Tag: party games

Quick Shot on Crescendo Giocoso Ritornello

I have an excellent interview today with Oscar Biffi about Crescendo Giocoso Ritornello, which is currently doing amazing on Kickstarter (that just means it’s a sure bet!)! It sounds like an amazing collection of larp scenarios – check out what Oscar had to say!

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What is Crescendo Giocoso Ritornello, as a project and as your vision?

Crescendo Giocoso Ritornello is the second anthology of chamber larps written by the Italian Chamber Orchestra, the community of roleplaying enthusiasts of Laiv.it. We are doing our best to make it a wonderful book with twelve interesting games, but to us it’s so much more than that. Three years ago we created the first Crescendo Giocoso, thanks to our community and our backers on Kickstarter. It was an incredible experience, kind of similar to Pavarotti & Friends: my games and the games of Italian game designers who I esteem, developed to be accessible to a wider public, from different countries and backgrounds.

It turned out to be the show of confidence our community needed in order to focus on our own way of designing games. With a format that worked for us as a starting base, we were able to start organising conventions not only to play games, but to write them together. Our player friends became authors and the same Italian Chamber Orchestra that was born as a joke became real, going from nine authors to almost thirty. Bigger communities of Italian larpers started to get interested in chamber larp and people from all around the world got to know our way of playing.

So in a way Crescendo Giocoso Ritornello as a book is the end point of a journey (we like to say “a grand tour”) made of writing workshops, online chats, conventions, sleepless nights on graphics and texts. In another way, we hope it could be a new starting point for our community, a demonstration that there’s people out there willing to hear our voices as game designers and that “anyone can cook” as in Pixar’s Ratatouille.

Black and white images in a five by six block of people playing various illustrated instruments, with the final bottom block being a green block with white text saying "Crescendo Giocoso - The Italian Chamber Orchestra."

What are some of the themes players will see in the different larps in Crescendo Giocoso Ritornello?

In terms of settings, players are spoiled for choice: from the Bronze Age to the Italian Years of Lead passing through XVIII° century Venice and fantasy worlds. Alzh & Imer is about a love story between tow elderly people, one of them afflicted by Alzheimer’s, and Pantheon Club is about social pressure: each player is invited to anonymously put into play a personal “silence” (something you don’t speak about with everyone, because you’re afraid to be judged) and someone else is going to play a Greek Deity who shares or hates this same silence. The truth is we put emphasis on game mechanics above all, so players will pull colored strings to create an imaginary village or scotch tape to build a prison without actual walls, they will play in complete darkness or utter silence, they will play in the same room or in different ones, they will create scene in reverse chronological order or play the same character in different moments of life. There’s only one fixed point: everyone in the gaming group is going to play and have fun. We’ve got nothing against game masters, I’ve been one for my entire life, but my days of watching one of my larps from outside, maybe to step in and just tell the epilogue in the end, are over: I want to play with my friends and as an author I’m not going to ask someone else to just stare at the others as they play. Sharing all this experiences and putting so many heads together has been a great way to explore very different ideas and everyone can find a complete list of previews for all the scenarios on our Laiv.it website here.

A series of shots of the interior and exterior of the book Crescendo Giocoso Ritornello with a red background for a sharp contrast. The book has nice illustrations and photos and a smooth layout.
The layout of this playlist looks *chef’s kiss* glorious.

The concept of the Italian Chamber Orchestra and coming together to write each of the scenarios is really brilliant and feels very collaborative. How do you work together and address disagreements, conflicts, or even just overrunning enthusiasm in such an environment?

To me the keys are transparence and dialogue. We try to create the ideal environment from the very beginning: even if a hotel with all the comforts would be awesome, we prefer to rent a house and take care of things ourselves, as a group. Maria is in charge of the logistics, but everyone brings something to eat and there are no assigned rooms. Everyone knows that we put authors first in every convention: we ask players which game they’d prefer to play of course, but we also make sure to tell them that is only a preference and they could end up in another game instead. A game is written by a person who deserves space and respect, as well as a player has the right to know what they are going to play. So, when we invited our players to become authors, we found a very sensible and open-minded audience. In order to share this way of doing things with newcomers, in our writing workshops we split up people who already know each other or who have similar experiences in order to create more diverse bands.

