Keywords

Interactive narrative, interactive storytelling, beyond panels

Abstract

Balancing passive and interactive experiences within a narrative experience is an area of research that has broad applicability to the video game, cinematic, and comic book industries. Each of these media formats has attempted various experiments in interactive experience. The goal of this research was to better understand how to construct an interactive narrative experience that preserves the integrity of the author's story, but allows for inspired interaction by a willing audience. A study was designed to test three different conditions. The two control conditions were examples of passive narrative storytelling: the Comic Book Condition and the Cinematic Condition. The experimental condition was a hybrid format of interactive and passive storytelling, wherein the participant had the opportunity to interact with the story to further engage with the narrative world. Participants used a mobile tablet to experience each format, geared toward minimizing the separation of the participant from the story. Touch / swipe interactions were used for the hybrid format to create as intuitive of an experience as possible. Narrative Transportation, engagement, and flow were the primary evaluators of the narrative's effectiveness for each participant. An analysis of the data showed that, in general, the current Beyond Panels framework was not effective in producing higher levels of reported Narrative Transportation, engagement, or flow. However, of those participants in the Beyond Panels condition, those that interacted more consistently throughout the experience did report higher Narrative Transportation compared to those that had minimal interaction. Data was collected to better understand the relationship that optional interactivity has with these factors. The results of this study will help to further research in the areas of interactive storytelling for mobile platforms. The results will be used to continue to evolve a framework for this hybrid storytelling format called Beyond Panels.

Notes

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Graduation Date

2017

Semester

Fall

Advisor

McDaniel, Rudy; Fanfarelli, Joseph

Degree

Master of Fine Arts (M.F.A.)

College

College of Arts and Humanities

Department

Visual Arts and Design

Degree Program

Emerging Media

Format

application/pdf

Identifier

CFE0007281

Language

English

Release Date

6-15-2019

Length of Campus-only Access

1 year

Access Status

Masters Thesis (Open Access)

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