Work
One Missed Call
Maker Lessthanthreegames · Work date 2026 · Medium in person · Role control · Experienced by the compiler 2026-07-19
Description
UNCERTAIN ATTRIBUTION. The published game of this title is by Caroline and Marc Hobbs (lessthanthreegames), matching your note that the ruleset is theirs: "One Missed Call is a story game for two players about loved ones separated by space, drifting apart or growing closer." — "A table-top role-playing game for 2," "less than an hour," "No GM, No dice, No prep." Players "play as two people in a long-distance relationship with one another, trying to convey your feelings for the other character while sitting back-to-back." It "explores the words we say and the emotions we leave unspoken when trying to make long-distance work." No telephone is used — the back-to-back staging simulates a call.
Source. https://lessthanthreegames.itch.io/one-missed-call
On the medium. Published work is a tabletop game for two, played back-to-back — no telephone, no audio device. Cameo's session was an adaptation: run by Sean Foer over a telephone call on speakerphone, audio only, with a verbal workaround for part of the game. The row codes the work as published; the adaptation is a session fact, recorded here.
Sean Foer's credited catalog does not include this title; he appears to have run the Hobbs ruleset. A work ABOUT phone intimacy with no phone in it.
Anatomy
Thirteen criteria after Lauren R. Beck. Each carries a source grade: M maker-confirmed, P published, F first-hand, I inferred by the compiler, ? not yet established. Definitions are on the anatomy page.
- Participants listen through headphonesnoP
Two people at a table. No listening device at all.
- Participants move through space as part of the worknoP
Seated back-to-back for the duration.
- Audio technology is necessarynoP
NO AUDIO TECHNOLOGY. Unmediated voices in a room. The only n on this criterion in the whole table, and it is why this is the sharpest control here.
- Site-, situation- or language-specificSituationI
"Sitting back-to-back" is a required staging reproducible anywhere — a situation, not a site.
- Engages with the history of a sitenoP
No place is referenced.
- Created for an urban environmentnoP
No urban dependence; it is a table.
- Created as an artwork other than theateryesP
Published as a tabletop role-playing game on itch.io. Game design, not theater.
- Intended to be understood as theaternoP
"Story game," "table-top role-playing game." No theatrical vocabulary anywhere.
- Accidental real-world sights and sounds are importantunknown?
Not addressed in the published text.
Did you experience this? Tell us - Spectator must participateyesP
Both players speak in character throughout; the game is nothing else.
- Has live performers other than the participantsnoP
Both parties are players. No performer/audience split — Beck's criterion says 'other than audience participants.'
- Involves game playsometimesI
Rules yes, and an ending, but no win state and no objective. 'No GM, No dice, No prep.'
- Uses props other than the listening devicenoI
A PDF ruleset is not a physical object handled during play.
1 of thirteen are still unknown for this work. If you experienced it, you can settle them in a minute.