The starting points for every collective game in LarpJam is the Crescendo Giocoso model, so we don’t have to discuss which kind of game we’re going to create, and a theme chosen by the director of the band. The director has no special creative control outside of it, they are just a veteran author with the task of coordinating work after the workshop, in order to make sure the draft is ready before the deadline of the next playtesting convention. Everyone can get involved as much or as little as they want: do you want to join in LarpJam to share ideas and then not write a single line of text in the next months? No problem, just tell it to your band. Writing a game, as well as publishing Crescendo Giocoso Ritornello, is a way of giving voice to our creativity and the feeling of being heard is essential. We do our best to create a free space where people can be honest without being judged and where conflict is an healthy part of the process.

A record with images in green of people playing characters and and in the center, white text "Crescendo Giocoso Ritornello - A Live Action Role Playlist" in a red circle.

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Thank you so much Oscar for the interview! I hope you all enjoyed it and that you’ll check out Crescendo Giocoso Ritornello on Kickstarter today!

A note: Thoughty always welcomes Italian interviewees, even as my interview style will be changing soon, and interviewees from all around the world – of all races! Even if we need to find a translator, I’m interested in helping you tell your stories. <3

Quick Shot on #FlirtSquad

Just in time for Valentine’s Day, I bring you an interview with the excellent Ken Davidson about #FlirtSquad, which is part of Zine Quest 2 on Kickstarter! Check out the interview below!

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What is #FlirtSquad, both as a product and as your vision?

Hello Beau, thank you for taking the time out to interview me, I really appreciate it. Okay, background first. My memory of events may not be exactly accurate, but about two years ago, Darcy Ross posted on Twitter because she had a hard time trying to flirt and she asked for advice. This was picked up by a lot of people on Twitter and spawned the hashtag #FlirtSquad. From there, you could post a picture or short clip of yourself trying to look flirty and you were guaranteed to have at least some people respond and tell you how amazing you were doing.

I was one of the first to reply and shameless about tagging people in that I thought could contribute (IIRC you were just such a person). There were so many people sharing so many things, and I read a lot of great advice on how to take better pictures, what was considered too far for people, how to communicate expectations etc. I was like “wow, this is really something.” However, when things really clicked for me was a couple of weeks in, when people who normally don’t try to be flirty online, people who don’t share a lot of pictures of themselves, people that have low self esteem, things like that started to post. They told me either in private or in their tweets that they had always been afraid to post pictures of themselves or to share selfies. Either thinking they weren’t cute, or people would make fun of them, or people would be creepy.

I knew we had something special at THAT point, I was also knew it was Twitter, therefore it was ephemeral, it wouldn’t last forever so I’m like “alright, how can I capture these moments? How can I share this with more people who either didn’t see the tag, or aren’t on Twitter, or aren’t in our small indie RPG bubble? What can I do?” The answer I had for that was “write a LARP!” So, here we are, this is my attempt to give people a safe place, where they can explore their flirty selves and build their confidence with like minded folks, and I think I’ve done it.

 That’s a whimsical answer, sorry. So, the game is a LARP that is a series of workshops under the guise that the #FlirtSquad is a real group you can join, we’re going to train you so you can build your skills, then we will choose who gets to join at the end. I have compiled an amazing team and we will be releasing it as a zine as part of #ZineQuest2. This is my first physical product that I will ever release, and depending on how this goes, either the first of many or the last.

A person wearing glasses and a hat, backlit, drinks from a coffee mug with a decorated latte in it.

This is so awesome! What is the structure of the larp, if any, and what are the guidelines under which players interact?

