all alone, flesh and bone, evil carved in stone

I break with established tradition because I am pairing this with an entry on the Train Wreck. This was too good not to announce in both places.

The past week, I have been spending nearly every hour possible in Twilight Tears, building a haunted house. It's named "Hunt House" partially because I wanted something simple and memorable, but also because, with very few exceptions, what I didn't create on my own, I acquired on various sim-wide and grid-wide hunts. While there are items I've bought in there, even some of those items I bought while on grid-wide hunts.

It's also a hunt on its own. There are fourteen (I tried for thirteen; I went one over) pumpkins to find and buy in the house. There are three levels to search. It's a Linden per pumpkin not because I'm wanting to make money--I won't--but because I did put a bit of effort into everything I put out.

With every pumpkin, you get the pumpkin you see (included in its decorated shell) and an item. Warning to the arachnophobic: Spiders are involved in the prizes! And the house, sort of. I'll explain.

Two of the hunt gifts are spider silks; they're all prim-based, because the spiders are talented, hand-trained Chechoslovakian clinging spiders: Primmatica adhesiva, in natural orange, and in specially bred pale, glowing green. There are also four variants of the spider crown.

In addition to those and to the pumpkins themselves, there is a bloodstained clown dress (that I may be inspired now to make additional versions of!); a box of radiant moss textures (you can see examples on the first floor of the house); a box of glowing light beams for spooky ambience; the rest are things I've had up in the store, but don't any longer.

Oh, one more spider thing--the clown dress? Comes with glass spider eyes.

You start here:



Yes, it's a door, standing in a field of black grass! I was amused by the concept of the cornfield with a door, but it struck me that it worked better as just a door, fairly unhidden.

It has an "ENTER" sign above it, that might help. Also a pumpkin tree. And a grave with floating ghosts.

(I love the grave, actually. Click the mound of earth--you're a zombie! Click the headstone--you get to float with the ghosts!)



Each level is a mini-maze; or maybe just a maze of corridors. You'll be going in the right direction, you won't get lost unless you turn around, and in general, if you've heard the sounds before, you're going backwards. It's not that confusing.



Some of the props used in the house are also for sale. If you just want the prop itself (mostly collider sound panels), just buy it when you find one you like. If you'd rather have the sounds full-perm for your own creations, drop me a notecard, we'll work something out. Nearly all the sounds I have--and all the sounds I used in the creation of this house--I either created and imported myself, or I got from royalty-free sites and imported in.



Go up level by level until you reach the attic. And there, you will find a lovely Victorian lady...who still thinks she's alive. Poor dear. But she's very loquacious, and just...dying...to talk with you. Something terrible happened to her, after all...

(There's a door to the side that will let you come back down to the main store, so you don't have to retrace your steps. And if you haven't gotten the gift for the Unknown Hunt, stick around and pick it up.)

I'm looking forward to this. I may tweak some things, as I said, but really--it's open, it's live!

Well...in a sense.

Come join us. We'll be waiting for you.