[{“id”:864,”date”:”2016-12-07T13:12:19″,”date_gmt”:”2016-12-07T19:12:19″,”guid”:{“rendered”:”http://narrativedesign.org/?p=864″},”modified”:”2017-06-06T17:38:10″,”modified_gmt”:”2017-06-06T22:38:10″,”slug”:”reality-is-dead”,”status”:”publish”,”type”:”post”,”link”:”http://narrativedesign.org/2016/12/reality-is-dead/”,”title”:{“rendered”:”Reality Is Dead”},”content”:{“rendered”:”
It seems the 19th century killed God and the 20th century killed reality.n”,”protected”:false},”excerpt”:{“rendered”:”
It seems the 19th century killed God and the 20th century killed reality.n”,”protected”:false},”author”:1,”featured_media”:0,”comment_status”:”closed”,”ping_status”:”open”,”sticky”:false,”template”:””,”format”:”standard”,”meta”:[],”categories”:[1],”tags”:[],”_links”:{“self”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts/864″}],”collection”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts”}],”about”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/types/post”}],”author”:[{“embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/users/1″}],”replies”:[{“embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/comments?post=864″}],”version-history”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts/864/revisions”}],”wp:attachment”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/media?parent=864″}],”wp:term”:[{“taxonomy”:”category”,”embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/categories?post=864″},{“taxonomy”:”post_tag”,”embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/tags?post=864″}],”curies”:[{“name”:”wp”,”href”:”https://api.w.org/{rel}”,”templated”:true}]}},{“id”:859,”date”:”2016-11-26T13:20:54″,”date_gmt”:”2016-11-26T19:20:54″,”guid”:{“rendered”:”http://narrativedesign.org/?p=859″},”modified”:”2016-12-30T12:42:54″,”modified_gmt”:”2016-12-30T18:42:54″,”slug”:”the-drama-of-friends”,”status”:”publish”,”type”:”post”,”link”:”http://narrativedesign.org/2016/11/the-drama-of-friends/”,”title”:{“rendered”:”The Drama of Friends”},”content”:{“rendered”:”
I first encountered Zuckerbergu2019s Friend function in about 2004 while doing research as a graduate student in interactive media.n
It was unique, but I failed to see its brilliance.n
To me it felt like a retreat to the social habits of high school and, to some extent, I suppose it was for us all. Or at least about a billion of us.n
The Facebook platform had yet to hit campus at The University of Southern California, and it seemed ripe to be exploited by it. So I sent a note to Mark and stated he should expand to other campuses, an idea he was probably already on top of.n
I never heard back.n
Over the years since, Iu2019ve stepped in and out of the Facebook scene. My current account and series of pages being the latest edition. Most recently over the course of the past two years, my casual research has turned into performance. I call it u2018transmedia storytellingu2019.n
You see, Iu2019m an interactive dramaturge. I started working in interactive drama at USCu2019s Annenberg Center under one Marsha Kinder in 2003.n
I design interactive systems to convey meaning, and so that a user might speak of their experience as a story, one well told.n
It took me by surprise recently to realize the Friend function may be the most dramatic function in interactive media today.n
More so than the flame wars of internet trolls, or the recoil on a virtual rifle in Call of Duty, Friending (and Unfriending) is so powerfully dramatic it echoes into real life. Itu2019s now taken so seriously people have a hard time differentiating between real friends and social media Friends.n
Iu2019ve learned this through a series of experiments using social media for performance, culminating in a crowdfunding campaign I ran a little while backu00a0and the subsequent product development.n
Though I understand why say, my niece or twenty-something cousin might take it all too seriously, I find it compelling even my professional associates do.n
My performance was so on-point that they were like putty in my hands, even when Iu2019d explain that it was a performance, a game, a story, a system, theyu2019d cower, call me crazy, or even yet worse assume I was some hacker bot.n
I didnu2019t intend to be malicious or hurtful, but Iu2019ve had several old real-world friends tell me off as a result. Such is life.n
Part of the beauty I believe is the simple binary of Friend and Unfriend. Iu2019d like to see Facebook implement a system like Google Plus. The Circles function is/was helpful in disseminating content unto targeted social groups. Sure Facebook has u2018securityu2019 measures, but again with limited variability.n
To some extent this realization has humbled me, Iu2019ve worked really hard to create interactive opera, but it seems Zuck might have me beat.n
We once thought that interactive media was moving into the creation of synthetic worlds, what in fact it has done is made the world more synthetic. The two now bleed together and for the most part people have a hard time cognitively differentiating between the screen and real life. The study of mirror-neurons in this context I imagine would only reinforce such a thesis. Read mine @ NarrativeDesing.orgn
Though I remain skeptical of the commodification of u2018friendu2019 and friends. The u2018Unfriendu2019 has become one of the most dramatic functions in social media.n
What Disney did to fairy tales and fables, Zukerberg has done to our social lives.n”,”protected”:false},”excerpt”:{“rendered”:”
