Asa Donald | Backwards Tabletop

@backwardsttrpg.bsky.social

1619 Followers 480 Following

He/him. Designing indie ttrpgs Newest Project: SPINE - A dark solo ttrpg about losing yourself in a book https://backwards-tabletop.itch.io/spine https://www.backwardstabletop.com/

Featuring hand-carved prints by Holly Freiberg. Image: A linocut print of a bleed heart and an inkwell.
Play with words. Hunt for secrets. Image: A copy of Pale Fire over a spread from SPINE. The spread includes a cipher from the text.
Embody the researcher who is reading and marking up the physical book in front of you.
When you're done, you can play SPINE again or abandon it on a Little Library shelf. Image: A little library with three copies of SPINE in it.
As you're absorbed in the book, advance your clock. Image: A clock that resembles a portrait. Inside, you draw your face as you are absorbed by the book.
Play by reading. For each page, pick an endnote and complete its prompts. Image: An endnote on a homunculus, featuring a scribble-headed stick figure.
Piece together the story without losing yourself in it. Art: A scanned spread from SPINE, featuring a newspaper clipping and a block print tower.
You are a researcher who has inherited a strange book from an estranged relative… Image: Print copy of SPINE
Spotted Cow beer.
You Will Die In This Place by Liz Little. Swords Against and City of Six Moons by Amabel Holland.
Incredible, groundbreaking writing. You Will Die In This Place is a labyrinthine tabletop RPG that insists on being read and played until you're lost inside.
The front cover and rear cover of YWDITP
Sister Dingo, for example, fancies “having lots of good lines and participating in scenes. She really gives each scene her all and checks with the studio audience every now and then to make sure she’s doing alright.”
And art from John Austen's illustrations of The Adventures of Harlequin (1923)
Art by Izzy Peters. Tybalt and Benvolio... erm... "exchange blows."
A game of romance and conflict. A game of defying and upholding the social order.
"O Fortune, Fortune, all men call thee fickle."
A violent collision between Verona's social order and your lover's desires.
Spinetta rushes out before the party begins. She has been sent to decorate the little cakes. Pawn F2 moves to F3.
"These violent delights have violent ends."
Two kings kiss. In chess, the kings may never kiss. Has this game always been about forbidden love?
Credit: @farenhi (itch.io). Signatures of 8 pages, bound using blue thread and with inverted cover colors.
Scan line
Gloves, a red pen, and printouts of art.
A collage of SPINE in Coptic stitch binding.
The front of the business card with a linocut print. Plus, the backside with a coupon and advert for my new game.
Print copy of The Balsam Lake Murders by Paul Czege
A match smokes inside a picture frame, as framed by the book's cover.
I abhor such games; they make my temples throb with abominable pain
A page torn in half, facing a collage of flowers.
A perfect rock. The book is open, as is the French fold reference sheet.
Collage art on an interior page of SPINE, incuding flowers and the words "the pit of your voice."
A post from @Sabeenahmad1 that says "Introduce yourself with what almost killed you"
A road sign that says Slow Down Frosty.
Mecha TTRPG Experience, 35 games for $20
a pair of brooks running shoes that match Lex's
A castle atop a stacked house of cards. All in simple geometry, solid colors, no shading. 5 colors in total, including white and the yellow background.
A binding of SPINE by @stampyourfoot. A stiffened board binding with 9 signatures, stitched and then boards glued to the endpapers.
A stack of copies of SPINE. Three different Little Free libraries, filled with books. Each has a copy of SPINE in it.
Print copies now available.
A dark solo ttrpg about losing yourself in a book. Free for a limited time.
Print copies now available. Cover for a perfect-bound paperback of SPINE
Print copies now available. The front cover of SPINE in a perfect bound paperback.
A dark solo ttrpg about losing yourself in a book. Free for a limited time.
"A game for the frenetic obsessed researcher in all of us. You’ll be up into the late hours, frantically flipping pages, deciphering notes in the margins, and trying to solve the cryptic puzzle that is SPINE." —Seb Pines (Dwelling, Deadline)
A dark solo ttrpg about losing yourself in a book. Free for a limited time.
"A venus flytrap of a book. SPINE entices its readers in and you’ll find yourself sinking deeper into a truly immersive mystery, until you look up and find yourself completely lost to its pages." —Seb Pines
Hello this is Rick with [excised] fence company just giving you a call in regards to getting you some crazy nudes more aliens uh if you'd like you could take a picture of the stairs or the area that you're looking to have the railing installed my cell phone is [excised] thank you
SPINE - I’ve not done a reading this week, but I do need to give a shout out to SPINE. SPINE is a solo game, existing in the tradition of Thousand Year Vampire, but with a greater emphasis on the text as text. Very few things are being generated ex nihilo, instead you have an actual body of work that you’re interacting with, and the relationship between the play and the text is extremely tight. The designer of the game has put out a series of articles talking about his conception of a “book game,” (link here) which I highly recommend reading. I also highly recommend following the print instructions for SPINE, it plays a lot better as a physical object than a digital one.
A pair of print-on-demand books from Mixam, front cover and rear cover. The rear cover appears to have notes affixed to it with tape. The notes include a game description and pull quotes.
"I’m partial to art about the transformative threat of art – and doubly enamored of SPINE, which equips you to transform the art right back. Whatever happens, neither you nor the game are walking away from the experience unchanged." — Ken Lowery (VOID 1680 AM, No-Tell Motel)
Horror Enthusiasts & Linguistic Puzzlers Must Explore -S. Kaiya J.
"SPINE is a captivating, tactile experience, compelling the reader to unravel layer after hidden layer. One of the most unique and memorable solo RPGs I've ever played." - Sam Leigh
SPINE is in the top spot for Popular games in the Physical Games category on itch.
A dark solo ttrpg about losing yourself in a book. Free for a limited time. Art: Cover preview of SPINE, featuring a spine in the shape of a vortext.
A set of six banners, previewing the upcoming interviews and essays. Interviews include Liz Little, Clayton Notestine, and Jay Dragon. Essays includ Bookplay in TTRPGs, How do we talk about TTRPG books, and A Defense of Reading TTRPGs.
Developmental editing by Furt the Goblin. Image: A Google Doc comment by The Furtive Goblin, "Is the double spacing between 'that' and 'loom' deliberate to draw the reader's attention to it to begin the maddening process, or just a typo?"