Meaningful Play 2010: ARG/transmedia panel

Alternate Reality Games: Interdisciplinary Designers, Designing Interactions

Meaningful Play

October 22, 2010Michigan State University

NARRATIVEMarc Ruppel

links, Paths and Play

What can an understanding of narrative contribute to ARG design? What can an understanding of design contribute to the narrative of an ARG?



Narrative situates play; design segments narrative across platforms and modes




How do design and narrative work together?




How do design and narrative work together?

Specificity from open-endedness

Links, Paths and Play

Personal Effects: Dark Art (2009)


‘Each medium has its weaknesses: print doesn’t have the immediacy of video … video doesn’t have the mystique and intimacy of audio … audio’s soundscapes can’t beat the arresting impact of a photograph. They all excel in delivering compelling content and emotion, but in different ways. So why not combine them?’

-JC Hutchins, author of Personal Effects (2009)


‘…if those are media or better ways to convey information in your story, then by God toss a link inside your book to send people to that website or medium so they can experience that so that you're not wasting words trying to articulate something that could just as easily or more easily or more emotionally convey a narrative impact in other media.’

-JC Hutchins, author of Personal Effects (2009)


‘It’s an unexpected wish come true to be collaborating with the team at Smoking Gun Interactive, the first developers I've encountered who really understand the difference and potential marriage between narrative and game - between storytelling and total immersion. I'm going to get to work closely with them, writing narrative pathways that carry readers through the universe of the game world. We'll all be writing for and stealing from one another, developing plot points, set pieces, and characters that have both stories in the books, and purposes in the games. Players who have read the books will have a richer game experience; readers who play the game will come to understand the stories from the inside."

-Douglas Rushkoff, on the subject of design in the ARG X


Links and paths? º Language of networksº A ‘path’ in network terminology is a

sequence of edges (or links)


Metacortechs:


The Beast:


What is a narrative pathway? How does it impact (or, how is it

impacted by) design?


What is a narrative pathway?º Since links in an ARG often prompt us to

synthesize multimodal content, migrate to a different site and combine it with the information there, links = migratory cues


• Migratory cues [def.]:

links composed of content from one site in a transmedia/ARG network that points to content and promotes movement to another site in that network


Most ARGs traffic in direct cues, i.e. website URLS, phone numbers, and other related means of directly engaging one medium in another º A narrative pathway in an ARG is a

series of migratory cues that create and mark navigation through a fictional universe


If we understand narrative pathways in terms of networks, we can plot these cues and the sites they originate in as links and nodes. In other words, we can visualize these pathways as elements of both design and narrative navigation.


X:


X:

GN at cue juncture GN after cue

X ARG


The LOST Experience:


Kress (2003): ‘reading paths’ shift from page to screen = ‘new page’


But as ARGs remind us, we also need to look for reading paths in the network structures of multiplatform expression

INTERACTIONBeth Bonsignore

A few distinctions…

Video Games Alternate Reality Games

Exposition

Provides Context

Cut scenes with little interaction

Completely Virtual

The story is the game

Anchored in “real” world

Interaction

Computational Rules

Controllers

Conversations

Collaboration

Challenges Typically external to narrative content

Embedded in story bits

Categories from: 2006 Alternate Reality Games White Paper. International GameDevelopers Association.

Interaction challenges

Connect story bits across multiple modes of communication

Provide a means to traverse across reality & fiction

Embed puzzles & activities into story bits

“Game Design as Narrative Architecture….” - Jenkins

Interaction challenges

Enable/Encourage participation & collaboration Participation Architect, Community Liaison

Enable personal expression

Player-Designers: Opportunity for Participatory Design?

“What is the vacuum that I create that allows that story to be told ?”

