Why Atlantic City's Boardwalk Was the Perfect LARP Backdrop
The timber planks of Atlantic City's celebrated oceanfront have long carried the rhythm of slot machines, salt-water taffy vendors and buskers dressed in whatever their wardrobes allow. For one autumn weekend in 2018, that same strip also carried the rhythm of enchanted forests, haunted piers and goblin encampments, courtesy of the High Level Games Convention hosted at the Showboat Hotel. The boardwalk became something it had quietly always wanted to be: a stage for living stories.
When a live-action roleplay session asks participants to believe, even briefly, that they are no longer in their ordinary lives, every sensory detail matters. Salt air, distant foghorns, the groan of a passing jitney and the salted wood creak underfoot gently rewrite the rules of the moment. On a strip that already feels like a film set, the leap from tourist to adventurer is shorter than usual, and that is exactly why the convention programmers leaned in.
LARP has always thrived in outdoor spaces that feel liminal, somewhere between festival and fiction. The Atlantic City boardwalk offers that feeling almost on tap. Add a gathering of enthusiastic designers, illustrators and live-action veterans into the mix and the venue stops being a backdrop and starts behaving like a co-author.
There is also a practical rhythm to the boardwalk that suits a busy convention schedule. LARP blocks can begin in the morning on the sand, move indoors for workshops after lunch and spill back onto the timber for evening encounters as the lights along the steel pier bloom to life. The geography is generous, and so is the imagination of the people who travelled there to use it.
A coastal strip already dressed for the part
Before any costumes are unpacked, the boardwalk itself is performing. Rusted iron lampposts, a working amusement pier, candy shops the colour of boiled sweets and rows of shuttered windows all read as set dressing to a player scanning for an entry point into fiction. Compared to a car park, a school gym or a suburban hall, the venue arrives pre-costumed.
| Location | Built-In Atmosphere | Weather Risk | Cast of Strangers | Indoor Backup |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Atlantic City boardwalk, USA | High, pier and ocean imagery | Coastal storms, salt spray | Tourists, buskers, runners | Showboat Hotel halls |
| Sydney Harbour foreshore, NSW | Very high, ferry and bridge views | Sea spray, changeable southerlies | Joggers, commuters, tourists | Nearby function centres |
| Gold Coast strip, QLD | Bright, neon and tropical storms | Sudden summer storms | Holiday-makers, drag performers | Hotel ballrooms |
| St Kilda seafront, VIC | Quirky, faded-carnival charm | Melbourne "four seasons" days | Skateboarders, pelicans, artists | Palais Theatre foyer |
The comparison above is meant only as a starting point for designers scouting locations. What Atlantic City showed in 2018 is that the boardwalk was already narrating before a single plot hook was read aloud.
Weather and water as unwitting game masters
The ocean does something few TTRPG modules can manufacture on demand. It introduces stakes. A gust off the water can flip a parchment map at precisely the moment a clue is being read. A sudden squall can scatter a questing party under a striped awning, where improvised diplomacy begins again. None of this requires a printed prop or a hired sound desk.
Ingredients that make a coastal LARP feel alive
- The horizon line, which gives ranged weapon checks and spyglass moments a believable answer
- Working traffic in the distance (trams, joggers, ferries) that keeps the world feeling lived-in
- A sky that shifts colour, offering natural lighting cues for dawn, dusk and midnight scenes
- Salt and spray, which can quietly damage paper props and force players to rely on memory
- The hiss of the surf, which masks whispered conversations between non-player characters and players
LARP runners who ordinarily work in fluorescent-lit community centres find that the weather itself begins to push narration forward. A scheduled "fog rolls in" cue becomes real fog, and the production budget is the Atlantic Ocean.
A cast that writes itself
Atlantic City in October is a strange mix: it is still partly in holiday mode, partly preparing for the off-season and partly hosting conventions of every stripe. The boardwalk therefore delivers bystanders who read as extras. A jogger in a hi-vis vest becomes a courier. A couple sharing a bucket of fries becomes an inn scene. A child chasing pigeons becomes the spark for a chase encounter.
This is not a flaw but a feature. The High Level Games Convention ran alongside ordinary foot traffic, and the LARP blocks were deliberately designed to read as friendly street theatre. There is a quiet Australian echo here for anyone who has watched a local gaming crew stage a pop-up zombie walk past the Queen Street Mall and pulled curious shoppers into the storyline without a single objection.
Designers who want to lift this trick back home should think about the strangers already on site. A street festival in Fremantle, a farmers' market in Hobart or a school holiday crowd at Sydney's Darling Harbour will all offer the same accidental cast for free.
From vendor hall to costumed procession
Inside the Showboat, the convention laid out the usual fixtures: panels, an exhibitor hall, escape rooms, demo tables and dedicated LARP zones. Outside, the corridor to those rooms was already in costume. Moving between spaces felt like crossing between scenes rather than buildings.
The programming team leaned into that. Scheduled interactive mystery walks invited attendees to chase clues along the boards in character, while evening LARP blocks used the pier approach as their threshold space. For GMs planning similar multi-venue events, the event submission form used by the High Level Games Convention team is a useful template for slotting outdoor content around a busy indoor programme.
The most striking moment, by general account from attendees, was the costume procession that threaded its way past fortune tellers, salt-water taffy shops and the amusement pier. It looked less like a parade and more like a city briefly remembering it had always been a fantasy port town.
Lessons Australian table runners can borrow at home
Australian convention organisers are used to weather as collaborator rather than obstacle. Supanova, PAX Aus and a long list of regional tabletop meets already plan around sun, salt and the occasional southerly change. A coastal venue, used well, can lift a LARP block from average to genuinely memorable.
Coastal spots worth a scout for your next LARP
- St Kilda promenade and the broader Catani Gardens area, with the Palais Theatre as an indoor pivot
- Manly beachfront near the ferry wharf, where the boardwalk offers a natural chase corridor
- Glenelg in South Australia, where the jetty gives a clear starting landmark for any nautical adventure
- The Esplanade in Cairns, backed by tropical gardens and reliable dry-season weather during convention season
For groups already invested in short tabletop campaigns, a useful guide to longer campaigns covers the kind of pacing decisions that translate well from the gaming table to the boardwalk.
The story the 2018 convention told most clearly was that the backdrop of a LARP matters almost as much as the script. Atlantic City offered salt, light, wind and a cast of strangers who never realised they had been cast. Australian organisers who treat their own seafronts, promenades and public gardens as built scenery, rather than empty squares, will find the same magic waiting.