(no subject)
Jan. 21st, 2004 09:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
learnedaxSo, thinking back over the couple of dozen LARPs I've played in the past sixish years, there really aren't that many which I both enjoyed and thought were well-written. Perhaps two or three, in fact. Frequently I run into what seem like the same problems repeatedly, particularly winding up locked out of the central action of the game, even when I am fairly certainI have done as much as possible to fix my inherent lack of plot by tying myself to others. I begin to wonder whether the problem here is, just possibly, that I'm not a good LARPer. Or at the very least not well-suited to the majority of games I have found.
Now, there have been perhaps half a dozen games where I was involved in major plots, and half of those I was happy because it seemed like everyone was involved in something, and they were good games all around. The remainder seemed to suffer from the usual swath of characters locked out of anything truly interesting, I just happened to be one of the few who got lucky. This does not make a very fun experience for me either, really.
In light of this it appears my odds of getting real enjoyment out of a (serious, at any rate) game are rather low. Maybe this is because most games are badly written from my perspective, or maybe I am not good enough to do anything useful if plot isn't handed to me on a platter. In either case it's very tempting to put a moratorium on my LARP involvement.
At the same time I'm having lots of interesting ideas and revelations about writing LARPs. And I feel a certain trepidation about becoming only a generator and not a consumer in the field. So I'm stuck then, I guess.
Now, there have been perhaps half a dozen games where I was involved in major plots, and half of those I was happy because it seemed like everyone was involved in something, and they were good games all around. The remainder seemed to suffer from the usual swath of characters locked out of anything truly interesting, I just happened to be one of the few who got lucky. This does not make a very fun experience for me either, really.
In light of this it appears my odds of getting real enjoyment out of a (serious, at any rate) game are rather low. Maybe this is because most games are badly written from my perspective, or maybe I am not good enough to do anything useful if plot isn't handed to me on a platter. In either case it's very tempting to put a moratorium on my LARP involvement.
At the same time I'm having lots of interesting ideas and revelations about writing LARPs. And I feel a certain trepidation about becoming only a generator and not a consumer in the field. So I'm stuck then, I guess.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-01-23 11:15 pm (UTC)As I said elsewhere, the main reason I didn't talk to y'all on Saturday was because it was a four-hour game. On that small a scale things happen too fast to easily correct, if I don't have much to do I can still Act (which is largely what I did), and if I *really* have nothing to do it will be over soon.
As an aside, I really do think Celebration worked out well for all but a very few, probably much better than average player satisfaction. It's just that I had some bad casting karma.
no subject
Date: 2004-01-24 12:37 am (UTC)Ah, well -- a bit of bad casting always happens. For what it's worth, you were a hell of a lot of fun to watch and listen to. (Your bit in the play was the one point during the game that finally got me into helpless giggles...)