-Ecklund

Parallel Worlds

Historical figures communicating across space & time

Leaving messages (and artifacts) for posterity

Secret societies whose members may act as stewards of these messages and artifacts

DESIGN CASE: AGOGARCANE GALLERY OF GADGETRY


1836

1861

1877


1836

1861

1877

2010

1877

http://lrsv.wordpress.com/2010/10/03/cabinet-of-curiosities-arcane-gallery-of-gadgetry/


1836

1861

1877

2010

2010

1877

[email protected]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWhui6trsAk

http://lrsv.wordpress.com/2010/10/03/cabinet-of-curiosities-arcane-gallery-of-gadgetry/

OUTREACHGeorgina Goodlander

Smithsonian American art museum

In FY10 (Oct 1, 2009 through Sept 30, 2010):º 47,583 people attended 551 public

programs. Regular programs include:º Family Daysº Lecturesº Musical Performancesº Gallery tours and talksº Film screenings

In Fall 2008…º Half of our visitors were visiting the museum for the

first timeº Adults alone or in groups were the predominant

visitor configurationsº The average visitor age was 44 yearsº “Activities and things for children to do” did not

rate as highly as museum exhibitions, collections, and interpretation

º We didn’t do anything for teens

What’s in a name?º Smithsonian American Art Museum (museum name)º National Portrait Gallery (tenant in common)º Donald W. Reynolds Center for American Art and

Portraiture (building/concept name)º Historic Patent Office Building (building name)º Smithsonian Institution (institution name)º National Gallery of Art (former museum name)º National Collection of Fine Arts (former museum

name)º National Museum of American Art (former museum

name)

Arg as Public programwww.ghostsofachance.com

0-9 10-19 20-29 30-39 40-49 50-59 60-69 70+ No response0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

How old are you?


“If someone had told me about a program which would leave 15-year olds discussing art with the same animation they show for sports and movie stars, I would not have believed them!” -10th Grade Group Leader

“I felt like I was living in National Treasure. The best museum experience ever” -10th Grade Player


34

5

6

7 – Lots of fun

No response

Now that you’ve been to this museum, do you think the museum is fun or boring? Please give us a rating between 1 to 7 with 1 being boring and 7 being fun.

Building communitieswww.ghostsofachance.com

“An internet collaborative art display in a national museum? Is it me, or is this very frigging cool!”

“What Ghosts of a Chance did well was invite participants to take part in the exhibit – essentially becoming part of the exhibit themselves.”

“[Ghosts of a Chance] was really refreshing and definitely gave me a sense of community with the people who were coordinating the event and the other people participating in it.”

Arg as brandingwww.ghostsofachance.com

Ideas for the arcane gallery of gadgetry

VISUALSRachel Donahue

Aesthetics

Color schemeFont setIcons and symbology

www.urgentevoke.com

icons

layout

PresentationNarrativeMissions and Attributes

Immersion vs. Interface

www.exoriare.com

missions

INTEGRATIONKari Kraus

Design Methods & the Counterfactual Imagination:

Joints or Faultlines in Reality (Ruth Byrne)

Cognitive patterns & principlesº Counterfactual thinking underlies the

invention of new members of a categoryº It underlies creation of new ideas by

combining conceptsº People often imagine counterfactual

possibilities to the most recent event in a series

º Diagnostic aspects of a concept may be those that are least mutable (e.g., the prickly spines of a cactus)

The Counterfactual Imagination

Joints or faultlines in reality (Ruth Byrne)º Our ARG research suggests that these

joints exist across multiple semiotic or sensory domains

º Relationship between fiction and reality often constructed metaphorically

“Reality shimmers with glimpses of counterfactual alternatives” ~Ruth Byrne, The Counterfactual Imagination

Rejected Patent Models Arcane Gallery of Gadgetry

Counterfactual thinking underlies the invention of new members of a category

Prehistoric cave paintings: required an ability “to move back and forth” between reality and make-believe.

~Paul Harris, The Work of the Imagination

Arcane Gallery of Gadgetry: Kairograph

Counterfactual thinking underlies creation of new ideas by combining concepts

Cathy’s Key (Jordan Weisman, Sean Stewart)

Chronicles of Narnia: The Wardrobe

KidsTeam: Working with Found Objects

Ghosts of a Chance: Player-Created Artifacts

Thank you!

Marc Ruppell@marcruppel / [email protected]

Beth Bonsignore@ebonsign / [email protected]

Georgina Goodlander@bathlander / [email protected]

Rachel Donahue@sheepeeh / [email protected]

Kari Kraus@karikraus / [email protected]

Meaningful Play 2010: ARG/transmedia panel

Education

Transcript of Meaningful Play 2010: ARG/transmedia panel