you approach the fire.
listen to the sound it makes as it burns. can you feel the heat on your palms?
thank you, for dropping by our small corner of the web. collectively we're known as Hearthplace, or the Hearth system. you can learn more about who and what we are here, or about systems and plurality in general here.
(feel free head over to sign our guestbook, if you haven't already. we'll be waiting here when you come back. -s)
all of us are still in the process of putting this thing together at the moment, so don't expect things to remain entirely stable for the next while. I haven't got any projects or original writing up yet, but those should be on their way soon. in the meantime, I can tell you a bit about what to expect from this part of site. I expect to have some sort of system blog running here eventually, as well as an (admittedly small at time of recording) collection of personal writing ranging from fantasy fiction to nonfiction rambling on plurality, history, philosophy, queerness whatever strikes our fancy. Kat and Robin are probably going to be putting together a few shrines (something for the Crane Wives band and the 17776 webcomic by Jon Bois are obvious candidates but it's hard to say what exactly they'll put their time toward.)
(personally, I want to try my hand at making some blinkies and buttons. this place is looking kinda empty right now.-L)
In particular, expect the style of the website to shift around a bit. I like what we've got now, but it may need to change in order to contrast with Chev's half of things. Or we might change the homepage style, though I'm not sure what we'd do with it insead of this.
lots of tinkering for us to do, but that's all for now.
-Sath Hearthplace, 2.19.23
Upcoming:
Expect an essay on Shady Part of Me coming in a week or two. This game falls under the category of media that has changed the way we look at ourselves as a system, and none of us can find anyone talking about it in detail or from a perspective that's not 'ooh, fun eMOtIonAl puzzle-solving platform game :)'. While it is those things, I think there's a lot more to unpack from it, at least for systems. Especially those of us with more checkered and traumatic pasts.
(Anyone and everyone else here is, of course, welcome to come along for the ride.)
We'll most likely break down a couple of the core emotional concepts that made the work so compelling for us, including: the way it handles concepts like protectors, the mindscape abstraction cooked right into the game's foundation and mechanics, the simple fucking joy of being able to really take some time and understand how both of the protagonists are feeling. I cannot reccomend this game enough.
In my (kat's) personal opinion, this isn't exactly something that would benifit from a spoiler warning at the begining of the discussion, and though my essay will most definitely include some spoilers for the plot, i'll try to stay away from ruining the puzzle-based gameplay if you decide to play it yourself. Buy it, play it, then we can talk about all that's to love.