#Feminism Is A Collection of 34 "Nanogames" From Designers Around The World

Pelgrane Press, known for its narrative games like Hillfolk and its collection of story-games, Seven Wonders, is releasing an anthology of 34 mini-RPGs written by feminist authors from 11 different countries. These "nano-games", collected in the book #Feminism, are typically playable in under an hour, making them ideal for one-shots. Pelgrane has kindly sent along some previews of the book, which you can see below. With games like Mentioning the Unmentionables by Sweden's Kajsa Greger ("Three games about the anatomy of women: "Dances With Vulvas", "Dying for a Cup of Coffee", and "Just Put Some Salt on It"), Shoutdown to Launch by America's Jason Morningstar ("In this game about gendered interruption, a bunch of engineers need to fix a problem with a rocket engine in the dwindling time before launch. It won’t go well."), 6016 by Norway's Elin Nilsen ("In 6016 the only historical source of the 21st century is a collection of clips from the soap opera Love, Lust and Lack of Trust."), and First Joyful Mystery by Ireland's Cathriona Tobin ("Players examine the impact Ireland’s prohibitive abortion laws have on people who find themselves pregnant."), each game has an intensity rating from 1-5.

#Feminism is a 96-page softcover available for pre-order; those who do so get the PDF version immediately.

One of the anthology's writers, Emily Care Boss, spoke about her thoughts when writing Ma, Can I Help You With That?, which came out of her own process of aging and seeing others supporting their parents. The game investigated the was relationships become strained, and how men and women tend to interact with the process. Jason Morningstar, who wrote Shoutdown to Launch, talks about how his job in academia helped highlight some of the gender ratios and power dynamics, while quietly honouring engineers like Katherine Johnson and Galina Balashova.

With 34 different nano-games, a whole range of subjects are covered. Tour of Duty by Moyra Turkington looks at women in the US military; Her Last Tweet deals with a campus shooting event; and in President, the goal of the game is to draft the first female president of the Akhaian Empire's press statement. There's a full list of the games below the images below!

​

First Date Katrin Førde
A game about a date gone wrong and a rant about the orgasm gap.

Flirt Agata Swistak
Flirt is an attempt to deconstruct the game almost everyone is playing — the game of hook-ups, crushes, and scoring!

Spin the Goddesses Karin Edman
A kissing game of lesbian witches.

Willful Disregard Anna Westerling
A love story.

Manic Pixie Dream Girl Commandos Lizzie Stark
A military unit undertakes its last whimsical mission before retiring to civilian life.

6016 Elin Nilsen
In 6016 the only historical source of the 21st century is a collection of clips from the soap opera Love, Lust and Lack of Trust.

Tropes vs. Women Ann Eriksen
Explore well-known movie clichés and tropes about women in a fun and not too serious way.

Lipstick Kaisa Kangas
Sofia hesitates about whether to wear lipstick to a TV debate on feminism.

You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby Julia Ellingboe
A game about gender, cultural, and ethnic representation in the movies.

Restrictions Frida Karlsson Lindgren and Sofia Stenler
A non-verbal game on how we are and aren’t allowed to move together, as two genders.

Mentioning the Unmentionables Kajsa Greger
Three games about the anatomy of women.

#Flesh Frederik Berg, Rebecka Eriksson, and Tobias Wrigstad
A physical game about the objectification of women or how women’s bodies are butchered into parts.

Selfie Kira Magrann
An intimate game about feelings in images.

So Mom I Made This Sex Tape Susanne Vejdemo
Different generations of feminists argue it out about sex, porn, and what the main point of feminism really is.

My Sister, Malala Elsa Helin
A game about freedom of thoughts and ideas for girls in Pakistan.

A Friend in Need Muriel Algayres
A nano-game about street harassment, victim-blaming and friendship. After a bad encounter on the street, can Ella get over victim-blaming with the help of her friends?

Driving to Reunion Laura Simpson
An intergenerational game about four Black women trying to understand each other, as they drive back for college reunion.

Catcalling Tora de Boer
Street harassment feels different depending on whether bystanders support the harasser or the victim.

How to Be Ava White Eva Wei
At a board meeting, parts of Ava White’s personality decide how to make her the perfect woman.

Shoutdown to Launch Jason Morningstar
In this game about gendered interruption, a bunch of engineers need to fix a problem with a rocket engine in the dwindling time before launch. It won’t go well.

“Something to Drink with That, Sir?” Evan Torner
A woman flight attendant performs emotional labor to serve three different male passengers.

