Curious about what is live action role play or larping for adults?
Despite the explosion of video games and mobile games played on tablets, there are still quite a few people who love to engage in role playing games. Dungeons and Dragons is a game that has gone by the wayside, but there are still plenty of games, both those that are played as board games and those that are played on the computer.
The hard core gamers go the extra mile and they do something called Live Action Role Playing (LARPing). What is live action role play? The game is actually just a life size version of the same kind of games people can play on their coffee tables.
LARPing is basically going the extra mile to get a player’s head into the game. Instead of rolling an eight sided die and looking into a book to see what the move is supposed to be, the person dons some sort of a costume and acts out the character they are playing.
As a general rule, when someone is LARPing they are not allowed to step out of character while the game is going on. This is not like settling down for a few minutes on the Xbox 360 and then going to the fridge and grabbing a Mountain Dew.
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People who enjoy doing a little live action role play get fully immersed in their characters and it is a point of pride that they are recognized as the person they are portraying.
The most important part about this particular type of game playing is that there really isn’t a limit on what kind of universe the player can find themselves in. If there has been a fantasy or science fiction story written about a certain set of characters, then they are fair game in the LARPing community.
Most people think of this kind of activity much as they would Dungeons and Dragons and so they believe that the role playing can only be based in that sort of setting. The fact of the matter is that there are all kinds of experiences where people are dressing up as characters from Star Wars in order to behave as the last Jedi Knights might have done.
The better the LARPer, the better the costumer is going to be, as part of the goal of this particular game is to look as though you are someone straight out of the story you are emulating. A good role player is not going to be wearing a guns and roses t-shirt during a situation where they are supposed to be a gladiator from ancient Rome. Quite a few of the people who get into this kind of gaming want to keep it pure, they want to pretend that they actually are someone else and that means dressing to the nines in whatever equipment they can outfit themselves in. If they are going for an ancient gladiator, then they will have a helmet and shield and weapon from that time.
The fact of the matter is that while the term Live Action Role Playing is relatively new, the concept really isn’t anything remotely original. To some degree, when you attend a renaissance faire you are seeing people who are engaging in this kind of make believe, though in those settings the stories are far less strict and laid out.
When you were a child you you engaged in this sort of activity but you just called it “playing.” The only real difference between just straight up make believe and LARPing is that, in doing this activity there is more of a structure in how you are supposed to act and what adventures you can actually embark on. The costumes are also quite a bit more detailed should you get into a hard core group of players.