The Book of 13 Hours

This is a book of games...

...or something like games, anyway. Sketches of games, maybe. I learned about them from a friend of mine and wrote some of them down on zir behalf. They are very young games, or maybe they were old once but have changed so much as to have biome young again. They are games to be read and poured over, to be examined, to be added to, but above all else to be played. Partially any selection of them an be played, in practically any order, although I do recommend beginning with GAME 1 and ending with GAME 12 or GAME 13.

The rules necessarily vary from game to game, but some things remain certain:

1. These games are better played among trusted companions. We are better off when we can rely on each other to respect our needs.
2. These games ar better played in living tradition. I called them sketches before: these games are, by necessity, incomplete. There is much that could be added, taken away, or adjusted in order to make them better suit your needs and preferences.
3. These games are games, and cannot bind us unwillingly.

If any player grows uncertain in these truths, or no longer wishes to play these games, it is time for GAME 13.

These games are talking games...

...in which you and your fellow players will talk to a stranger, called the GOD in this book. But you have to understand that GOD is an awfully tricky word, and not always a helpful one. These games are games of greeting a stranger. My mother warned me about strangers, when I first became interested in games like this.  I was elevenish, and I had learned a little bit about them from a witch who cut my hair. I was warned me to learn rules carefully, and to be cautious when I left the door open, if only because you never knew who could come in. 

The rules must necessarily vary from GOD to GOD, but some things remain certain:

1. The GOD is a guest and must sooner or later depart.
2. The players are hosts and operate from a position of power.
3. Guests and hosts owe each other many things: at the very least, mutual respect and commitment to fair play. 

If any party grows uncertain in these truths, or attempts to take cruel advantage of another, it is time for GAME 13.

These games are ritual games...

...and games of pretend, in which we get to suspend normal time and be things which we aren’t. In each of these games, we are asked to take on roles, titles, positions, and identities. Some of them will be stranger than others, and some of them will be more or less ordinary. Some will put words in our mouth and some will not. We might feel very attached to some of them, and some of them might feel like paper masks to be worn and discarded. We will do our best to play our parts well, and to the best of our imaginative potential.

The rules must necessarily vary from role to role, but some things remain certain:

1. Roles not innate. These games may ask us to play outside of our own experiences, and stretch the limits of age, gender, etc. Sometimes the game will suggest we assign roles based on player characteristics, but these, too, are open to interpretation and adjustment.
2. Names are important. These games ask us to take seriously the labels we apply to ourselves, and attempt to play them to their full potential. If you’re not sure what a name means, you can always work with your fellow players to try and figure it out.
3. Performance is productive. It is not unlikely that the play will stay with us when the game is done.

If any player grows uncertain of these truths, or feels trapped in the roles given by this game, it is time for GAME 13.

These games are reading games...

...like all card games, which ask you to look at a card and read it, and assign it a meaning. This is hard word, active work, even if we don’t always notice it. As your eyes move across this page, along these lines, through these sentences, you are doing something, bringing meaning to the words which was not here before. This is what I mean when I say that these games are old games becoming young again: they become young in each reading. 

These rules must necessarily vary from card to card, but some things remain certain:

1. Reading is not a skill which is necessarily improved by encyclopedic knowledge. The traditional glosses of the cards are only one way of understanding them and may, in fact, impair you. 
2. Conflicting readings will occur. The truth is, perhaps, between one reading and another, or in the reading which appeals to us all..
3. The cards are tools in our hands, and never the other way around.

If any player grows uncertain in these truths, or no longer wishes to give meaning to the cards, it is time for GAME 13.

These games were collected by Che...

...for several purposes, and I'd meant to do it for a while, but the Trans Oracular Jam finally got my ass in gear to return them to the world. So thank you to Moira Campbell and Sasha Winter, for hosting. Thank you additionally to my patreon supporters, for helping justify the cost of my labor here.

These games replaced something else...

...called the Visitor at the 13th Hour. These games are, in a sense, also the visitor re-imagined and re-turned. But if you want the Visitor as mm originally appeared, mm may be found among the Collected Bug Boys.