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DMS 463/563: Interactive Fiction (Spring 2008)

INSTRUCTORS: Josephine Anstey, Adam Liszkiewicz
LOCATION: 232 CFA
TIME: 11:00 AM – 12:50 PM, Mondays and Wednesdays
OFFICE HOURS: Anstey (F, 11:00 AM – 1:00 PM); Liszkiewicz (T, 2:00 – 3:00 PM)
E-MAIL: jranstey@buffalo.edu; Josephine.Anstey@gmail.com; Liszkiewicz@gmail.com

COURSE DESCRIPTION: Science Fiction ("The Veldt", Neuromancer, the Holodeck) has promised us fully immersive interactive narrative for decades. In the 1980s and 90s, hype about artificial intelligence and virtual reality, the eagerly awaited marriage between video gaming and Hollywood, and (perhaps less dramatically) hypertext, all suggested the promise was about to be fulfilled. But killer interactive fiction has not emerged. This course will examine interactive narrative in theory and practice.

COURSE WEBSITE: http://www.josephineanstey.com/Teaching/InteractiveFiction

COURSE REQUIREMENTS AND GRADING: There will be presentations, four hand-ins (one every six classes), and a final. Students should be prepared to discuss readings on the day they are listed; articles listed next to a date should be read by that date. On occasion, students will also be required to bring to class examples, or links to examples, of specific types of interactive projects (eg. Hypertext, games, poetry, etc.). Additional readings will be assigned to graduate students. Grades will be determined according to the following:

  • First Hand-In: brainstorming for interactive project and theoretical paper (10 points).
  • Second Hand-In: storyboard of project and outline of paper (10 points each, 20 total).
  • Third Hand-In: first working version of project and first complete draft of paper (10 points each, 20 total).
  • Fourth Hand-In: second version of project and second draft of paper (10 points each, 20 total).
  • Final: choose project OR paper and produce third and final version (15 points).
  • Participation and attendance, including examples and presentation (15 points).

ADDITIONAL GRADUATE REQUIREMENT: Throughout the semester, you will construct a network of reading based first on First Person, the books on course reserve, or other assigned texts and their citations, and then on books, articles, etc. that cite these books. The readings should serve as the research basis for your own future work. Finally, you can use this foundation to construct a broader list of cites using the bibliographies in the books and articles you've read. For each entry, you will write 1-2 sentences outlining the argument and its relevance to your own project. Minimum of 10 entries.

Though students will not be expected to report formally on their readings, we do expect you to integrate one of the readings into the discussions of each theory class.

REQUIRED TEXTS:

  • Shelley Jackson, Patchwork Girl (all students)
  • Noah Waldrip-Fruin and Pat Harrigan, First Person: New Media as Story, Performance, and Game (graduate students only)

ON COURSE RESERVE:

  • "Hyper/Text/Theory," George P. Landow, 1994
  • "Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in CyberSpace," Janet Murray, 1997
  • "Cybertext:Perspectives on Ergodic Literature," Espen Aarseth, 1997
  • "Hypertext 2.0," George P. Landow, 1997
  • "Narrative as Virtual Reality" Marie-Laure Ryan, 2001
  • "Writing Space: Computers, Hypertext, and the Remediation of Print," J. David Bolter, 2001
  • "Eloquent Images: Word and Image in the Age of New Media, Mary Hocks and Michelle Kendrick, eds, 2003
  • "Digital Media Revisited," edited volume, 2003
  • "Narrative Across Media: The Languages of Storytelling," Marie-Laure Ryan, ed, 2004
  • "First Person: New Media as Story, Performance and Game," Noah Wardrip Fruin and Pat Harrigan, eds, 2004
  • "Chris Crawford on Interactive Storytelling," Chris Crawford, 2004
  • "Interactive Storytelling: Techniques for 21st Century Fiction," Andrew Glassner, 2005

