As always, before starting the actual review, I want to thank the author Claudio Serena for sending us a physical copy of Five Days, edited by Ms Edizioni.

If at the end of this review, you would like to purchase the role-playing game, you can find it on the publisher’s website in physical version (including PDF) at a cost of 15 euros. And remember that by entering the code NoDiceUnrolled10 at the time of purchase, you can get it with a 10% discount! The game also features some free materials that can be found on the Fumble GDR website.

The introduction to Five Days already lays the foundation for what you can expect from this 45-page game:

Five Days is a tough game, in which you will interpret the tragedy of a dysfunctional group that will have to face real or metaphorical grief, between personal relationships ruined by time and silence… you play by asking questions inspired by the five stages of acceptance of grief (Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance), spending and exchanging tokens with the other people at the table to explore the history and personal relationships of the family you will play as.

Forget dungeons and tavern brawls, space travel and fantastic creatures; Five Days is about grief and relationships and must be approached with seriousness and care.

Safety at the Table

When approaching an intimate and intense game, even before sitting down at the table it is necessary to understand precisely what you will be facing. In the case of Five Days, this phase is fundamental. To help players approach the game, the author has prepared a glossary so that the game’s terminology is clear to everyone and cannot generate any misunderstandings.

In this case, the safety mechanics become essential. For this reason, the game has a dedicated chapter that specifies the themes offered by the gaming experience. Five Days, deliberately, can put the characters and their relationships under a magnifying glass (causing positive stress and discomfort). Given the nature of the game, the author suggests using Beau Jágr Sheldon‘s Script Change as a security system.

Since at any time during the game, someone at the table may feel uncomfortable with what is happening in the game, they may request a script change. You will have the opportunity to:

• “rewind” the scene to redo something already described, but in a different way
• fast forward to skip to a later moment or fade the scene
• pause to stop playing and return to the table at another time

The Premises of the Game

Five Days sets a premise that I consider very important: the people at the table will play members of a family. This concept is vital because the term is understood in the broadest possible sense. They could therefore be relatives, but also a circle of friends, a sect, the inhabitants of a condominium. Each person at the table chooses the role of their Component, the name given to the character in the game, within the family.

The table itself will then decide how much time has passed since the accident that separated the group and damaged the relationships between the Components; in the same way, he will then choose for what reason and on what occasion they met again. Another element to establish in the preparation phase is the presence or absence of the supernatural.

Five Days and Many Questions

The stages of Five Days correspond to those for grieving management: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance. There is no specific order in which to play the scenes, apart from the Acceptance scene which should be the last one. In each scene the active part is identified and decides which phase it wants to interpret; it is his task to choose one of the associated questions and play the scene answering it. The questions and actions that can be taken are linked to the phase being played.

The game is designed for groups of 3-5 people; It can also be managed by just two players, but I think it doesn’t perform to its full potential.

This RPG uses tokens, which serve to define which action will be undertaken by the Component protagonist of the scene. Each Member has two tokens at the start of the game while the family has 3 for each Member. Each scene allows you to choose between three actions, each of these is managed with tokens that can be spent, taken from the family reserve or given to another Component. Even if each scene has precise implications in the management of tokens, I can tell you that in general spending one serves to reveal information about what happened, taking one reveals one’s secret, giving one means asking the recipient to reveal one of their secrets.

The game continues until all players have answered 5 questions. So, after the last phase, the background to the day they separated will be clear; it will therefore be time to answer the final question: “What happened? And why doesn’t anyone want to talk about it?”.

Immersive Help Tools

Regardless of what type of family the group plans to portray, I think it’s important to keep in mind that Five Days is a game; although it may have something cathartic, it is not a psychotherapy session. You will be dealing with a master-full game in which each participant, although at different times, shares the same general narrative authority and, always, the final authority over their Component. To help the table immerse itself in the atmosphere of the game, at the end of the manual there is also a list of recommended music as well as the sources of inspiration.

To help the facilitator, provided in this role-playing game, there is a short guide at the end of the manual. Let it be clear that the facilitator is not responsible for entertaining the group, he has the function of reminding everyone of the rules if necessary and will ask questions to get the game back on track.

At the end of the manual, there is an example of a game to give a better idea of what the flow of a scene can be like.

Five Days Aesthetics Review

As I said at the beginning of this review, Five Days is a manual of only 45 pages; the format is the one now consolidated in the sector: A5. It is a light volume to transport, robust in its construction and practical to manage.

The manual is in black and white and the graphics are essential, without giving up an evocative touch. All the illustrations are decidedly eloquent, at times disturbing without ever being truly explicit.

The text is presented in a single column and the chosen font is easy to read. I found some difficulties however regarding the repeated use of the schwa. An inclusive language is increasingly preferable, however, schwa is not well read by those who suffer, for example, from dyslexia and is not recognized, or at least with difficulty, by reading software. I believe that the use of periphrases instead of a defined character, when possible, would perhaps have helped in this direction.

The possibility of accessing the sheets in digital version, although in English, is certainly an added value.

Five Days Review Conclusions

To conclude this review, I can without a doubt say that Five Days is a very delicate and immersive game, but not for everyone. It’s a game where bleed-in and bleed-out can be experienced with extreme ease, an immersive game that can unite as well as divide.

It’s certainly not the most suitable for an evening with strangers or complete role-playing newcomers. With a well-established and serious group, however, it could be perfect if you want to try a simple game to play with intimate and profound implications.

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