Games Like Genuine Article

The bureau does not write what it has not seen.

Your uncle Theodor Haas kept this office on Wollzeile 17 for thirty years. He died on the ninth. You have the rooms, the books, the seal — and his rules. Clients place objects on the green baize and ask their questions. Is this guild silver, or plate? Did the workshop that stamped this still exist in the year the owner claims? You turn the object in your hands, bring it under the glass, consult the register of marks — and then you write.

A certificate has three parts

Verdict. Grounds. Seal. Every ground you pin must be something you actually saw. Not something you assumed, not something the client told you. The bureau does not quote from memory and does not write from hearsay.

You may lie

A false verdict can be written. It can be sealed. It has a price. The wax goes down, and it cannot be lifted. The client pays the old rate — but the next one pays less, and the one after that less again. Three false seals and it stops mattering what is painted on your window.

What you will do

Vienna, 1901

A city of assay offices and pawnbrokers, where a workshop can close in 1869 and its mark can appear on silver struck in 1874. Somebody is marking things. You will start to notice the same hand twice. No supernatural. No magic. Only metal, paper, and what you can prove.