Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
2.3
Creation of Narrative, Scenario, Improvised Story and Experience
As described in section 2.2, the activity-based narrative/scenario approach and
associated concepts, provide a flexible framework for analysis and design of user-
player interaction and gameplay with one or more application on one or more
platforms. It's not difficult to see how the framework can support a variety of multi-
application and multi-platform use (as described in section 1) in our analogy of user-
player as editor, curator, composer, director, author, etc., creating their own narrative,
texts and experience through interaction and gameplay, within, between and across
applications/games and platforms. For example, as discussed in section 1, user-
players construct their own narratives of user experience and entertainment by
shifting from app to app on one or more platforms according to tastes, interests,
preferences, individual and group cultures and sub-cultures, as well as serendipitous
and improvised on-the-fly interaction, the activity-based narrative/scenario approach
provides a hierarchical framework and concepts to model, describe, reason about and
trace such interactions and gameplay. In addition, the activity-based
narrative/scenario approach can also provide support for future interactions and
gameplay. For example, recently, we have become more and more aware of the
increased interest from leading computing, software and social media corporations
(Google, Facebook) in the once novel technological products and platforms and novel
interactions that have not seen daylight outside of research labs and associated
conferences for the last few decades. In particular, the focus of interest has been on
emerging wearable platforms (e.g. VR headsets, iGlass, etc.) that can provide support
for many apps on one platform. While the activity-based narrative/scenario approach
provides a hierarchical framework and concepts to model, describe, reason about and
trace user-player interactions and gameplay with such platforms (as outlined in
section 2.2), it can also inform design for transitions between applications. For
example, Apple is already alert to similar design opportunities as demonstrated
through iPad's use of audio fades (in-and-out) and visual dissolves in response to
undetermined or random user-player “cut-ups”/“mash-ups”/switches between apps
and services. Extending this idea, the activity-based narrative/scenario approach could
be used to inform the design of devices for orchestrating or persuading user-player
“cut-ups”/“mash-ups”/switches between apps and services to heightened experiences
and engagements.
3
Discussion and Conclusion
In this paper we have proposed an approach and framework to reason about the user
experience of entertainment through engagement in task-based, as well as improvised,
extemporaneous and serendipitous interaction and gameplay. Towards this we have
explored the original writing of A. N. Leontev (1981) and proposed extensions to
bridge conceptual gaps to operationalize an activity-based scenario/narrative approach
[14] leading to a universal framework. Its power comes from two main approaches,
lens and spheres: firstly, its lens-like ability provides a way to focus on any level of
abstraction from high-level descriptions of activities to zoom in to any level of
