PARTIAL DRAFT, click below fro the whole shebang.
One of the things we try to do with Nordic Larp is to paint a big picture of the Nordic larp scene. One of the nice things in editing the 29 different stories about larps is seeing their commonalities and differences. A nice palette of tools, an interesting repertoire of genres and so forth: Looking at the manuscript and the photos made me realize only now that indeed, System Danmarc belongs to the old tradition of village larps, making it as much a follower of Trenne byar in that sense as Dragonbane is.
One exercise in this is that we think about putting a table of This Stuff to the intro of the book, painting broad lines and generic thematical similarities between our material. We have made work version of the table, and would invite you to comment below if you can add to our knowledge, or disagree with our draft.
Some of the categories are flimsier than others, and feel free to point out our errors in that sense as well: Physical Action and Therapy especially turned out to be a bit weird. The final version will probably be a bit cut down version of this anyway, so take this as a brainstorm draft.
X is intended to signify a strong relevance of a theme, ? indicates weak, accidental or partially failed relevance, and !!! means that we really need your opinion.
We are really interested to see how this ugly monster turns into an awesomely beautiful illustration in the layout process. 🙂
nordiclarp.wordpress.com 
6 comments
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September 2, 2010 at 18:27
Mike Pohjola
inside:outside a gamist larp? Because of the point thematics? Interesting claim…
Physical action seems to include pretty much all the games (as it should since they’re larps), so it’s pretty much a pointless category.
But that’s just nicpicking. The only categories you need for defining Nordic larps are:
DEALS WITH TOTALITARIANISM —————— DOESN’T DEAL WITH TOTALITARIANISM
Carolus Rex, 1942, Europa, Pehmoydin: Bratislavan syntiset yöt, inside:outside, Hamlet, Zombie, PanoptiCorp, System Danmarc deal with totalitarianism.
Helsingin Camarilla, The Executive Game, Mellan himmel och hav, Luminescence, Silmäpuoli merirosvo, Dragonbane, The White Road don’t deal with totalitarianism, and go against the flow of Nordic larp.
The rest I’m not sure, but they probably fall somewhere in between.
Juhana Pettersson is with me in this, ergo, IT IS THE LAW.
September 3, 2010 at 09:43
Stenros
Calling inside:outside gamist, is, of course, controversial. But no other game has been that influenced by game theory. Playing it in a gamist manner certainly was supported by the design.
Interesting point about totalitarianism.
September 3, 2010 at 10:47
Montola
I’m with Mike and i:o… we’ll at least notch down the gamism to a light green ?.
– M
September 4, 2010 at 08:00
Jiituomas
As one of the two lead designers, I’d say Bratislava by intent catered heavily for immersionism (despite the semi-fixed plot plan some might think dramatist), contained very significant intrigue (most of it of course futile) and was certainly a “positive negative” experience by intent. We intentionally set out to make an immersive positive-negative game.
We also tried to make it look and feel as close to 360 as possible without compromising player safety, even though we had no idea that something like “360” would actually exist as a concept at some point. So excluding violence, cannibalism and the penetrative parts of sex, it was very much in that tone.
September 5, 2010 at 10:30
Jiituomas
Also, I’d classify Helsingin Camarilla semi-collective, especially in the early run-time periods before it was split into two. Also, there was a definite dramatist bent to it all, at least on a general level.
September 6, 2010 at 10:41
Montola
Thank you for comments, still hoping for more!
– M