The Inversion of Me and My Room, by Tory Root
You are in a dream.
You do not know, entirely, who you are. You will probably find out--you may find out that you are somebody rather different. Or rather the same. You're not sure which would be more unsettling.
This is not a dream you will forget easily, nor is it one without consequences. It may well be more real than most of your waking life. You may never wake up at all.
But regardless: you are in a dream, and you keep falling.
The Inversion of Me and My Room is an experimental, somewhat freeform mindscrew larp with speculative elements about identity, judgement, and turning points. All players will receive periodic character sheet updates, and the game structure is on the rails, though this is not a dream without consequences. This game contains pervasive themes of abuse and institutionalized racism.
"I eat the knife."
- somebody who got stabbed
Tory came up with this game at three in the morning at Intercon O while trying to fall asleep and breaking through years of burnout and imposter syndrome after having written some stressful games, made herself bid it to Festival a month and a half out just so that she'd write it, wrote most of it in a week in a state of massive anxiety, and had such a successful first run that it's rekindled her faith in herself as a larp writer and she'll still get sappy about it at the least opportunity. Like now.
Sappiness aside, it's also a solid game, albeit impossible to describe any further without spoilers. Looking back on it nine years later, it does also have a slight case of White Person Writes About Racism; at the moment, we are not retiring it, simply offering that disclaimer.
April 17, 2015, at the Brandeis Festival of the LARPs in Waltham, MA.
September 20, 2015, at a private residence in Watertown, MA.
December 11, 2015, at a private residence in Waltham, MA.
February 19 and February 20, 2016, at Intercon P in Westborough, MA.
April 2, 2016, at the Brandeis Festival of the LARPs in Waltham, MA.
April 8, 2016, at a private residence in Arlington, MA.
February 11, 2017, at Intercon Q in Warwick, RI.
May 18, 2018, at the Living Games Conference in Peabody, MA.
April 6, 2019, at the Brandeis Festival of the LARPs in Waltham, MA.
September 17, 2023, through the Greater Boston LARP Society in Belmont, MA.
The Inversion of Me and My Room is a game for ten players (characters have varying genders) which runs for about three hours, in two rooms, under the direction of one GM. Average starting character sheet length is under a thousand words, and there's significant in-game reading.
The game has runtime GM information but no casting or stuffing information. It still might be one of the first games we officially box/publish.