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Welcome back to Geek Time, this is Brad. Hi, LuLu.

Hi, Brad.

On last episode we were talking about LARPing. And if you think that was geeky, this is gonna be even more.

Let's get our geek on.

All right. So let's start off with the genres, how does that sound？

That's great. Because last time you mostly focused on medieval all these like your traditional RPG game set in the medieval time with the magicians, there comes mages, wizards and healers, warriors. What about other genres？

They do have like the non-magical medieval reenactment. We even have a lot of Civil War reenactment type of things.

Wouldn’t that be potentially sensitive, though, politically ?

Er. . . for people, it's not really such a thing like it's just one of those things where you kind of like suspend all of your political ties to the current world and just go out and have fun.

I remember seeing somewhere that in America you do have the Civil War reenactment society.

Yeah.

Is that considered LARPing as well？Or is it a specific thing？

It is. It’s LARPing in its own way. They would never consider it LARPing, but it is LARPing. They are playing a character, they dress up, they have weapons. Their weapons, you know, fire blanks and everything, but they do have real cannons and they do all these things like they normally would. They camp and they cook. They cook like they would in the olden days. So it is reenactment, whether they want to admit it or not.

You just said you have historical reenactment. But last time you also talked about like vampires. . . is that a thing, like supernatural things would that be. . .

People might not do the whole costume with like werewolf or something. Some people do, some people like go out and create these really interesting werewolf type costumes and they'll go out on them but uh, it's really difficult, so not a lot of people actually take the effort to go do it right away.

Maybe it's also because there is this hidden fear in the folklore. So if they make the costumes too good, they might scare people.

Yeah, they do. I mean just the act of like kind of like going out to the forest and like doing these things, people kind of get weird out by it.

Yeah. It's like if you go to the forest for a walk and then you see a bunch of guys dressed up in medieval costumes, and you think, “oh, these are just a bunch of geeks”, but you see a werewolf, you go call the police.

I mean like the vampires, they have the fake teeth and they put on their fake teeth and people are kind of like “what are you doing？”

I suppose especially if you are saying that, for example, people are religious, this could be seen as quite protest.

It is, for some people, but I mean, everyone has their own things. So. . . Yeah.

Are there any LARPing of contemporary like known. . . let's just say probably like known supernatural but a content like. . . for example, can you COS. . . well, I say COS. . . can you LARP. . . let's say crime？

Yeah, definitely. like you can uh. . .

Detectives?

They have like the murder mystery dinners, some things like that. Yeah, murder mystery dinners, I think the other day we were talking about the escape rooms.

Oh yes. This is something that I want to mention because in American contexts when you say LARPing, you're saying that's the geekiest of geeks. So people probably will still have that certain stigma like these people they're living in a fantasy world.

Definitely.

You're a bit embarrassed to admit to people that you're doing that. But in China lately, I think in the past five years or so, you know, escape rooms这种密室 they are getting really popular, you've seen them around. But whilst escape rooms in other countries might just be an escape room where you focus on solving the puzzles and trying to get out. In China they've taken it to another level. Sometimes they have themed escape rooms where you dress up. You don't just solve the puzzles, you actually dress up as characters background from specific dynasty even, and then if you think about it, it’s pretty much LARPing because you are acting the character, you have your own sort of script, you can elaborate on that script, and then together you act out scenes, and then you'll probably solve a mystery and eventually get out of the room. And that is very popular in China and it’s very popular among young people. I don't think it really has that much of a stigma, people just thought of it as fun.

Yeah. I mean like that you're just going to a place and paying for kind of like. . . it's like going to a movie.

Exactly, but you get to interact.

But I think if people go out into the forest and like dress up, people are probably. . . that's kind of weird.

So don't you have any of those like I've described it that escape rooms that turned into a LARPing session.

I haven't seen anything specifically like that, but I have seen dinner theaters and things like that.

What a dinner theater would be interactive? In most theaters.

Yes, usually. Dinner theaters, either just that you sit down and you have dinner and you watch something, but a lot of dinner theaters you're put into something, or someone gets killed, and someone is the murderer, and like everyone has to kind of like figure out who was the murderer. It may be a plant or it may be just one of the characters and they're gets told that they're the murderer.

Yeah, that's basically murder mystery nights. I love those, those are fun.

So we kind of like move on and kind of go back to talking about like more of the actual LARPing, we're talking about some of the characters and guilds, a lot of times when we have LARPing.

