PWM Introduction

What is this?

Playing with Myself is a space where I play games by myself.

I’m at a place in my life where getting together with others to engage in the act of play is incredibly difficult. I’m sure there are many of us out there who used to play board games and role playing games with a group of friends, laughing and joking around a table in the living room. But we’re grown up now. Those friends have moved, or had babies, or simply become so busy with everything that life is. Not to mention the pandemic, the current climate situation, the state of politics in the US, and many, many other things that currently make the idea of ‘playing games’ superfluous or unimportant.

And that’s ok! I’m not blaming anyone. I don’t hold anyone at fault. Life happens.

But I like to engage in the act of play. I tend to make up stories in my head often. I’ve made a few half-assed attempts at being a writer.

So, recently, I’ve dipped my toe into the ‘solo-play’ world, and let me tell you, it is vast. There are so many games, systems, and tools to help players play by themselves. Some are hyper-specific. Do you want to be a field scientist studying cryptids? How about a thousand-year-old vampire? There’s a game for both of those. And they’re fun! Remember when you were a child and you’d make up games and worlds by yourself, just running and playing and pretending? These games give me that feeling, but with more rules, prompts, and die rolls so that I don’t always know what’s going to happen.

The issue is my notes from these games are scattered across different journals, physical and digital, in different places. I didn’t have a space to keep everything together, organized and clean. I needed somewhere I can write out my play sessions and my thoughts, as well as share them with anyone who might be interested or intrigued, or just wants to read a story.

My first couple projects will be transferring some games I’ve already played and putting them on here. I will be attempting to write a post weekly, with varying lengths. Most posts will be a play session showing the actions I (or my characters) took, the mechanics used, the die rolls made and the fiction created from those things. Some posts might be non-fiction, including thoughts and mechanics of the current game, reviewing a play session, notes, ideas for upcoming sessions, etc.

Once I’ve transferred over some previous games, I intend to attempt to play Blade Runner: The Role Playing Game, a very new game made by Free League. The game itself doesn’t have any solo mechanics but I have ideas for how to make it work using what I’ve learned and various tools I’ve found.

Thanks for reading. Subscribe if you’re interested.

Time to go play with myself.