Tonight was very quiet at Phoenix, only 9 people braved the rain to join us tonight. So what better night for "The Quiet Year"?

The story of our little community ended up heavily inspired by Welcome to Night Vale. It was located in the middle of the desert, our sun was enormous and a seriously dim shade of cherry red (that deepens and brightens when there is solar flare activity), there were paranormal happenings on the outskirts, a group of rocks that moved position to indicate fortuitous or "disfortuitous" weather, a telephone connected to nothing but the ground whispering strange yet wonderful ideas into the ears of any who braved the labyrinth to find it, a decision to build a monument to the founder (that later failed) brought the disappearance of several well-known and loved townsfolk... It was fantastic, and while only in the set-up was the inspiration intentional, I think we carried that vibe with us throughout the game, and it added to the game in odd and fantastic ways.

The Quiet Year is probably my new favorite story game, supplanting Fiasco. I loved the mechanics of story-telling from the third-person-omniscient perspective, rather than the first-person. The map-building aspect was fantastic, and probably one of the most clunky-sounding yet fluid-in-practice mechanics I've ever seen. I was in emotional turmoil when the Frost Shepherds came, after which point the rules forbid ANY further discussion of the fate of the community, even though there was so much left unresolved. This is the only game that has ever had me both hoping for and yet thoroughly dreading the abrupt end. Thank you Ben, Aaron and Jim for playing with me. I will definitely be looking to play this next time I'm around. Until next time, readers...

Good night, my fiber-loving, child-labor-reliant town...

Good night.

Great write-up, Brandon. I loved how every discussion would lead to rafts of Contempt being taken and put back at the same time, because we didn't agree on which way the community should go. Obey the phone? Smash the phone?