Enough talking about games–let’s play some! Here is where you can find links to games for free and paid download by me and many awesome designers.
GAMES AND GUIDES BY LIZZIE
Romeo & Juliet: A Larp
I worked with a team, contributing writing and game design to this edu-larp aimed at high school classrooms, produced for the Kennedy Center’s ArtsEdge.
Three Nano Larps About the Technosphere
A collection of nano larps, accompanied by a short essay, written for Berlin’s Haus der Kulturen der Welt, a museum of international contemporary arts.
“Manic Pixie Dream Girl Commandos” from #Feminism
A game about the emotional labor of manic pixie dream girl commandos, written for the #Feminisim anthology, which I also co-edited. #Feminism collects 34 feminist nanogames written by participants from eleven countries, and was an IndieCade selection at E3, as well as a 2016 IndieCade finalist.
Read more about the anthology here.
In Residency
A short larp about artists in residency at the elite colony of Brython. A game about the relationship between trauma and art, and the weird atmosphere of artists’ colonies, where intensely personal daily work rubs up against a claustrophobic cocktail-party atmosphere.
10-16 players, 1 or more facilitators, 5 hours.
The Curse
Would you cut out your breasts and ovaries if you thought it might save your life? A story about two sisters their partners making choices in uncertain circumstances, thanks to an inherited mutation on their BRCA1 genes.
4 players, 1 facilitator, four hours.
Pocket Guide to American Freeform
My ebook guide on how to write, run, and play American Freeform.
This Miracle
How do religions emerge over time, and what do they mean to the faithful? This Miracle explores religion and its place within human society with storytelling, roleplaying, and arts and crafts. Written with Nick Fortugno.
OTHER PLACES TO FIND GAMES
American Freeform
I’ve got a fairly comprehensive list of games, with links to their scripts here.
You also might be interested in the Golden Cobra anthology, a whopping 85-MB edition of 30+ games submitted as part of the Golden Cobra competition. They are all games for a flexible number of players, played in 2 hours or less, and in space that can be private or public.
Nordic Freeform
Find free downloads for Danish and Swedish freeform–in English–here:
- Stockholm Scenario Festival. Click on individual scenarios from this year or in the archive for scripts for English translations of some games run at this new convention.
- Alexandria Database. Contains free downloads of some English translations of games run at the Danish convention Fastaval.
- The Jeepform Collective. Jeepform is a subset of freeform that makes games about ordinary people and their problems. You’ll find a repository of the Danish/Swedish collective’s games in English and a few other languages too.
Short Nordic Larps
Some Nordic larp is short-form, meaning that it requires only a few fistfulls of people, a room or two, and a few hours. Here are places to find the scripts of such games:
- Larps from the Factory — An anthology of 20+ short Norwegian larps created by the Larp Factory organizations. You’ll find the book available for sale in hardcopy and .pdf on the site, along with a few free scripts, game materials, and short videos demonstrating various techniques.
- Chamber Games–a repository of small Norwegian larps, including some not collected in Larps from the Factory.
- The J. Tuomas Harviainen Collection. Free downloads of three short larps by the Finnish designer.
- Papers by Petter Karlsson and Martin Rother-Schirren. Free download of a surreal office larp.
Long Nordic Larps
Many Nordic larps are grand productions, with immersive set design, tens to hundreds of characters, and that last for longer than a weekend. With rare exception, these ventures are so complex that you won’t find scripts for them on the Internet. However, you will find coffee table books that lovingly document individual runs of these games:
- Mad About the Boy. A script for a weekend-long game about the world after all people bearing Y-chromosomes die suddenly.
- Rollespilsakaemiet (The Danish Roleplay Factory) is an organization in Copenhagen that runs larp for kids, commercially, and for fun. It has a spate of free downloadable books that chronicle larps such as the prison larp Kapo, Just a Little Lovin’, about the summer AIDS came to New York City, and much more.
- The Nordic Larp Book. A lovely coffee-table book documenting more than a dozen influential Nordic larps–from art stuff to dragons in the woods. It won the 2012 Diana Jones Award from Gen Con and is available for free download. A highly recommended read.