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Melancholy Island is one of the most affecting pieces of media I've ever read. My partner feels the same way; he cried several times while reading. (I have his permission to say that.) I feel very lucky to have backed this project at the diary tier. Reading/playing with Wall's diary as context was a singular experience. I'm a writer, but the words I need to describe Melancholy Island aren't flowing. To me, that's a testament to the work you've done here. You've created something devastating and truthful through this semi-fictionalized collection.

When it came time to create my island, I hesitated. The book was asking something of me I didn't want to do. I think that's the point, so I went ahead and did it. There's this wonderful friction between what the book was doing... and I wanted for Wall as the writer and myself as a reader. This was heightened by knowing what becomes of Wall from the beginning. Now my copy is a potent object, something created in the space between writer and reader. I think that's a powerful way to physicalize a process which takes place in great writing: the creation of something new when the reader/player is introduced.

And of course, having read the physical version, I only just now found the link on "I'm sorry" in the digital version. This truly is an expansive project that only grows as I explore it. 

"Well done" feels insufficient.

This made my entire week. I'm so happy it worked for you and that it affected you that way. Not to celebrate dread lol

Your comment is incredibly thoughtful; I very much appreciate the ramble. You clearly get what I was trying to do, and that's such a gift to me. Thank you!

I'm so glad this game poem / experience helped you feel better! That's a huge compliment. Thank you for playing it.

Thank you for playing it. It means the world, truly. This was an intense game to make, too, so anytime someone connects with it, I feel really seen.

That's wonderful to hear!!! Thank YOU for taking the time to engage with this work.

Thank you so much for saying that! I really appreciate it, and I'm glad you felt cared for (despite what the game claims at the start).

Thank you! Yes, game of ouch

Wow, your thoughts on this really made my day. Thank you for engaging with Excavation One in such a generous way. It means a lot.

To hear that my work helped you reflect on your own -- that's great! Thank you for commenting.

Holy crap, thank you so much! It was not easy to make, so I'm glad it's doing what it's meant to do.

The way this piece plays with control and impossible instructions is so incredibly effective. I also particularly love the use of tautologies. Lends this sense of inevitability and dread to the whole thing. Seriously, I feel like I'm learning so much by reading this -- about how to use the language of TTRPGs to deliver gut punches, about characterization, about ambient worldbuilding. I can't accurately describe the emotion I felt when reaching the end, and that's really good.

Also, thank you for including a dyslexia friendly version! This prompted me to start doing that with my stuff from now on.

What a stellar submission to the jam.

What a great entry to the jam! Captures something really cool -- dark yet scrappy in its hope. I think that's hope I'm feeling? Favorite lines: "they'll break before they understand" and the last line, of course.

This is fantastic design. I LOVE how succeeding with a flourish affects your next roll, and the fact that shocks don't level up, but Para does. And scoops are such a succinct and effective tool for the editor to structure a session around.

Thank you for such a thoughtful comment! Made me smile.

You're welcome and thank YOU!! I think I owe it to myself to play my own darn game.

I'm excited to try this out! (Fittingly, I'll need to visit the library to print it.) "On A Sunbeam" seems like a fantastic book to use for this exercise/LARP. As a Rook myself, I'm happy to see some good rook art. 

We called it "Celebrity Fit Check" at the treatment place I went to post-psych ward. The secret word/words were always the name of a celebrity or historical figure, and each incorrect guess meant the person would draw one more part of celebrity's outfit. Imo, better game, more fun. I had no idea this was such a common experience for those who have been inpatient.

I will purchase this when I get paid in about eight days.

That makes sense! Thank you :)

Hey! I'm working on a setting too, and there's something I'm getting stuck on. In her Songbirds style guide, snow mentions some suggested elements that make up a Songbirds setting. One of these is to have 10 Classes (for worldbuilding purposes), but try as I might, I cannot find what "Class" might refer to in the corebook. There's a mention of "class abilities" in a table somewhere, but no section detailing specific Classes or a description of what that term means in Songbirds.

Notably, Freelancers are distinct from Classes, since the style guide also mentions that you should have 10 Freelancers for a setting.

I wish I could afford Chevalier to reference right now lol. How are you interpreting that "10 Classes" suggestion? My current best guess is like, roles which songbirds can step into, specific the setting I'm building. I've got some stuff written out narratively -- ex: a class for pseudoscientific reverse-necromancy, a class for 'that guy everyone knows,' a class called 'The Vestigial Worker' -- but I have no idea how to approach making mechanics for each of these. Should I? Should they each have pre-chosen Skill proficiencies? Gifts and Curses? And what is this about "class abilities?"

Maybe the answer is 'whatever you want,' and I'm overthinking this.

Thank you! I'm not super familiar with the term "unfiction," and I'm excited to look into it. Feels apt. My original plan for this piece did actually include "screenshots" of Sitzprobe Assemblage, but I had to pivot and lean into that ambiguity in order to submit to the jam on time. Mr. Candle and his favorite forum are probably going to recur in my work, though, so maybe I'll end up making Sitzprobe screenshots sometime.