Thank you I also think it’s awesome! The structure of the LARP basically starts with warm-up exercises, followed by safety discussions, then we assign short roles which are different types of flirters, then an intro, then a series of workshops that I call phases. In each phase we’re teaching a skill related to Flirt which you can use in real life. For example, how to ask for consent, how to say no, how to do different flirty looks, things like that. I don’t want to spoil too much but some of the phases are REALLY fun. 

I ran the game at Big Bad 19 and there’s a phases I call speed flirting and OMG Beau it was SO MUCH FUN TO WATCH. I was giggling the whole time, that may have been my favorite thing that happened at Big Bad, the only problem was that it wasn’t long enough, which I am fixing as we speak! As far as guidelines for interaction I am teaching consent through various methods during the game as well as setting some hard rules in the beginning, safety was my biggest concern with this game and I think we’ve done it. Plus, I have a stretch goal, which was of writing we have not reached yet, to bring in Adira Slattery. Adira is going to add a phase which will deal with boundary settings in a more explicit manner, but still cute and fun.

How do you support players to ensure they’re able to commit to the #FlirtSquad theme safely and enthusiastically?

You have to be very frank and up front about what this game is.  I frontload the Play principles and advise to explicitly say what they are when you run this game. They are: goofy, fun, inclusive and encouraging. If people are not there for those four things and want to be creepy or whatever they can GTFO. As far as getting people enthusiastic about the game you have to be the model when you run this game.

The facilitator has a character in this game, they are the experienced Flirtsquad member who is going to run the recruits through the workshops and it is imperative that they model the behaviors they expect from the players. I ramble and mentioned safety in the last question but going back to it we use Okay check in and Open Door but we also actually have the facilitators not only model good behavior but also model bad behavior and have the crowd call it out.

Again, I don’t want to spoil too much, but Jess Meier and I ran the game and we had “shame” yelled at us a couple of times, it builds a camaraderie between the players which is built in the game and I hope extends to the world. I think that’s all I got, thank you so much again for taking the time out to interview me I really appreciate it!

The #FlirtSquad banner with a black background and Flirt Squad in white brushstroke writing. In the center of the image, three individuals of varying genders, ages, and races in fancy dress, one hiding behind a fan and wearing a hat, eye the viewer.

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Thanks so much to Ken for the interview! I hope you all enjoyed it and that you’ll check out #FlirtSquad on Kickstarter today! Happy Valentine’s Day!

What’s in a Ring?

I have a big life thing coming up soon – specifically, my partner Thomas and I will be exchanging rings near Halloween to make our relationship “official.” While looking at rings and thinking a lot about love and relationships, I realized there’s just not a lot of support for polyamorous people who want to have a formal aspect to their relationship, and especially when you’re not religious in any way, it can be difficult to have a way to mark your relationship.

Someday Thomas and I want to have a more formal commitment ceremony, when things are more secure, but for now, we’re just gonna have a quiet exchange of rings. I decided to write a little game about love, polyamory, self love, consent, and commitment – and give people like us a ritual to mark their love, too. I tried to be inclusive – I hope it is inclusive to you! If you like it, consider picking it up at https://briebeau.itch.io/whats-in-a-ring and leaving a donation to help us pay for a celebratory dinner. 🙂

Love to all <3

An image of the full text of What's In a Ring? over a watercolor flower.
What’s in a Ring? by Brie Beau Sheldon, dedicated to Thomas Novosel.

Five or So Questions on FlipTales

Hi all! Today I have an interview with Ryan Mather on the game FlipTales, which is currently on Kickstarter! It sounds like a fun experience, so check out what Ryan had to say below!

