Radical means we believe that meaningful social change requires the abolition of existing hierarchies, power relations and inequalities, the fundamental reinvention of social institutions, and the transformation of people and communities so we can live in peace, abundance, and with ecological care.

—SPRAG

Welcome to the Radical Futures Jam. Hosted in affiliation with SPRAG: Society for the Promotion of Radical Analogue Games, this is a jam for game-makers to explore the intersection of radical movements in society and in analog gaming, using tabletop gaming to imagine alternative futures to come.

Whether this is your first or fiftieth game jam, if you dream of the transformation of our social systems and networks of relation for the better, this jam is for you. As per SPRAG:

Structured play is primordial, and archeological evidence of analogue games dates their emergence beyond written language. But games of course take new forms and have new meanings as times change. Sometimes games reflect and reinforce the worldview of the powerful. Often games are subversive and encourage or teach people to organize together and rebel. The radical potential of analogue games has been tantalizing to many of our predecessors, but that potential is far from exhausted. We want to form a community to help us experiment with this potential and expand it in a moment of profound crisis and opportunity.

We strive to cultivate a supportive, generous, and comradely community. We are opposed to all forms of hate and oppression, and will not tolerate participation that promulgates racism, sexism, classism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, or any other kind of hate.

We take an expansive approach to the definition of games. An analog game can, of course, take the form of rules for an original system, a hack of an existing system, a setting or an adventure, or a set of character playbooks. And analog games can come in many material forms: zines, and pamphlets, and index cards, and so on. But in the spirit of this jam, an analog game can also be much, much more. A game can be a ritual or a recipe, a manifesto or an experiment, a set of instructions or prompts for improvisation. A game can take the form of poetry, or drama, or jazz. A game can welcome its players into suffering, and longing, and dreaming. A game can inspire laughter, and worship, and joy. Games involve us, and when they involve us in ways that encourage us to go beyond the systems of domination and oppression that determine so much of our everyday lives, we can say that such involvement is of a radical kind. Games, considered in this way, can in fact become vehicles for direct action and mutual aid, instruments in our struggle for a better world.

So come, let's imagine radical futures together.

Suggestions

If you don't know where to begin, here are some prompts with links to inspiration.

• Start with a system...
  • Powered by the Apocalypse
  • Forged in the Dark
  • Belonging Outside Belonging
  • Rooted in Trophy
  • Sparked by Resistance
  • Descended from the Queen

• Or start with a mechanic...
  • Oracle deck
  • Journaling
  • Jenga tower
  • Candles
  • Keepsakes
  • Map-making

• Or start with a noun...
  • The ground
  • The city
  • The stars
  • An artefact
  • A wreck
  • A world

Submission Guidelines

• Submissions should be for analog/tabletop play only
• Submissions should be human made (no Midjourney, Chat GPT, etc.)
• Multiple submissions accepted

Best Practices

• Consider including safety tools to take care of your players
• Use content warnings if your game includes violent, potentially triggering, or otherwise nsfw content
• Don't worry about fancy layout or art if those are not skills you possess—use what you have
  
• Plain text is better for accessibility too—multiple formats can go even further

Cover image is "Composition" (1930) by Robert Delauney, in the public domain at Artvee.