when glamour dies.

This was a really fun one. I used this game to flesh out part of a larger story. The prompts do a wonderful job at building in tension and the suspense that comes from real randomness. Both my character and I were kept guessing at what was going to happen, which was cool! I liked that the game promotes both action and introspection; it's a nice mixture.

I drew three Aces and three Kings pretty early...as well as the Joker, which makes it easy to get the most favorable outcome. I actually ignored it and kept playing for more of a mixed outcome, which felt more true to the story by that point.

When Glamour Dies is a journaling horror game inspired by The Wretched and thematically centered around proms, debuts, and other nights of ceremony and celebration.

It's 17 pages, with simple but readable layout, and it's multiplayer---which is surprising and cool for a Wretched engine game.

Also unlike other Wretched engine games, Glamour does not have a specific plot. You decide for yourself what the horror element is, and you could theoretically play anything from a slasher scenario to a death game to the end of Lover In The Ice, depending on how grisly and intense vs how restrained and elegant you want to go.

The jenga tower typically featured in Wretched games isn't present in Glamour, and Glamour even has some rebound mechanics where you can push past the point where you would normally lose. Plus, Jokers are shuffled into the deck to give you a genuinely positive effect if you stumble onto them.

As a result of this, Glamour has a more hopeful tone than Wretched games normally do. It's also probably a little easier to pick up, since you need less equipment and playing is less emotionally grueling / punishing.

On the other hand, without the Jenga tower, play is almost purely random. The order the cards come out of the deck in decides your fate, and while the odds are tipped towards your survival, the RNG can just choose to end you if it feels like it.

Overall, if you like elegant horror or teen horror, I'd suggest checking this out. It's fun. It's atmospheric. It's not really designed around inducing player suffering. And I think it'll produce some pretty cool, compelling stories depending on how hard you commit to the journaling element.

Minor Issues:

-Grammar tenses tend to change mid-paragraph, starting on page 4. For example "It was the night that you've been waiting for."

-Page 12, "failed to glean light about" failed to understand the truth of

Very cool take on the Wretched and Alone games by actually having you surrounded by people. I like the Masque of the Red Death vibe. There's a bit of ableist language I could do without (people being driven "insane" by events) but otherwise, I highly recommend this as a glamorous spin on the solo play genre.