#autobiographical games

[8cfc00]

genuinely impressive how much (public) discord servers manage to replicate the feeling of sitting at a lunch table and fruitlessly trying to join in on a conversation everyone else is having while everything you say is irrelevant or ignored. can you tell i have autistic™️ social difficulties

[ttrpgbookclub]

This month, we read "LOGAN: An Autobiographical Tabletop Game", an extremely vulnerable and moving lyric game by Logan Timmins (@breathing-stories).

You can find "LOGAN" on Logan's itch[dot]io linked here.

[haveyouplayedthisttrpg]

Have you played LOGAN : An Autobiographical Tabletop Game

By Logan Timmins

Play through real events from the author’s life, make key decisions, and create your own version of Logan.

[yellowocaballero]

After Byleth experiences a prophecy of rich children maiming each other, she realizes that she’ll have to step up her teaching game if she wants her students to graduate high school. It’ll ruin their social lives, sleep schedules, and potentially sanities, but that’s a risk she’s willing to take. Byleth will do anything to keep her students alive - even come to life herself.

Or: Byleth starts a child cult, Dimitri is the world’s luckiest simp, and a springtime of youth blossoms in the trenches.

Do people still like Fire Emblem? I have no idea if this is of interest to the general population. However, unlike my last fic, I wrote it to be pretty accessible to people who were normal and don't like dating sim slash tactics games. It's complete and will update on Wednesdays. It is also very much about a topic I care a lot about, so check it out if you're interested. Big BIG thank you to @usaigi, for whom this was written. I hope it pays you back for the game.

[sandboxer]

pleaseee talk about asexual slut edgeworth

I think that Edgeworth who largely has difficulty getting along with others would really enjoy the freedom of expression/weirdness/selfhood that is inherently packaged with kink (and sex in general, but especially kink). but at the same time he isn’t depicted to be very sexually motivated (unlike even Phoenix). he has no history of relationships that we know of and rejects pretty much anyone who flirts with him. but I don’t think any of this is incompatible with loving sex, even if it’s for reasons other than Sexual Desire. it can be a space to play and heal and be the weird serious haunted doll you were born to be. I think slutting it up could be fun and fulfilling for him even if he isn’t necessarily driven by capital-h Horniness

[short666bread]

Outside the Maxi

[thatonebirdwrites]

Cactus, 3 and 18!

Cactus got answered in this ask. :)

For the other two, I'm going to assume it is the deep asks that get uncomfortably personal game.

3. what is your favorite way to self care?

Got answered in this ask.

18. what is something you can’t bring yourself to get rid of?

I wrote a nonfiction piece about this actually. I'll copy/paste it here. (Wrote it back in 2022.) I have redacted all names and used abbreviations for my siblings instead since I don't want to put too much personal information out there.

The Dog

Always beloved, the old, raggedy stuffed animal gathered dust atop the storage bin, its tail held together by white stitches. I sit on my bed and pick up the old husky. He used to have long white belly fur and a luxurious grey-brown back and ear curls.

One day, my youngest sister, who has down syndrome, grabbed Dog and threw him onto the newly painted basement floor. Grey paint coated his white belly. For over a month, I had tried to comb out the paint to no avail, so I took Dog with me when Dad drove us to visit Grandma.

I carried old Dog gingerly in my hands, tears in my eyes, as I entered her enclosed porch. Grandma moved to hug me, but stopped when I held out Dog.

"Å nei," she said, one of her Norsk phrases, and gently took Dog from my hands. "What happened?"

My story stumbled out in a torrent of words, some slurred into tears. She hugged me against her side.

"We'll fix it." She collected her shears and sewing kit and told me to play in the sandbox outside. I did as I was told. The sister I share a room with, AMZ, played with me, and we built cities in the sand and told stories of who lived there.

By the time my siblings and I were called indoors for dinner, Dog was clean and shaven. No hint of grey paint anywhere except on the edges of his whiskers. I folded Grandma three peace cranes that day in gratitude.

Dog held no formal name. He first appeared when I was three years old - wrapped up in red and green Christmas paper, one of the few gifts we had that year. I hugged him in delight; his fur long and soft, his eyes brown and sad, and his tail curled like a peppermint cane.

