#49 to #52: Games for Endings & Beginnings
Go to a grave that hasn’t been visited for a while. Take flowers.
Get to know the grave and the person in it. While you’re stood in front of it imagine what they were like as a person.
What were they like as a child, a teenager, an adult? How did their hair feel? Where did they ache and what caused it? What was the furthest place they went to? Who broke their heart?
If you want, talk to them. Tell them a little about your life.
If you want, research them,
Visit on the same day each year. As yourself new questions each time. What where they like at the age you are? Will you live longer than them?
Each player brings a book. One of the players is the Gamesmaster, their book is the setting book. The rest of the players play as characters, their book is a character book.
To decide on the setting each player chooses a word, phrase or paragraph from the setting book and glues it to a central piece of paper. This is the setting sheet.
To create characters each player scans their book for a name and glues it to a different piece of blank paper. This is their character sheet. They should also find three words or phrases that describe something about their character. These are their characters abilities.
Each player with a character should pass their book to the left. Using the book they’ve just been handed they should find a word or phrase that describes their characters relationship to the character to the right. Hand the books back.
When you play you tell a story about your characters and the setting. Describe what your characters do, how they respond, what they say.
Add words to the setting map as they come up. Use names to add people and places. Draw maps.
The Gamesmaster describes the setting and the conflicts the characters face. The players control their characters and their response to it.
Play until there is a moment of uncertainty - until you’re not sure how a characters action will turn out. If that character has a relevant ability they can tick it off in order to decide how things go for them. They narrate the outcome.
If they don’t, or don’t want to tick it off, then the Gamesmaster flicks to a random page of the setting book or that characters book and use the first word of phrase they see that feels relevant to generate an outcome.
In a group write three resolutions each on separate pieces of paper. Mix them up and deal each player three random resolutions. Check back once a month. If a player is keeping up with a resolution they score a point (for each resolution). At the end of the year tally up points, the winner doesn’t have to play again next year.
Make the decision to do something for the next year, such as taking a photograph everyday, going somewhere new every month or making a game each week. It should be something that challenges you, that you believe will make a difference to your life somehow. You win for trying it & if you learn something about yourself along the way.
If you stick to it & make it through, well done.
