At a time of growing uncertainty, we become caught in the immediate, the latest news story of the “Now,” and we narrow our imagination. Faced with such rapid transformation of society, the Berlin Science Week asked us to look “Beyond Now” and imagine what lies ahead.

How do you push beyond now to communicate the astral sciences to a broader non-academic audience—young and old—without losing sight of the scientific value of academic research? How do you convey the idea that games are central to the astral sciences? How do you even reconstruct ancient games? In pursuit of these questions, the “Astral Sciences in Trans-Regional Asia” (ASTRA) Research Group participated in the 2025 Berlin Science Week with an exhibition and a workshop.

Held at the Museum für Naturkunde from November 1–2, 2025, planning our participation started about six months earlier. We worked closely with Stephanie Hood and the Research and Communication Management team to develop strategies for accessibility—using tactile dice, card holders, magnifying glasses, braille texts, texts translated into German, easy language texts—as part of the Institute’s ongoing commitment to reducing barriers in its public communication.

Cosmic Games: Real Gods Play Dice

Conceptualized by Jacob Schmidt-Madsen and coordinated by Ole Birk Laursen, our exhibition “Cosmic Games: Real Gods Play Dice” showcased a wide variety of ancient board games from across Asia. Ideas were turned into practice with the help of ASTRA student assistant Mariana Chisté Reinhardt, who designed everything from banners, flyers, and cards to table cloths.

Informative banners and flyers provided background and history for the curious, explaining how board game models of the universe are used to understand the inner workings of the cosmos and predict its influence over the fates of those inhabiting it.

We designed twelve flip cards, one side showing an astronomical chart or illustration, the other providing more information about the connection between astral sciences and games. Some of them we turned into a simple memory game as well, allowing visitors to test their memory and learning experience.

Our pièce de resistance was the Astronomical Chess game, an ancient Arab game that reflects the revolutions of the planets and the vicissitudes of fate. Based on a manuscript illustration, we designed and printed the Astronomical Chess game onto a table cloth, which was fitted onto a round high table. Much like the universe it models, the game has no clearly defined beginning nor end, compelling hundreds of visitors to think “Beyond Now.”

Playing with the Past: Reconstructing Ancient Games

Imagine yourself as a detective-cum-explorer in search of ancient games, exploring temples somewhere in Egypt, Mesopotamia, or the Indus Valley, and coming across fragments of something that resembles a game. You may find textual passages, visual clues, or know of similar games from the same region or period. How do you reconstruct such a game? This was the concept of our workshop “Playing with the Past: Reconstructing Ancient Games.”

After a 15-minute introduction to how game researchers work—drawing on a combination of textual sources, visual sources, material sources, and ethnographic sources—Jacob divided the 20 workshop participants into five groups. Each group was then given a case file, some basic clues, and some key questions. The task was now to reconstruct a game based on little known evidence. To be clear, as Jacob had explained in the introduction, the rules of games are often not known, as they were played in oral cultures, and rules often change according to various cultures and languages.

Knowing that there was no right and no wrong, the groups set off to make sense of the games in front of them. The goal was not only to reconstruct the rules of play, but also to reflect on the social context and function of the game as well as any symbolic or representational value it might have had.

What emerged were new insights into the history of games and a deeper understanding how game scholars work. Some participants expressed confusion at first but still managed to construct a game; in fact, some even came close to reconstructing a Chilean game along the lines of how game scholars have considered it was played. Some were attuned to the sometimes Western-gaze on an Egyptian game, while even others thought about divination, spirituality, and the impossibility of having an “end goal” when a game is divine and related to the eternal heavens.

Reflections on the Astral Sciences Beyond Now

More than a thousand visitors came to our exhibition, some stayed for long, inquiring about games and wanting to play, while others passed by briefly. Children wanted to play games, while their parents and adults were interested in learning more about the connections between games and astral sciences. That is the nature of a busy and bustling Berlin Science Week.

While our exhibition allowed guests to drift in and out, the workshop was limited to twenty participants. When the free registration opened in September, the workshop sold out within a day, and 40 people were on the waiting list. On the day, even more people showed up, hoping to get a spot.

To ASTRA Research Group, the attraction of the exhibition and the success of the workshop are evidence of the power of looking “Beyond Now,” of seeing the astral sciences as a playful space for collective visioning, and of a broader desire to connect the past to the present through games.