Nordic Larp Talks

Tag: character design

  • There Must be a Simpler Way – three ways to less work on character writing – Trine Lise Lindahl

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    Many a larp designer has struggled while writing page up and page down of unique character texts. In this talk Trine gives three examples of larps that have used reusable elements to reduce the time and work that go into writing a large number of characters, while maintaining the quality.

    Trine Lise Lindahl is an experienced larp designer, communicator and community organizer based in Oslo, Norway. She has co-designed multiple notable larps, including Mad About the Boy (2010), Play the Cards (2012), KoiKoi (2014), and 1942 – Someone to trust? (2017). She produced, edited and wrote for the anthology Larps from the Factory (2013) that pioneered the rerunnable chamber larp as a viable format of Nordic larp, and taught character writing at The Larpwriter Summer School. She has a background in history, education and design, and works as a content designer.

  • Shadows of the Backstory: Shadow relations as a tool to bring internal play to the surface – Lara Hartung

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    The inner lives of characters can offer a lot of play. In her talk, Lara Hartung presents a relationship mechanic that can make backstories come alive, externalize inner conflicts and enable direct interaction with distant or abstract themes: Shadow Relations.

    Lara Hartung is a larp designer, writer and science communicator from Germany.  As a member of the design collective Fractured Reality Studios, she is a lead designer for Blankspace and has worked on Greylight 2142.

  • Fleshing the Skeleton – How to empower players to make characters their own, without the risk of ‘breaking the larp’ – Mo Holkar

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    Mo Holkar talks about the fertile middle ground between larpwright-designed and player-designed characters; and how to empower players to make characters their own without the risk of their creativity breaking the larp.

    Slides: Fleshing the Skeleton – How to empower players to make characters their own, without the risk of ‘breaking the larp’ – Mo Holkar

    Mo Holkar is a UK larp designer and organizer. He is an editor at nordiclarp.org, and an organizer of The Smoke: London’s International Larp Festival. As well as his own designs, he has written characters for other people’s larps ranging from Fairweather Manor to Suffragette! to Reborn.

  • Same Role, Different Life – Karijn van der Heij

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    Karijn wants us to start thinking about the way we relate to the people who have played the same character as us in another larp-run. Much attention has been given to the things our co-players can add to our experience but are these ‘other selves’ also co-players in a way, that can add something to the way we look at the character?

    Karijn van der Heij has been a very active participant in the Dutch larp scene for fifteen years, where she has co-writing credits on over 30 larps in different genres. In the past five years, she has shifted much of her attention to the international games and strives to pilfer as many ideas as she can to bring into her local scene.