Short answer: Use Start over in the top bar's playback control. It asks you to confirm, then takes the running game back to your story's starting scene and resets every story variable to its default value - the same clean state you see when you first open Forge. It is the only action that resets variables; ordinary clicking around the timeline carries them along untouched. It restarts play only - your project and your edits are never affected.
Where the control is
On wider windows, the playback control in the top bar leads with a Reset button; on narrower windows the control collapses into a single dropdown where the same action appears as a Start over row. Both open the same confirmation first, so a stray click can't throw away your playthrough state.
What gets reset
- The playhead returns to your story's starting scene, at its first moment.
- Every story variable returns to its default value.
The result is identical to freshly opening Forge: the game starts over from the top with a clean slate.
What does not get reset
- Your content. Start over touches playback only. Scenes, dialogue, sprites, variables' definitions - everything you authored stays exactly as you left it.
- Variables during normal moving around. Clicking events, hopping between scenes, and previewing branches all preserve current variable values. That is deliberate, so the frame you inspect reflects the path you played. Start over is the one action that wipes them back to defaults.
For a reader-style clean run
If you want to play your game the way a reader would, use Preview in the Launch menu (top right). Preview always starts a fresh, clean run from the beginning in its own temporary save slot, separate from your editing session.