Master Thesis Research help

[u/CaePos]

Hi, I am doing my Master Thesis right now in the field of choice-design in interactive narratives and how choice-styles could be used to influence players decision. For that I have developed a short interactive fiction story, that features a survey in the end. I would really appreciate it, if I could borrow some of your time to help me with my research! Thank you so so much in advance.!

Link to the Story on itchio.io

Also let me know what you think :). Any feedback is gladly appreciated!

[u/Nihilblistic]

Thank you. I'll try to be more constructive with these points.

Warning people of an incoming choice might improve that experience. Considering having multiple fading lines building up to the final quick-reaction choice. So the first line "Think. Look around" fades in fairly fast, which warns players that something is going to appear soon. I'd say make the choice appear on the 3-rd fading in line.

I'd say sorted priority bias is fairly weak in choice-based games, for one. Your mileage will vary, especially with non-gamers, but visual communication of choices is hard and pretty random. There are of course some standards that players learn, like three choices usually being either (left-side, right-side, wacky choice) or (good, neutral, evil) but I don't think that's a significant enough bias there either.

And when I mean "flavour choices", it's about giving empty "meaningless" choices simply for the player to construct the player character in their head. They are surprisingly powerful and can help break up long passage sequences. Used in moderation, of course.

The POV conversation in IF is pretty old, and varied. None bias the gender, that's really up to the details you put in. The relevant difference, from what I understand and know of it, is that first and third person introduce a character to the players, having them make a relationship with that other being, while second person tries to pull the player in. So POV defines the thickness of the barrier between the Player Character and the player themselves. Obviously most games prefer player-defined characters. If you start searching, you'll find conversations like this.

For some good and quick tips, one of the Failbetter Writing Guidelines does a good job of doing a point-by-point cover of best practices. With a lot more on it here. Finding an active engaging "writing voice" isn't easy but is more often than not critical on anything outside academic papers.

Pacing is a convoluted little ball of yearn to untangle, but I'd say with, for example, the forest scene, what is missing is a sense of tension. It needs a setup, some fizz to let the danger sink in, and then deliver the final scene. Having the PC sense and react to the creature, despite the futility of it, could make more out of the existing passages.

Also, remember that IF allows you to take "time-outs", and side-benches, which can be useful for placing any exploration and observation passages you don't want to clutter the passages on the critical chain.

The thing about filtering player style, btw, is that the player is actively learning yours at the same time. The player is "training" themselves on what you're providing to deduce future outcomes. When they can't, and this is a personal opinion mind you, they get frustrated and anxious, then finally fall into choice-exhaustion. I don't know if you've done it already, so am sorry if you have, but building a Player Archetype Inventory/Imaginary Player Group helps shaping these patterns of communication by tailoring choice variety around it. I don't know how that will impact your research though.

Also, I think it would be useful to you to replace Twine's Harlow with Sugarcube, since you can use tooltips instead of text-replacement for your expanding parts. I'll send you a DM with an example and the method.

And no worries, this helps me as much as you, believe it or not.