My stuff on PoRtaL

PoRtaL is almost upon us and the program is up - in less than 48 hours we'll already be deep into presentations and discussions. So I thought this would be a good time to write something about stuff that I'll do there. I'll hold in total four presentations, two workshops and two larps.

Here's the schedule and short descriptions of what I'll do on this weekend

Friday, March 1st

Presentation: Terra Nova larp - 18:30 - 19:00

This will be a short review about what Terra Nova is about, what's been done on three Terra Nova larps so far and what the plans are for Terra Nova 2013.

Presentation: The Mixing Desk of Larp - 22:00 - 22:30

A short presentation of The Mixing Desk of Larp framework and the terminology used in describing it - a quick presentation of how different larps can be and what you get by changing the parameters.

Workshop: Create a larp - 22:30 - 23:00

Connected to the Mixing Desk of Larp presentation, it will be a workshop for a couple of people who'll design a larp this weekend (with a meeting every day) - it will be played as a "mystery larp" on Sunday. There are still free spots if you're on the convention - direct sign-up link is here.

Saturday, March 2nd

Workshop: Ars Amandi - 11:00 - 13:00

A powerful nordic larp method for simulating sex and intimacy by Emma Wieslander. The method will be explained, practiced, and several different scenarios played. Thanks to +Lizzie Stark for some tips on how to run this workshop. You can sign up for it here.

Larp: A Party Full of Secrets - 19:30 - 23:00

Of all the larps on this convention, this one will last the longest and take the most people. It will introduce some new things in Croatian larp (especially considering subjects of the larp) and I'm really looking forward to it. The backstory goes like this: Everything is about to change - to you and your friends. You've known them for years now, and this is the last time you'll see a lot of them. Life draws everyone in his or her own direction and everyone has some secrets. This is the last time you're together as a group of friends and it's time to do everything you missed doing so far. A modern-age larp for 6-20 participants (min. 3 male, 3 female). Clothes: modern, night club style. Ars Amandi can be used on this larp. There will be only one run of this larp - so sign up here. After it, I'll publish full game documents online under Creative Commons.

Sunday, March 3rd

Presentation: Amtgard 8.0 - 15:00 - 15:30

A new version of the Amtgard rules is coming - vastly different from what's familiar to most players from Croatia who played under versions 6 and 7. It's rewritten from scratch. This presentation will cover the most important changes.

Presentation: Pervasive larp and the announcement of the larp Exile - 15:30 - 16:00

A little bit about pervasive larps and how they differ from ARGs and other pervasive games. Exile... well, it will be a convention exclusive, but expect info about it here soon after convention.

Larp: Death of the Japanese Emperor - 19:00 - 21:00

Another run of the Death of the Japanese Emperor - a larp for 4-8 people accused of murdering the current Emperor of Japan and their misadventures in prison. If you missed it in December, now's your chance so sign up here.

That should cover it... See you on PoRtaL!

The 15 rules of larp

The following 15 rules (warning: strong language) were written some years ago in Great Britain, and have been pretty much generally accepted on the British larp scene. Especially popular is rule 7 - widely known by its number and commonly considered to be the most imortant rule of all (and I agree). Even the biggest British larp forum has taken Rule7 as its name. The rules have been originally created by the Drunken Monkeys and edited by Rick Wynne who added some extra stuff in the explanations to make them more understandable to international audience (it still contains some British larp lingo though), more work-safe and to throw in his two cents. (copy of the original wording is available here ) 1. Don’t play a mighty warrior; play a warrior and be mighty. Don’t label your character. As soon as you say that you are the best swordsman in the land someone will come along and kick your ass. Just get into the mindset of the person and role-play it out. 2. No one cares about you...

It's been way too long without any updates

I'm just back from PoRtaL XII, which was back in Plovdiv, Bulgaria, 6 years after PoRtaL VI , which is - incidentally - only 3 posts below this one on my blog, and I still remember it like it was yesterday. And this means I failed to review the past two year's PoRtaLs, also excellent. Here's some representation for them. Back during PoRtaL 10 in Krakow, I did a presentation called Designing larps with intent . It was streamed, and can be found on Youtube. For PoRtaL 10, I also wrote and ran a larp Journey to Tau Ceti - an expanded version of the Arrival at Tau Ceti. I was a mess at documenting it, and it still remains in an unpublishable state. Both of these were run on Friday, which means I haven't really see much else on the convention that day, but I did on Saturday, when I was also able to play Ties that Bind larp by Alexandros Alexiou. I skipped Sunday, as we had to go early to drive home. For documentation purposes, full program listing is here . At next year...

Discord is up

More stuff from my PoRtaL XII talk, Larps and Information Technology , seem to be coming true. In particular, the part about technology becoming old. And so it is with this blog. The technology it's built on is getting old and starts to not play as nice with modern browsers, plugins and smartphones as it used to. Specifically, the comment section doesn't seem to work for anyone. So I decided to open a discord to help us all connect in an easier way. If you are interested, join the Crolarper discord server here .

Diary of a Croatian larper

Search This Blog