Thank you for saying so! I do aim to make things that resonate with people :)

Glad to hear it! I appreciate your comment, however vague. I was definitely very intentional about what information I included and where, so vagueness is appropriate.

Thank you for the link (it works)! I'm in a similar boat with journaling. I'd really like to play more solo games -- both for the experience and to inform my own work -- but I find trouble carving out both time and energy.

That's so kind! I'll definitely try to track down the jam you mentioned; I really can't get enough of stuff like that. I actually released something a month or so ago about signal vs. noise! It's called "not signs... patterns." Very different vibe than this conversation, but I thought I'd mention it.

I feel really lucky that you've responded to Sitzprobe in this way. I think I've gotten maybe five-ish comments about the actual content of my games since I started posting them here in 2022, so it's really refreshing to hear what someone thinks about a thing I wrote. Comments like that can be trailmarkers in their own way. Thank you for your insightful words!

I think about that a lot, too. There are probably already numerous papers on the topic of micro-parasociality, for lack of a better term. But I think it'll be years until any of us can truly wrap our brains around the way "being online" has added all these overlapping layers between public and private, personal and commercial. Sometimes I get jealous of artists who have big platforms, but then I remember that while online presence can give someone that sort of reach, it can also render someone a "public figure" in an instant. Whether they want all those eyeballs on them or not! But then again, I cannot condemn the whole thing because I am grateful for what I've learned and experienced online. Especially what I've witnessed through the tiny windows of art.

Thank you so much! This is great to hear. As someone who has also chewed through a lot of analysis of weird games, I'm so glad I captured the feel. Never played OFF, but I definitely was in the same internet circles as those who did.

If you want a super interesting exploration/critique of that dynamic between artists and the people who try to know them through their art, I'd recommend the Beginner's Guide. (I have been both of the people in that dynamic at various points.) Absolutely pivotal game for me.

I finally managed to fix this after much time away from my computer. Thank you so much for letting me know! 

Goncharov (1973) motion picture score

What follows is an essay on the earliest known game of Goncharov.
Also, I'm lying.

~

I'm obsessed with your essay-game. Even that Frankensteined term feels like an incomplete answer to the question "what is this piece to me?" (A question I asked myself, of course. This will be a recurrent theme.) Whatever I call it, this thing hit me squarely in the ribcage because I've played Goncharov before. 

Please indulge me. I want to tell you about another seed.

Our freshman year of high school, my deranged theatre friends and I played Goncharov for an audience of one: our friend, my recurrent scene partner, and our theatre group's "leading man" -- Jeff. To this day, several of us remain fierce friends and constant collaborators, including Jeff and I. He is one of the most blisteringly skilled artists I know.

Together, our ragtag crew (minus our target) made up an anime called Demon Tomes. We embellished the stage with fanart, headcanon rants, and even one whole gif. It worked. Jeff believed and, much to our delight, joined us in the fandom. But now, as I'm writing this a decade later, a thought occurs. Did Jeff ever search for a Demon Tomes tag on Tumblr? We were all active in various fandoms there; surely his first instinct would be to search for footholds? 

Either he never bothered to investigate beyond our conversations, or he made the arguably "stronger" choice as a performer: he searched for this cool new anime, found nothing, and joined the scene anyway.

We knew/know him very well. We crafted Demon Tomes specifically for him. In retrospect, that curation probably sold the fantasy. Drawing each frame for that gif of the Caretaker smoking, I didn't have Jeff at the top of my mind, but he was  there nonetheless. Swimming somewhere fathoms deep.

But perhaps if you're quick when spotting ethical quicksand or familiar with the emotional dangers of method acting, you've already called foul in your head. And I wouldn't blame you! Perhaps if you were here with me, you'd say -- Hey Rook, the difference between Goncharov and Demon Tomes is that the former involves thousands of willing players who are in on the joke, whereas the latter involves one unwitting player who is perhaps the punchline. Couldn't that be considered a gaslighting prank? 

I have thought about this a lot myself. I put myself in Jeff's old boots and ask, "would I enjoy this if I were in Jeff's position?" 

Spoiler: Jeff did. This is more evidence for him knowing all along. He expressed nothing but delight from overture to plot twist to curtain call. And he absolutely could and would fool us jesters like that. He once had me guessing his three middle names based on initials for years, only to yank me offstage with a casual "oh, you already guessed them years ago, but I won't tell you which guess."

So Jeff loved Demon Tomes, and perhaps he was the director all along. But Jeff and I are very different in many ways. April Fool's day makes me cry. I'm painfully gullible in the face of deception without logic. Every time I think: "why would they lie about something so inconsequential?" Thus, I'm a sitting duck for pranks and I hate them. Pranks affect me so adversely that as April Fool's approaches every year, I remind my loved ones that they shouldn't prank me unless they want to witness me melting down on the spot.

I could write endlessly and aimlessly about this, but my ruthless chronic pain acts up more when I type for prolonged periods. It's become so agonizing that I can no longer draw, and I have no indication it will ever improve. My first love, my longest pursuit, my most-honed skill. My career. Each and every one, names for the same dead sapling.

