TEXT: Otherwise, you get one point on the down 
  side.
  •
  A confrontation may be won. You ended with 
  the upper hand in the confrontation. If you 
  initiated the confrontation, you managed to 
  pull it through. If you were drawn into play, 
  you successfully countered it. You get one 
  point on the up side.
  You will have to use somewhat different tactics de-
  pending on the relationship to the target and how 
  aggressive you are. If you are cautiously hostile, you 
  would want to get a good relation and a bad ability 
  into play. In that case, you would get up side points 
  in two cases of three, and the opponent gets down 
  side points in two cases of three. If you’re aggressive, 
  it doesn’t matter what abilities you get into play. You 
  gamble on winning the confrontation, thus gaining 
  one up side point for you and you opponent gains 
  one down side point. If you are friendly towards 
  the opponent, you must be very cautious. You might 
  consider getting good abilities into play on both side 
  and try to get the confrontation into a draw. That way, 
  both players would get up side points.
  The effects of publicity
  The publicity levels are guideline of how to role-play 
  the abilities.
  •
  Other peoples’ hidden abilities may not be 
  used as facts. You may only hint about them, 
  spread rumors and the like, but never state 
  them as facts.
  •
  Other peoples’ private abilities may only 
  be used as facts if the relationship is going 
  both ways, that is, if there is a relation from 
  that person back to you.
  •
  Other peoples’ obvious abilities may be 
  stated as facts if they are in your presence.
  •
  Other peoples’ public abilities may always 
  be used as facts.
  •
  You may always state your own abilities as 
  fact at will. This always allows other people to 
  use them.
  The publicity levels also govern when abilities may 
  get into play.
  •
  You need a reason to get other peoples’ 
  hidden abilities into play, and you need to 
  motivate how it is done.
  •
  Other peoples’ private abilities need a 
  reason and motivation as above, but the 
  demands are not as rigid.
  •
  Others’ obvious abilities may be used 
  whenever they are in your presence. They 
  may also be used if the abilities are men-
  tioned.
  •
  Others’ public abilities may always be 
  used.
  •
  You may use your own relations at will.
  How to do everything else
  There are no rules for action resolution in Aki. Aki
  isn’t “that kind of game”. The answer to the questions 
  “how do you attack someone” or “how do you kill 
  someone” is simply “you don’t”. 
  In the few cases you want to see if a certain action 
  succeeds, use common sense. If the action would 
  need training or experience to perform, then the 
  action succeeds if the character has a suitable ability. 
  Beyond that, there are no rules for action resolution, 
  no rules for combat or killing other people. 
  Note that if you’re using Aki as a part of another 
  Aki as a part of another 
  Aki
  role playing game, you can always use that other 
  game’s rules for action resolution.
  Administration
  As the episode closes, you will have to do some admi-
  nistration. A player who succeeds in accomplishing his 
  temporary goal receives fi ve up side points. A player 
  who succeeds in accomplishing any of the three big 
  goals receives ten up side points. The player then has 
  to decide on a new goal to replace the old one.
  Next, calculate the result. The result equals up side 
  points minus down side points. Enter the result in the 
  box, and then remove all points in the balance. The 
  result must then be balanced out by spending them.
  •
  If the result is greater than zero, you may 
  get new good abilities, make existing good 
  ones more public, or remove the bad abili-
  ties.
  •
  If the result is less than zero, you may get 
  new bad abilities, make existing bad ones 
  more public, or remove good abilities.
  •
  It costs fi ve points to make an ability one level 
  more public.
  •
  It costs fi ve points to get a new ability. New 
  abilities always start as Hidden. If you want it 
  more public, you have to pay for additional 
  publicity levels.
  •
  You may remove an ability. It costs 10 points 
  to remove a Hidden ability, 20 points to re-
  move a Private ability, 30 points to remove an 
  Obvious ability, and 40 for a Public one.
  •
  You must use as many points as pos-
  sible.
  Additional points remain to the next episode. You 
  may have to check between one and four boxes on 
  either the up side or the down side.
  © 2004 Krister Sundelin. All rights reserved. Don’t pass this game on. It’s mine! My own! My precious!
