The Cave You Feared to Enter

Become a Zinester ($3) or higher on our Patreon before January 2nd, 2025 to get this game for free, plus all of the zines we've released over the last month! You can even get this zine and EVERYTHING we've released over the last month FREE with a one-week trial of our Gamer tier!

🙋‍♀️ Solo or multiplayer
🖨️ No printer required
✂️ Index cards (plus scissors) or blank playing cards required

The Cave

Life can be a slog. But we can overcome anything, even if it's... not so easy.

As you live your life, you'll write your struggles, negative thoughts, and the things that upset and frustrate you onto cards (blank playing cards or index cards). Then, you'll lay out 36 of them in a grid and explore your way through them.

Coming face-to-face with our worst thoughts can be painful... But it can also be empowering! As you see thoughts you no longer agree with or can argue against, you'll write your new thoughts on the cards and remove them from the game.

You may not overcome every thought, but as you learn to overcome them more often, you'll learn that the cave you feared to enter isn't so scary after all! 

The Cave We Fear to Enter - The Inspiration

The Cave You Feared to Enter is based on the song "The Cave We Fear to Enter" by As I Lay Dying. This is an unofficial, fan game that isn't at all connected to the band or the song beyond the inspiration. If the band knew I made this I'd probably die of excitement lol, let alone actually give it their blessing.

The game is also based on the Carta system, from Cat McDonald and Peach Garden Games, and licensed for use under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license. While it doesn't use the mechanics and such found in the Carta system, it does involve laying out the cards in a similar way and then exploring through them as the Carta system suggests.

Angel's Choose a Song Jam 1 Entry

This game was created for Barb's Choose a Song Jam 1, and Angel entered the jam too! Check out her entry below.

Other "IRL Games"

You can check out all of our zines here, and check out some of our other "IRL games" (intended to be played while living your life) below:

Find Out More

Learn more about The Cave You Feared to Enter on our Patreon. Or come chat about it on our Discord server!

All of our posts are free aside from some exclusive polls. We share news, updates, behind-the-scenes design stuff, and more. Plus, each of our releases is either free for a limited time or has community copies; if you become a free member of our Patreon, you’ll get an email when we release something, and if you’re quick enough you can get everything free! 

Paid members help fund our creations and can get all of them as they come out, answer polls to help shape our future creations, and even get games and zines printed and mailed to you monthly in North America.