Jeff is perhaps the only person I've told about this grief who can perceive the vast meaning of the loss. He and I have very different practices, styles, and trajectories -- but we've both been drawing for about the same number of years. Which is to say: our entire lives, if you count the way I do. 

Jeff and I both graduated with razor-sharp skills and beautiful portfolios from meatgrinder, prestige-belching institutions. But Jeff went to art school, and I went to theatre school. We both got messed up in special ways, curated to us as individuals, and we paid for the privilege. For a long time, I thought the best metaphor for my time as an acting student goes like this: You know how when a caterpillar contorts its own body to rend its way out of a cocoon? But now I know that's a lie. I may have written it, but it originated with my professors. Caterpillars must undergo pain to transform and fly. My acting "training" was abusive. Abuse is not what's "best" for the person being abused. It is violently, ruiningly unnecessary.

If I ever escaped my cocoon, I didn't do so in theatre school.

I did so right here, just now.

~

for the caretaker playlist

What follows is the game of my life, as thanks for the benediction.

~

The village of Roxaboxen lies in a one-acre wood. You are the local mapmaker who lives by the fallen oak. You spend your days drafting ever-more specific maps of the acre. This requires a steady hand and an inquisitive eye. Travelers arrive and depart, but some stay long enough for you to learn their names, their mannerisms, their fears. You sketch them in your free time and trade them maps of the surrounding area for shards of sea-glass. 

There’s the hunter. She moved silently and took several spoonfuls of sugar in her tea. Then there’s the blacksmith and his brother, who picked up odd jobs around the village and has a gap in his teeth. The blacksmith worked with thunder-metal found in sheets in the one-acre wood, so named for the sound it made when shaken. You remember that low, rolling sound. And Luke, you remember Luke. He stayed the longest. He taught you how to fold a piece of paper into a scorpion, how to throw a knife, how to laugh without trepidation. The other travelers still pass through every once and awhile, but you know you’ll never see Luke again.

Roxaboxen has changed over the years, shifting around you like roots enveloping a stone. The treehouse was built, and visitors from all over painted on its walls, and then, after years, it collapsed in a storm. Pets get old and die. Gardens bloom. Things are always rising up and caving in around here. Growing, decaying. 

Thankfully, your younger sister -- the local tinkerer -- is a constant. She once fashioned a functional axe handle out of a porch spindle. She’s dormant dynamite, full of potential energy. Although you’re the mapmaker and she’s the tinkerer, she’s the one who has ventured all over the outer lands. She brings back scraps for her work and artifacts for you. A small wooden box filled with teeth, a stone etched with unknown symbols, curiously strong magnet. She will always come back.

Your task, too, stays the same: map the one-acre wood with increasing detail. You take to mapping the deer trails through the tall grass. The footprints of a hurried chipmunk. The slime-path of a slug which spent the day sliding across your front step. You take to mapping the stars. There, the kite constellation. The mongoose. The scorpion, for Luke. You look up, and you look down. The universe spreads in all directions, endless, and you will never see more than a fraction of it, let alone map that fraction. You have fashioned yourself into an authority on the minute details of Roxaboxen. You’ve charted the residents’ daily routines. You’ve mapped the rambling paths of sleepwalkers. And for what? You will never be able to capture the totality of this place, or any place. 

What use is a mapmaker who won’t venture beyond their one-acre world? 

So, today, you’ve decided to leave. What’s out there? Have you brought enough ink? Do you have your pencil-sharpening knife? How many people will think of you once you’ve left? Will they remember your name? Will you remember theirs? 

Who knows you now? I mean, really knows you? 

When will you come home? Will you ever? Why not? What’s wrong with home?

Who do you think you are?

 Are you scared?

 Will you go anyway?

You're absolutely welcome. Thank you for taking these games with you.

This is a collection of six small games, each with their own player count. The minimum is one player (LAST TRAIN), the maximum is 6 (FIRST CONTACT, SKELETONS + A SIX PACK, and BUT WHY?). The other games are for two players (BITTERSWEET BREW and SHELTER FROM THE STORM).

Thank you :> It's a tone I often try to strike with my art. It feels honest to me.

Thank you so much, I'm glad you found the games to be useful! 

A campfire is a wonderful setting for AFTERPARTY v2! Please do let me know your thoughts after playing. I use the term "game poem" after a TTRPG form out of Norway, and I don't speak Norwegian! There is a small community of English games in the Norwegian style. This website was hugely helpful in the development of AFTERPARTY: https://norwegianstyle.wordpress.com/

Hi! Is this jam for video games only? Or are physical games like TTRPGs accepted as well?

https://rookthegremlin.itch.io/afterparty-v2

https://rookthegremlin.itch.io/narcissus-echo

This rocks. An excellent pairing with Gaiman's work.

WONDERFUL, thank you!

Absolutely! I am new to itch so I don't know the UI very well. Where can I find the community copies option? For now I've made it free or donation.