  Triple Dogma award winner 2004
  Best rules • Most creative • Best graphic design
  
  Aki is probably unlike any other role playing game 
  that you’ve ever played. It is about relations and intri-
  gues in a perfectly ordinary high school as portrayed 
  in several shoujo manga (i.e. Japanese comics aimed 
  at younger women). As a result, the game does not 
  share the audience with the comics; instead, it is 
  aimed at grown-up and serious gamers.
  Aki can be played independently, but you can also 
  Aki can be played independently, but you can also 
  Aki
  use the mechanisms here as a part of any conven-
  tional role playing game. You will only need the game, 
  paper, pen and the character sheets to play Aki. No 
  dice are necessary.
  CHARACTERS
  The characters in this little drama are perfectly ordi-
  nary guys and gals in a perfectly ordinary high school, 
  somewhere in the suburbs of a perfectly ordinary Ja-
  panese city, as portrayed in a perfectly ordinary shoujo 
  manga. There is nothing special about the characters, 
  except that they don’t have any supernatural powers, 
  do not hunt vampires, are not vampires, never cross 
  paths with (or are) space princesses or space pirates, 
  or anything similarly weird. They are perfectly ordina-
  ry, but that might be regarded as really extraordinary 
  as far as role playing goes.
  Goals
  Each character has three goals: one social, one cur-
  ricular and one career-related. Each character will 
  defi ne one temporary goal for each episode. This goal 
  will be defi ned during the episode, and may change 
  between sessions.
  Abilities
  Abilities are measured in four levels, describing not 
  how powerful the ability is, but how public it is.
  •
  Hidden: The character tries to hide this abil-
  ity. 
  •
  Private: You may note the ability if you 
  manage to come into the character’s private 
  sphere.
  •
  Obvious: You will note this ability when you 
  see the character.
  •
  Public: The ability is openly talked about, and 
  may even appear in the tabloid press.
  Abilities may become more public. The ability may 
  change value from Hidden to Private, from Private to 
  Obvious and from Obvious to Public. However, the 
  ability’s value may not change in the other direction. 
  If something is public, it is very hard to make it un-
  public again. 
  There are two kinds of abilities, At-
  tributes and Relations.
  Attributes
  Each character has a number of attributes. Attri-
  butes describe the character. They may be anything 
  as long as they describe the character somewhat in 
  terms of how he appears, how he is, what he knows 
  and how he behaves. A good guideline is that most 
  attributes equals an adjective or adverb.
  Each attribute has a publicity value, as described 
  above. Attributes may be good or bad. If they are a 
  benefi t for the character, they are good. Otherwise, 
  they are bad.
  Attribute suggestions:
  Quick cell phone chatter, Sexy, Cute, Party Guy, Rich, 
  Gangsta, Well-mannered, Spoiled, Egoistic, Shallow, 
  Sporty, Well-trained, Hacker, Traditional, Martial Ar-
  tist, Chique, Shy
  Relations
  Each character also has a number of relations. Rela-
  tions are always directed at another person, and des-
  cribe what your character think of that other person. 
  The relation is made up of an adjective or an adverb, 
  to whom the relation is directed, and the publicity 
  value. Hence, there are two values in a relation: the 
  target and the publicity.
  You may have several relations to each person. Each 
  relation to that person described one aspect of your 
  relationship to that person. You may have relations 
  towards non-player characters.
  Relations may be good or bad. If the relation makes 
  your character hostile towards the other person, 
  then it is a bad relation. Otherwise, it is good.
  Relation suggestions:
  In love with, Best buddies, Member of same gang, 
  Loyal towards, Afraid of, Rival to, Related to, Co-
  employed with, Suspicious towards, Dislikes, Despi-
  ses, Blackmailed by, Indebted to
  The Balance
  The last value in the game is the balance. The 
  balance consists of two parts, the up side and the 
  down side. You may get points on both sides as abi-
  lities come into play.
  When the episode has ended, you sum up the bal-
  ance to a result. The result consists of the up side 
  points minus the down side points. The result may be 
  zero, greater than zero or less than zero. If the result 
  equals zero, the session is effectively over. No need 
  to worry. If the result is greater than zero, you must 
  get rid of the excess by getting good abilities, making 
  good abilities more public, remove bad abilities or any 
  combination thereof. If the result is less than zero, 
  you have to get rid of the “debt” in similar ways, by 
  getting bad abilities, making bad abilities more public, 
  removing good abilities or any combination. 