“Ma, Can I Help You with That?” Emily Care Boss
A game about family, age and the gendered nature of care-giving.

Glitzy Nails Kat Jones
A freeform scenario about intersectional feminism, interactions between women, and nail salons.

Stripped Dominika Kovacova
A game about stripping off the stigma.

President Kaisa Kangas
The war-waging Akhaian empire has elected its first female president, a very successful lady general, and feminists with conflicting agendas are trying to draft a press statement together.

Curtain Call Sarah Bowman
A larp about the experiences of a woman in the music industry over the course of four decades.

The Grey Zone Siri Sandquist
A larp about the grey zone between rape and consensual sex in a relationship.

Family Planning Clinic Baptiste Cazes and Leïla Teteau-Surel with Laura Guedes
A game about women’s health where players will play short scenes from the daily life of a French family planning clinic inspired by real stories.

First Joyful Mystery Cathriona Tobin
Players examine the impact Ireland’s prohibitive abortion laws have on people who find themselves pregnant.

Girl: A Game for Boys Livia von Sucro
A small exercise about empathy, designed for cis gendered men to take a glimpse of what it feels like to be a victim of violence against women.

Her Last Tweet Rowan Cota
A microgame exploring being a potential victim of a campus shooting event.

Tour of Duty Moyra Turkington
A freeform nano-scenario about what it’s like to serve and defend as a woman in the US Military.

SaveSave
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[Celebrim]

I had not meant to dismiss them at all. More to imply there are people misusing them in ways that undermine what they stand for.

I interpreted your meaning in that sentence as, "These are a bunch of things I approve of or favor, but they've attracted some persons that claim to be supporters that don't actually reflect favorably on the group."

That's a problem that comes with any successful social group, and likewise almost every group finds itself being represented publically by its most fringe and most radical elements. I won't delve into that generally, because the most obvious examples are religious and political, but I think that the truth of it speaks for itself if you reflect on it.

In the context of EnWorld, it's true of table top Role-Playing's public perception. It's not that there aren't basement dwelling overweight socially inept semi-autistic neck-beards that live with their mothers, it's just that that stereotype doesn't actually reflect even the average gamer (and even then, to the extent that stereotype has some partial truth to it, it does no good to treat those people as pathetic and worthy of disdain, which is one of the reasons I loved (parts of) the 'community' episode.) Likewise, I know from conversation with people that talked about their experiences that a great many in the Satanist community (or Satanist wannabes and would be rebels, and your 'fad' terminology is apt) during the 70s and early 80s treated D&D as being 'Satanist positive' and engaged with AD&D in some truly bizarre and sometimes dangerous ways (LARPing without any of the normal safety rules associated with LARPing, for example). One of the places I knew of that sold the material back when it was hard to find was an occult bookstore. And likewise, I had a cousin who was one of the early adopters in RPGs (perhaps one of the earliest in the state), who encountered the game through his communist commune. But that had more to do with the experimental nature of the 70's, and the very real relationship between D&D and the '70's counter-culture - while it certainly contributed to the occult scare - in no way justifies something like Jack Chick. Nonetheless, any social group pretty much always gets represented by its fringe simply because it is the fringe that is most visible, most memorable, and often the most vocal and out-spoken.

Some in the thread have said that my response to the document was motivated by the fact that I didn't think 'feminist' topics are worth discussion. That in my opinion doesn't represent my position at all. My position I think parallels my somewhat against the grain position that the 'occult scare' didn't popularize D&D and that the negative publicity it generated was actually highly destructive to the brand and the community as a whole. My problem with the document is that while there are probably some good games or good ideas buried in that mess, for the most part the document is representing 'feminism' through its fringe and often bundling the idea of feminism with things that I think are truly tangential to the subject. My problem is that greatly misrepresents feminism, misrepresents women, and will generally create a strongly negative reaction rather than a positive one, subjecting women and feminism to highly negative stereotypes rather than positive and uplifting ones.

I'm of the opinion that the most constructive contribution would be to highlight skillful creative work by female author's that weren't overtly about 'women's issues', precisely because it's becoming a negative stereotype that women designers can only create 'anti-games' (games with little or no actual gameplay) about 'women's issues'. Instead, it's almost always better to make your philosophical points in the subtext rather than overtly, so that liking your creative work doesn't depend on the consumer solely on having the same philosophical position you do. Authors like JRR Tolkien, CS Lewis, Gene Wolfe, Orson Scott Card, and John C. Wright very obviously have philosophical subtexts to their work and positions that they wish to advance. But they are by far at their most powerful when those topics remain undercurrents of their work, easily missed by those not already insiders. As soon as they get 'preachy', they have a tendency to be received as being quite wacky by the very outgroups that they might otherwise reach - to say nothing of the fact that the overtly didactic is typically not a marker of being very creative, skillful or artistic. One should be seeking to 'show, not tell', and 'Preaching to the choir', as the old analogy goes, does very little to change anyone's opinions.