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A group of people laughing while playing FlipTales with tokens and cards
Tell me a little about FlipTales. What excites you about it?
So the basics are that FlipTales is a super-accessible roleplaying game for all ages. you play as magical creatures going on adventures that feel like a mix between Disney and Miyazaki. It’s for 4-6 players, takes 30-60 minutes, and ages 10+. What most excites me about it is how easy it is for new players to dig into. I loved roleplaying so much because it gave me a chance to try out different identities and personalities. How’s it feel to play a femme character? How’s it feel to be a bully? Or to be introverted? It’s hard to find experiences that facilitate this kind of identity exploration through play. I always felt like TTRPGS were really powerful experiences, but so hard to get started. The community is focusing on accessibility more and more, and this is my attempt to contribute to that conversation.

I’ve seen some results in playtesting that I’m really excited about. Kids and grownups are able to play on equal footing because the mechanics are simple and story-focused. I’ve obsessively redesigned the rules so that people who have never played an RPG before can learn the basics in as little as 5 minutes (depending on how fast they read). I’ve watched players play their first game in one session, then write their own adventure in the next. I love the idea that we can enable all players to be not just consumers but also creators of games and settings.

Lastly, I’m excited about the beautiful art that Caroline Brewer has made for the game. It’s gender-neutral and age-agnostic, so all players can find something they connect to.

One more thing! Thanks to some generous backers, I’m able to use funds from the campaign to pay creators from underrepresented backgrounds to make stories for FlipTales. These stories already look like they are going to be a ton of fun to play. It makes me really excited to see what other stories people will come up with

A box labeled FlipTales with a variety of characters on the cover, two cards laid out in front of it with the "arboroid" creature and the "fungus lord" and three tokens of different colors with x's and o's on them.
How is the game “super-accessible,” and what did you do during design to make it that way?
I come from an industrial design background, so I was initially introduced to accessibility through the lens of usability. One of my first assignments was to design a toy for blind children, which led to me visiting a blind school and learning more about their students. When you design something to be usable for people who have some mismatch with their environment, it ends up being better for everyone. I’m borrowing the word “mismatch” from Kat Holmes, who does a lot of work in tech accessibility. I think it’s helpful to reframe “accessibility” from something that people with disabilities experience, to something that all people experience when they bump into a mismatch with their environment. For example, a person with vision loss will have a hard time reading text, but so will someone who has to glance quickly at their phone, or someone who just walked into a restaurant on a winter day and their glasses have fogged up.

So from that background, there are a number of things I’ve baked into the game so that all players can have a good time. Zero industry jargon. Straightforward instructions, with lots of visuals. Simple coins, simple character cards. Abilities and characters that are designed to appeal to players of all backgrounds. A format that requires zero preparation so that you don’t need experience or bountiful free time to have a game—and adventures that are as easy to write as they are to play!

My hope is that all these features combine to make an experience that feels straightforward to everyone. Of course, no game is ever finished, so I’m constantly playtesting and gathering feedback. Players’ feedback has driven design changes in every element of the game from the creatures and abilities, to how many stats the characters have, the colors of the coins, and how characters level up. I’ve deleted 75% of the game’s content over the course of development in order to hit a level of simplicity that worked consistently. I’m particularly interested in working with sensitivity readers to uncover mismatches that I can’t see on my own.

Two cards, the "crustaceanoid" and the "necromancer" with three tokens with x's and o's on them next to the rule book.
What is play like in FlipTales? What do you do and how does it function structurally?
Play in FlipTales consists of two main phases. The prompt, and freestyle. The wiz reads out a prompt and then players “freestyle” by taking turns suggesting ideas for what they would like to do. When players have an idea for what they would like to do, they flip their strength, magic, or smarts coins, depending on what’s most relevant. If they use a special ability they get extra coins. It’s a lot of storytelling and decision-making interspersed with coin flips. Since the rules are very light, players often will come up with their own mechanics to suit something they want to do in the game, like assist each other or give a friend an upgrade.
Who are you bringing on to design additional stories, and what are some of the ideas on the table for play from the stories?
So far, Sharang Biswas and Clio Yun-su Davis have been confirmed as guest writers. Sharang’s story is set in a kingdom where only boys are allowed to learn magic—your goal is to help a small girls’ school survive a visit from the superintendent. In Clio’s story, players try to stop a floral arrangement from reaching the empress of a neighboring nation, because an incompetent florist accidentally arranged the flowers to convey a very insulting message that could start a war. I’m really excited about both and am looking forward to finding more 🙂 I’m in the process of confirming a third writer.
A group of people at a table with cards and tokens, all playing animatedly.