  Create a character
  To play Aki, you need a character. First, defi ne who the 
  character is, in terms of name, gender, age, siblings, 
  mum, dad, and the like.
  Second, defi ne the character’s goals. Remember, 
  you need one social, one curricular and one career-
  related goal.
  Finally, defi ne the game values of the character. You 
  get ten points to buy good abilities and ten points to 
  buy bad abilities.
  You pay for the publicity levels. One point gets you 
  a Hidden ability, two points gets you a Private 
  ability, three points a Obvious ability and four 
  points a Public ability. 
  You pay for good abilities from the pool for good 
  abilities, and you pay for bad abilities from the pool 
  for bad abilities.
  You must have at least one attribute and at least 
  one relation. Otherwise, you may distribute your 
  points as you wish.
  When both pools are empty, and you have a to-
  tal of ten points worth of publicity levels in good 
  abilities and ten points worth of publicity levels in 
  bad abilities, the character is fi nished and the game 
  may begin.
  PLAYING THE GAME
  You play Aki in episodes, where each episode spans 
  over a couple of hours. A few minutes for book-keep-
  ing ends each episode. The episodes are called “episo-
  des”, not “missions”, “assignments” or “adventures”, 
  as the episodes do not contain any adventures and 
  you rarely or never get any missions from anybody.
  Aki is player-driven. The game master acts mostly as 
  a moderator or referee to call judgment on the use 
  of abilities if the players don’t agree, to keep order at 
  the session, and to play any other character that the 
  players don’t play.
  Episodes
  A typical episode begins with the opening. The ope-
  ning is supposed to get all players going. During the 
  opening, each player will have the chance to get one 
  (1) relation into play. You may never open an episode 
  with the same relation with which you opened the 
  previous episode. This rule exists to prevent that the 
  episodes get too much alike. If this had been an anime 
  episode, the mandatory j-pop song would be played 
  at the end of the opening and the opening credits 
  would roll by.
  After the opening comes the middle part. In the 
  middle part, the relations in play from the opening will 
  evolve and deepen. As the opening ends, each player 
  will have a temporary goal. As long as any player lacks 
  a temporary goal, the episode may not proceed to 
  the end. If necessary, the game master will have to 
  assign a temporary goal to the character.
  The last part is the end. In this part, most relations 
  that came into play in the opening will be closed, at 
  least to a level of equilibrium. At least one player 
  should fulfi ll his temporary goal.
  “In play”
  To get abilities “in play” is paramount to Aki. It is not 
  hard to get abilities into play. You simply combine 
  one of your own relations with one of someone 
  else’s relations or attributes. This is called 
  “an ability pair”. The relation used must 
  be one directed towards the character 
  whose ability you wish to use. If you don’t 
  have a relation towards that person, you may not 
  use his abilities. If you have more than one rela-
  tion towards the person, you may choose which 
  one to use. When you have the relation “in 
  play”, you role play it with the attribute 
  as the “ante”.
  You may never deliberately get your own 
  attributes in play. Attributes may only get into 
  play by someone else using it as a part of an 
  ability pair. You may only use relations your-
  self.
  When you wish to get an ability pair gets into 
  play, simply tell the game master and the other 
  player which abilities you want to get into play, 
  and then role-play it. Sometimes, the game master 
  may judge that an ability pair has come into play as a 
  result of two players role-playing.
  You may get non-player characters abilities into 
  play as if the non-player character were an ordinary 
  character. The game master may also do this towards 
  the players, as if he were playing a character like the 
  players. This option may be used to get the players go-
  ing. By getting the characters’ abilities into play, their 
  balance will shift and they will have to do something 
  about it.
  There are three possible outcomes of having abili-
  ties in play. Which one depends on how the confron-
  tation was role-played. Most of the time, it should be 
  rather obvious what the outcome is, but if it isn’t, the 
  game master will have to call judgment.
  •
  You may lose the confrontation. The other 
  gets out of the play in a better status. If you 
  initiated the play, the opponent countered it, 
  and if you were drawn into play, you didn’t 
  manage to counter it. If the play is lost, you 
  get one point on the down side of the bal-
  ance.
  •
  A confrontation may result in a draw. There 
  is no clear winner of the confrontation. In this 
  case, it is your part of the ability pair that de-
  fi nes the result. If your part of the pair was a 
  good ability, you get one point on the up side. 
  
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SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Kid Friendly/Aki.pdf