4 thoughts on “Goal is to interactivity, as plot is to narrative”
Could you please define “plot”? I’m not sure if it’s a pretty general word, or if it’s pretty precise…
I wouldn’t want to base my talking on false information…
I don’t need to define it. The dictionary does that for us.
According to Answers.com, plot is: “The pattern of events or main story in a narrative or drama.”
But to respond to the original post, I will say, wow – what an interesting insight! I think I will have to think about this one before I can really discuss it, but let’s see – so linearity in an interactive piece is created by goals, while in narrative piece it is created by plot?
Now how about the way that goals can be nested hierarchically and arranged sequentially? Does that have an analogue in plot?
A branching structure is just another form of linearity. It’s still one way traffic that goes from A to Z on a predefined path.
We’re very very comfortable as (Western?) humans with the thought of linearity, despite of recent cultural and scientific discoveries. Probably because we still experience time as linear. And this is probably because of our knowledge of (our own) death.
So we try to make everything seem linear. Even our games. It’s comforting.
Could you please define “plot”? I’m not sure if it’s a pretty general word, or if it’s pretty precise…
I wouldn’t want to base my talking on false information…
I don’t need to define it. The dictionary does that for us.
According to Answers.com, plot is:
“The pattern of events or main story in a narrative or drama.”
But to respond to the original post, I will say, wow – what an interesting insight! I think I will have to think about this one before I can really discuss it, but let’s see – so linearity in an interactive piece is created by goals, while in narrative piece it is created by plot?
Now how about the way that goals can be nested hierarchically and arranged sequentially? Does that have an analogue in plot?
A branching structure is just another form of linearity. It’s still one way traffic that goes from A to Z on a predefined path.
We’re very very comfortable as (Western?) humans with the thought of linearity, despite of recent cultural and scientific discoveries. Probably because we still experience time as linear. And this is probably because of our knowledge of (our own) death.
So we try to make everything seem linear. Even our games. It’s comforting.