What kind of characters are players able to play in the game, and how do the stories and accessibility make their narrative richer?
The creatures you can play as are Humanoid (magic shapeshifting human), Wingoid (bird), Arboroid (tree), Geoid (rock), Sauroid (snake in a wheelchair with cute little arms), Insectoid (any bug), Nucleoid (a single cellular organism), and Crustaceanoid (any crustacean!). There are sixteen abilities ranging from Scout to Fungus Lord to Elementalist to Assassin. They’re all on the kickstarter page if you want to check em out.

The stories all invite players to world-build and flesh out their character according to what they care about. Since FlipTales stories are all one-shots, the depth of the characters isn’t going to be anywhere near an episodic game. The richness in the storytelling happens as players try different combinations of creatures and abilities and hopefully get their feet wet writing their own adventures.

As a side note, if anyone reading this is interested in writing a FlipTales adventure, or would like to nominate a creator to write a story, feel free to reach out! As a part of the kickstarter, I’m providing funds for creators from under-represented backgrounds to make stories. You can also always submit a story through the website, which I’ll playtest for free and help refine if you need.

A cartoon of four people at a table with tokens and cards, animatedly talking.

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Thanks so much to Ryan for the interview! I hope you all enjoyed it and that you’ll check out FlipTales on Kickstarter!

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Behrend Bernhard, Esq. on Itch.io!

I have been putting products on my new account at briecs.itch.io and by that I mean, I have put up three things, it takes a lot of time.

Anyway, I put up Behrend Bernhard, Esq., my performative party game about monsters and lies, and it’s post-edits so it’s been hopefully improved!

https://briecs.itch.io/behrend-bernhard-esq
Cover image featuring University of Pittsburgh’s Cathedral of Learning surrounded by trees full of crows.

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Five or So Questions with Steve Radabaugh on Cast Off

Hi all! I spoke to Steve Radabaugh about his latest mobile game, Cast Off, a movie trivia game! It sounds like a fun time so I’m sharing what he has to say about Cast Off with you!

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Tell me a little about Cast Off. What excites you about it?

So Cast Off was originally designed by Jonathan Lavallee as a card game. I’ve turned it into an app. It’s a game where one team will select a famous voice and a role from a selection of 3 each. Someone on the other team will audition for the role by reading a line while impersonating the given voice. The rest of the team has to try to guess the voice and various facts about the movie the line came from.

I’m excited because I think the game really works better as an app than it did as a card game. It’s more convenient to pass around a phone than a deck of cards, and you always have it with you. I really think this will open it up to a new audience.


How did you go about getting authorization to make an app based on someone else’s game? What kind of process is that?

In this case, it’s probably a bit different than normal. I put a message out to IGDN members noting that I was looking for things to collaborate on, or just straight contract work. Jonathan approached me about this project last spring. He’s been great to work with, I’ve given him test builds along the way, and he gives me feedback. He also helps me make sure that the audio and visual elements that weren’t in the original game are on brand.

Images from the Radical Bomb website.

What is the interface of Cast Off like, from the player perspective?

I really tried to stick to the idea that it’s a card game. The players will see the 6 initial cards, and they choose two. It then displays just those two cards much larger for the person who is doing the audition to read. I added tutorial elements that can be turned on or off into the game to really guide the players. After doing testing, I found that most people tried just playing without looking at the tutorial.

What are the major mechanical functions of Cast Off, and how did you make them work?

