Literate Roleplaying: What is it?

Have you ever played Dungeons and Dragons or Diablo? Even more common, have you ever seen a play at your elementary school or Broadway? Well imagine the acting, setting, and actors- the entire play itself, all on paper. Imagine the entire play of Romeo and Juliet written as a story, rather than a script. Almost there. Now imagine the two main actors, typing or writing their actions and lines out to his or her own interpretation as they bounce words and actions off of each other. That is what we are about to discuss in this article. Literate roleplaying may be seen as the act of taking up the identity of one or more fictional or non-fictional characters in a given setting. The setting may be created by anyone, including the individual who starts the roleplay. Simply put, it is a world of one’s own creation, varying between the two extremes of creation from scratch and pre-made. Now, there is a lot to explain about this form of roleplaying, so much so that an entire essay could be written on the various aspects involved. However, this article is dedicated to explaining the benefits and drawbacks, therefore detail on what literate roleplaying is will be limited.

The Benefits

Through my many years of partaking in literate roleplaying, I have witness many benefits to enjoying such an activity. I shall list out some of the benefits below:

• Better grammar and writing
• Meet new people
• Become more creative
• Learn to work with others
• Become more passionate with your writing
• Feel a sense of pride for your work
• Create a story
• Type (in most cases) faster
• Learn to improvise

In many cases, literate roleplaying is performed online via a computer due to the simplicity of just hopping on and typing away. Although I have never seen anyone write out literate roleplays, it may very well be assumed that this is possible. Some of the most noteworthy benefits include improvisation and creativity, better grammar and writing in general, and becoming more passionate as a writer. Allow me to explain these three points, which I found to be very important in a personal sense.

Improvisation and Creativity

Many times I have had issues with creating characters from scratch. However with practice, this became much easier and my characters seemed much more three dimensional. Aspects of one’s character, such as appearance, personality, and history are vital in creating a solid representation of who one will be acting as. No one wants to play the role of a flat character with an overused background and lack of detail. Too much is never good, but too little is even worse. This ties in with improvisation, because one’s character will often interact with another and sometimes- one must come up with an idea to reply with as soon as possible. Improvising on the spot may include how one’s character will react to the other, what he or she may reply with, and how one’s character will follow the storyline, or develop it.