In this particular collection, I expect that these things would tend to appeal to alterhumans. The things in this collection aren't about alterhumans. (Or, in some cases, aren't necessarily about alterhumans.) This is a catch-all collection of even more various games, books, and tools that might resonate with alterhumans, for various reasons. In some cases, it's because alterhumans were involved with creating them. In some other cases, the creations seem similar to an alterhuman experience but they don't come from that context.
This is part of a series of collections for alterhumans. As that link explains about in more detail, alterhuman is an umbrella term that can potentially include as many members of these groups and identities as personally feel they relate to what's in here: therianthropes, otherkin, fictionfolk, plural systems, and furry lifestylers. At that link, I have other collections of things on itch.io that are actually about alterhumans, with explanations of what they are.
Here are some of my collections that spin off from this one, specializing in types of things that alterhumans tend to find interesting:
Content: Rated G. This is a comedy horror that has some scary themes. In the game's accessibility options, it lets you turn off some scary images, for example, spiders.
Medium: Computer game.
Genre and subject: Fiction. Comedy horror. Fantasy.
About: "an analog horror inspired telephone operator simulator where you answer incoming callers' questions about what's inside their home." The possibilities range from mundane (termites, black mold, or gas leaks) to various problems inspired by horror, fantasy, and folklore.
Content: Rated X. This story centers on a graphic sex scene. Warnings for blood, unprotected sex, violent institutional oppression in a dystopia, and fantasy body horror. WARNING FOR FLASHING LIGHTS!
Medium: An interactive story created with Decker. To read the whole story, you have to find and click on various parts of an image and scroll through text in small windows.
About: In a dystopia more than a hundred years in the future, two doomed rebels have sex in an otherwise empty theater just before it gets raided. While old werewolf movies flicker on the screen, the partners talk about how these films influenced their political movement and how they chose their own body modifications: fangs, fur, sex organs, and extra breasts.
Relevance: This is about people who chose body modifications that make themselves resemble classic horror movie monsters. The story doesn't happen to give a word to either characters' gender, species, or what they call people who get these sorts of body modifications.
Content: Rated G.
Medium: A single-player live action role-playing game (LARP), specifically a lyric game.
About: Inspired by Brave Sparrow (a game that would be in this collection too if it was on itch.io). The gameplay has a lot of thoughts about how to express the values of domesticated dogs in human life. For example, one aspect of loyalty is duty, and it explains how that can be expressed by voting or volunteering.
Medium: Live action role-playing game (LARP), specifically a lyric game.
About: As described by the designer of this game, it is "a hack of Avery Alder's Brave Sparrow. Brave Sparrow is an awesome and poetic game about bravery, quiet beauty, solitude, and the hope of regaining what's lost. Definitely check it out if you haven't. Rave Sparrow, meanwhile, is a wacky little game about optimism, being loud and social, getting messy, also some bravery, and pushing yourself not to let opportunities pass you by."
Content: Rated R, 18+. The game creators say this is a horror game and not for children. They also say, "There are rare flashing images in the game, so if that’s a health risk for you, please turn them off in the preferences." (Emphasis added.) Without spoilers, I can say that generally the content warnings are for graphic violence and unreality. The game creators have a page where you can see a list of specific content warnings and where they are in the game.
Medium: Computer game. A visual novel with many meaningful choices and many endings. This listing on itch.io is for a demo. The full version is on Steam.
About: You need to slay the Princess, or the world will end.
Relevance: Without significant spoilers, I can say that from very early in the game, your choices are narrated or guided by voices in your mind that are almost but not quite your own. When one of my partner systems and I played this game together, we agreed that this story sometimes sounds remarkably plural to us, though as far as we've seen, it isn't named as such. See what Plural Reviews has to say about this game.
Content: Rated G.
Medium: A computer desktop utility.
About: "Replace your ordinary mouse cursor with its eternal nemesis: the cat paw."
Vibe: Whimsical.
Content: Rated PG-13 or R. Animal death and reproduction.
Medium: Computer game.
Story: You are a dragon, an animal balanced between wild carnivore and sapient intelligence. You have a multitude of choices that can shape every aspect of how you grow up and explore your world as dangerous humans encroach upon your wilderness.
Relevance: The designer of this long computer game about being a dragon was involved with the dragon otherkin community.
Content: Rated PG-13. Warnings for alcohol, drugs, body horror, scary moments, trauma, grief, kink, fantasy racism, and gross-out humor about spoiled food and unsanitary things.
Medium: Computer game. Mostly a visual novel with a few puzzles.
Duration: Hours for each play through. You have to play the game over from the beginning to get the other endings.
About: Science fiction with some elements of comedy and horror. The first truly artificially intelligent robot asks you (a failing journalist) to help investigate the disappearance of their creator.
Relevance: There is a side-story about people who look like furries because they're getting nonhuman gene therapy, and not just for purely aesthetic reasons. It shows many arguments that conservatives use to oppose that practice, which sound curiously similar to arguments that conservatives use today to oppose various health rights, especially abortion. I wonder if this might be very much like what many of us therians, otherkin, alterhumans, and furries may face in the future.
Content: Unrated.
Medium: Zines.
About: "Six anarchist zines that might be of interest to alterhumans. Some of which served as inspiration for THERIANARCHY."
Content: Rated G. Friendly for all ages.
Medium: A short interactive picture book created in Twine.
Duration: Each play through is a few minutes long. You can replay it several times to choose different options.
Story: You spend a day as an intern for a talking animal to learn kindly lessons from them.
