So you’ve died. Only, rather than disappearing into the inky black, the way any sensible modern atheist would anticipate, you have been relegated to an eternity as a ghost trying to communicate nouns to lexically obsessed mediums. Dang it. Your mother was right all along.

That’s kinda-sorta the premise behind Phantom Ink, the word game by Mary Flanagan and Max Seidman. Phantom Ink has been kicking around for a few years now, one of those sturdy team games one can count on to make an appearance at gatherings once everyone is too tired for anything more taxing. It’s an unassuming plaything, redolent of any number of parlor games. That’s its greatest strength. Despite its simplicity, even despite its sleepy-eyed coziness, it’s the sort of game you can rely on.

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