This was a really fun task to do although I have to admit it took me much longer to complete than any of the other tasks up to now. I first had to decide on what the story would be that I wanted to tell throughout my game and it took quite a few hours of brainstorming just to settle on this aspect of the task alone. I finally chose to craft a story that I could share with my younger cousins and I hope that even you (as part of a slightly older audience) will still enjoy it too. It’s meant to amuse and there are multiple endings that can be reached.
Of course, the story was only the peak of the glacier as working in Twine requires understanding how passages are linked, knowing how to edit fonts, add in effects etc. This tweaking is what brings the story to life and adds a personal touch to each Twine created. The passages are of course at the heart of a Twine story or game as they are the links (or hypertexts even) that allow the reader to follow a path of their own choosing. In my story, most generally these links appear as two separate word statements at the bottom of each passage as it’s displayed in the screen and although they appear to be just words, they require an action by the reader to choose how they wish to move to the next part of the story. There are also circular links included in my game at each alternate ending that allows the reader to return to the start of the story and travel along a different path if they so choose. I have also included associative links to other websites hosted outside of Twine for more information on certain topics.
In the end, the hyper-textual links in Twine passages allow the reader to visit and carve out for themselves a rich virtual path in the story (unique in many cases to each reader as there are multiple snippets of information to move and link through, which in essence will make the story and how it’s read unique to each reader). To play the game I designed, download the Career Fair Day folder and open the file. Enjoy!
Reference:
Bolter, J. D. (2001). Writing space: Computers, hypertext, and the remediation of print (2nd ed.). Mahwah, N.J: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. doi:10.4324/9781410600110
Love the game! Looks like I’m cut out to head to Mars 😛
Haha, that might really happen in our lifetimes! 🙂
I had such a laugh while playing this game. Your loops were great. I took a couple of spins through it and it was so fun. I appreciate the artwork. I liked the originality and the effort into making your own. Since our intro video was sarcastic, I wonder if that is why many of us brought in more adult humour? All in all, your game is great for all ages.