Building Interactive Narratives: Characters, Stories and In-Betweens. Experimentations and Critique

Interactive narratives constitute a complex and articulated subject of research and experimentation, rooted in different epistemologies. Their potential and extended fields of application make them a regular object of investigation in many areas, as well as an important element within the contemporary design curriculum in the communication domain. Acknowledging their paramount role in communication and its design, as well as the fact that narratives move through different media, we present and discuss a design methodology for conceiving interactive storytelling projects based on character-driven stories. Since AY 2015/16 we started a study to enquire and understand the benefits and implications of initiating this design activity from a different starting point: 1) archetypal characters, 2) thick and compelling storyworlds, 3) real testimonies shaped as short stories and fragments of memories. To verify and compare the effectiveness of the methodology and its tools in triggering learning, as well as to explore their potential in terms of design education, we observed the design(er)’s storytelling and world-making experiences conducting each time a four-months ethnography and a participant observation. In the following, we present the design methodology and its evolution through time, as a consequence of the needs and design issues emerged during its infield experimentation.