Paul Czege
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paulczege.bsky.social
Paul Czege
@paulczege.bsky.social
2.3K followers 310 following 3.2K posts
Game designer. Currently shipping a zine about how to play immersive journaling games:
https://www.paulczege.com/
On Masto as @[email protected]
He/Him.
#JournalGaming
#ttrpg
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paulczege.bsky.social
He doesn't just make games.
A fork holding a bite of sweet potato pie with a lovely flaky crust and now you're sure Paul Czege is the real deal.
November 29, 2025 at 4:15 AM
paulczege.bsky.social
Don't get so caught up in your Black Friday shopping frenzy that you forget to eat 🥩

paulczege.itch.io/two-raw-mors...

(Prometheus. Yum.)
My hand holding a home-printed copy of Two Raw Morsels, a journaling game about consuming scraps of the flesh of Prometheus.
November 28, 2025 at 5:44 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
Steve Martin and John Candy trying to get home for Thanksgiving.
November 27, 2025 at 9:49 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
Making a game/zine and selling and mailing it to people as stamped letter mail feels more like conversation, more like human interaction than any social media platform.
Five game zines by me, The Balsam Lake Unmurders, The Ink That Bleeds, Inscapes, The Sneeze, and Be With Me. Stamped, hand-addressed envelopes with game zines in them.
November 27, 2025 at 1:22 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
Holy cats. Check out her bio.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greta_G...
She could easily have been an inspiration for Millennium Self, one of my journaling games on 5"x7" cards.
My hand holding a copy of Millennium Self, a journaling game on a 5" x 7" card. The front says "You are the most loved actor across the ∞ realities. You've made films across many worlds, so many films you've forgotten some of them. You've had romances with other stars that played out in magazines, and with unknowns who still make your pulse race thinking about them. You've had an exceptional life. Now at 120-years-old you're being interviewed for a documentary about your life and films." All the journaling prompts are on the other side, which you can't see, but you get the idea.
November 26, 2025 at 6:13 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
If you ordered a game/zine from me this weekend my shipping intern just mailed it to you.
A boy in a bike helmet and jacket putting stamped envelopes into the mail slot at the post office.
November 25, 2025 at 6:38 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
A movie that takes place where I'm from.
Eminem and Chloe Greenfield doing a pinky swear in 8-mile.
November 24, 2025 at 1:37 AM
paulczege.bsky.social
I just got an order for The Ink That Bleeds from someone who lives in one of the most beautiful places in the world. Do people who live in paradise need immersive journaling games?
A gorgeous sandy beach with crashing waves and palm trees and cloudy volcanoes in the background.
November 23, 2025 at 8:29 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
Six seven!
November 22, 2025 at 6:15 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
You're exchanging this year with someone who likes writing, journaling, self-reflection, crimesolving, Twin Peaks, Northern Exposure, mystery games?

Wrap The Balsam Lake Unmurders with a fun journal, a nice pen, and a deck of cards.

🎁🎄🤶
A copy of The Balsam Lake Unmurders with a nice journal, deck of playing cards, silver pen, atop tissue wrapping paper.
November 20, 2025 at 3:29 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
"Excuse me, do you have a pen I can borrow?"
"Yes of course. Here you go."
An very weird looking green plastic pen that's a whole body figure of The Grinch smiling.
November 20, 2025 at 3:39 AM
paulczege.bsky.social
Do you know someone who likes to write? Will you be shopping for holiday gifts at #PAXunplugged this weekend?

My how-to zine The Ink That Bleeds & my journaling games The Balsam Lake Unmurders & Be With Me make great gifts. @ipr.bsky.social will be selling them at their booth 3701 in the Expo Hall.
A portion of the PAX Unplugged 2025 expo hall map with an arrow pointing to booth 3701, cozy looking holiday snow flurries, and thumbnail images of The Balsam Lake Unmurders, The Ink That Bleeds, Inscapes, Be With Me, and The Clay That Woke.
November 19, 2025 at 5:34 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
I think you already knew that games can be metaphysical experiences, right?
A teenager out at a park holding a copy of The Ink That Bleeds behind their back.
November 19, 2025 at 2:26 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
A RPG with mechanics that prompt you to write your thoughts and what transpires in a journal.

I wrote a how-to zine about them:
www.paulczege.com

There are many many journaling games people have made. I have a collection on itch of ones I've played:
itch.io/c/2831407/jo...
A copy of The Ink That Bleeds, by Paul Czege, outside among trees with the sun rising behind it.
November 18, 2025 at 7:35 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
Are you hype for #PAXunplugged this weekend? Have you been curious about journaling games?

@ipr.bsky.social will be selling my how-to zines, The Ink That Bleeds and Inscapes, and my journaling games The Balsam Lake Unmurders and Be With Me at their booth 3701 in the Expo Hall.

