BIG ANNOUNCEMENT! The Implementing Transformative Role-playing Games textbook is now available for free download and print on demand! The book is the second in a series of two developed by the EDGE Consortium, an Erasmus+ Cooperation Partnership, featuring authors from Uppsala University, Dragons’ Nest, Avalon Larp Studio, Chaos League, and Turku University of Applied Sciences. The peer-reviewed book has been published in the Transformative Play Research Series within Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis at Uppsala University.
Table of contents:
Preface
Sarah Lynne Bowman, Simon Brind, Kjell Hedgard Hugaas
Chapter 1: The Basics of Implementing Transformative Role-playing Games
Sarah Lynne Bowman
Chapter 2: Implementing Transformative Role-playing Games in Specific Applied Contexts
Sarah Lynne Bowman, Angie Bandhoesingh, Elektra Diakolambrianou, Felipe García-Soriano, Kjell Hedgard Hugaas, Josefin Westborg
Chapter 3: Production and Logistics for Transformative Role-playing Games
Simon Brind, Halfdan Keller Justesen, Sarah Lynne Bowman, Alessandro Giovannucci, Felipe García-Soriano, Kjell Hedgard Hugaas
Chapter 4: Theory and Practice in Facilitating Transformative Role-playing Games
Sarah Lynne Bowman, Angie Bandhoesingh, Simon Brind, Elektra Diakolambrianou, Kjell Hedgard Hugaas, Felipe García-Soriano, Alessandro Giovannucci, Josephine Rydberg, Josefin Westborg
Chapter 5: Cultivating Safer Transformational Communities
Sarah Lynne Bowman, Kjell Hedgard Hugaas, Nikola Sekulić
Chapter 6: Theory and Practice in Playing for Transformation
Sarah Lynne Bowman, Kjell Hedgard Hugaas, Guus Quinten van Tilborg, Simon Brind, Alessandro Giovannucci, Nikola Sekulić, Josephine Rydberg
Chapter 7: Playtesting and Researching Role-playing Game Implementation
Kjell Hedgard Hugaas, Joshua Juvrud, Sarah Lynne Bowman, Josefin Westborg, Guus Quinten van Tilborg, Felipe García-Soriano, Josephine Rydberg
Synopsis:
This textbook explores implementation practices for running transformative analog role-playing games, such as transformative leisure, educational, and therapeutic applications. We foreground central considerations for hacking existing games, framing, scaling up existing designs, adapting to the needs of specific populations, creating functional groups, and working with stakeholders.
Additionally, the textbook covers many practical considerations when producing and running logistics. Examples include project management, organizational teams, establishing the setting, character writing, location logistics, as well as tech, interaction, and sensory design. We offer suggestions for communication, casting, documentation, guiding player preparation, workshop design, and onsite logistics.
Next, the textbook discusses different facilitation roles and responsibilities. We describe several skills associated with good facilitation and recommendations for working in different settings. Additionally, the textbook presents general principles for cultivating safer and more accessible transformational communities surrounding play. We discuss ways to address physical and psychological risks in implementation for both organizers and players, such as injury, psychological overwhelm, and inappropriate behavior in the community.
The textbook also features theories connected to the play experience, including motivation, creative agendas, and labor. Then, we present several concepts related to transforming one’s self concept, social identity, relationships with others, and spiritual development through transformative play. We include various practical recommendations for working with preparatory activities, steering, bleed, different types of immersion, interpersonal dynamics, group dynamics, and gathering play experiences through feedback and documentation.
The textbook closes with a chapter offering practical advice for playtesting, iteration, and conducting research on transformative play, including study design, ethics, data gathering, and analysis. We conclude with a list of studies offering empirical evidence for the affective, cognitive, and behavioral benefits of these games.
We recommend also reading the first book in this series, Transformative Role-playing Game Design, edited by Bowman, Diakolambrianou, and Brind.
Graphic design by Kate Blomgren, Daria Shpak.
Layout by Bora Haxhirai.