LCC 6317 Interactive Narrative Georgia Tech Fall 2001

Wednesdays, 2-5 Room 349

Class CoWeb

Janet Murray email Office Hrs: Fridays 2-3 or sign up Skiles 335B

Texts | Grading | Syllabus 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

Course Description

Interactive Narrative covers a wide range of genres from videogames to interactive TV to virtual reality installations. The object of this course is to further the understanding and practice of this emerging art form. The premise of this course is that the digital medium has its own affordances, just like oral recitation, print, film, etc., and will like them allow us to tell stories that draw on previous traditions but that represent human experience in ways that have not been possible before.

Texts

Readings:

 Janet Murray, Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace

Other article-length readings to come.

Games (some of following):

Peter Molyneux, Black and White

Will Wright, The Sims

Warren Spector et al, Deus Ex

Verant, Everquest

More to come…

Interactive/Enhanced Television (some of following):

AFI eTV Projects / CPB Projects (Tapes and cd-roms to be made available)

Sarah Cooper (IDT '01), Reliving Last Night

Michael Mosley (IDT '01), Buford Highway

More to come…

Films (some of following):

*Malcolm in the Middle (episode)

Star Trek: Next Generation, "Parallels" (episode)

G0!

Timecode

Groundhog Day

Run Lola Run

More to come…

Films/Plays/Prose Fiction (some of following):

The Norman Conquests (Alan Ayckbourn)

Hamlet/Rosencrantz and Gildenstern are Dead (Shakespeare, Tom Stoppard)

Gone with the Wind/The Wind Done Gone (Margaret Mitchel, Alice Randall)

Men Giving Money, Women Yelling (Alice Mattison,short stories)

The Search for Intelligent Life in the Universe (Jane Wagner)

More to come…

Please feel free to suggest additions to this list of texts.

Texts | Grading | Syllabus 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

Grading:

15 points (1/week in class preparedness and preparation)

25 points (4-5 pts per weekly exercises)

30 points Project 1

30 points Project 2

up to 5 points extra credit for course related technical support/helpfulness to other students/resource contribution

up to 5 points extra credit for exceptional originality and ambition

Project Evaluation Criteria:
  1. Extending the coherence and expressivity of the digital medium: Does this project belong to and extend a tradition of practice? does it originate a new genre or subgenre? does it establish and extend conventions of participation? (10 points)
  2. Integrating the interactive and immersive elements with story elements: Could this story only be told in this medium? Does this story grow richer with replay? How important, moving, effective, original, witty a story does it tell? (10 points)
  3. Utilizing the affordances of the digital medium: Does this project utilize the participatory, procedural, encyclopedic, and spatial affordances of the digital medium? Does it script the interactor? How well does this project signal its boundaries to the interactor? Is the navigation coherent? Does it offer the experience of dramatic agency?How well segmented are the story elements? Are they well juxtaposed on replay? Are the landmarks clear? Are the parameters dramatically significant? (10 points)

 

Texts | Grading | Syllabus 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

Syllabus weeks: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

 

 

Wed

Topic

iTV Focus Texts

Game Focus Texts

Hand in

1

8/22

Overview

Overview of student narratives, iTV examples, games.

same

Exercise:in-class exercise generate examples of interactive narrative, harbingers.

2

8/29

Incunabula/Harbingers

HoH 1-3: Harbingers

Malcolm in the Middle (or equivalent)

+ (your choice)

 

HoH 1-3

AI Web Game

Sims "albums" online

Myst

Majestic

Incunabula/Harbingers:

Look at at least 2 of these self-defining formats. What do they achieve expressively from expanding into these digital shapes? What affordances of the medium are they exploiting? What works best/worst about them? Hand in response to CoWeb as set of screenshots, chart, or other visual presentation.

3

9/5

Story/Games

HoH 4-6

Alternate: live action role playing game

 

HoH 4-6

Pick one:

Deus Ex;

Black and White, Sims; Play for at least 6 hours with a partner who also plays for at least 6 hours. Compare experiences.

Exercise:

Present screenshots/stills/diagrams that indicate elements that affect (positively or negatively) the experience of immersion /agency/transformation, and the active creation of belief

4

9/12

Intersecting Stories

Simultaneity:

choose one:

Timecode

Mosley: Buford Highway

Norman Conquests

Wagner: Intelligent Life

Exercise:

Design a navigation scheme for simultaneous/interlinked stories

Simultaneity:

Look at Star Wars or other franchise game or D&D game: Consider the problem of the Star Wars game currently in development. Consult development site. Exercise:

What advice would you give the developers. In particular how would you arrange time and episodic structure in the story world.

Do either iTV or game focused exercise.

5

9/19

Variant Stories

HoH: chapters 7- 8

choose one:

Groundhog Day;

Run Lola Run

Noises Off!

Hamlet and R & G

HoH: chapters 7- 8

Game episode (from Deus Ex or other game) which can be played through by characters with different attributes, skills, etc.,

Exercise (for either iTV or game texts):

Diagram the structure, indicating segment boundaries and parameters for each variant of each segment. Write pseudocode to generate a segment, including one that goes beyond what is in the example.

6

9/26

 

September 11 Events

 

How do the affordances of the medium help us tell a fuller story?

7

10/3

 

  Review concepts: morphemes, segmentation, dramatic agency, scripting the interactor, active creation of belief, parameterized replay.

 

 

8

10/10

Project One Proposal

 

Meet without JHM

Post to Web

 

 

Present a proposal for a prototype of a story game; intersecting story space; or replay/variant storyworld.

 

9

10/17

Project One: Draft

  Draft Design: Make clear design goals.

 Draft and Design Critique Project One draft prototype due

 
10

10/26

FRIDAY

Project One: Final

NOTE CHANGE OF DAY OF WEEK!!

Submit final version of project. Prepare a list of responses from the interactor that would indicate achievement of one or more design goal...

 

Project I FINAL prototype due

 
11

10/31

Multiauthor world

HoH ch 9, 10

 

Exercise:

Information design for multiple author world

12

11/7

Collective Story Due

   

Exercise:

Group: Collective Story Template Due

13

11/14

Project Two

Proposal Design Critique

Proposal Design Critique

Project Two Proposal due

Choose from among earlier work for more ambitious Project Two

(14)

11/22

(no class)

THANKSGIVING

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15

11/28

Project Two

Draft: Design Critique

 

Project Two Draft due

16

12/5

Project Two

Final: Design Presentation

 

Project Two Final due