Dad asked me his name. I shouted, "Dog!" I had misunderstood the question, only meant to state what he was. A dog. But the name stuck.

The irony was not lost on my family each time I packed Dog into my suitcase. I preferred cats and held a deep fear of dogs, and yet, Dog was my prized possession. For every trip I took, Dog traveled with me.

Dog had many an alias, one being King Bryant the Third. He ruled Landra, my bed, while King Kitty - this bright garish 'cat' stuffed animal that had a different neon color for each limb - ruled Artica, AMZ's bed.

King Kitty loved to kidnap King Bryant's adopted son (named simply Son), a husky pup I'd found in a church bin and slipped into my backpack when no one was looking. King Bryant would valiantly search for the Son, often forced to answer riddles from Artica's other denizens, or would narrowly escape a deadly Care Bear Stare. King Bryant knew to never trust a Care Bear.

One adventure required him to ascend a cliff of pumice rock, which lurked at the foot of our beds. Carefully he climbed, his feet and claws scratching for purchase, until the top, where his Son sat, shivering, in the clouds. They overlooked a massive rainforest, the trees bigger than the pumice mountain, and a waterfall cascaded into a cool, turquoise lake. Vines and bushes blocked much of the forest floor from view, the sunlight barely penetrating.

King Bryant and his Son avoided the forest, neither could hold a flashlight for long without it tiring their teeth, and hopping on three legs to hold one was quite ridiculous. King Bryant refused to sully his dignity. His adopted Son didn't mind if the hopping didn't last too long, but King Kitty loved to ruin such games whenever they kidnapped the Son. The Son never seemed to mind the kidnapping; perhaps King Kitty had become a second parent by then?

King Kitty often laid traps along the paths up the pumice mountain or along the edges of Landra or Artica. One trap accidentally summoned a horror from the void. That day, King Bryant had to fight his way out of a dungeon of crotchdiggers, deadly headless and bodiless Barbie legs that spun from the darkness. One could only detect them from the wind across the hairless skin that howled through the dark. King Bryant got sliced once along his tail.

The Great Grandma Spirit would, eventually, mend his wounds (time ceases to exist for games such as this, and often I would tape the tail in place until my family could head up to Grandma's again).

King Bryant knew not who devised such dastardly creatures (my older sisters' creation one Halloween), but it was one of the few times he teamed up with King Kitty to defeat their evil. Crotchdiggers were not allowed in Landra or Artica.

The room I shared with AMZ wasn't technically a room for a child. More of a living area in the basement. The pumice wall blended into the rainforest wallpaper, and that ended where our beds began. Two dressers marked our "wall" that separated our beds from the Sega Genesis TV.

On rainy days, Dog and I would curl up in the broken beanbag chair and navigate to the music section of the options screen - the frozen levels of Sonic the Hedgehogs being the best. The pound of the rain in harmony with the 8-bit melody gave the world a surreal quality that invigorated the imagination. I always tucked my journal nearby and would dutifully record how long I played or read books from the library. Sometimes story ideas blossomed, and I'd feverishly write them down. Dog kept watch on my shoulder, in case any ghosts ventured beyond their lair which lay deep in the realm of Laundry.

Have I ever stopped bringing Dog with me on my travels?

Deep in the South, before I got sick, I carried Dog in my backpack, while I chainsawed broken branches, sledgehammered posts, mud and taped drywall, and dug forest trails. Dog witnessed it all in safety, and often slept by my head at night. When my teammates asked about him, I would laugh and say he was a great pillow. But the truth was Dog comforted me in dark times - a reminder of goodness in a life riddled with trauma and disappointment.

I look at Dog now, and truthfully, I never stopped bringing him with me. He's been to 38 states, tucked in my backpack, where he peered out through the hole I made with the zipper. Then, when I fell ill, he came to comfort me in the hospital, and guards my bed during particularly painful flare-ups.

Dog had transcended his humble origins - King Bryant the actor, Dog the pillow, and now my favorite good luck charm. I pet his head, his fur no longer soft but prickly in spots from age and countless stitches to mend yet another hole.

I position him atop a pillow on my bed, his final throne, a memory encased in fiber and cotton.

