I’ve been waiting for interactive story to take off for years and I’m relatively new to the field, Chris Crawford has been plugging away at it for over a decade. Originally I thought the games industry would lead the way in developing interactive story, however the defining feature of games is of course the game – not the story. The industry has also famously been conservative as Wagner James Au put it, The game industry is Hollywood for Lost Boys.
It’s a business comprised almost entirely of young gamer dudes, serving an audience of young gamer dudes, covered by a gaming press of young gamer dudes, all of whom are only interested in creating, playing, and covering games that interest young gamer dudes—which they believe to be the pinnacle of entertainment.
Seeing virtual worlds though I thought it was a second chance for interactive story. However most are struggling just to find a business model and the technology is nascent. There’s still a lot of opportunity in virtual worlds but what has captured my attention is serious games. For one they have a business model. Secondly, their educational value is increased the more immersive they are and incorporating story will only help that.
Over the weekend I spent some time going through examples from Visual Purple. They specialize in serious games and simulations for training and education. What impressed me most was their incorporation of movie techniques. In Winning in Wireless: Year 1, they incorporate a virtual world but also utilize great cut scenes to pull the player into the story. Exposition is the bane of storytellers and especially in training materials, but WiW does a great job by putting it over an action sequence.
Seeing examples from Visual Purple I can say that serious games are the best application of interactive story yet. And Visual Purple isn’t the only pioneering company in this space.
- Daden Limited and their open source project PIVOTE
- PIXELearning
- Serious Games Interactive
- Tandem Learning
- Visual Purple
It will be interesting to see what these companies come up with in way of tools, innovations, and conventions. It also won’t be much of a stretch apply these to interactive stories aimed at more entertainment than educational pursuits. Just check out the Power of Story: Driven to get an idea of where it can go.
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