Grimoire is a solo adventuring roleplaying game about being a wizard compiling a grimoire. The grimoire that you compile can also be adapted for use in other rpgs, making this one of the rare games that directly encourages content creation for other systems.
Grimoire's PDF is 60 pages, with a layout that feels like an old tome. There's a lot of visual variety and some nice illustrations, and it's really pleasant to look at. The text *is* ever so slightly difficult to read, but I'm not sure this is a bad thing. Taking your time and poring over the words is thematically appropriate, and there weren't any sections that I struggled with.
Mechanics-wise, Grimoire is played with cards, dice, a journal, and any other book of your choice. The other book serves as a word bank, and is used to select keywords for spells.
Character creation is quick, creative, and story-based instead of stat-based. You define traits about yourself, and you define a goal, but you don't allocate any points to anything.
That said, it is possible to lose Grimoire. Gameplay involves navigating a deck of cards---some of which heal you and build your resources, others of which damage and impoverish you. Taking more than three damage kills you. And while you *can* use spells to nullify the effects of negative cards, doing so causes you to gain Corruption, which can also kill you. Furthermore, drawing jokers at any time can set you on a path towards death.
Thankfully, you do have a lot of control over the gamestate. The structure of the game is divided into turns, and during each turn you can select an action from a detailed list. Actions include things like beginning research on spells, encountering cards from the deck, spending coins to heal yourself, or burning cards from the deck for small amounts of coin.
Grimoire's central mechanic of spell research is also handled through actions, although it feels more detailed and procedural than the rest of the game. You start researching a spell by playing a face card, and then complete it by playing other cards equal to the Spell Point value of the face card. Go over, and the research fails. Succeed, and each card adds context to the spell, giving you a unique and detailed magical ability.
Examples are provided (as is a very helpful condensed rules reference,) but there is a somewhat arcane feeling to the process, and the game seems to intend for you to have multiple spells in progress at any given time, allowing you to shunt new cards over to spells they won't scuttle.
Overall, if you want a meaty solo game that will make you feel like a wizard, has a decently long runtime, and will generate spells that you can adapt to other game systems, I'd strongly recommend checking this out.