COURSE SCHEDULE:

i.) M 1/14 – Course Introduction

First Cycle

1.) W 1/16 (Theory) – Mateas and Stern, “Procedural Authorship: A Case Study of the Interactive Drama ‘Façade’” (http://www.interactivestory.net/papers/MateasSternDAC05.pdf);
Charles Deemer, "What is Hypertext?" (http://www.ibiblio.org/cdeemer/hypertxt.htm)
IFAndComputerScience Josephine lecture notes
2.) M 1/21 – NO CLASS (Martin Luther King, Jr.)
3.) W 1/23 (Example) – Façade (http://www.interactivestory.net/);
read Mateas, "A Preliminary Poetics for Interactive Drama and Games" (http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~michaelm/publications/DigitalCreativity2001.pdf)
A Behavior Language: Joint Action and Behavioral Idioms 2004. Mateas, M. and Stern, A. In H. Prendinger and M. Ishizuka (Eds), Life-like Characters. Tools, Affective Functions and Applications, Springer, 2004
4.) M 1/28 (Practice) – discussion of The Clicking and hai(per)ku; students generate master list of their skills and interests, and potential groups, for projects
5.) W 1/30 (Theory) Douglas J. Gratch, "Adaptive Narrative: How Autonomous Agents, Hollywood, and Multiprocessing Operating Systems Can Live Happily Ever After" (http://www.ict.usc.edu/publications/ICVS-2001-Douglas-final.pdf);
Marie-Laure Ryan, "Peeling the Onion: Layers of Interactivity in Digital Narrative Texts" (http://lamar.colostate.edu/~pwryan/onion.htm)
IFAndComputerScience2
6.) M 2/04 (Example) – Patchwork Girl (http://www.eastgate.com/catalog/PatchworkGirl.html);
read N. Katherine Hayles' "Flowering Connectivities in Shelley Jackson's Patchwork Girl" (http://www3.iath.virginia.edu/pmc/text-only/issue.100/10.2hayles.txt)
7.) W 2/06 (Practice) – FIRST HAND-IN DUE – students finish work for first hand-in; lecture on Critical Reading.
Attach:CriticalReading.doc
[Note: students should begin playing Online Caroline today (http://www.onlinecaroline.com/). The game takes 24 days to play and must be completed before 03/05, which is 28 days away.]

Second Cycle

8.) M 2/11 (Theory) – Anstey, Josephine, Dave Pape, The Provoking Thing: A VR Relationship in the Technical Report of Emotional and Intelligent II: The Tangled Knot of Social Cognition, Papers from the 2001 AAAI Fall Symposium, North Falmouth, MA, 2-4 Nov 2001
Brenda Laurel, "Placeholder: Landscape and Narrative in Virtual Environments" (http://www.tauzero.com/Brenda_Laurel/Placeholder/CGQ_Placeholder.html);
Magy Seif El-Nasr, "Applying Principles from Performance Arts for an Interactive Aesthetic Experience." (http://faculty.ist.psu.edu/SeifEl-Nasr/conference/VRDrama.pdf)
9.) W 02/13 (Example) – “The Thing Growing” (http://josephineanstey.com/Thing/TheThingGrowing);
“Placeholder” (http://www.tauzero.com/Brenda_Laurel/Placeholder/Placeholder.html)
10.) M 02/18 (Practice) – story systems; discussion and development of systems relevant to individual students’ projects; read Nicholas Szilas, "Stepping into the Interactive Drama" (http://nicolas.szilas.free.fr/research/Papers/Szilas_TIDSE04.pdf)
11.) W 02/20 (Theory) – Gonzolo Frasca, "Rethinking Agency and Immersion: videogames as a means of consciousness-raising." (http://www.siggraph.org/artdesign/gallery/S01/essays/0378.pdf);
Aylett, R.S.;. Louchart,S; Dias, J; Paiva, A and Vala, M. "FearNot! - an experiment in emergent narrative." (http://www.macs.hw.ac.uk/~ruth/Papers/narrative/iva05-VICTECnarrative.pdf)
Presenting are Bob Farrell, James Twig, James DelFuoco, Dave Mauzy, Candie Syphrit, Jeff Howeel, Alex Meglin, Alex Truex, Donnell Newkirk and you.
12.) M 02/25 (Example) – Blast Theory (http://www.blasttheory.co.uk/);
Eddo Stern (http://www.eddostern.com/);
Paul Vanouse (http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/~pv28/electart.html)
13.) W 02/27 (Practice) – SECOND HAND-IN DUE (diagram, storyboard, and/or systematic description of project; outline of paper) – finish work for hand-in