Relevance: I think therianthropes would be interested in this.
Content: Rated G. Warning for descriptions of bullying and dysphoria.
Medium: An illustrated zine created in Twine. Its interactivity is in that you click to advance to the next page, but it's a linear piece with no choices.
Duration: A few minutes long. One play through to see all.
About: Non-fiction. A trans woman's personal memoir where she explains what she means when she says she is a pupper. It's a reference to a meme that felt really meaningful and helpful to her.
Content: Rated G. Friendly for all ages. Voluntary transformation, which isn't really shown.
Medium: A computer game created in Bitsy.
Duration: A few minutes long. One play through to see all.
Story: You put some ingredients into a cauldron and become a catgirl.
Relevance: I think otherkin and transspecies people would be interested in this because it's about choosing a nonhuman transformation.
Content: Rated PG-13. References to bodies and sex aren't explicit.
Medium: A supplement for any tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG) or story that has nonhuman cultures.
About: In a nonhuman culture, would they have the same norms about gender and relationships? What do they think makes a gender, could it be something else unrelated to what humans think is key to that? Consider these questions when you're world-building or designing a character. You can use these dice rolling tables to generate some ideas for your game or story.
Relevance: I think otherkin and xenogender people would be interested in this because it's about experiences of gender that differ from human norms.
Content: Rated PG-13. Consensual physical intimacy and desire.
Medium: An interactive fiction story created in Twine.
Duration: Each play through is a few minutes long. Replay with different choices to see each of the story paths.
Accessibility: This game is text only, so it should be accessible for players who have impaired hearing or vision.
Story: You are trying to choose a dance partner at a party for monsters while navigating social cues and sensory overload as a queer autistic creature.
Relevance: I think otherkin would be interested in this.
Content: Rated G. Friendly for all ages.
Medium: Twine game.
About the author's experiences with being autistic and transgender, and how this relates to domestication and wildness.
Relevance: I think therianthropes would be interested in this because it contextualizes personal experiences in animality.
Content: Rated G. Friendly for all ages.
Medium: Live Action Role Play (LARP).
About: The players sit in a circle and use nonverbal communication to role-play as wolves in scenarios described by the game master.
Relevance: I think therianthropes would be interested in this because it has nonhuman animal protagonists and has you emulate animal behavior.
Content: Rated G. Friendly for all ages, though it deals with some topics that are heavy or that some may find troubling. Hunting and fishing for food. Your character can black out from exhaustion, or get thrown in jail. However, you don't die, and you don't do combat. Some story elements are about hunger, poverty, homelessness, the displacement of Native Americans, and the enslavement of African Americans in this game that is set during a period of US history soon before the Civil War.
Accessibility: Closed captions for audio dialog. Some text on screen is in cursive and doesn't have audio narration.
Medium: A first-person video game, sometimes called a walking simulator.
Story: You play as Thoreau in a historical reenactment of his memoir Walden. It's very detailed and accurate, aside from where it has to take artistic license for game play reasons.
Relevance: I think therianthropes would be interested in this because of some of its narration about the relationship between human and nature.
Content: Rated PG-13. I haven't tried it yet, so explore with caution.
Story: A visual novel of romance and murder mystery set in a world of dragons.
Relevance: Though you can only play as a human in this game, I think dragon kin would be interested in this. In fact, many of the backers of this game's development were members of the dragon community. One of whom, a dragon otherkin, Goldkin, backed the game at the highest level, inserting a couple of their own fictional characters into the game, Lorem and Ipsum.
Content: Rated PG-13. Photosensitivity warning for flashing lights! Warning for description or depiction of panic attacks, social anxiety, unwanted intrusive thoughts, depression, low self esteem, suicidal ideation, dismemberment, painful experiences, protagonist death, family member death, violence involving animal-like fantasy creatures, and sexual violence.
Accessibility: Again, photosensitivity warning for flashing lights! You play with a mouse, and some puzzles require you to click on small details extremely fast before a short timer is up.
Medium: A computer game that was created in Flash. A visual novel with occasional puzzles you must solve to progress.
Duration: Hours. It's impressive that nearly all of the music, interactivity, animations, and hand-drawn art were created by one person, especially given how long and fully-realized this game is. Make sure you unlock all the endings to get the whole story, because the final secret ending is important. If you get stuck on that one, it's worth looking up a hint from other players to get it.
Story: Unconventional fantasy. An adventure through a world where people's thoughts can manifest as nonhuman entities called thoughtforms or tulpas, who are sentient personifications of ideas, and people can train to become something like magicians who use their own thoughts to influence their surroundings.
Relevance: I think plurals would be interested in this because of some of the world-building about thoughtforms and powerful thoughts.
Content: Rated G. Voluntary transformation. Cooking food.
Medium: Computer game. Play with a keyboard and mouse (WASD controls), or a video game controller.
Story: A peaceful, wholesome, somewhat surreal fantasy game about running a cat café on a magical island where your neighbors are witches and people can turn into animals.
Relevance: I think therianthropes, otherkin, and transspecies people would be interested in this because of its voluntary transformation themes. You play a human protagonist with a lot of unlock-able character customization options, and you can find a spell that you can optionally use to turn you into a cat.
Content: Rated G. Friendly for all ages.
Medium: Brief instructions for a single-player live action role-play game (LARP).
Duration: You play it for a couple of minutes occasionally during your day.
Story: As a mindfulness exercise, you try to pretend that you are explaining to an imaginary friend about the real world around you.
Relevance: I think friends of plurals would be interested in this.
