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Introduction to Gamification Part 10: Narrative

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Intro to Gamification Part 10 Introduction to Gamification Part 10 Narrative

Narrative is in my opinion, one of the most powerful yet underrated ways of improving almost anything! A good story can carry you through the most boring of times by creating the most exciting of images in your imagination.

However, building stories into certain, less “play” compatible environments can be a challenge. So can creating stories that fit with the very “stop/start” nature of many gamified environments.

What is Narrative?

First, let’s look at what narrative actually is. Put over simply, a narrative is just a story. However, the way I like to look at the difference between a narrative and a story is that a narrative is happening now, whereas a story has already just happened (and a collection of stories is a history…). Read More ...

A Challenge for My Readers – Micro Story Telling

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It has been weeks since I last spoke about narratives and stories. I just wanted to pass a thought by you that fits in nicely with my stuff on Narrative Atoms and to set you a challenge. I saw a great article thanks to Rob Alvarez, Bucholska that had something very similar – 2 sentence horror stories.

This fit in brilliantly with something I had done recently, so got me to thinking. How much story can you fit on a post-it note? How much text do you need to create a story in the minds of your users/readers? Read More ...

Her Story, Gone Home and Narrative Atoms

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Last week I wrote about Narrative Atoms in some details. They are basically small nuggets of narrative that can stand on their own but together build the bigger story.

Two obvious examples that I totally forgot about are the game / narrative experiences of Her Story and Gone Home.

Her Story is the fabulous creation of Sam Barlow. You take the role of investigator, reviewing a police archive of video footage of a British woman accused of murder. You can access the footage in any order you like, gleaning more clues and information with every video you watch. Sometimes the videos will not make sense until you find the video that came before it, others give you all you need in just a few seconds of footage. The joy is discovering how the story fits together, jumping back and forward through the timeline. New snippets of information give you new ideas on what to search in the archive, leading to many “Ahahaa” moments. Read More ...

Narrative Atoms, Story and History

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A revisit to an old set of thoughts I had on what Narrative is. My general thought is that narrative is real-time telling of a first person experience as it happens. A story is all of the narratives put together from the first “Narrative Atom” of the story until the last! History is the collection of all of the stories and all of the narratives up until now. Beyond that, you are looking at the future.

When I started to look at this concept again, I decided that it was easier to record a little video about it than it was to write! However, the basic idea is that you can imagine history as a lake. When our lives start it is like a pebble being dropped into the lake. Each ripple is a narrative atom in our story. These ripples move out from the centre, touching the stories of others, creating an interconnect web – a collective history. Anway, watch the video to get more of that. Read More ...

Zombies Run! 5K – Attempting to get fit

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Well, the scales have shouted at me again and it is time to get in shape. I have let myself go over the last few years and my body is beginning to tell me off as well!

I used to run, but always hated it. For a while I was trying to use Zombies Run! from Six to Start, however there was an assumption that you were already fit enough to run in the first place. This time, I thought I would start slow and steady with the help of Zombies Run’s baby sibling – Zombies Run 5K.

It is an app that takes you through an 8 week program that should help you get from couch potato (me) to someone who can run 5 kilometres. Obviously there is nothing all that new about this idea. What Zombies Run! adds to the equation is a narrative that helps to keep you going through the exercises. Read More ...

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