'Do you trust me?'

Requesting a review copy is a bigger ask then you'd think. It's not easy to let a game into your life for the dozens of hours it will take to learn, play, think over, read about, write up, photograph, edit... Staring at me from my shelf are more than a few games that haven't sat with me the way I wanted them to, and I'm struggling to find the time and energy to give them the fair shake they deserve; I dearly believe all of them will be deeply loved by the right people.

Intimacy instantly drew me in with its gorgeous art and unique premise. The keen reader will sense a 'but' lingering somewhere after the end of that sentence. We'll get there.

'Why did you choose me during this round?'

Intimacy is a very simple card game about empathy, proximity, engagement, and consent. Players take turns being active and passive; actives ask another player to partner with them – then a card is drawn. 'Lock fingers with your partner and gently squeeze.' 'Use a finger to trace a spiral into the center of your partner's palm.'

Then a question.

'Do you feel safe right now?'

The game takes great care to remind players that consent is absolutely paramount, and in this way it behaves as a form of therapy or care for both the active and passive partner. More than any other game I've seen, Intimacy requires a very large degree of trust and buy-in from its players; you cannot really just break this out at game night.

If you're a regular Ding & Dent reader you'll know that our usual fare is miniature-laden, story heavy conflictfests, often involving space, guns, or even spaceguns. Intimacy on the other hand has no win conditions, no strategic decisions, and what conflict it does involve is brought by the players to the magic circle it inhabits.

Reviewing Intimacy was very difficult – mostly because I had no one I was comfortable playing it with. Reading the cards, it felt like these overblurred too many of my boundaries (which ironically, is its entire purpose – this is a game entirely about breaking down walls). My walls between introvert and extrovert, private and public, personal and platonic. My partner Dee didn't want to play it either, meaning I was a game reviewer reviewing a game I couldn't play. This is the review where I'd come closest to feeling like I'd failed as a games writer.

'Is it possible to experience intimacy digitally?'

It wasn't until I lowered my drawbridge and invited in some help that the egg was cracked; Greatway Game's Adrienne Ciskey helped me find the right frame to put the game into, and you're reading the result. Despite never having drawn a card, Intimacy made me think, more so than any other game I've written about. It made me hold my hangups to the light; made me consider how often we take boundaries for granted; When was the last time you asked someone during a game 'Are you comfortable continuing to play?' When was the last time you were miserable but decided to keep going instead of saying 'My feelings about this have changed since we started. I'd like to stop now.'

Gamers are social creatures who would often rather just go along with what makes everyone else happy, but we mustn't set ourselves on fire to keep others warm – and conversely, it might suck that your game night is being derailed, but if you're not able to respect the boundaries your friends are setting, some evaluation of priorities might be in order.

'Have you ever been in love?'

So long as you understand exactly what it is - a gentle way to drift past the shields we've put up but would rather bring down - Intimacy is gorgeous and subtle. As a gamer's game, well... it's not. I would honestly rather it have fewer rules than it does now - sentences like 'play 8 rounds' feel deeply incongruent to its very nature.

But that's okay. I would rather we have a hundred more games like Intimacy than another Twilight Imperium; a compassionate, humane experience with the explicit goal of making our world a kinder one. You can buy it here.

The hardest review I've ever written: Calvin reviews Intimacy

Calvin Wong

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