Interactive Fiction on the Web
Modern Storytelling: The Digital
Tradition
By Susan Dumett
On Friday April 11, 1958, two
members of the Izard family were found murdered
in their home. The couple's children disappeared
the same day. Forty years later, Doris Hammack,
age 42, has come forward, claiming to be one of
the missing children.
Sound like a case for Sherlock Holmes or Agatha
Christie's Hercule Poirot? In fact, this is just
one of several unsolved mysteries the Law
Enforcement Division of Yoknapatawpha County,
Mississippi (U.S.A.), hopes you will help it
solve.
Fans of William Faulkner will recognize
Yoknapatawpha County as the fictional location in
which the Pulitzer Prize-winning author set most of
his stories. But it's Tom Arriola, an actor and Web
site developer -- not Faulkner -- who is the
mastermind behind the Izard story and others like
it on the Crime
Scene Web site. Arriola constructs cases based
on factual information, and then admittedly makes
them a "little more dramatic at times" to engage
readers' interest.
While readers of most paperback mystery stories
are led down a single plot line, Crime Scene
readers actively create a story line and
participate in solving cases by asking questions of
the detective (who is Arriola), by offering
observations, and even by providing leads. In
addition to crafting a central story, Arriola
creates detailed "evidence" -- newspaper clippings,
photographs, even audio and video interviews with
witnesses and suspects -- that visitors to the site
use to piece together the case.
The Internet as Theater
"I see a lot of parallels between the Internet
and theater," says Arriola, who views Crime Scene
as an experiment in theater. "It used to be people
went to the theater to be totally drawn in, to love
the characters, and be swept away by the
story."
Arriola's intention is to make people think the
investigations are real -- at least at first.
"People view these files and have nightmares or
break down into tears -- [it] seems so
real, so immediate, that you can't look away," he
says. In fact, he recently received e-mail from a
forensics teacher congratulating him on fooling her
into believing the Crime Scene investigations were
true.
Crime Scene is just one example of a growing
form of online entertainment: interactive fiction.
Across the Internet, authors and Web designers who
share a love of storytelling and technology are
combining their passions to create a type of
entertainment that requires the audience to
participate and dictate the course of the story.
Arriola thinks there is great future for
interactive fiction -- and for people interested in
pushing the boundaries of a new form of
entertainment -- on the Internet. "I expect the Web
to become a new staging ground," he says.
Readers As Authors
The course of interactive fiction is based on
hypertext -- a body of text connected to other
bodies of text. (The journal Telecine contains an
interesting essay
on the use of hypertext in interactive
fiction.) While books, television shows, movies,
and traditional theater are considered linear --
the author and characters guide the audience down a
specific path to the end of the story --
interactive fiction usually has no single direct
path through a story, and the course of the story
is driven by each reader's choices.
Each reader's choice and its corresponding story
line often is based on a series of preceding
options and often is followed by several forks in
the road. Readers of books who generally put
themselves in the shoes of one or more characters,
get to take that experience one step further and
make decisions for that character. "Interactive
fiction is popular because it's new and
exploratory," says Stephen Linhart, creator of
Button
Talk, software that translates stories with
multiple plot lines into HTML format. "But also
because when it's done right, it gives great
freedom to the reader."
For instance, Linhart's story, The Luminous
Dome, begins with the following text:
First moon of autumn is waning. But
still it weaves a path on the swift and noisy
waters. Beyond the river, a strange luminous
dome hangs in the night. Its glittering surface
isn't the work of your own people. But surely it
cannot be the crude work of mortals.
The fragrant woodland beckons to you with
night secrets. But none could be more wondrous
than the glowing dome across the river.
Which is followed by these five options:
Return most swift to report your
discovery to the Queen.
Drink of the dark noisy waters.
Attend the voices of the night.
Cross the shimmering path of moon
beams.
Delve into the secret places of the
forest.
What lies across the moon beams? What happens if
you drink the dark, noisy water? Each option
creates a different story line and subsequently
poses more choices and experiences. In a sense,
readers write their own stories using the
information and materials provided by the
interactive author.
Endless Possibilities
Interactive fiction comes in many shapes, sizes,
and genres. In addition to mysteries and science
fiction fantasy story lines, online audiences can
tune into the adventures of Adventurer
Al, a crass, bungling superhero created by
Jason Puckett, a high school student from Moraga,
California (U.S.A.). "I thought up the idea for
Adventurer Al because there are so many creative
directions in which to develop the character," he
says. "And people love it."
There's also Amnesia,
an interactive novel created by readers making
choices about the main characters; The
Lord Mayor's Yacht, a mystery set in 1596
in Cardiff, Wales; Virtual
Nashville, a story in which readers try to
land a virtual country music contract; Escape
from Westfield, which gives readers the
choice of becoming one of four characters trying to
escape suburbia; Dream
Cruise, a story about a not-so-relaxing
ocean cruise; and TheCase.com,
which features daily mini-mysteries that engage
readers on the Web site and via e-mail.
While some interactive stories are supplemented
by graphics and multimedia elements including audio
and video, many are simply text with no added
frills. There are usually no special technical
requirements for getting access to the latter
category, and like a good book, users can enjoy the
medium alone or with friends and family, reading
the stories aloud and making group decisions about
how to progress.
The Economics of Interactive Fiction
Steve Schaffer of San Francisco-based Newfront
Productions, which creates TheCase.com, says that
more than 200,000 registered TheCase.com users
currently receive clues by e-mail each week. In
addition to mysteries for adults, the site offers
special cases for kids to solve. Unlike Crime
Scene, whose plots develop over several weeks and
can take time for readers to solve, TheCase.Com
provides a quick daily dose of entertainment.
"TheCase.com appeals to a wide audience," Schaffer
says. "We think there is a huge market opportunity
for quality online fiction and interactive
stories." Puckett agrees and says corporate Web
sites that feature regularly updated interactive
stories -- such as online serial soap operas --
could see an increase in repeat visitors.
So what about the economics of online
storytelling? Currently, while some material is
free, other interactive content is available only
on a subscriber basis. Linhart thinks interactive
storytelling can be sustained by advertising --
either through corporate sponsorship or simple
banner ads. Arriola, for his part, has been offered
deals to license his Crime Scene content with
America Online and New Line Cinema for one year,
with an agreement to sell the Japanese language
rights to a major Asian publisher.
Susan Dumett is a writer for
PreText,
Inc., a Seattle-based Web
design and content company. PreText
publishes PreText Magazine, an
online publication that explores the
issues shaping cyberspace and the digital
media.
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Links
Crime
Scene: http://www.crimescene.com/
Essay, "What
is Hypertext?" by Charles Deemer:
http://www.teleport.com/~cdeemer/essay.html
Button
Talk Software:
http://www.stephen.com/button/button.html
Adventurer
Al: http://orama.simplenet.com/games/al/
Amnesia:
http://www.bergen.org/amnesia/
The
Lord Mayor's Yacht:
http://www.storymakers.com/works/CarlThelen/Yacht/Yacht.htm
Virtual
Nashville:
http://www.virtualnashville.com/
Escape
from Westfield:
http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Hills/6657/escape/
Dream
Cruise:
http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Arcade/1234/index2.html
TheCase.com:
http://www.thecase.com/
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