The Grinning Hill is a solo journaling game of accepting and dealing with a huge new responsibility. As the last remaining descendant of Aquila Uffington, creator of The Grinning Hill —a hill with a massive smiley face carved into it— your job is to visit a town you've never heard of, in a country you've never heard of, to perform upkeep multiple times a year. This trip is your first, and in fact the first time you've ever heard of the hill or this part of your family.

Will you do your job as requested? Will you make subtle changes to the art? Will you make it into whatever the heck you want? Or will you shrug it off, sell your inheritance, and keep living your life?

The Grinning Hill is an analog game, not a video game. It's a 37-page document (mostly prompts) that guides you through your story: from your situation when you discover your new role and how you feel about it through your work on the hill, exploring the surrounding area, and learning about the hill, your ancestors, and the home you've inherited. Who knows, maybe you'll even discover aliens or other conspiracies around the 3,000-year-old hill art! It's your story!

Note: a single game of The Grinning Hill is likely to take hours, but you can get enough of a feel to rate it in under an hour. With that said, I totally understand if you pass it by.

As for the theme... at face value "tiny creature" has almost nothing to do with the game (you might find bunnies or a tiny kitty though!). My use of the theme is twofold: * I went with the definition of "creature" as "anything created" to represent the hill art. Compared to the hill itself and the town, it's a "tiny creature" that had a massive impact on millennia. * It also represents you being a tiny creature. A singular person responsible for such a huge piece of art, over 3,000 years old, in a town and country you had never heard of before.

Patchwork Potions

The Grinning Hill is a hack of Patchwork Potions — https://bespoketacle.itch.io/patchwork-potions — which means it uses the same system, although numerous modifications were made. The rulebook explains this in more depth, but Patchwork Potions is a fantastic game worth checking out!