STATES of PLAY Nordic Larp Around the World
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STATES OF PLAY Nordic Larp Around the World Edited by Juhana Pettersson The official book of Solmukohta 2012 Pohjoismaisen roolipelaamisen seura StateS of Play Nordic larP arouNd the World The official book of Solmukohta 2012, published in cooperation with the Solmukohta organization. Edited by Juhana Pettersson Graphic design by Tommi Kovala, tommikovala.com Published by Pohjoismaisen roolipelaamisen seura Proofread by Juhana Pettersson, Kenneth Quek, Johanna MacDonald & Jukka Särkijärvi States of Play: Nordic Larp Around the World © 2012 Juhana Pettersson Introduction Photos © 2000 Onni Qvickström Folk Fantasy © 2012 Mike Pohjola High on Hell Photos © 2011 Mike Pohjola & Olli Lönnberg © 2012 Elin Nilsen Photos © 2011 Peter Munthe-Kaas Reliving Sarmatia © 2012 Michał Mochocki Valve: the Grand Adventure © 2012 Katri Lassila & Antti Kanner Valokaari Photos © 2011 Tuomas Puikkonen © 2012 J. Tuomas Harviainen Photos © 2000 Henri Block The Joy of Kidnapping Photos © 2011 Tuomas Puikkonen Kiirastuli OY © 2012 Vili Nissinen The Golden Rule of Larp Photos © 2011 Vili Nissinen © 2012 Simo Järvelä Photos © 2011 Tuomas Puikkonen Playing ”Thus Spoke Zarathustra” © 2012 Ari-Pekka Lappi A Moment of Weakness © 2012 Yaraslau Kot The Labyrinth of Possibilities © 2012 Gabriel Widing Dublin2: The EU’s Asylum Policy in Miniature Translation © 2012 Thom Kiraly © 2012 JP Kaljonen, Johanna Raekallio & Mikael Kinanen Photos © 2011 Haidi Motola & Mikael Kinanen We Created a Monster, Part I © 2012 Johanna MacDonald Weddings and Anti-Condom Activists Photos © 2012 Pilar Andeyro © 2012 Trine Lise Lindahl Photos © 2011 Sigve Indregard We Created a Monster, Part II © 2012 Aarni Korpela Larp and Aesthetic Responsibility Photos © 2012 Aarni Korpela & Anu Leponiemi © 2012 Tova Gerge Songs and Larp Tears and Defeat © 2012 Alexey Fedoseev & Daria Kurguzova © 2012 Nathan Hook Photos © 2012 Ksenia Kozlovskaya & Photos © 2012 Nicklas Silwerulv Tatiana Rodionova What is Good Playing? Pathos © 2012 Niina Niskanen © 2012 Lorenzo Trenti Photos © 2012 unknown The Evaluation of Elusiveness © 2012 Aleksandra Mochocka Shadowrun Photos © 2012 Paweł Ściborek © 2012 Thomas B. Photos © 2008 Le Four Fantastique & Maud Jenni ¡Lucha Libre! © 2012 Jenni Sahramaa Give Me Your Hands, I Will Be Your Eyes Photos © 2011 Suvi Korhonen & Nino Hynninen © 2012 Aaron Vanek Photos © 2011 Aaron Vanek Tahtotila © 2012 Suvi Korhonen & Tuukka Virtaperko Mistakes I’ve Made Photos © 2012 Suvi Korhonen © 2012 Claus Raasted Your Character is Not Your Own The Rogue Wave © 2012 Gustav Nilsson © 2012 Andrea Castellani The Blessing of Lineage It’s About Time © 2012 Lauri Lukka © 2012 Eleanor Saitta Photos © 2012 Lauri Lukka Letting the Stories Go Beyond the Game Master © 2012 Emma Wieslander © 2012 Emily Care Boss, Ivan Vaghi & Jason Morn- ingstar We Hold These Rules to be Self-Evident © 2012 Lizzie Stark Photos © 2012 Kyle Ober Special thank you: Heidi Westerlund, the people involved with the ”white cover” edition of Talk Larp Printed at Toptryk Grafisk, Denmark, 2012 ISBN 978-952-67599-4-4 ISBN 978-952-67599-5-1 (PDF) Pohjoismaisen roolipelaamisen seura: www.nordicrpg.fi Solmukohta: www.solmukohta.org CONTENTS Introduction . 7 Songs and larp . 95 High on Hell . .10 Pathos . 102. Valve . 12 Shadowrun . 107. The Joy of Kidnapping . 17 Steeds: Give Me Your Hands, I Will Be Your Eyes . 112. The Golden Rule of Larp . 19 Mistakes I’ve Made . 117. A Moment of Weakness . 25 The Rogue Wave . 119. Dublin2 . 27 It’s About Time . 124. Weddings and Anti-Condom Activists . .35 Letting the Stories Go . 129. Larp and Aesthetic Responsibility . .42 Tears and Defeat . 135. Folk Fantasy . 48 What is Good Playing? . 137. Reliving Sarmatia . 54 The Evaluation of Elusiveness . 140. Valokaari: The Magnificent Failure . .62 Lucha Libre . 147. Kiirastuli . 66 Tahtotila . 153. Playing ”Thus Spake Zarathustra” . 74 Your Character is not Your Own . 157. The Labyrinth of Possibilities . 77 The Blessing of Lineage . 161. We Created a Monster, Part I . 83 Beyond the Game Master . 163. We Created a Monster, Part II . 87 We Hold These Rules to Be Self-Evident . 170. The Only Thing We Forgot . 93 Writer Bios . 