Anna Hollinrake And Pavle Mihajlovic On The Magic Of Biking On Broom in Crescent County
Crescent County owes its existence to three factors: an artstation post from 2017, a BAFTA Breakthrough event from the same year, and a motorbike helmet. Anna Hollinrake and Pavle Mihajlovic, the co-founders of Electric Saint first met at said BAFTA event and then, in 2019, learned how to ride motorbikes together, as Hollinrake comments ‘largely because I had a motorbike helmet and it was expensive’. At one point during their practice, Mihajlovic successfully helped Hollinrake avoid a motorway when she’d got separated, after that starting a studio didn’t seem like as big a deal as it would otherwise have had.
Crescent County, which Electric Saint have dubbed a ‘delivery life-sim’ on its Steam page is a game inspired by one key idea: the motorbroom. It’s a world where broomsticks are more than a costume element for Halloween, they’re motorised and representative of the same kind of freedom that motorbikes are in our universe. The game, which does not have a release date at the time of writing, will see players step into the shoes of Lu, ‘a messy young adult figuring herself out’, taking on the role of both a motorbroom courier and a motorbroom racer. In addition to this, players will be able to befriend and romance Crescent County’s denizens, decorate their home, and more. The press release is quick to point out that your flat will be ‘slightly tragic’ and the romance will be ‘the messy kind’.
Finding Home In A Digital Space
Anna’s first jump into the motorboom world - where brooms are loveable objects, encapsulating freedom and independence as motorbikes do in our universe - was back in 2017. The drawing, titled ‘Motorbrrruuuuuum’ inspired her. ‘From there on out, [it] stuck in my head’, she said, adding ‘once all of the… motorbroom stuff fell into place, I was just hooked and became very annoying about it’.
The bond between Hollinrake and Mihajlovic, respectively the creative director and technical director at Electric Saint, shone through in our conversation, and it’s clear that they are on the same wavelength in terms of the game’s aesthetic and core themes. Mihajlovic, who came to the UK to join Peter Molyneux’s studio 22Cans in 2012 when he was just 18, recounts the feeling of being overwhelmed and feeling lost in Guildford, before he knew the area or had made any friends. It was this progression that made him want to work with Anna Hollinrake on Crescent County, the sense of learning the lay of the land, ‘a consistent space’, as he puts it, and finding new friends, who the game’s press release cheekily dubs ‘delightful weirdos.’.
The feeling of being out of place and trying to find a new home is something that many of us can relate to, whether we’ve moved for work, university, or any number of other reasons. Crescent County is deeply inspired by this feeling, as Hollinrake made clear.
‘I think there’s so much day-to-day mundanity that can be amped up for hilarious game reasons. How do you navigate the politics of a shit house share? Or how do you find the people that you want to hang out with because they actually get you as a person?’ It’s a feeling she wants to place at the heart of Crescent County in a ‘chaotic and crunchy gameplay kind of way’.
Cozy But Crunchy
In the game’s press release, Hollinrake described the game’s style as ‘cozy-with-bite’. I was curious to know more about this. How would she and Mihajlovicstrike that balance, without one style overpowering the other?
‘I think the first thing is making sure that the moment-to-moment gameplay feels really good…if the driving doesn’t feel amazing, then what’s the point?’ She went on to say ‘We're putting a lot of thought into how the haptics feel, how the camera responds to the speed that you're going at, what kind of powers you're able to use, how the environment responds to that’. The end goal is ‘flow-state gameplay’, a feeling of being in the zone. A point of reference that Hollinrake raises is OlliOlli World, a game that she played so much she had to wear a wrist brace, and one that she feels strikes the balance between being tough while also letting you take it at your own pace.
They want this same balance to be struck in the story as well, Mihajlovic says, while the game may want to provoke good vibes, it will not just be good times.‘It’s a story about pretty good people that maybe don't have it all together yet or that haven't quite figured it out’, he explained.
From what I’ve seen of it, the game has the same energy as the best of punk rock - a hard-to-describe crunchiness with a human heart. It’s a comparison that Hollinrake agrees with, saying ‘I think that being overly positive and saccharine can do characters a disservice sometimes and I think when you see characters with some flaws, some morally grey areas, trying to work stuff out, that could be quite comforting for people to see represented.’ She went on to tell us, ‘Also, it's just more fun. I think that you can absolutely still get that sense of warmth whilst also asking what it means to find your place in a community and work out interpersonal dramas’.
Climbing Aboard
What is going to happen when a player loads up Crescent County for the first time? ‘The core thing that they’re going to be doing is driving around this beautiful island on their very own motorbroom. That’s the core experience that we want to give…getting your own broom that you can customise, Mihajlovic said. Hollinrake went on to add ‘Then you meet all of the motorbroom enthusiasts channelling some roller derby inspired energy and kind of building those relationships there through hanging out racing around the island inviting them back to your crappy studio flat.’
The pair remained tight-lipped about specific details the game will feature, such as whether it will feature a trick system, but Mihajlovic did mention that the game will reward players for doing cool things, as well as allowing them to correct any mistakes that they’ve made ‘if you missed a turn, we have some abilities that help you kind of. [You can] go back a bit and fix any mistakes you might have made if you're not as comfortable with the driving elements.
The profoundly positive reaction to the game has thrilled the team - ‘it’s been really cool because we’ve gotten a ton of fan art already…it’s been incredible’, Pavle Mihajlovic said. They put this down to the game’s vibe being profoundly generative, ‘something that you can see yourself as a part of’, as Hollinrake put it. As to the possibility of Crescent County cosplays?
‘If someone rocked up to Comic Con, where I’ve been tabling since 2018, in Crescent County cosplay, it’s all over – I’d just weep, I wouldn’t be able to stop crying. I’d be a ruin. Yeah, if that happens, that’s going to be something else’.
Crescent County does not yet have a release date, but it is now listed on Steam for those who want to wishlist it and keep track of what appears to be a fascinating and engaging project.
