Issue Two: Histories
It’s my great honour as guest editor to introduce the second issue of Playtest Material, “Histories.” The call for submissions for this issue will open to the public September 15 and close October 15.
Call for Submissions
We welcome work engaging with historical memory, historiography, archival practice, nostalgia, lineage, inheritance, canon formation, and the politics of remembering and forgetting within RPG culture.
Possible topics include, but are not limited to:
- Histories of particular games, scenes, movements, editions, communities, or design traditions.
- Local histories of clubs, conventions, campaigns, or gaming communities.
- Labour histories of the work of making RPGs.
- The construction of RPG canons and genealogies.
- Lost, forgotten, or marginalised RPG traditions.
- RPGs as historical simulation, reconstruction, or mythmaking.
- How fictional histories function within campaigns and settings.
- Alternate history, counterfactual play, and speculative historiography.
- Material culture: books, pamphlets, maps, miniatures, character sheets, websites, and ephemera as historical artefacts.
- The relationship between RPGs and broader political, social, technological, or economic history.
- Histories of how games have depicted nonhumans and framed environmental issues.
- Critical examinations of reactionary nostalgia, invented traditions, or historical romanticism within gaming culture.
If you are interested in submitting an article, please submit a pitch via this form:
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About the guest editor
Wythe Marschall (he/him, founder, Stillfleet Studio) is a writer, game designer, and anthropologist trained in the history of science. He created the sci-fi TTRPG Stillfleet, the underlying Grit System, and the Stillfleet Studio to blend historical materialist politics and games. Wythe is the co-developer of Blister Critters by Anthony Grasso, the editor of Danse Macabre: Medieval Horror Roleplaying by Christopher Pickett, the co-developer of The Sometimes Kingdom RPG with Ethan Gould, the editor of ULTRADELVE by Konstantine Paradias, and the cohost of the game-design podcast Why We Roll (with Pickett). Wythe’s latest books are the 2025 version of the early modern fantasy game PICARO! and Danse Macabre’s dungeon(-ish) setting Unsunken: Paris Below.