176. INTRODUCTION My first Solmukohta was in 2000.1 It was a pretty different event from what it is today. Apart from a few cosmopolitan trailblazers, most Finnish, Swedish, Norwegian and Danish larpers and roleplayers were gawking at each other and won- dering at how different our larp cultures were. Most people had never been to a game in a foreign country, and the tradi- tional Solmukohta books collecting articles from around the Nordic countries and the world were still in the future. We didn’t know anything about larp in Russia or Italy. Even the Swedes seemed like exotic aliens, their speech al- most understandable if you concentrated hard enough. Sol- mukohta was all about Nordic cultural exchange, trying to learn from our neighbors. I remember people sleeping in classrooms and playing crazy Norwegian art larps. Someone told me they involved putting your hand into broken glass, so I didn’t try them out. Later, I discovered that this was not true. I was working as the janitor at a concert venue, so I missed big parts of the conference, but it was an impressive experi- ence. I heard about wonderful games like the Swedish Knap- pnålshuvudet and Carolus Rex, both from 1999. My friend Mika Loponen burnt in protest The Manifesto of the Turku School, by Mike Pohjola. In his manifesto, Mike argued that immersion in the character was the purpose of roleplaying, a view widely ridiculed at the time. Later, this idea has be- come almost conservative in Finnish larp discussion. I got involved just in time. The next few years saw the birth of some of the most important works of the Nordic Larp canon: Europa in 2001, Hamlet in 2002, Mellan him- mel och hav in 2003. After Norway’s initial prototype The Book, the first proper Solmukohta book was also published in 2003, by the Danes. It had the appropriate title As Larp Grows Up, and it collected many of the creative manifestoes that had been published so far, as well as new articles. 1 The annual Solmukohta event is called Knutepunkt when A young Mike Pohjola watches as Mika Loponen burns his in Norway, Knutpunkt when in Sweden, Knudepunkt when in Manifesto of the Turku School at Solmukohta 2000. Photos: Denmark and Solmukohta when in Finland. It’s a roleplaying Onni Qvickström conference mostly dedicated to Nordic larp design. 7 THE IDEA Daria Kurguzona’s article ”Songs and Larp”. Its description Thinking back to those times, you can see a scene being of song-based game design will shake your convictions. For born, flaring brightly with the excitement of all these new those who fear Nordic decline, I suggest as a remedy JP Kal- ideas. With time, things changed. Instead of gaping at each jonen and Johanna Raekallio’s documentation article on the other, we started working together, going to games in other game Dublin2 or Tova Gerge’s ethics probe ”Larp and Aes- countries, and finding common ground. We started to un- thetic Responsibility”.) derstand the things that made Finnish, Swedish, Norwegian Nordic Larp has become an idea that’s being exported and Danish games into what is now known as Nordic Larp. to the rest of the world, an ideal of ambitious game design Instead of being a venue for Finns to marvel at what the ready to change the world, for fun, for art, or for more ide- Norwegians are doing, Solmukohta became the epicenter of alistic reasons. It’s a dynamic idea, ready to incorporate a design movement. The original scene as it existed in 2003 anything and everything into itself, as long as the result is a died and was replaced by something new. Nordic Larp, cod- game like we’ve never seen before. ified into a canon in the book of the same name by Markus Montola and Jaakko Stenros, became untethered from its This BOOK geographical moorings and started to spread to Italy, Ger- This book provides a snapshot of a design movement at a many, the Czech Republic, the U.S. and many other places particular moment in time. It’s a forum for new design ideas, around the world. but also an attempt to document the games we are making Here, it’s important to note that Nordic Larp is not the for posterity. By necessity, it’s a confused collection, since same as the larps played in the Nordic countries. Indeed, making sense of what’s happening now is a luxury that’s only most Nordic larps are not part of the Nordic Larp design available to us after the fact. Because of this, the categories movement. This leads to the bizarre situation where the of ”Art and Design” and ”Documentation are joined by ”New Nordic Larp movement can enter into dialogue with Finnish Frontiers”, articles that explore concepts and phenomena larp the same way it can be in dialogue with Russian larp. new to the Nordic larp scene. In the Solmukohta of today, I’m no longer astonished at As befits the collective, collaborative and co-creative what the Danes or the Norwegians are doing. They’re fel- nature of roleplaying, most of the ideas I’ve had about this low citizens of the Nordic Larp community, doing ambitious book were stolen from somewhere else. The documenta- projects based on a strong tradition of Nordic larp design. tion articles follow the lead of the Danish Do Larp book and Nowadays, the truly new stuff comes from all those Italians, Stenros and Montola’s Nordic Larp. The physical dimen- Germans and Americans who have taken some of the ideas sions of this book were cribbed from Larp, the Universe and of Nordic Larp and made them part of their own artistic Everything, the Norwegian Knutepunkt book of 2009.