So, over the weekend while I was waiting for my summer class’s students to turn in their final writing projects, I put together my entry for the Appx. N Jam. If you’re not on itch.io, you’re probably unfamiliar with this “game jam” concept: basically, someone suggests a themed creative project and people can join it and submit their own take on it. Some have prizes (like the Appx. N Jam does), some don’t.
Come to think of it, if you’re not deep into D&D lore, you might also not know about Appendix N, to which the jam’s name refers. But that’s explained on the game jam page linked above, so go see that if you’re curious.
This particular jam is unusual because, while it’s themed, it also involves a somewhat unique component: each participant was assigned the title of one made-up (fake) pulp-era sword & sorcery novel to use as inspiration for their work. What work? To create a simple old-school RPG adventure, short enough to fit on both sides of an A4 paper. It’s a bit like a One-Page Dungeon (as in the famous One Page Dungeon Contest), except you get to work with both sides of an A4 page instead of just the one side.
Imagine my surprise when I was assigned the title “Circe’s Grin.” I am unable to resist a reference to Homer, even if it means making another island adventure despite the fact my last published adventure, Isle of Joy, was at the time being voted on for an as an Ennie Award nominee. Too on-brand? Well, maybe, but this island adventure has a few weird twists all its own.
Anyway, that’s not the point of this post. What I actually came here to mention is that game jams are great. Personally, I learned a lot about layout in Affinity Publisher. I made a black-and-white (well, greyscale) RPG map for the first time ever, too! What’s more, I even built my own template from the ground up for a document in Affinity Publisher, and the first time I didn’t end up just abandoning the idea of consistently using styles along the way: I figured, might as well learn how to do it right. That’s the benefit of these kinds of game jams: they don’t just get you up off your butt and creating, but they also provide you with the impetus to finally sit down and learn stuff like mapmaking and layout. I now can confidently do with Affinity Publisher that I literally could not do a week ago. Of course there’s a learning curve, but the great thing about a jam like this one is that you’re working on a relatively small project, something light. Writing up the contents wasn’t hard (aside from the task of keeping everything concise enough to fit on an A4 paper, that is). The great thing is that even the frustrating moments weren’t too bad.
As one of my writing teachers once commented, taking on smaller projects is like flying in a glider: even if you crash, it’s not just a big investment and the damage is much less “expensive”—at least, compared to what happens if you attempt to fly a jet liner your first time out. You can crash and walk away whole, to lay out another adventure another day. For this reason, I’d recommend for anyone who is interested in leveling up their game design skills to join a jam like this one… or, hell, maybe just join this one! (There’s about a week left, and that’s plenty of time to put something together, if you’re not busy.) Don’t be intimidated by the (really!) nice looking entries already there. Just focus on learning whatever you’re wobbly at, and use the time pressure to give you a little positive stress toward getting the thing done and published. And then, move on to the next thing.
Anyway, you can see Circe’s Grin over at my itch.io page (or, if you’re participating in the jam, you can rate it on this page once the submission period is over), and you can see all of the entries over on this page. There are a bunch of really good-looking ones. There’s even one by my buddy Justin (as “Yesterweird”). Here’s a link to where you can download and rate his adventure!