High-Performance Spatial Text: Ludic Constriction and Narrative Performance in XR Game Engines
Proposal Type
Workshop
Location
Narratives & Worlds
Start Date
July 2026
End Date
July 2026
Abstract
High-Performance Spatial Text: Ludic Constriction and Narrative Performance in XR Game Engines
This workshop explores spatial text narratives under conditions of speed, constraint, and embodiment in XR and VR environments, situating electronic literature within the ludic and performative logic of contemporary game engines. Building on an earlier UnderAcademy workshop that examined Burma-Shave–style narrative sign systems in virtual space, this iteration shifts from a contemplative journey model to a high-velocity literary paradigm, realized through a collective racing simulation in Unreal Engine.
Drawing on theories of spatial form (Joseph Frank), visual-verbal inscription (W. J. T. Mitchell), cybertext and ergodic literature (Espen Aarseth), and post-print textuality (N. Katherine Hayles), the workshop frames constraint as a generative literary condition. It further engages Frode Hegland’s work on spatial text, transclusion, and hypertextual structure, alongside Dene Grigar’s scholarship on electronic literature preservation, platform specificity, and immersive textual environments. Together, these frameworks foreground how XR destabilizes traditional reading by imposing severe spatial and cognitive pressures: limited field of view, motion, embodiment, disorientation, and divided attention.
Participants will collaboratively design an improvisational, text-driven racing environment, embedding narrative elements into tracks, vehicles, spatial signage, HUDs, audio cues, and procedural triggers. Text is encountered kinetically—skimmed, missed, collided with, or reconstructed through repetition and failure—transforming reading into a performative, ludic act. Meaning emerges through play rather than linear progression.
The workshop also incorporates AI-assisted and collective authorship, using generative systems to produce textual fragments and responsive narrative behaviors tied to player speed and movement. Rather than producing a finished game, the outcome is a working literary engine that treats Unreal Engine as an expressive writing system, advancing electronic literature through XR embodiment, ludism, and high-speed spatial text.
High-Performance Spatial Text: Ludic Constriction and Narrative Performance in XR Game Engines
Narratives & Worlds
High-Performance Spatial Text: Ludic Constriction and Narrative Performance in XR Game Engines
This workshop explores spatial text narratives under conditions of speed, constraint, and embodiment in XR and VR environments, situating electronic literature within the ludic and performative logic of contemporary game engines. Building on an earlier UnderAcademy workshop that examined Burma-Shave–style narrative sign systems in virtual space, this iteration shifts from a contemplative journey model to a high-velocity literary paradigm, realized through a collective racing simulation in Unreal Engine.
Drawing on theories of spatial form (Joseph Frank), visual-verbal inscription (W. J. T. Mitchell), cybertext and ergodic literature (Espen Aarseth), and post-print textuality (N. Katherine Hayles), the workshop frames constraint as a generative literary condition. It further engages Frode Hegland’s work on spatial text, transclusion, and hypertextual structure, alongside Dene Grigar’s scholarship on electronic literature preservation, platform specificity, and immersive textual environments. Together, these frameworks foreground how XR destabilizes traditional reading by imposing severe spatial and cognitive pressures: limited field of view, motion, embodiment, disorientation, and divided attention.
Participants will collaboratively design an improvisational, text-driven racing environment, embedding narrative elements into tracks, vehicles, spatial signage, HUDs, audio cues, and procedural triggers. Text is encountered kinetically—skimmed, missed, collided with, or reconstructed through repetition and failure—transforming reading into a performative, ludic act. Meaning emerges through play rather than linear progression.
The workshop also incorporates AI-assisted and collective authorship, using generative systems to produce textual fragments and responsive narrative behaviors tied to player speed and movement. Rather than producing a finished game, the outcome is a working literary engine that treats Unreal Engine as an expressive writing system, advancing electronic literature through XR embodiment, ludism, and high-speed spatial text.
Bio
Patrick Lichty is a multifaceted artist known for his work in various technological media. Born in Akron, Ohio, in 1962,. His career spans over three decades, during which he has established himself as a media artist, writer, curator, designer, and educator.
Lichty's artistic practice explores the impact of media and technology on society. He has an interest in augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), generative and telecommunications art, and machine drawing. His work critically examines how media shapes human perceptions of reality. He was a CalArts/Herb Alpert Fellow and exhibitor at the Whitney Biennial.