 

[-Wing-Zero-]

i think i'll be the one to decide my snark levels, thank you very much. if you can't handle it, third grade is about 12 years that way.

this is a gaming forum meant to discuss mechanics and time-wasting hobbies. this isn't a support group for highly sensitive children. no need to try and wring all humanity out of discussion in the name of echo-chambers.

 

[nightwind1]

i think i'll be the one to decide my snark levels, thank you very much. if you can't handle it, third grade is about 12 years that way.

this is a gaming forum meant to discuss mechanics and time-wasting hobbies. this isn't a support group for highly sensitive children. no need to try and wring all humanity out of discussion in the name of echo-chambers.

I see you joined the very day this thread was started. That makes one wonder if you're some kind of anti-feminist troll.

 

[Mallus]

That makes one wonder if you're some kind of anti-feminist troll.

I'd bet the color of his pill is red. I mean, not real money. Maybe electrum pieces. Or quatloos. Or those bitcoins based on Doge...

Anyway... some of the content sounds cringeworthy and some of it sounds great -- I'd play Manic Pixie Dream Commandos in the heartbeat -- and some it sounds fascinating but hard to use in practice.

In other words, this sounds like exactly like a gaming product with multiple authors. Albeit one with a hashtag name that gets some folks dander up.

Not seeing what the fuss is about.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I'd bet the color of his pill is red. I mean, not real money. Maybe electrum pieces. Or quatloos. Or those bitcoins based on Doge...

Anyway... some of the content sounds cringeworthy and some of it sounds great -- I'd play Manic Pixie Dream Commandos in the heartbeat -- and some it sounds fascinating but hard to use in practice.

In other words, this sounds like exactly like a gaming product with multiple authors. Albeit one with a hashtag name that gets some folks dander up.

Not seeing what the fuss is about.

lol exactly. I would make that bet with real money, but I've grown pessimistic about people lately.

But yeah, it's a thread about a gaming product that have political themes, by multiple authors. Looks about as hit and miss, to me, as Volo's guide was for me. Firbolg are great, gnolls were terrible, etc.

The amount of vitriol in this thread should be surprising, but again, pessimism rising.

 

[77IM]

(Continued from the other day)


The Grey Zone: Another Inside Out-style debate where you play the voices in a woman's head. But this time the scenario is pretty intense: It's the morning after some not-totally-consensual sex. This is going to hit way too close to home for some people. I would love to watch a mature and thoughtful group play this game.

In case it's not clear: This game does NOT involve role-playing acts of rape. All of the sex acts (which may have been rape or maybe not; that's the whole point of "The Grey Zone") occurred in the past, off-screen. Other posters on this thread have stated that "this makes the game where people will be LARPing rape for certain" but this is factually untrue.​

Family Planning Clinic: 5 mini-scenarios in which you play doctors and patients at a family-planning clinic. This one gets points for being based on true stories, and for having some diversity of scenarios. Not very creative mechanically, though.

First Joyful Mystery: This is interesting because it's kind of a "create-your-own-scenario" setup, in which each player creates both a pregnant character, and two supporting characters -- one for abortion, and one against. Then, each player gets a turn acting as their pregnant character while two others act out the supporting characters. This is pretty cool, but the topic, abortion, is super-duper-hot-button. Like, mega-nuclear-hot-button. Abortion is a feminist issue but it also goes WAY beyond feminism. Still, with a mature group, this could be an interesting way to frame the debate, and I like the flexibility in the setup.

Girl: A Game for Boys: Men role-play a support group for women who have recently left extremely abusive situations. The setup is very simple, but the topic is so loaded with emotion that I'm not sure it needs any game mechanics to push it along.

Her Last Tweet: In this game you role-play a group of female CS students working on a project when a campus mass shooting breaks out. The role-playing is broken into phases of increasing intensity. Spoiler: At the end some of you will die. This is making me tear up just reading about it. Would totally play, and then cry, and then hug.

Tour of Duty: The group collaboratively creates a personality and history for a female soldier, including a brush with Military Sexual Trauma. This is more of a discussion than role-playing exercise, but still, it could get really ugly. The statistics alone here are terrifying. I'm really not sure this is the best format for discussing this topic. Or perhaps, the game should give more guidance on how to discuss the most sensitive issues here; this is legitimate trigger-warning territory.

