Project 1 Ideas
I haven't yet solidified my ideas for Project 1 enough to give a
specific proposal, so instead I will present several alternative ideas
to be narrowed down through discussion. None of these actually fits
the standard form of a web-based narrative, which is why I want to
take the time for more discussion and brainstorming before I put too
much work into a project which may not fit the proper criteria. My
ideas so far, fit into broad categories, are:
Live-Action Role-Playing Games
Since this is the form of interactive narrative in which I have the
most interest, and the most experience, I would be interested in doing
a project involving authoring a live-action role-playing game. Since
the scaleof such games is usually relatively large, the writing of
such a game could easily be spread over both of the story projects of
the class. I expect the target size for the games I would consider
writing in the context of this class would be approximately 20
players, with a run-time of a single evening. This is as large a game
as I would consider tackling on my own, though something larger, or
more progress toward the same goal could be possible with a larger
team, which I may be able to form with some of my classmates at a
later time, perhaps for project 2.
I would endeavor to make each individual project have some sense of
completion, and be a work in itself, so that they can be analyzed and
judged based on their own merits, not some promise of potential
extensions. The first project would include setting the basic
scenario and rules, and creating a small, but internally cohesive
subset of the characters of the game. The second project could then
extend on the first by adding more characters, more plots occurring in
parallel, as well as more supporting game mechanics. After the end of
the course, I would probably extend the scope of the game further,
adding more characters and finishing things up, perhaps with the help
of another GM or two, and then run the game through the MIT Assassins'
Guild. For this reason, I may wish to limit the extent to which the
entirety of the game is presented to the other students in the class,
since many of them would be potential players, who I would prefer not
to know any game-secrets which would keep them from playing.
As to the specific scenario and story of the game, I currently have
two basic plot structures in mind, each with several characters and
plots already partially formulated. I will be seeking comments and
suggestions as to which would be better, or even which people would be
more interested in playing. Both are created based on some aspects of
the universe and characters presented in another work of fiction. In
summary, the two basic game possibilities are:
- B Ark is a game based in the universe of Douglas Adams'
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy trilogy (i.e. 5 :) of books.
The basic scenario is a modification of a scene in one of the books
where two of the main characters (Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect) find
themselves hurled back in time to land aboard a massive ship carrying
1/3 of the population of a planet, fleeing from a supposed disaster.
In the books, Arthur and Ford crash-land with those people on the
ancient Earth and the story continues from there.
My game scenario takes this basic framework of this story and throws
in many new elements and characters to create something truly hectic
and potentially hilarious in true Douglas Adams style. The game takes
place aboard the Ark ship, with the most pressing and most public plot
being the attempt to avoid a deadly crash-landing, either by repairing
the ship's controls to make a safe landing, or even to divert the ship
to a different landing site. Along with Arthur and Ford, and the crew
of the Ark ship, other characters will appear, including the other
main characters of the book (Zaphod, Trillian, Marvin), Agrajag the
infinitely prolonged (an immortal being out to insult the universe),
the Crickett robots stealing starship components to build their cosmic
key, etc.
All of this probably makes relatively little sense to anyone who
hasn't read the books recently, but I think there are easily enough
plot ideas here to make a game, with the combination of new characters
and ideas with modifications from those of Douglas Adams' creation.
- Cats is based on the universe of the musical of the same
name, as well ass several of the T. S. Elliot poems which inspired
that musical. The action of the game takes place at the "Jellicle
Ball" a yearly event where intelligent cats come together to
celebrate, dance, and to pick one among them who will be given the
honor of moving on to the "heaviside layer" (a clear heaven metaphor)
to be reborn (reincarnated) into a new life. As such, the most public
plot of the game will revolve around Old Deuteronomy (the elder and
leader of the Jellicle Cats) and his attempts to choose who that
honored cat will be.
Many individually interesting characters and plots will arise from the
attemts of various cats to prove their worthiness. The poems and
songs on which the game is based present a world where cats each take
on a defined role (such as Skimbleshanks the railway cat,
Mr. Mistofelees the magician cat, Macavity the mystery cat, etc.), and
each cat will be attempting to perform some impressive act to prove
themselves to be particularly impressive in their roles. Other
sources of immediate conflict include incursions by other 'races' of
cats (the Persian and the Siamese for instance), as well as possibly
other types of animals (such as dogs). Violent conflict will be
somewhat strange in this game, since I picture Jellicle cats as not
"fighting", but rather dancing around each other, performing and
mimicking more and more difficult and complicated acrobatic maneuvers
until one or the other fails to keep up (I have some ideas on how to
create a mechanic for this). Several unexpected characters will also
make appearances, though I don't wish to mention them hear due to the
risk that potential players may read this proposal.
Story Web Authoring Tools
The second idea I have for a project is even farther removed from the
authoring of an actual story, though perhaps more related to web-based
narrative. My idea is to create general tools (probably in the form
of scripts written in Perl or Java) to aid in the authoring of
web-based narratives. The tools would provide the capability of
easily creating lexia based on standard templates, with links
dynamically created based on symbolic names and authoring formats more
simple than pure HTML. Using a standard or modified template, an HTML
author could then write an HTML-based story without worrying about the
technical formatting details, and then run the scripts which would
link it together and fit it into standard formats with frames, tables,
graphics, etc. as necessary to facilitate navigation.
Features could also be added (either as template modifications or as
keywords in the story text) to support changing of backgrounds,
embedding of graphics and links, and customization of the structure of
frames and tables on each page of the narrative. I will base the
features that I implement heavily on input from the students in the
class. After presenting my sample pages I will take suggestions of
what features they believe Web Story authors would find useful, as
well as what input formats would be the easiest to use and understand.
I can then implement scripts which will enable those features in the
manner most transparent to the author. The final goal of the project
would be to create a system which would allow authors to create Web
Based narratives that take advantage of as many technological features
as possible with a minimal level of understanding of the methods of
that technology. One shouldn't have to be a programmer to be an
author, but since I am a programmer I can make that be true.
Andrew Twyman,
kurgan@mit.edu
Interactive and Non-Linear Narrative,
Spring 1998