Field Guide to Memory

Last updated
Field Guide to Memory
Cover of RPG Field Guide to Memory.png
Designers Shing Yin Khor, Jeeyon Shim
Publication2021
GenresSolo tabletop role-playing game, storytelling game, journal-writing game
Players1
Playing timeDaily prompts for 20 days
Skillswriting, storytelling

Field Guide to Memory is a one-player, narrative, pen-and-paper journaling, indie role-playing game by Shing Yin Khor and Jeeyon Shim about the mentee of a missing cryptozoologist traveling across the United States in search of information about their missing mentor.

Contents

Gameplay

Field Guide to Memory is a "keepsake game" where players create a physical artifact as part of the game mechanics. [1] [2] Players follow daily prompts that ask them to write, create art, and do other physical activities in the real world, often involving nature. [3]

Publication history

In December 2020, Shing Yin Khor and Jeeyon Shim launched a Kickstarter to fund the creation of the game. The crowdfunding campaign surpassed the goal of $18,000 and raised just over $62,000 with the support of 1817 backers. [4] [5] Initially, the game was run as a live game in February 2021 for Kickstarter backers who received the game prompts via email over the course of four weeks. The game was then repackaged as a PDF of daily prompts available for purchase on Itch.io. [1] [3]

Reception

Field Guide to Memory won the 2021 IndieCade Award in the best live game category. [1] [6] Jeeyon Shim was awarded the 2021 Diana Jones Award for "Best Emerging Designer" largely based on her work on Field Guide to Memory. [7] Kelly Knox for Nerdist called it the best solo (one-player) tabletop role-playing game. [8] Greg Loring-Albright at Drexel University wrote about the game in his Ph.D. research on keepsake games. [9]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Diana Jones Award</span> Annual award for excellence in tabletop gaming

The Diana Jones Award is an annual award for "excellence in gaming". The original award was made from a burned book encased in lucite. The award is unusual in two ways: first, it is not an award for a specific class of thing, but can be awarded to a person, product, publication, company, organization, event or trend – anything related to gaming; second, it does not count popularity or commercial success as a sign of "excellence". The award was first presented in 2001.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Indie role-playing game</span> Aspect of role-playing game publishing

An indie role-playing game is a role-playing game published by individuals or small press publishers, in contrast to games published by large corporations. Indie tabletop role-playing game designers participate in various game distribution networks, development communities, and gaming conventions, both in person and online. Indie game designer committees grant annual awards for excellence.

<i>Blades in the Dark</i> Tabletop fantasy role-playing game

Blades in the Dark is a tabletop fantasy role-playing game by John Harper, set in a fictional city of Doskvol, inspired by Victorian London and Gothic fiction. The game was crowdfunded on Kickstarter in 2015 and published at the start of 2017.

Whitney "Strix" Beltrán is a narrative designer and Project Narrative Director at Hidden Path Entertainment. Her writing and design career includes the indie role-playing game Bluebeard's Bride. She also founded the advocacy initiative Gaming as Other to promote inclusivity in the gaming community.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shing Yin Khor</span> Malaysian-American artist and cartoonist

Shing Yin Khor is a Malaysian-American artist and cartoonist. They are the creator of the comics The American Dream? A Journey on Route 66, The Center for Otherworld Science and Say it with Noodles, the last of which won them an Ignatz Award. Khor's middle grade graphic novel, The Legend of Auntie Po, earned an Eisner Award and was a finalist for the 2021 National Book Award for Young People's Literature.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leder Games</span> American board game company

Leder Games is a board game developer owned by Patrick Leder and based in Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is best known for publishing asymmetric games such as Root and Oath: Chronicles of Empire and Exile, which were both designed by Cole Wehrle. As of 2023, board games released by the company have usually been illustrated by Kyle Ferrin.

<i>Avatar Legends: The Roleplaying Game</i> 2022 tabletop role-playing game

Avatar Legends: The Roleplaying Game is a fantasy tabletop role-playing game produced by Magpie Games. It is set in the world of the animated television series Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra, and takes place in five different time periods. Players take the roles of martial artists, technological experts, or benders – people who can manipulate one of the four classical elements – who fight for balance in the world while also working towards their own goals and struggling with inner balance, represented by opposing ideals held by a character.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jeeyon Shim</span> Korean American game designer

Jeeyon Shim is a second generation Korean American indie role-playing game and live action role-playing game designer and writer. A former outdoor educator, her body of work is strongly influenced by themes of connection to the natural world. Playing Shim's narrative games often involves creating a keepsake artifact.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lucian Kahn</span> American game designer and musician

Lucian Kahn is an American role-playing game writer/designer and musician based in Brooklyn. His work focuses on LGBT, Jewish, and subcultural themes, typically utilizing satire and farce. His games include Visigoths vs. Mall Goths,If I Were a Lich, Man, and Dead Friend: A Game of Necromancy, and his music includes Schmekel.

The Indie Game Developer Network (IGDN) is a trade association for developers of indie role-playing games, board games, card games, and LARPs. They present the annual Indie Groundbreaker Awards at Gen Con. Their other programs include a scholarship to attend the game designer convention Metatopia, a mentorship program, and a peer coaching program.

Magpie Games is an American tabletop role-playing games publishing company. Their 2021 crowdfunding campaign to fund the publication of Avatar Legends: The Roleplaying Game raised over five million dollars, breaking the record for Kickstarter's highest earning tabletop role-playing game. Other notable publications include Bluebeard's Bride and a role-playing game adaptation of the board game Root. The publisher has won IndieCade, ENNIE Awards, and Indie Game Developer Network awards.

