Young at Heart is a short, black & white, 14-page storygame.
You’re not young anymore. Now, young children buy baseball cards of you. You’ve come far; once a rookie, now you’re going to be in the hall of fame. One of the greatest still playing a game steeped in a history you’ve always loved. Getting paid to live out your dreams has always felt like a privilege, not a job.
For what has seemed like countless years you’ve given everything you had to the game. Game after game, you put on your glove and pitched your heart out. Always believing that win or lose, putting everything you’ve got into something is what really matters.
And now, standing on what sometimes feels like the loneliest place in the world, you’re at a pivotal crossroads in your life. Maybe the most important decisions you’ll ever make will be made here and now, during this baseball game, on the pitching mound of Yankee Stadium.
It’s time to lift that tired old arm of yours one more time in order to really give this game, maybe your last game, everything you have left.
In this roleplaying game, you and some friends are going to work semi-cooperatively to get an all-star ball player through the most difficult, and maybe the most defining day of their life.
Young at Heart does not concern itself with simulating the game of baseball. Instead, it focuses on getting into the headspace of the pitcher and what they are going through on the mound in order to keep throwing that ball, and throwing it well. What do they think about? How does it feel? Where does their inner strength come from? How does the act of committing to playing a game their whole life affect the rest of their life?
As you experience the inner struggles of this individual, know that you’ll also be carving out a future for them as well as creating their past memories. Collaboratively, you’ll be defining the moments of a person who has given their life to a game they’ve played ever since they first put on a glove and began to play catch. All in order to see where they end up after one of the hardest days of their lives.