The biggest part is just drawing and displaying cards. When you start playing it builds an array of the cards that you have access to. (There are 5 sets total to choose from, and you can choose as many as you like. One comes with the game, the other four are in app purchases.) It pulls three random cards out of the array displays them, and them puts them into a second discard array. What’s interesting to me as a programmer is that I don’t actually every “shuffle” the deck of cards. Its more like grabbing a random card out of the middle instead of just grabbing the top card.

How can people access Cast Off and how do they play once they have?

Cast Off will be available as of October 26th, 2017 on both iOS and Android. The best way to play is with a group of at least four people, it can easily play a group of twenty or more. Everyone shares one device, so there’s not a huge requirement of everyone having the device. The players divide into two to four teams, there does need to be at least 2 people on a team. Team one will start with selecting the cards for the role and the voice, then pass the device to one person on team two. That person will attempt to impersonate the voice while reading the line. The rest of their team will have 30 seconds to try and guess the voice and facts about the movie the role came from. The person who did the audition marks which things were correct. Then it’ll be team two’s turn to draw cards.

😀

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Thanks to Steve for the interview! Make sure to check out Cast Off on Radical Bomb’s website and share with your friends!

This post was supported by the community on patreon.com/briecs. Tell your friends!

To leave some cash in the tip jar, go to http://paypal.me/thoughty.

If you’d like to be interviewed for Thoughty, or have a project featured, email contactbriecs@gmail.com.

Patreon Spotlight – Caitlynn Belle

Today I’ve got a spotlight on a Patreon that is super great and super weird. It’s also very sexy! 

Caitlynn Belle is a designer that some people might be familiar with, as her game A Real Game won IGDN Game of the Year in 2016. She has a Patreon to fund her work, as well as a website dedicated to her public releases. Her products are innovative and unusual, and approach topics not everyone might be used to. Curious about what those might be? Read more below!

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Caitie herself!

So, would you mind giving me a brief pitch for your Patreon? Tell me about some of your creations.

My Patreon is what I use to fund my endeavors and gather attention for the games I make: a lot of great people there give me incredible feedback and promote my games, and the financial support I get helps take some of the stress off my living requirements, so all in all Patreon is what’s keeping my work going right now! I create small, short-ish games about sex, kink, communication, and connecting to others.

My game “A Real Game” won an award at GenCon! That and Our Radios are Dying are probably what people know of me best. It’s a game about taking an actual printed copy of the game and interacting with the pages, sometimes transforming or modifying them, as the game itself becomes sentient and speaks to you, unsure of its right to exist. It’s certainly gained the most attention, with a lot of different interpretations, which is always interesting to see!

Our Radios are Dying is a game about two space lesbians who got separated from their spaceship and are now drifting through space with only an hour left before they die. They have nothing else to do but talk about their relationship and their problems and who they are. You play it by sitting on rolling office chairs and actually spinning and floating around on them, as if moving through space, and I quite like it.

Kirigami Dominatrix Display Simulator is a game about domme-ing a sheet of paper. You take on the role of an alien dominatrix and do kinky things to the paper using common stationary tools, using this to immerse yourself in and symbolize BDSM play. I think it’s my most clever game, and it’s informed a lot of the rest of what I do.

Screenshot from inside Kirigami Dominatrix Display Simulator.

I’ve read Kirigami Dominatrix Display Simulator, and it’s a freaking fantastic game. I loved the design, and the use of paper and scissors and other modification of the paper is a gorgeous idea. It also includes some extra rules on how to simulate BDSM and orgasms in other games, which I loved, and it’s one of the most innovative and respectful games I’ve seen involving sex.

Tell me a little about your process for creating games. Do you brainstorm? Do you use any specific techniques? Is it pure Caitie goodness? How do you do it?

Typically I think of something I wish I saw in games or a particularly trope or idea I want to fiddle with, and I’ll just keep that idea floating around in the back of my head. At the same time, I’ll think of characters or situations or plots that I like and keep those floating around in the back of my head as well. At some point, there’s a marriage, and then I make a game!

