discovering his goal to become a game designer and you on your path to become whatever you choose.
Growing up surrounded by such creativity just so happened to inspired you to want to create something of your own.
Now that you’ve graduated high school it’s time for you to head off to university! You’ve decided to leave the mid sized city that you call your hometown, and go to the big city NYC! You’ll be attending NYU more specifically, but you won’t be making this move alone you’ll be attending with your best friend Maxine!
What will you discover in your university life?
Will you solely focus on schoolwork or wind up in the raging party scene?
Will you explore new creative endeavors or solely focus on honing your craft?
With so much going on will you even have the time to possibly find your muse, or maybe even become someone else’s?
-Features-
- Design your mc from clothing style to physical appearance to pronouns, gender identity, name, looks, and more.
- Choose 1 of 6 majors that grant you different classes with new students and professors: (Studio Arts, Dance, Drama, Photography and Imaging, Songwriting, Recorded Music)
- Curate your MCs personality and how they react to all the drama and excitement university life has to offer. Style your MC’s dorm room and their aesthetic style.
- Navigate the cliques and scenes to figure out where your MC fits in. Maybe you're a social butterfly and you just float from one social group to another!
- Engage in a romance with 1 of 10 characters. 5 female/male gender selectable and 5 gender set characters. And 2 poly routes one with The Rebel Rejects and one with The Exes (Faye and Karla).
- Choose one of three part time jobs to give you a little extra spending money for things like spring break and birthday gifts for your new friends.
- Follow The Muse through your MC’s freshman and sophomore years. Junior and senior year will come much later in Book Two of The Muse. The third and final book in The Muse series will cover the start of MC's new life after graduation.
-Romance Options-
- Roxanne/Robbie Sawyer: (f/m) The lead singer and guitarist of The Rebel Rejects. Ro is everything you would want in a lead singer cool, charismatic, and super talented. Don’t let their dazzling aura intimidate you though because though they may have a raging wild side they can also be extremely down to earth.
- Joleen/Johnny Nielsen: (f/m) The drummer of The Rebel Rejects. Jo is the oddball of the band with a sunny exterior and twisted flower child past. They may be a sweet boho bimbo with a heart of gold, but there’s a lot more that lies behind those blue green eyes.
- Delphine/Desmond Hartley: (f/m) The bassist for The Rebel Rejects. De is the super glue propelling the group forward. With high expectations from their parents, and dreams that soar even higher, success is the only option.
- Rina/Ren Fukushi: (f/m) R is the best ballet dancer in this incoming freshman class, and no one would ever think to say otherwise. They’re cold and closed off, if it isn’t about ballet then they don’t want to hear it.
- Everly/Everett Thompson: (f/m) Eve is a triple threat. Singing, dancing, acting they can do it all. They hope to complete their EGOT before they turn 40.
- Karla Reyes: (she/her) Karla is a sophomore at NYU studying Studio Arts. Her favorite medium is watercolor on canvas. She dabbled with sculpting and ceramics...until she broke up with her ex, Faye, and can’t stand to be in the same studio with them.
- Faye Winters: (she/they) Faye is every bit the ethereal being they seem to be, and just as flighty. She is a sophomore majoring in dance with a minor in studio arts. She has this effortless charm and beauty that extends to her art whether its her dancing or her sculptures.
- Sebastien Auclair: (he/him) Sebastien is in his third year of university, he’s an exchange student from the Paris College of Art. He is studying photography and imaging. Sebastian loves Paris, but he is excited for this change of scenery.
- Maxine Matthews: (she/her)Max is your best friend in the world! Your parents are friends so you were destined to best pals since birth, thank god you actually like each other or all those shared family functions would have been really awkward. Max is funny and always has great commentary for every show or movie that you watch together. Which is why you weren’t surprised when they decided to major in dramatic writing. Some people think that you’re too close. They wonder how is it possible that you could be just friends.
- Silas Walker: (he/him) Silas is your RA. As your Resident Advisor he's super helpful and friendly. You have a question about the best study spots, bad professors, how to use the subway, well he's got answers. He keeps all his advisees at arms length because everyone knows RAs can't canoodle with their advisees. And that just makes it all the more enticing.
Stay up to date on Tumblr! Make sure to check out the character profiles and interviews.
Check out The Muse Playlist on Spotify!
Status | In development |
Platforms | HTML5 |
Rating | Rated 5.0 out of 5 stars (22 total ratings) |
Author | ImaniJoy |
Genre | Interactive Fiction |
Tags | Romance, Slice Of Life, Text based |
Development log
- Demo Release: Prologue Part 136 days ago
Comments
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Hi! I enjoyed the demo very much! I like the premise of your story, I’ve always been drawn to the slice-of-life tales. And I was impressed by the breadth of choices you give the reader to develop an MC that’s uniquely their own.
I do have one critique, though. With as much choice as you give the reader, I felt like those choices weren’t reflected in the way the story played out. For example, I created my MC as a bit of a rule following, straight A, over-achiever, and I made the selection that I was looking forward to graduation and being successful. Yet the story still read as if I was ready to get down and party—the option of being that friend the others have to drag to the party might be more applicable in this case. And the talk with the brother felt odd, too. I feel it would have played out differently if you were a little prudish or a strict rule follower, as opposed to if you had a history of partying or being rebellious. I think fleshing out the player’s choices more will really make the story more immersive.
I do think you have created the foundation for a truly wonderful story here, especially with how much control you give the reader, so I hope you don’t take this as any kind of deterrence. I’m definitely keeping my eye on this and looking forward to reading more!
Hey! Thank you so much for the feedback it's really helpful to get critiques like this. I get what you're saying about having some more straight edge classic overachiever dialouge and I'll definitely try to work on that. I've got a few player character archetypes that I'm still trying to flesh out.
As for the talk with Cameron, it's more so about his past experiences with some of his friends, than how he really views the MC. I do think this conversation could use some more choices and outcomes though.
All in all, you've given me a lot to think about and I'm really glad you cared enough to give me your honest first impressions.
ooooo, im already excited to see more >,< <333333
Thank you! I'm glad you're enjoingbit so far!
The game is going very well. The story is engaging and interesting. I'm looking forward to more!
Thank you so much! More is definitely coming...soonish.
love the demo already
Thank you so much!
I'm enjoying what you have so far and can't wait to see more! Question, is the demo supposed to end in the middle of the party?
Thank so much! Yes it does stop in the middle of the party, I had intended to get more completed but ran out of time. The next update will have the rest of the prologue and the first day of chapter 1.
Alright, thank you!
I love it, the characters (especially Cam, our big bro), the background, the different paths we can choose, the fun, the drama 😀 I'm looking forward to more ❤
Thanks so much! More is definitely coming soon...soonish.