It’s a good day to be a gay wizard.
It was either yesterday or early this morn that I discovered two games about gay wizards being released quite recently. In celebration of nothing special today, I decided to indulge in both.
I’ve been a fan of Heather Robertson’s games for a couple years now, so I was quite chuffed to see another gem released, brought to my attention by the lovely RPS.
I’m not one to jump onto new games*. I have a huge backlog that I’m earnestly attempting to work through — I even have a goddamn spreadsheet that keeps me on track. However, I simply couldn’t stop thinking about You Are A Wizard because it seemed too perfect to ignore.
And yes, the game is too perfect to ignore. There’s absolutely nothing I could think of that would improve this experience, especially considering the ending that made me cry. It’s incredibly idiosyncratic, which is one of the reasons I told my potential boyfriend (?) that I often prefer single-developer games over AAA titles.
In that same conversation with him, I mentioned that I wanted to begin breaking down my stubborn distaste for RPGs, probably by starting with some of the stranger one-person games I’ve seen floating around (and maybe, just maybe, trying out a low-commitment D&D campaign someday).
There’s some cool stuff that will help me ease into it, and Riverhouse Games makes RPGs that fit this well. I have already purchased (but not yet played) their We Are But Worms: A One-Word RPG, but being that The Yielded Piece of Little Ground has you play a gay wizard, I went with that today.
I’m afraid of leading plants to their deaths, and I’m terrible at pretending to be someone other than myself, so I figured this game would help me deal with those two things. Well, I’m already gay as fuck, so at least I don’t have to imagine that part.
The rules indicate that I’m supposed to grow some seeds, so I went to the store to buy some. However, the wonderful associates there steered me towards the succulents, being that they’re difficult to kill. The enthusiasm they had for this, plus the mini-tour of the plant-storage refrigerator, plus the free balloon one of them gave me, ended up with me hugging all three of them and thanking them for an incredible experience.
Although I’m not playing exactly by the rules, I feel that it’s close enough in spirit that I’ll be able to go through this process. I’m a bit nervous about being a daddy, as well as being able to maintain the role for the duration of the game.
Note: I’ll probably write more about it at some point, but I wanted to publish this today.
*Uh, I admittedly purchased Baba Is You as well… but there’s no mention of gay wizards, so I’ll write about it another time.
Previous recommendations from this season: Pico-8 Advent Calendar / Games for Winter / Dinosaur games / FLATJAM 2018 / a tiny printable zine / Potpourri
