The Road to Death is Long

You are dead. Where are you going? Pull eight runes to reflect on your life. Follow the runes to your chosen death realm, and don’t get eaten by Níðhǫggr along the way. He eats oath-breakers, so let’s hope you haven’t broken any of yours.

This project is dedicated to the Runevaettir. 

You will need a set of Elder Futhark runes or use a rune generator to play.

Submission to the Trans Oracular Jam 2024. This game is in development and will receive updates later this summer.

This game is under the Olivia Hill Rule (Creative Commons Share-Alike Attribution).

If you're a fascist or if you hate queer & trans people, you're not welcome to play this game. It's against the rules. If you're reading this and thinking, "You just call everyone you disagree with a fascist," then you're probably a fascist, or incapable of drawing inferences from context and acknowledging a dangerous political climate that causes the oppressed to be hyperbolic. Don't play this game. Heal yourself. Grow. Learn. Watch some Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood or something.

Inspirations: 

• The Prose and Poetic Eddas
• tarot-based journaling games
• the rune poems, particularly from Wikipedia and the Old English Poetry Project (The Ansuz quote comes from Dr. Ophelia Eryn Hostetter)
• Anna Anthropy’s Princess with a Cursed SRD
• American Gods by Neil Gaiman
• Sarenth Odinsson’s rune workshop at Winter Trothmoot 2024
• Gjallarbru cover image was painted by Louis Moe (1929)

Creative Liberties

• In order to carve a good story, a few liberties have been taken with the game. In the lore, Folkvangr and Valhalla do not have guards at their gates, although Helheim does. 
• Usually a Valkyrie will guide you to Valhalla, but I really just wanted a gossipy raven to chat your ear off while you go to Valhalla. You may, if you wish, insert a Valkyrie of any gender instead.
• In order to have clear, simple game mechanics, your character has one soul. However, within Norse mythology, Heathens have several soul-parts that intertwine, move, and interact. For a succinct overview, read this, and a detailed overview can be found by Winifred Rose here.

Thanks…

To my play-testers: Seb, Lia, Lyndi, Nico, and Jai. To Great Uncle Jim for inspiring the Sowelu prompt. To the server Skidbladnir for always encouraging folks to look at the rune poems themselves. To Odin for ever encouraging me to learn, to will, to dare, and to create. To Freya for her encouragement and protection. To Hel for her strength. And, of course, to the Runevaettir themselves for their perpetual insight and revelation.