Third Cycle

14.) M 03/03 (Theory) – Teeside/ Spider Studio/Fencott Fencott, C., "Agencies of Interactive Digital Storytelling" (text will be made available); presenting are James B., Jake, Dave M., Candie, Jeff H., and James T.;
Jill Walker, "How I Was Played by Online Caroline" (http://jilltxt.net/txt/onlinecaroline.html); presenting are Alex M., James D., Mike V.
15.) W 03/05 (Example) – Online Caroline [Note: game must be completed by today]
The Flat (http://www.dreamingmethods.com/uploads/theflat/)
16.) M 03/10 – NO CLASS (Spring Break)
17.) W 03/12 – NO CLASS (Spring Break)
18.) M 03/17 (Practice) – students working toward first “finished” version of project – individual and/or group meetings today
19.) W 03/19 (Theory) – Poetry as an Alternate Practice of Interactive Writing - Augusto de Campos, "Eye for Eye," and Decio Pignatari, "LIFE" (http://www.ubu.com/historical/); presenting are Andrew C., Andrew D., Bob;
Paul Guest, "Popular Romance" (http://www.bornmagazine.org/projects/popular_romance/); Tanvir, Alex S., Alex T., and Jon;
Jim Andrews, "Arteroids" (http://www.vispo.com/arteroids/); Vrun, Laureanne, and Donnell;
Jim Rosenberg, "Intergrams" (http://www.well.com/user/jer/ig/ig8.3.html)
20.) M 03/24 (Example) – The Madeleine Effect by Melissa Berman (accompanying text will be made available)
21.) W 03/26 (Practice) – THIRD HAND-IN DUE (first “finished” versions of project and paper)

Fourth Cycle

22.) M 03/31 (Example) – evaluating each others projects:
Andrew D. James D + Bob, Donnell + James T.
James B. + Alex S. + Dave M
Tanvir et al + Candie + Alex2
23.) W 04/02 (Practice) – the revision process: students working toward second finished versions of project and paper – individual and/or group meetings today
24.) M 04/07 (Theory) - Ken Perlin, “Building Virtual Actors Who Can Actually Act”

Perlin's thesis is that "believable" animation will heighten agency in interactive fiction, what techniques are you using to heightne agency in your work? - write a paragraph for Wed

25.) W 04/09 (Theory) – Medler, B. and Magerko, B., "Scribe: A General Tool for Authoring Interactive Drama" (http://gel.msu.edu/magerko/papers/30_medler.pdf);
Jon, Tanvir, Jake, Lauranne, Dave Mauzy, Mike, J. Boatwright, Candie, Jeff

- Marc Cavazza and Charles, F., "Dialogue Generation in Character-based Interactive Storytelling." (http://www-scm.tees.ac.uk/users/f.charles/publications/conferences/2005/AIIDE05CavazzaM.pdf)
Alexes S, M, T, Bob, Andrews C & D, James T & D, Varun

26.) M 04/14 Aaron Hinklin, Fisher Price\\

Interactive Fiction in Games - students bring examples

27.) W 04/16 (Practice) – FOURTH HAND-IN DUE (final working versions of project and paper) - as per usual, students will have the bulk of the class to work on papers and projects.

Epilogue

28.) M 04/21 – Drew Messer, Electronic Game Therapy
Interactive Fiction in Games - students bring examples
29.) W 04/23 – STUDENTS SHOW WORK
30.) M 04/28 – STUDENTS SHOW WORK - The class will discuss possible options for an end-of-semester show.

Deadline for Final Project Hand-in: Wednesday, May 8th

UNIVERSITY STATEMENTS:

DISABILITIES: If you have a disability (physical, learning or psychological) which may make it difficult for you to carry out the course work as outlined, and/or requires accomodations such as recruiting note takers, readers, or extended time on exams and assignments, please contact the Office of Disability Services, 25 Capen Hall, 645 2608, and also your instructor during the first two weeks of class. ODS will provide you with information and will review appropriate arrangements for reasonable accomodations.

PLAGARISM is literary theft and a betrayal of trust. The term is derived from the Latin word for kidnapper and refers to the act of signing one's own name to words, phrases, or ideas which are the literary property of another. Plagiarism comes in many forms, all to be avoided: outright copying, or paraphrase, or a mosaic or disguised use of words and phrases from an unacknowledged source. ?To avoid plagiarism, make it your habit to put quotation marks around words or phrases, or to isolate and indent longer passages, that you are using from someone else's writing. And be sure to cite the source, in a footnote or endnote, or within parentheses in the text. The penalties for plagiarism can be severe: from an F for the particular assignment, to an F for the course, to referral of the case to the Dean of Undegraduate Education for administrative judgement. If you are unsure about how to use and document sources, please consult your instructor.

WEAPONS AS PROPS: If you are planning a student production which involves using any prop which could be interpreted to be a weapon [toy gun, BB gun, knife, etc.] And you are planning to shoot on the UB campus or any other public place, you must obtain written permission from Campus Security or the equivalent authority before you shoot. If you do not you will face serious problems including possible expulsion from the university.