Loss, hope/despair, solidarity

Designer: Rhei

Number of participants: 10–20

Duration: 3 hours

The presenter feels that this larp IS suitable for young people aged 16+

About the larp

An earthquake has struck your town disrupting your day. Within minutes everything was chaos, houses were crumbling down, places filled with memories turned into ruins. You may have lost your close ones. You heard the scream of the injured and the dying – they are still resonating within your ears together with the thundering noise of the ground cracking open. You might have been injured as you barely managed to make it out with your lives. Then the rain hit you, as if not only the earth but even the sky had decided to turn against you. Nobody said it was safe to enter, but you had no shelter and while everything was still in chaos you moved into this old building with cracks. Now, you are stuck in here with too many of you and not enough room. No food nor water supplies except for spare bottles you fortuitously had on you. You don’t know when the rescuers will arrive, but given the lack of organisation in managing disasters you don’t expect help to come any time soon. You fear you will all perish and worst of it all the shocks haven’t stopped yet.

Content Warnings: Some players might choose to play injured character.

Costume (optional): No requirement but players are free to bring chalk if they want to look like they have just ran away from a crumbling building. Any make-up to represent injuries is also welcome as are any props to role-play first aid if one wishes to.

Presented by

Rhei: I started attending weekly LARP meetings at my University in early 2019 because a couple of friends invited me. Then curiosity took over and wanting to explore different LARP styles I visited London to attend a workshop organised by the Game Kitchen. That’s when I discovered that I actually enjoy creating games perhaps even more than playing them so I started thinking about running my own game. New ideas would not stop coming to mind, but designing something functional was challenging and this is probably my first properly written game.

Parameters

Physical contact	Intense contact; intimate or forceful
Romance and intimacy	Can agree on the level of physical contact and romantic involvement players are OK with. Players may choose to play a couple but sex is not part of this setting.
Conflict and violence	Will be discussed with players; given the setting conflict is likely to arise and it might lead to simulated violence. No weapons.
Communication style	Any degree of speech (players may choose to play silent characters who are in shock). Written communication is also fine as well as it is preaching or singing but these are not the main means of communication. Playing music is also acceptable as long as it’s OK with everyone.
Movement style	Mostly sitting and lying, but pacing the room is fine. No vigorous movements.
Characters	Players build their characters around a predesigned skeleton or archetype
Narrative control	There is no story as such, it’s more like abstract activity
Transparency	Transparent design, but players can create secrets during play and keep them from each other / reveal them when wished
Representation level	The room should be a good enough representation of the place, but I can’t make cracks into the wall or grounds so those will have to be imagined.
Play culture	Players are collaborating to achieve joint aims
Tone	Intense

Sunday afternoon, Studio 3