Wasted Hours
A downloadable game
Welcome at the Royal Institute of Paranormalities
Your job as a field researcher is to protect paranormal phenomena in a world of real monsters. Except for today, because today you’re on desk duty. How will you waste time till evening falls?
Wasted Hours is a roleplaying game for one about making the hours pass at an office desk. You will roll dice and write down on your timesheet the ways you waste time.
Wasted Hours is a game for 1 player and takes about 30 minutes.
Your stationery (print the files on A4 without borders for best results):
- Two six sided dice (2d6) in different colors
- One representing WORK (black)
- One representing WASTE (white)
- The character/timesheet
- The overtime sheet
- The rules file
- A pen(cil) to journal the day
Submit records of supernatural entities that haven’t been observed, snoop around in the drawers of colleagues or have a taste of everything in the communal fridge. And maybe inspect the sound coming from the corner office? Just make sure the boss doesn’t spot you doing nothing and don’t drink too much coffee trying to work.
An entry for the One-Page RPG Jam 2023 set at the Royal Institute of Paranormalities, a setting inspired by X-Files and The Office.
Let me know what you think of this game - it's my second one, so all feedback is welcome down below in the comments.
Thank you for playing!
Download
Development log
- Version 2 of the rules file is out nowJan 24, 2024
Comments
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This game is so cute and fun! I played it on stream and everyone loved the style/theme. Thank you so much for making this game 😌💖
(Actual play starts at 00:09:49)
Hello! I'm a game dev, I was looking at jams and saw your entry for rpg game jam. I don't really understand roleplaying yet, but your entry got my attention visually. It looks very pretty! I loved even the way most highlights look different from each other! How did you made the pdf file? Is it css, word or other software? Game sounds very interesting and fun too, I loved the theme. Thanks a lot, great work!
Just played it a second time and as predicted, it was even more fun than the first time!
As you suggested, I played it a bit more defensively this time — I thought more about which dice to choose.
Additionally, I wrote my entries in English instead of German (my native language), which held me back a little when writing the entries. Both strategies helped a lot in winning the game instead of just drinking coffee over and over again :D
In the first session, I wrote in German, which got me too excited to write more and more complex stories, so I didn't put much thought into which dice to choose and ended up writing these long entries :D.
I played it while watching 1½ episodes of X-Files, which I think is a very cool combination.
During the game, I remembered the characters you posted on your Instagram, and it helped me not to stick too much to X-Files while writing entries - cool inspiration!
I also figured out what confused me the first time playing it:
The rules in the 4 boxes are essentially just duplicates of the rules in the text, but all in one place. Maybe it's just me being a confused human, but I didn't realize that in the first session and didn't even notice that the "Grab a toilet break after you reach a certain amount of cups" is referencing the 3rd and 5th coffee on the timesheet :D
To fit the style, here is a picture of my investigation:
Again: maybe it's just me being a beginner in RPGs and in interpreting rules.
I think it would have helped me if the rules for "toilet break/boss" had just been mentioned in the text of "A. Choose Work" and "B. Choose Waste" as list item no. 4. These boxes are a nice summary, but they aren't really necessary.
Anyway! Great game! I love the whole style and your art as well!
In case you're interested, here is my timesheet from today:
Wow, I love this! You've certainly created the perfect vibe for the game (and thanks for checking out my Instagram).
The way you describe the monsters and activities is so in sync with the vibe of the institute. Touching slime without thinking, telling the janitor to keep an eye on the dancing demons, the fun self-nailing nails and low-key checking the pictures for life: it's just perfect!
Also a massive thanks for your feedback on the rules file. I have updated it with tables only for the WASTE and WORK options and an extra table for explaining the iconography in a few words. I think it definitely works better this way, but I may still update it in the near future.
Thanks for playing!
hi excited to start this game, but I just wanted to say that it's "stationery" not "stationary"
Thanks for your eye for detail. I've corrected the word in the newest version of the rules file.
This was the first ever solo RPG I played - I played this a week ago and it was a great intro to solo RPGs!
The design and setting really helped me to put myself in a situation like Fox Mulder - somehow bound to a desk and shooting pencils into the ceiling while my colleagues are allowed to have fun with aliens :D
I must say that I'll probably need to play it a few more times to get the mechanic of the coffee and boss. I had the issue that I had to write 2-3 sentences each time-slot, so I reached the 6 coffees at lunch.. maybe I didn't understand it correctly - but reaching 6 coffee ends the game, right? So I had to End at 13h already.
This felt a bit unsatisfying - but I still(a week later) think about the stories from this one session, so definitely fun!
I also think this is mainly because to took me until almost the end to understand why you wrote "Choose wisely." :D
Or is the "Grab a toilet break after you reach a certain amount of cups" intended to prevent ending the game early? Am I allowed to take a coffee break to skip crossing out a coffee or something like that? At the time I had 5 coffees I was a bit stressed and uncertain if what "a certain amount of cups" really means(if I missed a "take a break now" mechanic) :D
Anyway - I probably figure it out in the next session:D Its already printed!
Hey! Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts about the game. I'm glad you enjoyed it and could picture yourself in the vibe.
Yes, running out of icons to cross out ends the game. The approach I was going for is to choose WASTE or WORK depending on how much coffee icons or boss icons you have left. So if you're running out of coffee (because you had to reroll a lot during WORK), it's better to go for the die representing WASTE (risking crossing off boss icons instead of coffee icons if you have to keep rerolling).
Anyway, thank you for giving such focused feedback because that means I didn't explain the concepts properly or there should be more icons preventing the game from ending early. Have fun during your next session!
This looks like a lot of fun. I love the design and the coffee stained sheets.
Thank you for the kind words!