Final Breakdown
5
17
7
2

 

[77IM]

Same gist as before with this, I’m not saying that nothing can ever have feminist influences in it, but if we’re going to “explore” the subject then the author or creator has to take into account that that exploration may lead to rejection of feminism in part or in whole, and I really, really do not think that these “games” allow for that.

You might want to consider why you "really, really" think that.

Because I read the whole document, and I think your thought is wrong. Some of the games do push Feminist Orthodoxy pretty hard, but many of them do not. In fact, on many issues there isn't one single orthodox stance within Feminism as a movement, so rejecting it in part or in whole is basically impossible.

To answer your questions about specific games: "Lipstick" and "Riding to Reunion" are exactly what you think they are; but, ironically, these are two of the games that LEAST enforce a stance, as they present dilemmas for which there isn't an easy answer. "Shoutdown to Launch" is one of the funnest looking games and it's designed to make you experience a phenomenon that's already happening. The discussion afterwards asks you several things about it, but the game itself doesn't assert any particular position on the issue.

Obviously the authors of these games consider themselves feminists and are pushing an agenda, but rather than rejecting the games for pushing an agenda, I prefer to be grateful that they are open about the agenda they are pushing. You won't see "#RichWhiteMen, an anthology of 34 games that promote the status quo," but I'll bet if you trawled through the great body of work that is our industry, you would find at least 34 games that do exactly that but in a more subtle way.

On the other hand, while I guess there could be a market somehow for things like this, I can’t imagine who this is for. If your group is super into modern feminist causes, then this is stuff you already know and would at best just be indulgence for your own assumed moral superiority. If your group is not already on board with modern feminism, then it’s going to cause serious frustration and division. My group is somewhere in-between, and even they wouldn’t touch this with a ladder split into a ten foot pole because ham-fistedly going through biased political improv sounds about as fun as chewing glass.

This is a legit criticism. The front-matter of the book emphasizes that "RPGs should be fun!" but let's be honest, most of these will not be fun at all. (A few will be hilarious and awesome, though.) However, playing them may still be rewarding.

The games themselves run a pretty broad spectrum from "introduction to empathizing with your fellow humans" to "play this game to call BS on your pseudo-intellectual friends," so in a sense, there's a game in there for everyone. But as a product, it's unclear to me who is going to be lining up for this.

My best guess is that this is aimed at educators, counsellors, and activists who are looking for alternative ways to consider feminism than just "sit around and discuss it." Of course a few of the games in there are sadly little more than "sit around and discuss it."

 

[ArchfiendBobbie]

The Grey Zone: Another Inside Out-style debate where you play the voices in a woman's head. But this time the scenario is pretty intense: It's the morning after some not-totally-consensual sex. This is going to hit way too close to home for some people. I would love to watch a mature and thoughtful group play this game.

In case it's not clear: This game does NOT involve role-playing acts of rape. All of the sex acts (which may have been rape or maybe not; that's the whole point of "The Grey Zone") occurred in the past, off-screen. Other posters on this thread have stated that "this makes the game where people will be LARPing rape for certain" but this is factually untrue.​

Sex that is not consensual is rape. There's no wiggle room on this one.

Basically, your entire defense of this particular "game" amounts to trying to exploit technicalities.

 

[77IM]

Sex that is not consensual is rape. There's no wiggle room on this one.

Basically, your entire defense of this particular "game" amounts to trying to exploit technicalities.

No sex is roleplayed, therefore, by your own definition, this game does not involve roleplaying rape. That's not a technicality. That's what the game is.

You've made a lot of great points on this thread (I particularly like your notion of "fad feminism"). You might consider that you were just plain wrong on this one, though.

 

[ArchfiendBobbie]

No sex is roleplayed, therefore, by your own definition, this game does not involve roleplaying rape. That's not a technicality. That's what the game is.

You've made a lot of great points on this thread (I particularly like your notion of "fad feminism"). You might consider that you were just plain wrong on this one, though.

I'm going to concede the point.

I actually have a post up about this one, and in particular the aspects of roleplay and how it applies. But I realized I was beginning to post like one of those feminists I complain about. I was becoming part of the problem. And that I cannot stomach.

I don't agree with your interpretation. But, I have doubts that my disagreement is truly legitimate and not just based on my own knee-jerk reaction to a topic. And posting it would completely destroy what I have advocated repeatedly on this particular subject.