Sometimes two ideas click instantly, sometimes it takes forever. There’s stuff on my computer that’s been waiting years to get used, and maybe it never well. Eventually they work though, and I write out what I think is the best part of that system, slowly building up ideas while daydreaming at work. Then once I have it written out, I mercilessly edit and cut everything I can until it’s distilled down into what I think is the simplest and most fun version of that idea possible.

One of her better known games, bugfuck, is about bugs fucking. Like, for real. It’s amazing.


What is your background in games? How did you become a designer?

I grew up around people that were roleplaying and I never understood it, but I always wanted to figure it out and play. I did a little bit in middle school, but then sort of got into it proper in high school. I kept trying different games and different ways to play because I got bored after a while of just playing only one game, and so I got experienced with different mechanics and different playstyles. As I played with more people and as I started to dig into the indie publishing scene, I tried to make houserules that I wished were in the games I played – and then eventually after years of that, I had a more defined sense of how I liked to roleplay, but didn’t find very many games that experimented with it, so I made my own!

What helps you decide the medium to use for your games, the mechanics, and so on?

Basically editing. I slap together a game that I think will accomplish what I want, and after exploring it some, I realize it doesn’t do what I want at all, and then I search for what will. The first drafts of most of my games are very traditionally game-y: dice, character sheets, processes. It’s by seeing how those ideas don’t allow me to achieve the story I want that I open myself up to what does. It’s just ruthlessly cutting everything away until I only have the barest idea left.

What do you do to draw in more players and customers?

Oh, I wish I knew. advertise monthly or bi-monthly on social media, I enter a lot of contests, I get hired to do Kickstarter stuff and so on, eventually hoping that people will recognize my name and like what I do and seek me out. I just design a lot and spread out a lot and try to be as visible as I can.

How would you define your “brand” as a designer?

I angle for weird, sad, beautiful, and sexy, pick maybe 2 or 3. It’s just stuff I like to see in stories. Strange things and strange stories are fascinating to me and I love seeing games with quirky mechanics and ideas. I like and aim for stories that feature hot sex or heartbreak or life-affirming beauty or just invasive weirdness, so that’s what I try to make!

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Thanks so much to Caitlynn for the interview and the opportunity to check out her process and work! Up next Caitlynn will be releasing a game in #Feminism 2nd Edition, and has been doing work on a fair number of Kickstarters, so keep an eye out for her name when a new product comes out!

Remember to check out her Patreon to support her work and her website for more games! 

This post was supported by the community on patreon.com/briecs. Tell your friends!

To leave some cash in the tip jar, go to http://paypal.me/thoughty.

If you’d like to be interviewed for Thoughty, or have a project featured, email contactbriecs@gmail.com.

Behrend Bernhard, Esq. Version 1 – A Performative Party Game

Hello All!

It’s your friendly neighborhood Brie with a new game! This is, as with my previous games, a text-only version 1, so if I need to make edits I will do so and update the original file with a new version.

It’s a performative party game* where you get together friends and play out a court scene where one player gets to play a larger performative role as the title character, Behrend Bernhard, Esquire, one plays a court reporter who handles record taking, tallying records, and so on, and the rest of the players are witnesses providing testimony. All of the players have a small chance to roleplay, while Behrend’s character is the most active and asks questions of the witnesses. However, at the end, there’s a chance that any of the players could have a final dramatic scene. Yes, there is a twist, but it’s clearly detailed, and it is at the forefront that everyone is making up their stories. 🙂

I’ve been exploring player involvement and how much players want or need to participate in games, and at what level they’re most comfortable, as well as how to integrate different levels of power or authority in a game. I’ve also been looking at how we can make lies and secrets public while still playing within the fiction we’ve concocted.

Here it is!




*Some might consider this a live action roleplay game, and in some ways it is, but I think it’s a step away from that, personally, and you can argue about it if you want.

This post was supported by the community on patreon.com/briecs.