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This chapter maps the design terrain between two fields that hold promise in cultivating democratic skill development: live action role-playing games (larp) and deliberative events. First, we provide definitions for both fields, explaining how they have independently developed as spaces to help address critical issues in democracy. In the case of political larp, these events are often held as a form of activities to raise awareness on key social problems that challenge democratic cohesion and peace. Deliberative events, on the other hand, are often held as a means to promote discussion on political issues among people who hold ideological differences, which tends to lead to depolarization and a sense of collective identity in the group. This chapter examines the overlap between the benefits reported in empirical research in both fields, recommending learning objectives and desired outcomes for designing deliberative larps. We briefly discuss key topics necessary to explore regarding the conditions for both fields, noting challenges that might arise in the design of deliberative larps, e.g., for inclusion. Finally, we provide implications for this new research agenda, indicating areas for growth in the design of both fields in dialogue with one another.  

This chapter explores the potential of live action role-playing (larp) as a tool for encouraging participant engagement with political issues and for developing democratic values and skills, including skills related to democratic deliberation. The history of role-playing as a tool for democratic training significantly pre-dates leisure role-playing games, and role-playing games, including larps, have engaged with political issues and democratic themes for as long as they have existed.

Within certain design communities political larp has been particularly prominent. One such community is Nordic larp, the early works of which were designed for political awareness-raising or even intended to affect participant behaviours in the real world, and the use of Nordic larp for political discussion, satire, activism, and democratic skills training has continued. Another one is educational larps (edu-larps), now a professional practice, which has brought bespoke design practices to applied spheres of informal, non-formal, and formal learning, often also informed by pedagogical theory and didactic best practices.

This chapter maps the development of Nordic political larps with examples that tackle their uses and impacts. It also explores challenges related to playing and designing larps with political impact goals. 

This study describes and assesses an educational intervention implemented to teach conflict transformation skills and address issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in higher education. Developed within the European Union's ROCKET project, the initiative connected courses across the Universities of Göttingen, Groningen, and Uppsala through Critical Virtual Exchange (CVE), incorporating both synchronous and asynchronous online learning activities. 

Role-playing game scenarios were facilitated to provide experiential engagements with conflict, allowing students to practice nonviolent communication, identify positions, interests, feelings, and needs, and explore distinct conflict styles. Utilizing a mixed-methods evaluation framework, the research collected demographic data alongside quantitative assessment via subscales adapted from the Intrinsic Motivation Inventory (IMI) and qualitative student feedback. Findings indicate positive student responses, characterized by medium-to-high scores across theIntere st/Enjoyment, Value/Usefulness, and Relatedness subscales, demonstrating the potential of role-playing games within virtual exchanges to support intercultural communication skills in higher education settings. 

This chapter briefly introduces various categories of analog role-playing games, as well as “cousin forms” that share similarities with transformative RPGs. This section is not intended to be comprehensive, but rather establishes key terms and genres that we will use throughout the book.

This textbook was developed for EDGE, an Erasmus+ Cooperation Partnership for curriculum development in transformative game design between Uppsala University, Avalon Larp Studio, Chaos League, Dragons' Nest, and Turku University of Applied Sciences. 

This chapter outlines our definition of transformation, describing the three types of transformative role-playing games we emphasize in this book: transformative leisure, therapeutic, and educational. We also provide a brief overview of our model of transformative game design, upon which we expand in later chapters.

In this chapter, we highlight the many theories and concepts that have informed our theoretical framework and curriculum in transformative game design. Reflecting our interdisciplinary backgrounds, these theories arise from role-playing game studies, peace and conflict studies, psychology, social psychology, sociology, counseling, pedagogy, anthropology, and several other fields. Key concepts include bleed, alibi, RPGs as transformational containers, immersion, identity, transfer, ritual, psychotherapeutic techniques, various interaction theories, and educational theories, among others. 

This chapter offers practical recommendations for designing transformative role-playing games based on our model. Topics include designing transformative goals, framing activities such as workshops and debriefs, narrative design, and culture design. 

In this chapter, we emphasize topics related to establishing and maintaining psychological safety, as well as methods for community container setting, meaning ways in which to cultivate transformational communities around games. Topics include safety strategies before, during, and after games; working with specific populations; crisis management; and sensitive content and representation. In particular, we discuss politics, culture, gender, sexuality, race, and ethnicity, neurodiversity, and accessibility.