Tag Archives: cold war

Eschaton Lite

This was originally housed on a side page of my Nowhere Band site; I realized recently that it makes a lot more sense for it to live here.


rev 1.3, 2.24.10


The purpose of this document is to produce a playable version of the game Eschaton as presented in Infinite Jest.  As we’re making several departures/simplifications from the version laid out by David Foster Wallace, we’ll call this version Eschaton Lite.

Eschaton Lite simulates a Cold War nuclear exchange, using tennis balls  thrown around on a large gamespace representing a polar-projection map of the Northern Hemisphere. Blocs made up of nation-states and treaty groups will flex their nuclear muscles at each other over a strategic prize, and all hell will inevitably break loose.

(for those who care, the departures from the full Wallace version of Eschaton are as follows: Wallace Eschaton is played on a space consisting of 6 tennis courts, arranged 3×2, and missile launches are conducted by lobbing the balls with tennis racquets; Lite’s space will generally be smaller, and balls can be thrown rather than racquet-lobbed. Additionally, Wallace Eschaton calls for heavy use of computers both before and during play; Eschaton Lite will put pre-game decisions at the Ump’s discretion  and use a combination of Ump discretion and pencil-and-paper for in-game computing).

For purpose of example, this document will refer to a game scenario set in 1984, wherein the US, NATO, USSR, Warsaw Pact, and Israel will deal with a crisis in East Berlin.

Continue reading Eschaton Lite