Myocardial Infarction - Rules

Preface

Hello. I'm sure you've all heard about that beloved game known as Myocardial Infarction. It really is a stroke of genius. For those of you that already know how to play, the mere mention of the title should make your heart flutter in anticipation. The rest of you should be quaking in fear, your teeth chattering and your hands trembling uncontrollably with the powerful palpitations of terror that accompany the last fleeting moments of your lives.

Yes, it's that time of year again. The time when we actually visit this forum / play stupid forum games / convene to post pithy statements about the meaning of life. OK, not really. I'm actually just talking about a new forum game. Hopefully everyone's familiar with the basic "take turns writing parts of a story" game. This game is basically the same thing, only with an added twist.

Premise

MI is, at its core, a variant of that most basic of group writing games. Any number of people can participate and the story is alternately developed by each of them. Under the usual rules, players write a sentence or a paragraph at a time and pass the story off to the rest of the group. The end result is a complete story of any desired scope and scale. The rules are designed to allow for anyone to join in or leave at any time, generally allowing everyone to play at their own pace.

There is, however, a significant difference in the game's premise. Instead of a group of casual participants writing a piece at a time under their own names, players in MI assume the role of a fictional author character with every piece they write. The author has his or her (or its) own name and writing style. An author might even have radical ideas on how the story should or will turn out, or even what kinds of themes and behavior are appropriate or encouraged.

Why a different author for every piece? Unfortunately, the story is under a terrible curse. For whatever reason, the original author only got to write the first 1000 characters of the story before collapsing of a heart attack. No notes or outlines are found. Seeing the great promise of the original work, a second author takes up the task of completing the story. Beginning where the first author left off, the second author quickly writes another 1000 characters before suffering a fatal heart attack as well.

This process continues for quite a while, each author bravely continuing where every single predecessor has mortally failed. Often times, the author drops dead right in the middle of a word, leaving his successor to finish it off. Finally, the last author acquires the nearly-completed text and writes out the 1000 characters of the ending. Smiling with satisfaction, he/she/it shuffles back to the blank title page and scribbles down the best title in the universe. He then collapses, dead, knowing that his life has been sacrificed for the ultimate betterment of humanity.

How to Play

The first thing you'll need to do is create a pool of possible beginnings for the story. Anyone can submit any number of beginnings. Like every other piece of the story, the beginning piece must be exactly 1000 characters long (not including whitespace) and come with the fictional author's name (or "anonymous" if the deceased author is unknown). After you have a reasonable pool of beginnings to choose from, everyone votes for which submission they like the best. The details of this process are up for modification, but the suggested format is that each player gets one vote and ties get broken via coin toss.

Now that you have the beginning of the first chapter, writing continues for a week. Anyone can add any piece to the story at any time as long as the following requirements are met: the piece is exactly 1000 characters long (again, not including whitespace), the author is credited if possible, the piece doesn't contradict previous pieces, and the piece is written by a different player than the one before it (no posting twice in a row).

After a week of this process, the body of the chapter freezes and you have to decide on an ending. This is decided on in the same manner as the beginning was chosen, except that the ending submissions should include the chapter's title in addition to the standard 1000-character body.

Once you've finished your first chapter, you should continue writing the next chapters in the same manner. You should be able to produce a new chapter every eleven days or so.

When the story has reached its conclusion (or the players have run out of enthusiasm), players should submit a story ending piece. This is submitted as part of the normal chapter-ending process. Story ending pieces include the overall story's title in addition to the standard ending fare. If the story ending piece is chosen, the chapter becomes the final chapter of the story and the story is titled and completed.

Congratulations, you now have yourself a story!


NOTE: This is just the rules thread. If you have questions or suggestions, please let me know. If you're interested in participating, you should go to the story thread.

I HAVE RETURNED. And I like it!

Ok, I totally rewrote the rules to make them easier to follow along for new players.

I'm just going to post here what I intended to submit for the first continuation to the Hidalgo tale until you guys got the jump on me.

Ser Guadelupe Hidalgo wrote:Guadelupe peered outside the cabin’s murky window. The sounds of gun shots echoed outside, and he saw that the ground was littered with corpses. The cool steel of Guadelupe’s musket pressed hard against his cheek, as he took careful aim at a crouching enemy soldier, taking cover behind a smoldering wagon.

Guadelupe had left with a group of comrades to flank the enemy. He was the only survivor, surrounded by enemies retreating to what they thought was an unoccupied cabin. Caught out of position, his only option was to coordinate with the next offensive and hope to break out in the confusion. Guadelupe was sweaty and dirty from his escape from the frontlines. Sweat dripped from his brow, dribbled across his musket, and wet his trigger hand, making his grip damp and uncomfortable. He gripped tighter, feeling the metal and bone pinch his flesh.

He envied his target’s condition. The white boy, no older than 21, had a thin film of sweat on his forehead, but looked much cleaner. The boy soldier wore a neatly pressed white dress shirt, tie, and black dress pants, indicative of his kind. He looked completely out of place in the ragged battlefield. Guadelupe heard his army’s trumpets and squeez-

Author: Maxwell Smart

ed the lemon (if you know what I mean) into an empty beer mug he had brought into the cabin.
He sighed with relief as the pressure on his bladder subsided. Yet another thing he envied the white boy for was access to a proper bathroom. Unfortunately the boy heard the sigh and swiftly crept over to investigate.

He had only time to fasten his trousers before the boy burst through the door pointing 2 guns straight at him.
“Surrender or di- OH you sick bastard,” the boy yelled as Hidalgo froze, his hands still touching his crotch. He instantly realized his error and put his hands up.
“No! Merci, por favor! It is not what you think!”
The boy eyed him suspiciously. “And what do I think, hmm?”
“I was jus-”
As Guadalupe mind cleared, his heart slowing from a rapid pace, he noticed that the boy was actually unarmed and only making finger guns.
“AHA!” he cried, lowering his hands. “Nice try senor but you can't fool me!”
He stepped to the right to pick up his musket.
“What? Stop! You die now!” the boy frantically cried, jabbing his finger guns wildly in the air.
“Bang! Bang! Bang...” he stopped as Hidalgo swung the barrel of his musket up to aim at his heart.
“Now it is you who must surrender or die, eh?” Hidalgo smiled

New house rule suggested by @Xenoe:

You cannot vote for your own beginning entry (this is to prevent a tie because everyone voted for their own entry). Thus, in the case that you like your submission the most, vote for the 'next best' one.