I first encountered Zuckerbergu2019s Friend function in about 2004 while doing research as a graduate student in interactive media. It was unique, but I failed to see its brilliance. To me it felt like a retreat to the social habits of high school and, to some extent, I suppose it was for us all. Or … Continue reading The Drama of Friendsn”,”protected”:false},”author”:1,”featured_media”:0,”comment_status”:”closed”,”ping_status”:”open”,”sticky”:false,”template”:””,”format”:”standard”,”meta”:[],”categories”:[5,7],”tags”:[],”_links”:{“self”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts/859″}],”collection”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts”}],”about”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/types/post”}],”author”:[{“embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/users/1″}],”replies”:[{“embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/comments?post=859″}],”version-history”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts/859/revisions”}],”wp:attachment”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/media?parent=859″}],”wp:term”:[{“taxonomy”:”category”,”embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/categories?post=859″},{“taxonomy”:”post_tag”,”embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/tags?post=859″}],”curies”:[{“name”:”wp”,”href”:”https://api.w.org/{rel}”,”templated”:true}]}},{“id”:721,”date”:”2015-08-13T14:54:39″,”date_gmt”:”2015-08-13T19:54:39″,”guid”:{“rendered”:”http://narrativedesign.org/?p=721″},”modified”:”2017-06-06T20:10:31″,”modified_gmt”:”2017-06-07T01:10:31″,”slug”:”player-stories-interactive-narrative-design”,”status”:”publish”,”type”:”post”,”link”:”http://narrativedesign.org/2015/08/player-stories-interactive-narrative-design/”,”title”:{“rendered”:”Narrative Design 101″},”content”:{“rendered”:”
Designed narrative should drive all acts of creative communication. Mind I didn’t say story.![""]("https://media.licdn.com/mpr/mpr/p/5/005/068/1d3/3e80bfa.jpg")
n
Narrative is structure, experience the vehicle and story its interpretation. Design, functional art, is a fundamentally expressive communication with the external world though which an author relays a message. Intent is not a question. Great designers always call function and purpose into question when defining form. When structuring engaging user-experiences for the actual or virtual it’s no different.n
For various reasons the stage has been set for an unnecessary battle between play and story. Storytelling has been cast as a subservient player to design in all but a few cases, and yes it’s developed an inferiority complex.n
The thing is, it’s a dichotomy that just doesn’t exist. Story and play are built out of the same units.n
What the interactive narrative design paradigm I preach so vehemently about proposes is that either you put down your shield and get to collaborating, or fall victim to the next generation of talent whom fuses both these skills into one pungently wonderful craft of entertainment wizardry (I’m scared of them myself). This crew of inspired story makers grew up on “Assassin’s Creed”, GTA and “Halo”. They aspire to make games a dance of meaning, form, action and symbol. Suppose that’s one of the reasons why I do to, I’ve taught them, they rock. Really though, Disney Imagineers have done this and done this well for years. If you need a lesson promptly make your way to a theme park. Take those lessons alone to the context of game/experience design and think about the possibilities.n
![""]("https://media.licdn.com/mpr/mpr/p/5/005/068/1ce/375fdf6.jpg")
n
n
In the end that’s what it’s about. Reaching out to people and enriching their world with play, intrigue, fun and ultimately joy. Using a combination of game design, UX, traditional story development techniques, writing, visual theory, production design – and everything in between (couldn’t hurt!). Whatever included needs to be aligned with the intended user-experience, in order to further agency and suspension of disbelief. The design must be managed as a whole, driven by the precepts of the core creative vision and its subsequent iterations.n
This isn’t writing nirvana – I’m not here to blow hot air. We are talking about designing games -next-generation entertainment experiences a different way – a narrative-centric approach. Driven by the idea that mechanics – actions – are the fundamentals units of both story and game play.n
What do you want your audience to walk away and say about your experience?n
Itu2019s going to be a story u2013 the viewer/user/players story u2013 not the one you paid top-dollar for some Hollywood talent to write. “I did Xu00a0and then Yu00a0before all of Fu00a0happened. It was awesome.”u00a0That story is driven by the narrative architecture, the navigable interactive sequence that is experience.n
What we have here is a medium with the power to command the world, quite literally, to enable the protagonist in us all. We, us, here see it u2013 there veiled in the distance like the flowering of some alien moon. What we, as game developers, as experience designers, are called to do is make and make again. Until its picture is so clear u2013 it drops like radiant fire from the sun, piecing the beholders eye and saying u201cYES! THIS IS YOUR WORLD! MAKE IT YOUR OWN!u201cn”,”protected”:false},”excerpt”:{“rendered”:”