<i>Visigoths vs. Mall Goths</i> Urban fantasy tabletop role-playing game

Visigoths vs. Mall Goths is an urban fantasy tabletop role-playing game with LGBTQ dating sim elements by Lucian Kahn, with art by Robin Eisenberg. The ancient Visigoths have time traveled to 1990s Los Angeles and are battling mall goths for control of the mall. The game's tone is silly and the setting has many puns. The game was inspired by 1990s movies The Craft, Empire Records, Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure and Clueless.

<i>Bluebeards Bride</i> Gothic horror tabletop role-playing game

Bluebeard's Bride is a gothic horror tabletop role-playing game published by indie role-playing game publisher Magpie Games in 2017 that is based on the Bluebeard folktale of a young wife left alone in a castle who is tempted to open the wrong door. The game focuses on themes of misogyny and feminism.

<i>Honey & Hot Wax</i> Anthology of role-playing games

Honey & Hot Wax is an anthology of live action role-playing games on the theme of sex and sexuality, published by Pelgrane Press in 2020. It includes games by Sharang Biswas (co-editor), Yeonsoo Julian Kim, Julia Bond Ellingboe, Kat Jones, Lucian Kahn (co-editor), Jonaya Kemper, Will Morningstar, Alex Roberts, and Susanne. It also has a foreword by Naomi Clark, academic chair of NYU Game Center and designer of the board game Consentacle, as well as a chapter on consent by Maury Brown.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alice is Missing</span> Tabletop role-playing game

Alice is Missing is a tabletop role-playing game played in silence through text messaging. Players investigate the disappearance of a high school girl. The game was designed by Spenser Starke and published by Hunters Entertainment in 2020 after raising over $138,000 on Kickstarter. In 2022, Paramount Pictures began developing the game into a movie.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jiangshi: Blood in the Banquet Hall</span> Jiangshi fiction tabletop role-playing game

Jiangshi: Blood in the Banquet Hall is a tabletop role-playing game about Chinese immigrants to North America managing a family restaurant while battling Jiangshi, legendary hopping vampires. The game was designed by Banana Chan and Sen-Foong Lim, who are both Chinese immigrants. It was published independently in 2021 after a Kickstarter campaign raised over US$100,000. The instructions focus heavily on authentic portrayals of Chinese history and immigrant experiences. The game's tone can range from serious to comedy horror. Themes include fighting racism, exploring intergenerational knowledge and relationships, coping with economic hardship, and working together as a family.

<i>Brindlewood Bay</i> Murder mystery tabletop role-playing game

Brindlewood Bay is a murder mystery tabletop role-playing game about elderly women amateur detectives, inspired by Murder, She Wrote and H. P. Lovecraft. It was designed by Jason Cordova and was published by Gauntlet Publishing after a 2022 Kickstarter campaign raised $477,518 from 7,748 backers.

Sharang Biswas is an Indian American designer/writer of tabletop role-playing games and interactive media, a writer of speculative fiction, an adjunct professor of game studies at NYU Game Center, and a freelance games journalist. His work focuses on LGBTQ and science fiction and fantasy themes. Biswas has won multiple awards for his game writing work as both a solo designer and a collaborator: one IndieCade award, four ENNIE Awards, and two Indie Game Developer Network awards. He was an Artist in Residence at the Museum of the Moving Image.

<i>Women are Werewolves</i> Tabletop role-playing game

Women are Werewolves is a fantasy tabletop role-playing game by Yeonsoo Julian Kim and C.A.S. Taylor about nonbinary characters in a family where only the women transform into werewolves beneath the full moon. It was published in 2022 by 9th Level Games after a successful Kickstarter campaign raised $23,556. Women are Werewolves won "Game of the Year" at Dicebreaker's 2023 Tabletop Awards and the first annual Nonbinary Tabletop Awards in 2024.

<i>Im Sorry Did You Say Street Magic</i> City-building tabletop role-playing game

I'm Sorry Did You Say Street Magic is a city-building tabletop role-playing game created by Caro Asercion in 2019, based on the system in Microscope.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Carpenter, Nicole (March 26, 2021). "Field Guide to Memory is a 'keepsake' game written inside your own personal journal". Polygon. Retrieved September 28, 2022.
  2. "The Gaming Shelf Enters the Tavern". Yahoo Entertainment. 18 October 2022. Retrieved 2023-04-03.
  3. 1 2 Meehan, Alex (2020-12-17). "Keep your own physical journal over four weeks in storytelling game Field Guide to Memory". Dicebreaker. Retrieved 2023-04-03.
  4. "Field Guide to Memory". Kickstarter. Jeeyon Shim. Retrieved April 10, 2023. "$62,449 pledged of $18,000 goal. 1,817 backers".
  5. Moreno, Jim (2020-12-19). "Field Guide To Memory Has You Create Your Own Unique Journal As Part Of The Game". TheGamer. Retrieved 2023-04-10.
  6. "2021 AWARD WINNING GAMES". IndieCade. Retrieved September 28, 2022.
  7. Carter, Chase (2021-08-04). "Jeeyon Shim wins 2021 Diana Jones Emerging Designer Program". Dicebreaker. Retrieved 2023-04-03.
  8. "Solo Tabletop Games to Play When You're Tired of People". Nerdist. Retrieved 2023-04-03.
  9. "PhD Student Greg Loring-Albright Investigates "Keepsake" Games". College of Arts and Sciences. 2021-09-09. Retrieved 2023-04-03.