A live action role-playing game (LARP) is a form of role-playing game where the participants physically portray their characters. The players pursue goals within a fictional setting represented by real-world environments while interacting with each other in character. The outcome of player actions may be mediated by game rules or determined by consensus among players. Event arrangers called gamemasters decide the setting and rules to be used and facilitate play.
A role-playing game is a game in which players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative, either through literal acting or through a process of structured decision-making regarding character development. Actions taken within many games succeed or fail according to a formal system of rules and guidelines.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to theatre:
The fourth wall is a performance convention in which an invisible, imaginary wall separates actors from the audience. While the audience can see through this "wall", the convention assumes the actors act as if they cannot. From the 16th century onward, the rise of illusionism in staging practices, which culminated in the realism and naturalism of the theatre of the 19th century, led to the development of the fourth wall concept.
A story within a story, also referred to as an embedded narrative, is a literary device in which a character within a story becomes the narrator of a second story. Multiple layers of stories within stories are sometimes called nested stories. A play may have a brief play within it, such as in Shakespeare's play Hamlet; a film may show the characters watching a short film; or a novel may contain a short story within the novel. A story within a story can be used in all types of narration including poems, and songs.
Murder mystery games are a genre of party games. One of the players secretly plays a murderer, whilst other players must determine who among them is the criminal. Murder mystery games often involve the actual 'murders' of guests throughout the game, or open with a 'death' and have the rest of the time devoted to investigation.
There are four basic theatrical genres either defined, implied, or derived by or from Aristotle: Tragedy; Comedy; Melodrama; and Drama. Any number of styles can be used to convey these forms.
An epilogue or epilog is a piece of writing at the end of a work of literature, usually used to bring closure to the work. It is presented from the perspective of within the story. When the author steps in and speaks directly to the reader, that is more properly considered an afterword. The opposite is a prologue—a piece of writing at the beginning of a work of literature or drama, usually used to open the story and capture interest. Some genres, for example television programs and video games, call the epilogue an "outro" patterned on the use of "intro" for "introduction".
Strictly, digital theatre is a hybrid art form, gaining strength from theatre's ability to facilitate the imagination and create human connections and digital technology's ability to extend the reach of communication and visualization.
Applied drama is an umbrella term for the use of theatrical practices and creativity that takes participants and audience members further than mainstream theatre. It is often in response to conventional people with real life stories. The work often happens in non-conventional theatre spaces and social settings. There are several forms and practices considered to be under the umbrella of applied theatre.
God, subtitled A Comedy in One Act, is a play by Woody Allen. It was first published in 1975, along with Death, and Allen's short stories in Woody Allen's book Without Feathers.
Transmedia storytelling is the technique of telling a single story or story experience across multiple platforms and formats using current digital technologies.
Kattaikkuttu is a rural theatre form practised in the State of Tamil Nadu in South India. The performers – by tradition only men – sing, act and dance and the musicians accompany them on the harmonium, the mridangam and the mukavinai. The terms Terukkuttu and Kattaikkuttu are often used interchangeably. However, historically the two terms appear to have distinguished, at least in certain villages, between two different kinds of performance: while Terukkuttu referred to mobile performances by two actors participating in a procession for the village deity Mariamman, Kattaikkuttu denotes overnight, narrative performances at a fixed performance space acted by an ensemble of about fifteen actors and musicians.
Museum theatre is the use of theatre and theatrical techniques by a museum for educational, informative, and entertainment purposes. It can also be used in a zoo, an aquarium, an art gallery, and at historic sites. It is generally performed by professional actors. Varieties of museum theatre include historical characters, puppetry, movement and music.
Sleep No More is the New York City production of an immersive theatre work created by the British theatre company Punchdrunk. It is primarily based on William Shakespeare's Macbeth, with inspiration also taken from noir films, as well as some reference to the 1697 Paisley witch trials. It builds on their original 2003 London incarnation and their Brookline, Massachusetts 2009 collaboration with Boston's American Repertory Theatre. The company reinvented Sleep No More as a co-production with Emursive, beginning performances on March 7, 2011. Sleep No More won the 2011 Drama Desk Award for Unique Theatrical Experience and won Punchdrunk special citations at the 2011 Obie Awards for design and choreography.
Audience immersion is a storytelling technique which attempts to make the audience feel as though they are a part of the story or performance, a state which may be referred to as "transportation" into the narrative, permitting high levels of suspension of disbelief. Audience immersion may be used to enhance learning or to create a more realistic experience. Various methods may be employed to this end, including narrative perspective in writing or technical design in the performing arts. An early example of audience immersion is from the 1846 travelogue Pictures from Italy by Charles Dickens, in which the narrator, speaking in the first person, addresses the reader using second-person pronouns, allowing the reader to "picture themselves with Dickens as he travels."
Pig Girl, first produced in November 2013 and then published in November 2015, is a play by Colleen Murphy that draws upon the events of the 2007 Pickton case surrounding the murders of Indigenous women by Port Coquitlam pig farmer Robert Pickton. The play tells the stories of the fictionalized characters Dying Girl, Killer, Sister, and Police Officer in order to illuminate the Canadian issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women. Pig Girl was awarded both a Carol Bolt Award and a Governor General's Award.
Video game writing is the art and craft of writing scripts and narratives for video games. Similar to screenwriting, it is typically a freelance profession. It includes many differences from writing for film, due to the non-linear and interactive nature of most video games, and the necessity to work closely with video game designers and voice actors. There are many differing types of text in video games in comparison to stage shows or movies, including written text, foreign or made-up languages, and often situation-based information. Especially when developing Triple A games, more than one writer will be required to create the game, split into different roles.
Immersive theater differentiates itself from traditional theater by removing the stage and immersing audiences within the performance itself. Often, this is accomplished by using a specific location (site-specific), allowing audiences to converse with the actors and interact with their surroundings (interactive), thereby breaking the fourth wall.
The Under Presents is a multiplayer virtual reality game and performance space which can also be viewed as an independent video game. It is developed and published by Tender Claws, and was released on November 19, 2019, for Steam VR, Oculus Rift, and Oculus Quest.
