Murder Ballad
A downloadable game
Murder Ballad is a storytelling/roleplaying game for two to five players, about how we relate to stories about violence and death.
Over an hour or two, we play out the evolution of a folk-song, from the true crime that inspires it to its eventual forms in the present day. Along the way, we each play a variety of characters who encounter this ballad, and consider what songs like these mean to people, why we find them fascinating, and why we pass them on.
To play, we need a deck of standard playing cards, a tabletop space, and some index cards to write on.
Thanks to Jessi for graphic design expertise, and to everyone who helped proofread and brainstorm, or just had to listen to me endlessly hum bluegrass music.
Update 2/20/2020 - I've uploaded some notes on the game, including some info about its development, observations following playtesting, and advice for improving play.
Download
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Development log
- dev notesFeb 21, 2020
Comments
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Just played this with some internet friends who all share a love of folk music, and we had a really good time! We started out with a sibling pair of Gold Rush-era highway robbers who had a dispute while steering a fleeing stagecoach, resulting in the sister sending her brother to his (likely) death in a river below.
We tracked the ballad into the vaudeville era, seeing how different performers reshaped it into everything from a cautionary tale about sibling rivalry to a gruesome ghost story to a commentary on gender. In one of the face card ending scenes, we even pulled all the way into the present day and explored how a YouTuber tracked the source of a modern cryptid back to the ballad and the ghost stories it inspired.
This is a fun and creative game premise that's fairly easy to set up and play with minimal time and tools - thank you for writing and sharing it!
Thank you so much! It's such a nice surprise to find new feedback here after all this time. I'm glad you enjoyed it!
I had a blast playing this a year ago at Big Bad Con. Not only does it give space for individual creativity and collaborative shaping of the feel, but it also is an insightful tool to understand stories, myth, and truth. A version of this game would be a great resource for a high school social studies teacher, which I say in the best way possible.
This game rules. You should play it with friends.
A badass game where you and your friends tell a MURDER BALLAD with branching narratives. I love the use of playing cards in the mechanics, and how the game represents the changing nature of stories that get passed on over time.