Role Play

Okay..this is my very rough draft/ramblings about role play I'll clean it up and make it pretty enough to use in the future.

Role Play is an act of collaborative writing, it's very like acting.  It's power is in how one tells a story through behavior, description, and (chat-find the right word for this).

Here are some examples of role play:

(insert masks, and one of the "campaigns-personal role play )

(ask Eve for one that I can use-role play sims)

(find or make a dance role play-how two people relate physically in sl)

There are different syntaxes that people use for role play.

Examples Third person all the way:

/me sticks out her foot to show off her tall brown lace up boots.  "These boots are made for walking..."  Walks over to the short blonde woman with the flowing hair and offers to shake her hand.

First and third person mixed

/me sticks out her foot to show off her tall brown lace up boots.  "These boots are made for walking.." Walks over to you and offers to shake your hand.

First person all the way

/me sticks out my foot to show off my tall brown lace up boots.  "These boots are made for walking..."  Walks over to you and offers to shake your hand.

Action v/s talking

/me sticks out a foot to show off  tall brown lace up boots. "These boots are made for walking.."

"These boots are made for walking..."  Sticks out a foot to show off tall brown lace up boots.

These boots are made for walking.  *sticks out a foot to show off tall brown lace up boots*

IM's and chat

One convention that is often used in role play is that one might be the character in chat and the typist in IM.  This works in the most formal role plays but not in the most informal.

Why role play?

When I was a child I role played alot.  I didn't call it that.  I called it "playing house" "cowboys and indians", "land of the lost", "superheroes", "cops and robbers", "dolls", and "GI Joe", among other things. 

The question that I seemed to be answering then..in every game was: what would I do if>>>?  The if changed with each role play and with the cast of kids I played with.  They chose their roles and we explored the possibilities of response to challenges and situations together.  While the imaginary circumstances were unusual and usually outrageous..we got alot of questions answered, and shared ideas with each other.  I sort of think that spending so much time playing "what if" games, gave me a better sense of how to approach problem solving than I might have had otherwise.

Adults seem to play for much the same reasons that children do.  Some of it is just because it's fun, like solviing a puzzle  or making a piece of art is fun.  Some of the play is because it gives us a reason to be together and something to do while we are together, as though we were playing cards.  Some of it is because it gives us access to emotional/physical reactions in a safe environment.  Some of it is because it allows us to explore our options in a half imaginary universe.  Some of it is because it is a way to communicate very directly and clearly with others.  Some of it may be an attempt to wear our Selves more lightly. 

Avatar identity and role play

One way that people role play in sl is to choose a role that is unlike them in real life.  For me this usually means my avatar is younger, and thinner than me, and i change the hair color to red, brown or black instead of my real life blonde.  Sometimes it means I change genders, ages(i have a child avatar that I have role played with a friend) or even species...becoming more or less a wolf, cat or crow.  For some of my friends it means becoming a demon, witch or vampire.  Some move freely between monk and teddy bear or spikey winged birdwoman and cuddly winged lion.  In all of those situations, there is a shift in how people react to the person, and how the person reacts to the rest of their community.  It can be quite liberating to see the world from another point of view.

Why be a child?

One of the role plays that brings up the most "stuff" for people in sl seems to be child avatars.  There is alot of sexuality in sl and that can be frightening when mixed with kids, even adults pretending to be kids.  But there are also alot of not scary reasons adults might pretend to be children.  For instance, for me, it has been a way to get back in touch with some of the great things I knew as a child and to let go of some of the things that still hurt.

I have never met a child avatar in second life who was a child.  The majority of the people I have met and talked with who were children in second life have been adults who have told me some pretty cool things about how the experience has changed their way of living in the here and now. 

Sex and violence in role play

Alot of the role play in sl is about sex, and violence.  This is true on all the levels of role play, I think.  I know it comes up when I am talking to myself, when I was a kid violence was certainly a topic of many role plays, many of the sims include sex and/or violence, and often when two people are using role play to communicate it is about sex or violence. 

I can't tell you much about why that is, but here is my suspicion.  The most difficult bits of life to navigate are sex and violence.  If one has the opportunity to explore in a fairly risk free environment some of what will be explored is one's reactions to sex and violence. 

Unfortunately, SL includes human beings so it is not entirely risk free.  People's feelings certainly get hurt, and there are blurred lines between role play and reality that can lead to real consequences.  Just like anywhere in life, it's tempting to fall deep into a role and forget that it is just a role. 

Why do I do role play?

The most important thing it's done for me, is allow me to communicate with myself.  I do this in two ways.  One is to describe emotions, feelings and movements.  The other is to play out an almost dreaming thought process.

Most often, I am role playing in SL what I am doing in real life.  I sit at a play as being meeting and watch the screen, nodding my head at what is said...so I *nod* in chat.  I sit and think in real life I might add *nod's thoughtfully* to my response in chat.  I smile at what my friend has said..I say it in chat *Corvuscorva smiles*. 

In more descriptive role plays I might say something like "My gut twists as I watch the great big monster come closer".  As I describe my very physical reactions..well...I have alot of imagination, so if I type "my gut twists" I'm probably feeling some anxiety, even in play. Luckily, in play, I get to take it much less seriously.

The better I describe the feeling to you, the more in touch with it I am.  The more in touch with it I am, the better I describe it.  I've gotten to know alot about myself as I have role played emotions and feelings.  I also have learned alot about why and when I feel certain things (like anxiety, or joy). 

The second way I've gotten to talk to myself in role play is harder for me to describe or understand.  It feels alot like dreaming. 
A few times in SL I've found myself acting out conversations between bits of myself.  How those bits divide up changes from conversation to conversation, but it's been an interesting way to figure out just what stories I've been using to guide my life.   Thank goodness I have had sympathetic audiences to listen to me talking to myself.  I have to say...that isn't always pretty, and I perhaps it wouldn't interest anyone but me, but it does interest me alot (masks, the thing on the blog, see if I can find a third example)

So why besides attempts at self therapy and navel gazing?  Well...because it's fun to be part of someone else's game, too!

What to think about if deciding to role play?

What role play sim should I role play in?  How do I find a group to role play with?

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