The Grinning Hill

The Grinning Hill is a solo journaling game of accepting and dealing with a huge new responsibility. As the last remaining descendant of Aquila Uffington, creator of The Grinning Hill —a hill with a massive smiley face carved into it— your job is to visit a town you've never heard of, in a country you've never heard of, to perform upkeep multiple times a year. This trip is your first, and in fact the first time you've ever heard of the hill or this part of your family.

Will you do your job as requested? Will you make subtle changes to the art? Will you make it into whatever the heck you want? Or will you shrug it off, sell your inheritance, and keep living your life?

The Grinning Hill is a 37-page document (mostly prompts) that guides you through your story: from your situation when you discover your new role and how you feel about it through your work on the hill, exploring the surrounding area, and learning about the hill, your ancestors, and the home you've inherited. Who knows, maybe you'll even discover aliens or other conspiracies around the 3,000-year-old hill art! It's your story!

Note: a single game of The Grinning Hill is likely to take hours, but you can get enough of a feel to rate it in under an hour. With that said, I totally understand if you pass it by.

One Google Doc to Rule Them All

I highly recommend using the Google Doc to play this game, as the table of contents is SUPER useful! You'll still need the tracking sheet, but you can find a link to it from the Google Doc :D

Ludum Dare 56

This game was created for Ludum Dare 56, meaning it was made in 72 hours. It was also made for the theme "tiny creatures," which at face value has almost nothing to do with the game (you might find bunnies or a tiny kitty though!). My use of the theme is twofold:

• I went with the definition of "creature" as "anything created" to represent the hill art. Compared to the hill itself and the town, it's a "tiny creature" that had a massive impact on millennia.
• It also represents you being a tiny creature. A singular person responsible for such a huge piece of art, over 3,000 years old, in a town and country you had never heard of before.

To our non-Ludum-Dare fans, like our other previous Ludum Dare games, we plan to continue working on this in the future. This version will forever remain as the "Ludum Dare 56 Edition" though (or something similar).

Patchwork Potions

The Grinning Hill is a hack of Patchwork Potions. That means it uses the same system, although numerous modifications were made to the system for the same of this game. The rulebook explains this in more depth, but Patchwork Potions is a fantastic game worth checking out! 

Previous Ludum Dare Creations

You can check out all of our games here, and our previous Ludum Dare titles below:

Find Out More

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