February is here and with it, some new games and new features! Hopefully you’re all ready as we aim to wrap up winter and tip headlong into spring!

Before the death grip of winter releases us, though, I’m excited to share with you the first look at my upcoming game: A Long December.

In short, A Long December is my love letter to the video game The Long Dark by Hinterland Studios. The framework of the game utilizes the Wretched & Alone SRD, which is based on the game The Wretched by Chris Bissette. We’ve talked about The Wretched and Wretched & Alone games before on the blog, and in that post I mentioned that I had yet to complete designing a game using the SRD. That was, technically, true at the time, but A Long December was in progress at that time.

If you’ve never heard of The Long Dark (or seen any of the clips from when I previously played it on stream), it is probably one of my most highly recommended games in terms of things like exploration and lore. It’s set in an alternate future Canada, on a remote island filled with deep coal mines and the remnants of an insular society not keen on outside influences. There is a story mode (called Wintermute), and a survival mode that allows you to explore Great Bear Island in all its frozen glory… But there’s no saying you’ll survive. Your character has to contend with the natural elements such as fog and blizzards, as well as wolves and bears that have become more aggressive than normal. There are other challenges to deal with, such as unique weather conditions like glimmer fog, which make it so you cannot sleep, or the occasional nighttime aurora which no only powers the electrical elements around the island, but also turns the normal wolves and bears into a darker and more fearsome version of their usual selves.

All of that is to say: The Long Dark is a wonderfully complex game that I personally feel doesn’t get enough hype. In certain gaming spheres (namely survival gamers), it seems quiet popular for those who enjoy solo gameplay. Which is where A Long December comes into play.

A Long December takes many of the gameplay elements of The Long Dark and builds them into a 15-day trial of survival. I’ve taken the Wretched & Alone framework and tweaked it just enough to give the player a strict timeline of their game: Either you gather the supplies you need within 15 days, or you don’t. Either way, the game ends at 15 rounds.

For myself, this timeline was critical: I have struggled with Wretched & Alone games in the past that seem to drag on for far too long, or or it turns into a game where even if I outlast whatever it hunting me I cannot be rescued. I wanted to avoid that with this game and so I created a pair of checklists of items to be located, along with a timeline tracker. This keeps the tension high as the game progresses: Will you character find what you need to wait out the coming storm? Or will you repair the transponder and radio for help? Or will fate be against you, and you’ll lose all of your gear, lose your base camp, lose your life?

As we’ve previously discussed, Wretched & Alone games are not about winning so much as they are about faith and hope in the wake of overwhelming odds. I believe that in A Long December, I have set the stakes high enough to create the tension needed for the game while still leaving enough room for the player to have hope that they will win.

Truly, this is one of my favorite games that I’ve created and I think it shows! There will be three limited edition bundles coming to the shop soon that will have everything you need to play the game, and I cannot wait to share all the details with you on what’s going to be included. There will be 10 copies of the limited edition cover in the shop that aren’t bundled, as well as a print-on-demand version that will be in the shop once the limited covers are gone. We’ll also have this one available in the digital format, should you prefer that.

Next time on Behind the Scenes, we’ll dive into another upcoming game that has been percolating for some time: Knight of Flowers! If you like this sort of post, you can check out others like it in the Ramblings category. Be sure to follow us on social media for more sneak peeks at things coming up soon, including cover reveals!

We’ve all be there. The Forever GM of your friend group approaches you with a pitch for a new campaign. Everyone is excited, everyone is discussing the plot hook and what kind of characters they want to build and how best to form a party.

And then there’s you. Or, in this, case, there’s me: Sitting quietly with my brain screaming, “WHERE DO WE START?!” Character creation has always been, and remains after years of playing TTRPGs, one of the most challenging things about starting a new game.

For me, personally, the reason is simple: I do not care about these stats on a page until I’m given a reason to. They do not become a character to me just be virtue of having a name, a class, and a stat block. So many times, in the beginning of a campaign, my characters feel very flat and one dimensional - Until I have something that helps me develop their backstory and personality, their connections to the world the other players and me have found ourselves in together.

One tool that I have used in the past is The Ultimate RPG Character Backstory Guide, by James D’Amato. This book helped me understand some of the foundational things about character creation, as well as how to add “flavor” to your character. Give them hobbies. Talk about the holidays they celebrated in the region where they’re from. Tell us about the time they broke their grandmother’s heirloom mirror. Figure out why they decided to become an adventurer.

I find, though, that sometimes this isn’t enough to get into the mind of the character and what is where I feel solo TTRPGs can help fill the gap. Many times, they have their initial setup that you can simply drop your character into, and a premise to follow through with pre-drafted prompts. This sort of scenario helps me a lot with learning who my character is: How would they react in this particular moment? Which of their personality traits come to the forefront?

I’ve designed a few games that are specifically character journaling exercises, where you can simply plop your character into the scenario and play. However, a game like Let the Tides Carry You Back to Me can be used completely independently of its scenario: In the end, it is simply a series of questions designed to help you learn who your character is.

The initial premise of a game can also be tweaked to fit your character, as well. Something like 32% (which we played here)could be tweaked to fit a fantasy campaign be having the character be shipwrecked on a deserted island with only enough supplies to last them seven days, and they have to source materials to make a signal fire.

At the end of the day, so much character development happens during the course of your campaign, but it can feel daunting to go into a new story with your character and not know anything about them. Solo games can help bridge that gap and assist in creating both backstory and personality for a character who was previously a blank slate.

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