Two weeks ago, I came across the term visual novel and pounced on it. While the story I plan to write for my dissertation certainly won’t be novel-length, the concept of visual novels encompasses the middle-ground between text and game that I would like to explore. They’re close enough in interactivity to Twine that I would be able to include the ideas inspired by that medium, and still fairly new and niche (so rewarding to explore) but well-established enough that I can build off of existing structures without having to handicap myself with development.

Still, they’re a medium that I’m not incredibly familiar with and bring up several topics that I need to delve into in preparation for my dissertation. These can, broadly speaking, be split into 3 separate categories:

1. The Content
2. The Execution
3. The Conversion

Which sounds like a great outline for a cyberpunk story, if you ask me.

So far, any research I’ve undertaken this semester has been academic in nature. As this project will significantly expand on my current skillset on the developmental side of things, I will also need to expand my research methods. I did attend the EFI Pals session on Action Research, which may well become relevant here (see below).

The Content

By which I don’t mean the actual plot of the story. This is what I’m going to call the design elements of the visual novel that I would need to consider and create. Current ideas and concerns include:

• an appropriate font with usage rights that is generally well-readable but speaks to the aesthetics of the work (currently cyberpunk), and easy to read on screen.
• background colours, or “mood lighting.” I’d like to play with evoking both genre and plot in the visuals by having colours change depending on location (i.e., a street scene at night lit up in the genre-classic blue and purple, colours darkening when the characters enter into an underground lair, etc.). Further research needed into visual storytelling and colour theory (and maybe web design). No sound elements.
• Maybe further illustration elements? Cover art – how would I create it and what does it need to entail? Visuals for interactive bits? Are there clickable links and how are they presented visually? What device will the visual novel be read on and how will that affect layout decisions?

Now: The Execution

From what I can tell so far, there seems to be a broad range of interactivity in visual novels. Some are essentially a clickable version of a traditional novel, others are decked out versions of Twine with diverging plot branches, illustrations, and Easter Eggs. As I keep harping on, interactivity is important to me. Therefore I would need:

• a script with its various branches
• interactive elements such as puzzles or minigames if they serve the story. It would be fun to have the characters encounter puzzles which the players then have to solve (and perhaps even have the plot be affected by whether they can or not).
• possibly Python coding depending on the platform I use. So it’s a good thing that I struggled my way through those notebooks, I suppose.

The Conversion:

Meaning basically:

• Where will the story go once I have it written? Where will I host it? Which engine should I use to create it? (I’m assuming different engines/platforms have different capabilities, which will in turn influence storytelling possibilities, leading us right back to the content. So this is an Action Research moment in the making.)

Many questions, not a lot of answers yet. Still, I’m currently kind of excited about it, and that seems like a good sign.

Week 7 – Group Supervision 2: The Road From Here / Alexa Pukall / Knowledge Integration and Project Planning: Narrative Futures: Art, Data and Society (2023-24) by is licensed under a