Merryweather
Merryweather is a game about spending a year in a world not your own. It is a game about consequences. It is a game about being roused from the waking life to find yourself in the dream. The characters in Merryweather are a group of average high school students who find themselves trapped in a surreal, phantasmagorical version of their hometown after exploring an abandoned mansion called “The Ancient.” While exploring the attic of The Ancient they are faced with a horrible event that drives them to flee in mortal fear. The exact nature of this event is unknown at the start of the game, but will be developed during play. Eventually the game will build to a dramatic crescendo where the characters either overcome their anxieties and insecurities to face the source of what they saw in the heart of The Ancient; or they are defeated by they’re own fragile emotional states, laid low by fear of an adversary too great to conquer
Opening fiction/setup:
It was a clear star blazed night when your friends helped you into the rowboat. A soft wind joined you on the journey across the lake and for a moment in it’s gentle embrace you forgot about the town getting smaller behind you, about high school, about your family, about money troubles, and the friendships too soft and thin to be pulled across black water to a simple island. As you all climbed the decaying wooden steps, as you each passed the threshold through the door fallen off its hinges, as you explored the ancient ancestor: friends whispering and laughing by flashlight; the scent of the girls’ soft hair mingles with stale parlor atmosphere; old floorboards creak under new shoes; and as a cool aluminum can kisses you full on the mouth and fills you with cheap amber beer understanding sinks in. You become keenly aware that these are the memories of youth that you will carry in your coat pockets for the rest of you days.
And then you all climbed the stairs to the attic; and then you saw the rusty heart of The Ancient. The room contained only terrible things. Things you were not meant to see; things that looked back at you with hateful, uncaring eyes. It came at you, but you fled. The Ancient was awake. The Ancient had started its work.
You all ran from the house, and rowed for the shore and the town and the warm houses you expected on the other side. You didn’t know what you all had done, but you were sure you weren’t supposed to have done it. Your friends hurried talk, full of fear and worry, the light din of oars cutting the lake water, and when you reached the shore you could see a thin line of smoke drifting from The Ancient’s chimney. A single question began nagging. Dread descends. What have you done?
- Merryweather.pdf
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Tags: Kevin Allen
