‘How would you plan one of these stories?’

Firstly when planning an interactive narrative, taken from my experience playing Visual Novels, I’d think about what story I can create that can branch out. Essentially the base of the story i’d keep broad, focusing only on the setting. Then once I nail that down I would begin to become more specific about the characters, whether or not I’d like the audience to be the character or simply dictate and control his/her actions. Normally in Visual novels the longer you play the more you become the character so in the end I guess it doesn’t really matter. I’d then begin to think about how I can branch out the narrative, whether to create choices that alter the narrative.

‘Could you introduce an interactive element to one of your brainstorm ideas?’

I have already kind of implemented this concept of interactivity, I worked in the new documentary studio last year and worked heavily on this idea of interactivity, mainly using it to create a new form of documentary story telling. In one of my current Story Lab ideas however involves using the ‘X-Com’ game franchise to create an expanding narrative based on events that take place in the game. I’d implement this with interaction with the game itself and maybe even have audiences participate in the narrative by ‘assisting’ soldiers by creating mini-games that they have to complete in order to greatly benefit the character(s) being portrayed.