What is larp?

Larp is an artform and a storytelling medium, just like books or films. It is not a genre in itself, but a way to tell stories and just like in books, any setting, story or theme can be explored. There are larps about choosing between love or fortune in the 1810s, about surviving and navigating social structures in a post apocalyptic bunker or about  creating art. But there are also larps about immigration politics, honor culture and other more difficult topics.    

 

How does larp work? Is there a script? Is there an audience?

There is no script but at our events you most often get a written character. This is a description of a fictive person that you get to embody and live as during the game. See it as a more structured way of playing and improvising. It is like theatre in the way that we act as someone else but differs in the way that there is no audience. Just like the point of, say, hiking in the forest is not to entertain an audience but to explore the experience itself. And a lot of the experience is to play with social situations and relationships. You can for example play with questions like “How do I get the thing that I want in this situation?”, “Can I be the leader of this group?”, “How does my best friend react if I challenge her bad behaviour?”, “Should I work to solve this relationship or should I break up?”. 

 

Why do people larp?

There is not one answer to this question. Some larp to tell stories, others to better understand topics or different perspectives while some larp to immerse themselves in their favourite genres and find joy in playing. 

 

Why do you organise larps?

We want to create art that is meaningful to us. To tell stories about humanity, difficult topics and to give people a place to explore creativity. We believe that we need to practice imagining new worlds and ways of seeing the world to be able to change the world. This means that activism motivates a lot of our work as well. 

 

I want to try larp – where do I start? 

It can be a bit difficult to overview the artform and what is happening in it. One thing that sets it apart from, say escape rooms or theatre, is that you have to sign up and prepare a bit in advance so it’s not as easy to just search the event pages of a city the week you go there for holliday. First off, you could check our “current projects” and see if there is something active there – we try to keep them updated. The best way to always be notified of a new project is our Discord server where we announce larps and also other organisations’ larps. You can also contact us and ask for tips if you, for example, have a particular book or setting that you would like to experience more deeply. Visit our Discord here.
 

I am signing up for one of your events – what happens next?

It depends on the larp as all projects have a bespoke design. But in general, the signup period is at least half a year prior to the event itself. First of all you sign up. When the sign up closes there will be a lottery for the spots if there are more signups than available spots. Those who do not immediately receive a spot are placed on a reserve list. You secure your spot by paying a deposit, and then later the full participation fee. The next step is the casting, where we allocate the participants to the different characters in the setting. This is usually based on a questionnaire that you get to fill out in the signup process. It asks about what themes and character traits you are interested in exploring.

 

Some time later you will get an email with the written character. It is chosen for you specifically and can contain things like background story, goals in life, relationships you have. It is then your task to interpret this, to get to know this person and to step into it and make it yours. It is often a good idea to contact a couple of the people that you will play with to just establish some contact and maybe get a feel for the themes you want to explore. 

When it’s time for the event itself you show up according to the information given to you and we will guide you through the process. It usually starts with a half or full day or preparation and workshops where we go through information on setting, character groups, names, rules etc. And when that is done the larp itself starts when we press the metaphorical play button. After the game ends, which is usually about 2 or 3 days later, there is a gathering and depending on the event it could be a debrief and/or an after party. Before leaving you are often asked to help with some basic cleaning. This is often followed by an evaluation and possibly a lot of chatting with new friends.

 

How are your events different? 

We do a wide variety of larps. Some are lighter in theme while others explore darker parts of humanity. We try to be very clear about what you can expect.