/Slutten (The End)/

Thank you for asking!! :D

[tropylium]

there's at least half a dozen videogames I've played way more, but for some reason the one that most often turns up in my dreams is SimCity (SNES version 1992). here's a brilliant thriving city, of shining white marble, archways and fountains. here's a perfectly average city but with secret undocumented features unlocked for the first time in history. here's a fucked up disjoint city that somehow still functions. here's a vaguely noneuclidean city with no object permanence

people? is there such a thing? who knows. the buildings just grow

[sisterdaniela]

okay so silly but me and my friends were looking for chill games that we can play together remotely now that we live in different countries.. and one of them said "hey what about keep talking and nobody explodes???" and i was like "omggg i never played it but i know it, it looks so fun!!" and i genuinely could not remember where i knew that from tbh! and just now, youtube recommended me a video called "dan and phil play keep talking and nobody explodes". weird

[mysticdragon3md3]

[shock]

A loosely-autobiographical fiction, An Index of Personalities is a 43-page graphic novel about a fractured boy who dies without knowing the experience of love but, miraculously, wakes up from the dead in the driver's seat of a 1989 Ford Crown Victoria. Through connecting with the people he meets in his drive across America, he learns how to glue the damaged pieces of his mind together for the first time.

This book is the largest collage project I've ever made and took me ten months to finish. I glued, stitched, laminated, cut, burned, painted, colored, built, created, and destroyed hundreds of sources dating from the 1950's to today. All of this material was gifted to me by others, found in secondhand stores and garbage bins, childhood books I've kept for nearly two decades, outlandishly outdated science textbooks, and personal mementos. Scanning this collage unfortunately means you won't get to play with the stuffed letters, hidden niches, and other interactive elements, but I like to think it stands up without them! From Neopets, to Dostoyevsky, to Playboy, to the illustrated Big Game Animals of North America this book is bound to, it has a lot going on. I try to read whatever I take from, and I've learned so much that I never would have found any other way. I'm so excited to finally be able to put this out into the world! If you'd like to read the whole thing, I figured out how to make a Gumroad so you can get the files for free at this link. <3

[therevengeoffrankenstein]

the key to understanding 'gray' is the dissonance between how the author knows that socialism is the doorway to utopia/happiness and how the narrator is on the precipice of this realization for most of/the entire book, up until (and, depending on how you interpret the text, including) the final page.

'gray' is a story of two star-crossed lovers who were *largely being torn apart by the oppressive capitalist society of american culture and the cure to this was them being freed from their worldly 'responsibilities' by death.

i'm always struck by how open-ended the ending is on whether or not the narrator merely hallucinates re-uniting with Her or actually does die in that tour bus bunk and walk off into the 'sunrise' (the specification of 'sunrise' (the dawning of a new day, a new beginning) vs. the traditional 'walking off into the sunset' (symbolizing closure, an ending) is even more striking and supportive of this reading) of the afterlife with Her.

*asterisk here because i am well aware that there is a lot more to the evil machinations of capitalist society than just the baseline of the economy and careers. lol. it permeates/corrupts all facets of life under it.

one of the things that is encouraged under capitalism, for example, is misogyny/the patriarchy. which is another thing largely at fault for the failures of the main relationship in 'gray' and i am not trying to undermine that fact.

[bunny-heels]

this game is autobiographical

[thewertsearch]

TG: oh so this is the trollplanet TG: pretty cool not really what i pictured AA: what did you picture […] TG: a bunch of trolls flying around in little grub pods constantly screaming at each other through bullhorns shaped like buckets AA: thats very silly and a little perverse […] AA: but actually that sounds like what it might have been like on some parts of the planet sooo

Aradia lived out in the boonies, so she's not much of an authority on cosmopolitan life in Alternia. Sollux is the city boy, and I wouldn't be surprised if this was what his area was like.

TG: so what am i supposed to do now that im dead […] TG: where are the fucking hauntoffs at is what im asking AA: i dont know about hauntoffs AA: but there is plenty of time to satisfy various curiosities you might have about existence and whatnot

I guess even this neighbourhood has a Janet.