Hang on a minute, what are guilds? Guilds are translated in Chinese into 公会. I guess if you play games you would notice. But what exactly? Are they just like a group?

Just a group of people who work together. Sometimes the guild will have a specific goal, like maybe they might be an evil guild and they might have the good guild and they might be fighting against each other. And in games like any of the online games like World of Warcraft, there will be guilds of people who go and fight bosses together. But in like LARPing, you'll have the same type of thing where you'll have like a guild and you might be part of like one or two different guilds.

I see. It is just like exactly 3D copy of the game, which brings me to the question, in a game, you complete certain quest, you’ll level up. How do you level up as a LARPer？

Usually what it comes down to is how many events you've gone to. So they'll be like if you've gone to 12 events , then you go up a level. And weekend events might be worth more points. And so you might go up levels a little bit faster if you go to the big, huge weekend camping trips.

But you just need to show up? I mean, you don't need to play the game well to get more points?

Well, like uh, it depends on the group you're in, sometimes you don't get any points if you don't have a costume, or if you are not playing your character, if you are like, you actually have to play that particular character class during that day. Otherwise you just get points as what's called a warrior class, which is kind of like the basic class.

Emm, I see. And then let's talk about how you actually do these magic or healing. . . weapons I get, if it's just a sword, you would fight like a real sword. What about magic？Do you just chant？

Some things are chants, right. There are some magic that have to be line of sight and so they actually have to see you, but they have to chant something like 5 times or 10 times. And if they chant this, then you die or something like that.

So if I look at you and go, “Brad, you're dead, you’re dead, you’re dead. . . ”

Yeah, just kind of something like that. Like if you say it 10 times that character dies. Now there are other types of magic that are like beanbags basically kind of like a fireball. You can throw it at a person and it hits them, it kills them, but that's like a fireball, that's more of a low-level attack. And then they have things like healers, they have to touch you and chant for 10 seconds or something like that or they can use kind of like a bandage. If there is a bandage they just have to tie the bandage around you and you could do that.

I can see why there's social stigma. I can see why people think these people live in fantasy world because it is, I mean, no offense, but this does. . . essentially it’s just adults trying to play dress-ups, same as in a Chinese context. I'm not saying this to any lovers out there in an offensive way. In fact, I am super into that dressing up.

And then finally with like we have like poison, right. So if you're an assassin, you can have a throwing knife which is kind of like a beanbag as well. It's just kind of like some foam with some sort of weight in it and you can poison that or you can poison your knife. And if you hit someone with it, even if you don't kill them with that hit, they'll die within like a 500 count or something like that, or no, a 300 count like 5 minutes.

I see. So that's pretty much just modeled after the actual game, what happens in actual online computer games. What about monsters, though？So do people actually dress up as monsters or is it more like a concept or how is it like？

Sometimes you'll get monsters kind of like the octopus or a crack in type monster where you'll have like maybe three or four people working together, they have to stay within a certain range of each other. They might have like a belt, kind of like tied or like a rope that keeps them tied together. But then like as they'll have like two swords, they'll each get two swords and they basically kind of be like the tentacles. And so if you get hit by the sword, then it's your dead or something like that.

I see. Alright, So before we finish, just out of curiosity, when you are LARPing, who's your favorite character to play？

I usually played the ranger.

Oh, like with bow and arrow?

Bow and arrow, yeah. We had bows and arrows that we could use. Like kind of an archer had light armor and so you could actually wear armor that would protect you. You could run around and like you could use the bow and arrow. It was kind of the most utilitarian. There wasn't any magic, but you had access to like the best weapons, right？You didn't ever have like the really strong swords or anything like that, but you had long range weapons and you had like swords and things like that.

Actually, having played some of those games, long range weapons always very necessary, especially if you cannot get very close. I know a lot of listeners probably have never heard of this world before, but if you at least have been to an escape room and have tried out some of the costumes, leave us a comment and share with us. What is your favorite character to play？Or if you have never experienced that, just imagine if you can be in that situation, who would be your favorite character to play.

If you're interested in playing, you can start your own guild, just go online and you can find the rules for lots of these games available for free.

Recruit me! Recruit me! I can be a mage.

All right, on that note, we say goodbye to you. I can't wait for our next geeky discussion.

Me, too.

We'll see you next time.

See you.

Bye.