#journalGaming
A map of the PAX Unplugged 2025 Expo Hall with an arrow showing how to find Booth 3701 and thumbnail images of The Ink That Bleeds, The Balsam Lake Unmurders, Inscapes, Be With Me, and The Clay That Woke.
November 18, 2025 at 4:22 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
Remember the time you fell in love 🌹 with a paint swatch?

sites.google.com/view/paulcze...
A copy of Be With Me, by Paul Czege, displayed outside with a lovely cut rose and a yellow paint swatch.
November 17, 2025 at 5:05 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
My son really wanted it when we saw it at the thrift store, and it was only $2. He's always liked The Game of Life. And it's less excruciating than the original game. It's quicker. There's more strategic decisions. And the text message cards are occasionally legitimately funny.
A text message card from The Game of Life: Target Edition. Your roomate texts you asking to borrow your phone charger because they lost theirs. You agree. Then they text you to say they lost yours. And then the card forces you to make an unplanned purchase from the electronics department at Target.
November 16, 2025 at 11:19 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
Setting this garish thing up is like giving your kiddo their first practice setting up a wargame. It has lots of little same sized circular tokens that need to be sorted and stacked in different places.
The Game of Life: Target Edition all set up for play.
November 16, 2025 at 8:55 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
Drive an hour up into the mountains from Denver.
Hike for an hour-and-a-half (3.5 miles).
Drive an hour back home.

Worth it? Totally.
My son up ahead on the trail we hiked today looking back toward me. Lots of golden dry grass, mountain conifers, sunlight and shadows, and forested mountains in the distance.
November 16, 2025 at 5:14 AM
paulczege.bsky.social
The how

and the why

of #journalGaming.
A copy of The Ink That Bleeds by Paul Czege, out among trees with the sun rising in the background. It's a zine about how to have an immersive experience playing journaling games. A copy of Inscapes by Paul Czege out among red rocks with a vivid blue Colorado sky in the background. It's a zine about what happens to you when you play immersive journaling games.
November 14, 2025 at 5:32 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
It's been a while, but I'm now in Act 3 of @luciellaes.bsky.social's Cage of Sand and discovering the bodies of murder victims. The first of them is The Star, who is my friend Irah I met in Act 2 and who showed me around, and I'm pretty messed up now finding her dead.

#journalGaming #ttrpg
A home printed copy of Cage of Sand by Luciella Elisabeth Scarlett, along with my current journal, my current orange ink pen, and six face-up cards from the Terra Volatile tarot representing the bodies of murder victims I discover: The Star, the VI of Swords, the Queen of Coins, the Knight of Wands, the King of Swords, and Judgement. It's interesting that all but one of them are Major Arcana. The odds are against that.
November 13, 2025 at 11:05 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
My counter argument is the poorly drawn comics I make with my son. His characters, my scripts, his art, my lettering. This is Princess Maclumpha talking with her bff Shark Girl about her new workout routine.
A comic drawn by my son with a script by me. Princess Maclumpha says: I started a new fitness program at the gym. Shark Girl says: Yeah? What is it? Princess: Giant toad wrestling. Shark Girl: Wow. That sounds cool. How's the burn? The next frame shows Princess Maclumpha about to wrestly a giant humanoid toad. Princess: It's great. The giant toads are super strong. You're terrified the whole time. Shark Girl: That sounds great. Princess: And you can barely breathe for how stinky they are. Shark Girl: Wow. Princess: And their bufotoxins give you a rash. Shark Girl: Huh. And then a frame where the Princess and Shark Girl are just looking at each other. Princess: But it's so worth it. Shark Girl: Yeah.
November 12, 2025 at 6:06 PM
paulczege.bsky.social
I do all sorts of bizarre stuff. I wreck the page numbers. I use unreadable subheads. I obscure stuff with splatters of blood. But I make sure you can read the text, because I want you to play the game.
A page from The Ink That Bleeds. It looks great. There's some text in grey along the margins in a handwriting font, like it's bleeding through from the other side of the page, but it's ornamental, not essential to play. The main text is fully readable. The first page from Two Raw Morsels. There's some blood spatters and a bloody thumb print obscuring the game title a bit, but the main text is fully readable. A page from The Clay That Woke. There are subheads in an evocative, undreadable font, but you don't really need them to navigate the text. The main flow of rules text looks great. A page from The Sneeze. The page number is blown out, like it took a blast of air. And the main flow of rules text uses two different fonts that feel a little odd together, but they're both totally readable and great.
November 12, 2025 at 3:35 AM
paulczege.bsky.social
At what point do Schumer, Kaine, etc, realize they got rolled and now people are going to lose their healthcare and die?
November 12, 2025 at 1:48 AM
paulczege.bsky.social
One foot on land and one in the water. When she comes up she always makes me think of tea.

#tarotSky
The Star from the Rider Waite Smith tarot deck, drawn by Pamela Colman Smith. She is crouched with one foot on land and one in a small pond, pouring water from an ewer in each hand, one into the water and one onto the land, where it flows away in five rivulets. She is nude, and there are stars in the sky, and an ibis in a tree.
November 12, 2025 at 1:23 AM