Designed narrative should drive all acts of creative communication. Mind I didn’t say story. Narrative is structure, experience the vehicle and story its interpretation. Design, functional art, is a fundamentally expressive communication with the external world though which an author relays a message. Intent is not a question. Great designers always call function and purpose … Continue reading Narrative Design 101n”,”protected”:false},”author”:1,”featured_media”:0,”comment_status”:”closed”,”ping_status”:”open”,”sticky”:false,”template”:””,”format”:”standard”,”meta”:[],”categories”:[7],”tags”:[],”_links”:{“self”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts/721″}],”collection”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts”}],”about”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/types/post”}],”author”:[{“embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/users/1″}],”replies”:[{“embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/comments?post=721″}],”version-history”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts/721/revisions”}],”wp:attachment”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/media?parent=721″}],”wp:term”:[{“taxonomy”:”category”,”embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/categories?post=721″},{“taxonomy”:”post_tag”,”embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/tags?post=721″}],”curies”:[{“name”:”wp”,”href”:”https://api.w.org/{rel}”,”templated”:true}]}},{“id”:715,”date”:”2015-08-13T14:43:42″,”date_gmt”:”2015-08-13T19:43:42″,”guid”:{“rendered”:”http://narrativedesign.org/?p=715″},”modified”:”2017-06-06T17:39:48″,”modified_gmt”:”2017-06-06T22:39:48″,”slug”:”a-hypertextual-transmedia-database-narrative”,”status”:”publish”,”type”:”post”,”link”:”http://narrativedesign.org/2015/08/a-hypertextual-transmedia-database-narrative/”,”title”:{“rendered”:”Hypertextual Transmedia Database Narrative”},”content”:{“rendered”:”
The sci-fi docudrama selfie of transmedia project I produced over the past three weeks, shot/developed over the past 10 years, just broke 50,000+ views on Youtube @ http://bit.ly/1EONuug – Heck you might see yourself in it. Still in a rough cut, but it while it’s free! u00a0It’s a hypertextual transmedia database narrative. We can talk about that more later – in class. Find more of the story @ Pinkyelephant.com and various other outlets in the actualu00a0and virtual worldu00a0we now co-occupy.n
nItu2019s going to be a story u2013 the viewer/user/players story u2013 not the one you paid top-dollar for some Hollywood talent to write. “I did Xu00a0and then Yu00a0before all of Fu00a0happened. It was awesome.”u00a0That story is driven by the narrative architecture, the navigable interactive sequence that is experience.n
What we have here is a medium with the power to command the world, quite literally, to enable the protagonist in us all. We, us, here see it u2013 there veiled in the distance like the flowering of some alien moon. What we, as game developers, as experience designers, are called to do is make and make again. Until its picture is so clear u2013 it drops like radiant fire from the sun, piecing the beholders eye and saying u201cYES! THIS IS YOUR WORLD! MAKE IT YOUR OWN!u201cn”,”protected”:false},”excerpt”:{“rendered”:”
Designed narrative should drive all acts of creative communication. Mind I didn’t say story. Narrative is structure, experience the vehicle and story its interpretation. Design, functional art, is a fundamentally expressive communication with the external world though which an author relays a message. Intent is not a question. Great designers always call function and purpose … Continue reading Narrative Design 101n”,”protected”:false},”author”:1,”featured_media”:0,”comment_status”:”closed”,”ping_status”:”open”,”sticky”:false,”template”:””,”format”:”standard”,”meta”:[],”categories”:[7],”tags”:[],”_links”:{“self”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts/721″}],”collection”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts”}],”about”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/types/post”}],”author”:[{“embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/users/1″}],”replies”:[{“embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/comments?post=721″}],”version-history”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts/721/revisions”}],”wp:attachment”:[{“href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/media?parent=721″}],”wp:term”:[{“taxonomy”:”category”,”embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/categories?post=721″},{“taxonomy”:”post_tag”,”embeddable”:true,”href”:”http://narrativedesign.org/wp-json/wp/v2/tags?post=721″}],”curies”:[{“name”:”wp”,”href”:”https://api.w.org/{rel}”,”templated”:true}]}},{“id”:715,”date”:”2015-08-13T14:43:42″,”date_gmt”:”2015-08-13T19:43:42″,”guid”:{“rendered”:”http://narrativedesign.org/?p=715″},”modified”:”2017-06-06T17:39:48″,”modified_gmt”:”2017-06-06T22:39:48″,”slug”:”a-hypertextual-transmedia-database-narrative”,”status”:”publish”,”type”:”post”,”link”:”http://narrativedesign.org/2015/08/a-hypertextual-transmedia-database-narrative/”,”title”:{“rendered”:”Hypertextual Transmedia Database Narrative”},”content”:{“rendered”:”
The sci-fi docudrama selfie of transmedia project I produced over the past three weeks, shot/developed over the past 10 years, just broke 50,000+ views on Youtube @ http://bit.ly/1EONuug – Heck you might see yourself in it. Still in a rough cut, but it while it’s free! u00a0It’s a hypertextual transmedia database narrative. We can talk about that more later – in class. Find more of the story @ Pinkyelephant.com and various other outlets in the actualu00a0and virtual worldu00a0we now co-occupy.n