One of my weaknesses here is that it's going to be really hard for me to tell how much of the book is weird because it's trying to be Vampire, and how much is it because it's just a weird book. But I persevere.

I skipped it before, but the front-of-book material includes a notice that nothing in this book is real, it's all just make-believe. Which makes it odd to me that the opening of Chapter 1 (Into the Secret World) makes a case for the supernatural to fit in right alongside the world we know ourselves. Plausibly it's there to ease the reader into a setting that's exactly like our world unless specified otherwise, but it still feels like mixed messages, especially in the context of... well, we'll get to that.

The Everlasting presents itself as a means for its readers to experience the Campbellian Hero's Journey and forge a personal mythology. That's not me doing clever cultural analysis, that's just what it says on the page (to be expanded further in Chapter 13). There's no "what is a role-playing game" section, but there is a section explaining the book's take on role-playing itself (mostly synonymous with in-character speech and emotive acting). Interestingly, Everlasting specifies that players should share their characters, rather than assigning specific character to players, proposing it as an antidote for the need to win, a way for high-power characters to avoid stealing the show too much, and a way for players to get to know each others' characters better... and I think it's on the right track there? It fits some of my own thoughts about mixing up traditional player/character relations at least. While there is a chapter for Guiding (GMing) the game, this intro material suggests that the Guide's duties should be distributed among all players for a GMless experience.

The sidebars start giving us our first hints of the rules (or "guidelines," as the book prefers), mentioning that dice, cards (poker or tarot), and free conversation are all possible tools for gameplay. Miniatures are optional. Pencil and paper are suggested for writing secret notes or drawing pictures (cute), and also for your character sheet I guess. This is all much more traditional than the main text, except maybe the cards, and it's easy for me to imagine groups falling into old habits because their tools feel so familiar. Additional sidebars describe the basic parts of a story (plot, setting, characters, etc.) in a way that leaves me wondering about the origins of ancient railroading discourse.

Back to the main body: Everlasting makes a claim for its primary theme (their words, not mine) very clearly: "Prejudice and ignorance, along with a lack of understanding and compassion, will ultimately lead to the destruction of us all." It's certainly not subtle, but it does give me something to measure the rest of the book with. Following that we get a couple more major concerns (brooding solitude, holding on to the past too tightly) and a smattering of genre motifs to draw from when making a campaign. "Dark Fantasy," intentionally contrasted with horror, stands out to me as trying to stake out unique thematic ground. I guess that's why there's an elf book.

The setting of Everlasting is called "the Secret World," more or less our world but with supernatural entities and realms hiding out where we can't see them. We get some ancient backstory (dragons made the world and raised up titans as immortal rulers of humanity) and some recent backstory (demigods have been dying out rapidly, demons are becoming more active, and supernatural entities are being rapidly drawn to North America where they will probably fight each other). There's a great big glossary that I will not summarize for you.

The revised edition keeps most of the text unchanged. It rearranges some of it, makes a few edits, but the biggest outright removal is cutting the discussion of reaching an altered state of consciousness through particularly vibrant role-playing. The bits about a Hero's Journey and personal mythology were kept, just not that part.

both original and revised editions mention the possibility that Nazis were actually a plot by immortal supernatural entities. why did people keep writing that