The Children of Massey Woods

Entry for the 2026 #FolkloreJam. The Children of Massey Woods is a one-page solo TTRPG. It is a game of childhood, of ghosts, of confronting mortality, and of finding comfort in friendship. When I was little, all of the kids after church would play in the cemetery, out amongst the graves. I remember being very young and seeing all the graves at the very back of our little graveyard... and they were so old that they names had eroded away. In some cases, there were no names at all. Mainly, on the graves of children who had died before they could be named. There were also so many graves of children under the age of seven. It was a surreal feeling, being a little kid and realizing that there were graves of children my own age or younger, and realizing "Wow, something bad happened to them when they were very young." I remember being a kid and thinking that the woods around the graveyard were haunted by ghost children that I could play with and keep company, so that they wouldn't be alone. That's the personal, local folklore that inspired the Children of Massey Woods. The Children of Massey Woods © 2026 by Alex's Gaming Corner is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/