... man, I miss The Good Place. I’ve been rewatching clips from the show this week, and it's actually got a lot in common with Homestuck. They're both character-driven stories with enormous scope, centered around a bizarre institution which governs all of reality.

AA: there are all sorts of friends to meet AA: ones you already know and ones you dont

Is Aradia referring to members of her own team, or are there ghosts from entirely different sessions floating around the Bubbles?

Feferi was prophesized to unite only two races, something she's achieved through the Horrorterrors. This implies we won't be seeing any other alien species, but we could see other human Players. Technically, it also means we could see other trolls, but that's pretty unlikely. As far as we're aware, Alternia only spawned a single session.

Anyway - the more I think about these Dream Bubbles, the more I'm starting to realize how much strategic potential they have. Affinity for the Furthest Ring is a genuine boon, and being a Derse Dreamer is more advantageous than I thought.

AA: time is like a game […] AA: and games are fun but sometimes you dont realize how much fun you were having until theyre all over AA: and sometimes you look back and realize for some stupid reason you werent having any fun at all!

What an interesting sentiment that I’m sure is not at all autobiographical.

Aradia spent the entire session as a robot with zero agency, and never got to use her powers for her sake, instead of the timeline's. It makes perfect sense that she didn't have fun with her Aspect.

Tavros! My man, Tavros!

Alright, this is actually fantastic. Tavros died before he could reveal Vriska's batshit plan to the team, but Aradia has handed him a second chance. All he has to d-

AT: lOOKS LIKE i FOUND ANOTHER POINT IN TIME TO BOTHER YOU, AT: wHEN, i GUESS, AT: yOU ARE MORE EMOTIONALLY SUSCEPTIBLE, […] TG: are those sick fires youre packing there TG: you best not be bringin that fire into my bubble less you plan on dropping that shit

-he's just here to rap, isn't he.

[manonamora-if]

honestly u have too many games... i dont know where to start... can u like... do a 5-word blurb for each of them?

Ah well... I can certainly try! 😅

Note: I'm including the experimental stuff too, because lol.

Try hard (or don't) for love? (Slice-of-life, choice, short-ish, multiple endings, completed)

Amnesiac peep becomes a noble (Court Intrigue, choice, long, WIP)

Privileged writer can't write (Slice-of-life, input/choice, mid, WIP -currently in re-writes)

Monotonous space-life actually a conspiracy (Sci-Fi, choice, short-ish, multiple endings, completed)

Friends(?) investigate an occult mystery (Lovecraftian horror, choice, mid, multiple endings, WIP)

Kid finds out grandma's special (spoopy, choice, short, multiple endings, completed)

Meme car chase with a twist (unreality, QTE choice, short, multiple endings, completed)

Space trucker on special delivery (Sci-fi, choice, short, multiple endings, WIP)

How devoted are you? (???, micro, completed - FRENCH ONLY)

Antique computer with a weird installed program (Sci-fi, choice/puzzle, mid, two endings, completed)

Cliché detective investigates "murder" (Mystery, choice, WIP)

Single choice to define a life (Sci-fi-ish, input, short, multiple endings, completed)

Hhmmm unresolved trauma? (Autobiographical, choice, short, completed)

The Best Proposals are kookies (Slice-of-life, input, short-ish, multiple endings, completed)

On course for Collisions (???, choice, micro, completed)

The signs were all there (Slice-of-life, choice, micro, completed)

Internal fight against pride and prejudices (Slice-of-life, choice-ish, micro, completed)

When the yummy hurts your tummy (??? surreal?, choice-ish, micro, completed-ish)

Kill or be killed (Survival, choice, short, completed-ish)

Surreal dreams be weird (Surreal, keyboard, short, completed)

Nightmare deviation and horrid road-maze (Slice-of-life, choice, micro, completed, FRENCH ONLY)

Couple tries some kinky stuff (juuuust a hint of NSFW) (Slice-of-life, choice, short, completed)

Depressed person eats a real meal (Slice-of-life, input, short, completed)

Surreal dream bites depressed horn-ish-dog (Surreal, choice, mid, multiple endings, completed)

Dramatic Lesbian writes love letters (Epistolary, choice, mid, multiple endings, completed)

Repair robot fixes broken things (???, input, micro, completed-ish)

