From the introduction:
As I was putting together these games I realized that in different ways each one deals with memory. Fall Lineup grew out of nostalgia. When we were kids we loved gimmicky shows like Automan and Small Wonder. Previews for Manimal captured our imaginations; my best friend was so terrified by them that he couldn’t go into a dark room for a month. A year or two ago we were talking about some of the shows and I realized that even though I could easily find clips online that seeing them again might ruin my memories of them.
The House of Unusual Size explores lost memories. Inspired by Gaston Bachelard’s The Poetics of Space, a version of the game originally appeared as part of the 2013 National Game Design Month 24-Hour RPG competition. Johanna Haas provided editorial and moral support when this came together during Thanksgiving, and the folks at Gaia House in Carbondale, Illinois, gave invaluable advice. Silas Marques de Lima deserves special praise for introducing the game to group therapy sessions for teens in São Paolo. His descriptions of their experiences inspired me to revisit the game.
Pen in Hand deals with a form of personal and social memory that evolved into a source for historians. I used to work as the director of a nineteenth-century house museum, and while doing research and reviews and I ran into repeated references to the autograph books kept by young women. The ways in which people used the books—and particularly the ways girls and young women used secret books to mark levels of connection—has fascinated me ever since.