Two new author interviews: cheerleader's choice and undying fortress
Author Interview: Charli Battersby, Cheerleader's Choice: New York Spirit
Be! Heroic! B-E heroic! When villainy rules the streets of New York, it’s up to you to grab your pompoms, lead the cheer squad, and climb to the top of the pyramid to save the city!
Cheerleader’s Choice: New York Spirit is an interactive novel by former cheerleader Charli Battersby. Your choices control the story. It’s entirely text-based, 280,000 words and hundreds of choices, without graphics or sound effects, fueled by the vast unstoppable power of your imagination. You’ll cheer and you’ll lead, in a game that you read! I sat down with Charli to talk about choices and cheers.
Cheerleader’s Choice: New York Spirit releases Thursday, December 11th! You can wishlist the game on Steam today.
Read a sample of the author interview with Charli Battersby below and check out the rest of the interview on our blog at
choiceofgames.com/blog
This is is your return to COG and this time: it’s personal. Tell our readers about your life as a cheerleader.
I became a cheerleader as an adult, just like the playable character in the game. I was a nerd in high school, and didn’t even dream that I could ever be a cheerleader. When I tried out for the team, I was riddled with self-doubt. And, even after making it onto the team, I still had impostor syndrome. This is a core theme in
Cheerleader’s Choice, which, I assure you IS a comedy. All of this is played for laughs, with a lot of satire and slapstick as your make your way in the bizarre world of adult cheerleading.
And yes, there really are adult cheer teams, similar to the fictional “New York Spirit” in my game. These are mostly non-profit organizations that raise money for charities, and are primarily made up of ex-cheerleaders in their 30’s. In the game, your character can be a total newbie, or an experienced former cheerleader. And you can be young or old. I was no sorority girl when I stared cheering, so the middle-aged, clueless newbie, options in the game are very close to my own path.
In
Cheerleader’s Choice I depict cheerleading as realistically as I can, based on my experiences doing stunts, marching in parades, doing charity work and, of course cheering!
I try to show the behind the scenes training that goes into those amazing performances. You don’t start the game as a naturally gifted cheerleader who effortlessly becomes the world’s greatest cheerleader. There’s lot of work just to make it onto the squad. And it only gets harder from there.
Wishlist on Steam:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2500720/Cheerleaders_Choice_New_York_Spirit/
Full author interview here:
https://www.choiceofgames.com/2025/...attersby-cheerleaders-choice-new-york-spirit/
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