Learn about the early queer community!

Have you heard of Molly House? It is a truly fascinating game 🤩 - both in terms of gameplay and theme. It was designed by Jo Kelly and Cole Wehrle and recently released by Wehrlegig Games.

Molly House aims to shed some light on a very interesting piece of history: The early days of queer spaces in 1720s London! Mollies - 🧐 people who wished to explore alternative, unconventional ways of joy and life as opposed to what was considered “normal” at the time - were building up a vibrant community in the backrooms of coffeehouses, taverns and similar establishments. You’ll step in the shoes of these mollies and become the main characters of this thriving underground community. You’ll throw parties and festivities 🍸, engage in masquerades 🎭 and try to live your best life while constantly trying to elude the watching eyes of the Society for the Reformation of Manners - a group that had nothing better to do than to try to expose people involved in behaviors they deemed unacceptable.

You can never be sure about who to trust - constables and traitors are everywhere, also at your party! 😱

Gameplay itself is pretty unconventional too, but in a good way ☝️ - if you know Cole Wehrle games, you’ll know what I mean. The game also has a pretty whopping complexity rating of 3.65 on BGG, and I can attest to that. After playing a bunch of times it doesn’t seem that difficult, but learning all the little rules and details certainly takes some time. Luckily, most of it is pretty thematic, which helps with the understanding of what you do and what the consequences are. 👍

As you play, you’ll accumulate joy for yourself and the community by participating at community events. In preparation you move around the board to collect vice cards, which represent guests, desires and actions at festivities. You also build up your reputation in the community which helps you gather more joy, but beware as it is a double edged sword - as you engage more and more, a gossip pile, and thus evidence against Molly houses, builds up, which can lead to raids and indictments.

We’ll talk more about gameplay, but for today the fact that this game is amazing will have to suffice. 😉