We take a glimpse at the complex relation between technology and narratives.

1. Impact of
technology
on
narratives
Pietro Polsinelli
@ppolsinelli
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2. A superstitious belief is the belief in a
privileged relation between narrative and
paper books.
Vast majority of our history there simply were
no books. Maybe there will not be.
Books are not essential components of
happyness or culture; sorry 
Oh books! Oh writers!
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3. Technology Technology
as
as
a barrier
facilitation
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4. Narratives through
technology

5. Orality, Poems / Songs, Written.
Only few can read and write.
Most can read and write.
Letters in the Roman Empire took
two weeks to go across the empire.
Technological evolution.

6. Technological evolution changed
things. It gave universal access to
information, lots of information,
streaming information, formerly
accessible to only a few. Changed
reading habits, also life habits.
It spread so quickly…
This is…

7. "by 1500 1000 printing presses were in operation throughout
Western Europe and had produced 8 million books.“
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_spread_of_the_printing_press

8. Age of the passive narrative

10. And then, Internet, social
networks and videogames
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11. Quality of narrative is
independent of the medium.
Good, meaningful narrative
through Twitter, even Facebook.
Melt-a-Plot: UI design includes motivation.
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13. 13

14. The games universe
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15. Two different
narratives through
games

17. Self referential / Referring games
Both may be good or bad.
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18. Non played games.
Dear Esther, Proteus, Journey
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19. Games for change

20. Games for change
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21. Ludo narrative
dissonance
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22. Oh how nice it is to work as a
slave for this multinational
http://unmanned.molleindustria.org/
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23. Playfied solutions
“Gamification”. Bottle bank arcade. Somemtimes, unhealthy psychological consequences.
Techniology of “fitting better”: technology for control (Foucault).
Game play is instrumental to an external goal.
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24. http://thegamebible.com/
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25. Learning & teaching
with games
from games
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26. Cargo Bot
http://twolivesleft.com/CargoBot/
Videogames are ideal for transmitting formal rules through concrete examples. This can cover a lot of
ground.
Also probe – test – rethink – probe cycle.
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27. Search energy in a 3D environment.
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28. The dark side
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29. No narrative ideal, no purpose beyond monetization. Lenses in a skeleton: The Sims Social.
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30. Measure, measure, measure.
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31. Addiction by Design Natascha Schull
http://gelconference.com/videos/2008/natasha_schull
97% is given by the slot machine – study IT

32. Narrative
for / in / from / out
games
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33. The Magic Circle: Huizinga, Johan. 1971. Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play Element in Culture. Boston:
Beacon Press.
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34. Which story?
- user gameplay story
- learning story
- author scripted story
- game generated story
- describing the game (story as ux tool)
Distinguish: emergent narrative vs. embedded narrative.
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35. Classical media is not interactive: depends how you look at it. There is a
branching reality, and videogames are rarely truly interactive.
http://gamamoto.com/2011/11/08/storytelling-and-video-games/
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36. “If one understands that
storytelling for games
has little or nothing to
do with interactive
storytelling one has
already saved oneself a
lot of trouble.”
It goes in many directions.
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37. 37

38. 38

39. Anti narrativism
http://www.whatgamesare.com/2012/05/games-dont-tell-stories-people-tell-stories.html#more
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40. There isn't one right way to include stories in games: Storyteller, Blackbar ...
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41. The flow
The blurry edge between challenging and too difficoult.
There is the flow. We are tackling the tip of something complex. When we are
kept at the margin of our abilities – it’s the flow graph. So its complex,
there are exceptions everywhere.
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42. Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (Author)
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43. Stress based classification.
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44. Koster – Deterding definition of fun.
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45. “Fun is
about
learning in
a context
where there
is no
pressure”
But in school there is, and there has to be, pressure. There is here a dynamic.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=x5YtkTw4wn4#!
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46. http://codingconduct.cc/Pawned
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47. Fun is learning - but
learning is not always
fun.
“Fun is a feedback we
get in the mind when
absorbing patterns for
learning purposes” Koster
From “Theory of Fun”
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48. Technology
Technology
as
as
a barrier:
facilitation:
creates
breaks the
(dangerous)
language
language
games
games

49. This breaks the language game, in an accessible
way.

50. Beyond
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51. 51

52. Wittgenstein, Foucault, Kripke
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53. My twitter stream is mostly
dedicated to game design:
http://twitter.com/ppolsinelli
A blog on game design
http://designagame.eu
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