“I want to explore how you find th📖e friends that get youꩵ, rather than the people you hang out with because you don’t want to feel lonely,” co-founder tells me when explaining the messy queer experience at the centre of .
It’s a game about a driven girl in her mid-twenties who moves𒅌 to a new town to find herself, which Hollinrake shares is based heavily on her own experiences living on the Isle of Wight as a young creative, moving away from home for the first time and trying to get to grips with working in video game development. It’s a harsh road defined by bitter triumph and remorseful sacrifice, but one that everyone in Holli🌺nrake’s line of work must walk.
Despite the emotional foundations though, Crescent County is also aiming to be one hell of a fun time. You are a fresh-faced motorbroom rider living in a witch-tech world where deliveries are made on the back of pimped-out broomsticks inst🥃ead of busted mopeds, and your job is to make ends meet, forge new friendships, and figure out what you want in life. Crazy Taxi with a sapphic twist, or Kiki’s Delivery Service if the young witch was screwed by the gig economy.
“I’ve been dreaming about making this game for years,” Hollinrake tells me. “The stuff I’ve been taking to conventions has been this kind of witch-tech, sci-fi fantasy mash-up for such a long time, and it’s something my brain has latch꧅ed onto and won’t let go.” But with history in both triple-A and independent spaces, Hollinrake is abundantly aware that you have to rein yourself in on certain projects, and to make a game that truly represents who you are, going independent is often the only way. And that’s how Electric Saint was born a few years ago🅰 alongside fellow founder Pavle Mihajlovic and a very small team of contributors.
Throughout our interview, Hollinrake also isn’t shy about how overwhelming making a game can be as such a small studio. You are writing, coding, creating art, conjuring up lo꧃ads of inventive ways to market the title on social media, and trying to live your own life far away from all that. It sounds like a fun, exhausting ride that is a double-edged dream come true.
“There were a few times over the yea🌄rs when I tried to make [Crescent County] a reality, but it never felt quite right, like I didn’t feel like I had enough knowledge to launch myself into the indie space. But I also had experiences working with a really small team on a little game that everyone loved and I got to use a lot of my natural art style. I didn’t have to be anyone else.”
Having followed Hollinrake’s work and moving in the same queer circles, yoꦆu can tell from a single glimpse at Crescent County that it is unap♉ologetically her, and as a result, will resonate with a lot of gamers in the same creative space who want to feel unrestrained while safe in the knowledge they can find a community that welcomes them with open arms.
In the game, you won’t just deliver packages or engage in motorbroom races with friend💜s, you will earn currency to decorate your sparse rental flat, befriend and flirt with other UberEats witches, and just have a fun time without always thinking about the future.
“A lot of [the game] comes from being a person who doesn’t really know who they are in that young adult way where you’re having to navigate emotional challenges, conflicts with all your frien🌃ds, and acknowledging that some of the decisions you’ve made haven’t been good,” she explains. “It&rsquoꦏ;s a pretty universal thing, right? You can run away from stuff, or you can tackle it head on. Or you can tackle it sideways but also address the messier interactions you played a part in.”
In the past Hollinrake has worked o𒊎n the likes of Magic: The☂ Gathering, Fall Guys, and the vastly underrated Adventure Time: Pirates of the Enchiridion.
We’ve seen myriad games in recent years explore this sort of tumultuous growth that people in their twenties go through, especially LGBTQ+ individuals who have so many more barriers to contend with to find their place in the world. It’s beautiful, but also an absolute nightma♈re.
Yet it's through this adversary where you find yourself, often through joy, hardship, sex, love, arguments, and feeling like you have nowhere else left to turn. So you opt to suck it up, hop back on your broom and keep on going, since finding yourself is more than worthwhile.
“It’s about that sense of found family, finding people that really get you, but also just the silly experiences, like trying to navigate a crappy house share,” Hollinrake laughs. “Or hoꦇw you interact with people that are outside your general sphere of influence and having to slowly become a public facing adult after leaving behind the bubble of university.”
⚡ ANNOUNCING OUR DEBUT GAME: CRESCENT COUNTY ⚡
💫 Drift and drive on your witch-tech motorbroom
🎁 Make deliveries by day, street race by night
🖌️ Turn your crappy studio flat into a home
😘 Be a flirty disaster and kiss your friends
👇 AVAILABLE NOW TO WISHLIST!!! 👇
— CRESCENT COUNTY 🧹 (@ElectricSaint_)
‘Coming of age’ is a phrase that comes up several times when talking Crescent County, and how thi💧s descriptor is often applied to teenagers in high school trying to win over crushes or nail high grades before applying to college. But you often forget that people in their twenties and thirties are still going through a similar journey as they try to make friends, fall in love, or find a craft that is truly their own. Hollinrake hopes to create a game that isn’t just exploring a magical witch-tech world filled with motorbroo🐼ms and sapphic flirtation, but to depict a place where you can feel lost and found all at once.
Since its reveal, Crescent County has been described by fans in a variety of silly littleꦑ ways. Some of the prospective titles include Broom Stranding, Kiki’s Delivery Service: Turbo Edition, and Sapphic Crazy Taxi. People really took the gays on brooms thing and ran with it.
“I’m really interesting in finding a community, figuring out what you owe it, and what you have to face up to whenꦰ you f**k up, but how you can come back to that place as well, “Hollinrake continues. “I think [there’s value] in having joyful, warm, and chaotic experiences but always asking questions about how you can take ownership or your behaviour, not run away from a mistake, and how these things🔯 can make a place feel more significant. How do you find your home through that?”
Hollindrake and I are similar in that we struggle to create art without emotional meaning, and that will often drive us to bring new things to life whether we realise it or not. Who you are, a🧸ll you’ve been through, and what your goals are will influence the art you conjure up. It is all over Crescent County, even if it still manages to be a fun, bubbly, and gorgeous game about delivering packages, ♔smooching girls, and decorating your charming little island flat.
Crescent County is currently in development for PC and Xbox.