Girl-bossing your way out of the maze (Mythological, input, short-ish, completed)

Not really a game, just if you're curious about programs

I SWEAR I AM WRITING (autobiographical, keyboard, short, completed)

Bad maze on purpose (bad game, input, short-ish?, completed)

Bad "VN" I'm fixing soon (mystery?, keyboard, short, WIP)

And that's all there is :P

[schmergo]

My bizarre real-person headcanon: Josh Groban and Ben Platt are mortal nemeses. Here's the timeline behind this theory, beginning with the known and branching off into the possible future. 2017: Josh Groban makes his Broadway debut in Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet to much critical acclaim. At the Tony Awards, Ben Platt, starring in Dear Evan Hansen, wins Best Actor and Dear Evan Hansen beats Natasha/Pierre for Best Musical. 2023: Josh Groban makes a triumphant return to Broadway, headlining a revival of Sweeney Todd. Surely this will be his year? Nope. Ben Platt's limited run production of Parade transfers to Broadway, making his own triumphant return to Broadway after a hiatus of the same length. Neither wins the Tony Award this year (J. Harrison Ghee does), but Parade wins Best Revival of a Musical over Sweeney Todd. Later in 2023: Josh Groban goes full method and immerses himself in the murderous, vengeful instincts of Sweeney Todd. Revenge against Ben Platt will be his! But he can't be too obvious about it. He's playing the long game. 2028: Surprise! There's a revival of Phantom of the Opera announced! Both Ben Platt and Josh Groban are considered as potential Phantoms. Unknown to anyone, Josh Groban has been perfecting his own Phantom-like skills of appearing and disappearing into thin air, throwing his voice, and murder. Oh yeah, and he plays the pipe organ. He gets the role! But wait, what's this? Hugh Jackman was eaten by a crocodile mere weeks before he was supposed to headline the new Broadway production of The Greatest Showman? Ben Platt heroically steps in to save the day and takes the title role! He wins the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical, but not Best New Musical (the critics say, "We love Ben Platt but this show is clearly just a vehicle for Hugh Jackman [RIP].") The Phantom revival wins Best Musical, but something terrible happens at the Tony Awards! There's a technical glitch when the Phantom performance is due to start and they move it to the end of the awards ceremony. But right as everyone's marveling at the artistry of the production at the delayed performance, something Totally Unpredicted happens. The chandelier crashes... INTO BEN PLATT!!! 2030: Ben Platt survives the chandelier attack but he loses his entire memory and has to relearn everything, including how to sing! He can no longer recall the moment that the chandelier crashed into him-- nor the moment that Josh Groban looked at him from the stage and mouthed 'Long live the king!' In a startling and bold act, Ben Platt returns to Broadway in a one man autobiographical show about living with amnesia and relearning to perform. He wins the Best Actor Tony Award! Josh Groban is away doing Phantom in Europe. 2040: There's a high profile immersive revival of Les Miserables on Broadway! The producers consider both Ben Platt and Josh Groban for Jean Valjean. But Josh Groban gives off such an in intense murderous energy when they find him in the same room as Ben Platt that they get a brilliant idea and offer him the role of Javert and Platt as Valjean. The production is a hit. The tension between Platt and Groban is off the charts. When it's time for the Tony Awards, both are nominated for Best Actor in a Musical (ala Colm Wilkinson and Terrence Mann in the original Broadway production). On the day of the Tony Awards, an astonishing thing happens: Platt and Groban TIE for the Best Actor in a Musical Award! The crowd goes wild! Everyone is cheering! The theatre... the cheers... it triggers something long-buried in Ben Platt's mind. Suddenly, he remembers the night the chandelier fell on him at the 2028 Tony Awards.... Josh Groban was looking right at him as it happened.... Ben Platt snaps and begins to clobber Josh Groban onstage. In his fit of rage, he doesn't see Josh Groban pull out a gun. Is this finally the end of this age old rivalry? BUT WAIT, WHAT'S THIS? IT'S J. HARRISON GHEE (SNUBBED STAR OF THE REIMAGINED REVIVAL OF LA CAGE AUX FOLLES) WITH A STEEL CHAIR!!!! At least, this is what I imagine.