3 Easy Steps to Make an Interactive Story — Even if you’re a newbie!
I remember when I got started with interactive stories, I’d look at all these cool illustrated stories. And I’d think, they had a huge budget, or they had a ton of developers, or they had all these creatives giving them ideas.
I’m just one person! How can I do that?
I’d talk myself out of the project before I even started it.
The problem was that I was looking at all this surface stuff, getting all enamoured with it.
But I was not looking under the surface.
Looking at the elements that made each experience work. The frameworks that actually make a learning experience memorable.
So, I’m going to share with you my method on how to get your interactive story crafted.
Are you ready?
Ok.
So the design process is three easy steps.
1. Plan it!
2. Write it!
3. Direct it!
There’s a little more detail to each of these steps and that’s exactly what I’ll be going into right now.
PLAN IT!
Step 1: Set a direction for yourself.
What’s the vision for this project?
What gets you excited about it?
Why are you doing it?
What are some of those reasons that are going to help you justify it?
What’s that big North Star that you’re aiming for?
You’ll be collaborating with others.
You’ll need their help.
So when you ask for their help, do you have the excitement and conviction behind your words?
Having that big vision, that North Star can be a way to draw people in, get them to come along with you. Get them to be as excited to develop this as you are.
Step 2: Choose the framework for your Interactive Story
This is what we call scope first design. Or as one of my clients called it “the light at the end of the tunnel”
It takes away the anxiety of starting from a blank slate. This anxiety isn’t something only you experience, it’s something your clients experience too.
Imagine this scenario. You commission a watercolour artist to do a painting of your family. You’ve seen some of her pieces, and that’s what drew you to her work in the first place. You know what you’re getting yourself into.
Everyone knows it’s going to be a watercolour painting.
No one is thinking it’s going to be a bronze sculpture!
So in your case you already know it’s going to be an interactive story. If you’re pragmatic, and work with your stakeholders with the end in mind, half the work is already done at this point. Everyone knows where this is heading and has a general idea of how it’s going to work.
Choose the framework that will deliver on your promise.
Which interactive story framework will influence the behaviour change everyone wants?
WRITE IT!
Step 3: Gather raw materials.
Collaborate with subject matter experts. I’m talking about somebody who’s in the trenches. Somebody who’s in that role. Somebody invested. Somebody who knows what’s going on.
You want to be talking to people who are in the field. They’re waking up and they’re doing that specific job. They don’t wake up and act as a SME. You steal a little bit of their time to interview them. So you can get the most contextual stories for your scenarios.
Step 4: Craft a beat sheet.
Use the transcript to craft a single, simple story outline. The conversations with your practitioners become the fodder for your beat sheet.
The beat sheet is a play by play of these punchy steps.
The step by step path that somebody’s going to take through your scenario.
DIRECT IT!
Step 5: Develop your interactive outline.
Now that you’ve got a story in a high level outline, you’re ready to move into the finer details. Here we use something called “the marvel method” to write your outline visually.
It will focus on the logic of the interactions, the mechanics, it will also give you an idea of the pace of your scenes. You’ll be able to imagine the entire experience visually. And, it’ll serve as a great development tool as well.
Step 6: Develop the working prototype
The visual communication you used to develop the outline does the heavy lifting here.
You plug your scenes, decisions, consequences and feedback into the interaction template you’ve set up in your software… Articulate Storyline, Captivate, Twine… whatevs.
You and your stakeholders can now play through the experience. Determine if it flows well, if the pace is good, and if the characters resonate.
You’ll also be testing how people work through the experience. Do they make common mistakes etc.
There’s no surprises in this process.
This is very smooth.
This is very systematic.
This is iterative.
Rinse and repeat step 6 as needed.
Remember, art is never finished, only abandoned. So realize nothing is perfect, and there’s a time to pull the trigger and launch.
Your turn!
Do you have an interactive story that you look up to and wish you could do the same thing?
Let me know in the comments :)
For some of you you’re going to be able to take this and run. Maybe, this is exactly what you needed to unlock that combination lock, the ‘aha’. For others, I don’t want to leave you hanging. So jump on Zoom with me, and let’s talk about your goals. Let’s figure out exactly what’s been holding you back OR what it will take for you to make that pivot into interactive stories.
