The changing panorama of interactive storytelling: a review from locative to transmedia

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DOI: 10.20287/doc.esp17.dt02
The changing panorama of interactive storytelling: a
review from locative to transmedia
Valentina Nisi*
Resumo: Desde os primórdios da civilização que o modo como contamos e consu-
mimos histórias define o sentido que damos ao mundo. Cada nova tecnologia implica
um impacto nos artefactos narrativos. Hoje em dia, as tecnologias digitais ubíquas
permitem estruturar e distribuir narrativas de modos novos e sem precedentes. Este
artigo discue a evolução da narrativa interativa surgida pelo advento de interfaces mó-
veis. Tentarei exemplificar esta evolução a partir do estudo crítico de estudos de casos
e ter em conta o meu próprio percurso de investigação.
Palavras-chave: narrativa transmedia; narrativa interativa; meios de comunicação; his-
torias multimedia com localização; tecnologias conscientes do contexto; interação
Homem-computador.
Resumen: Desde los orígenes de la civilización, el modo como contamos y consumi-
mos historias define el sentido que damos al mundo. Cada nueva tecnología implica
un impacto en los artefactos narrativos. Hoy en día, las tecnologías digitales ubicuas
permiten estructurar y distribuir narraciones de modos nuevos y sin precedentes. Este
artículo presenta la evolución interactiva surgida con el advenimiento de interfaces
móviles. Intentaré ejemplificar dicha evolución a partir del análisis crítico de estudios
de caso, teniendo en cuenta mi propia trayectoria investigadora.
Palabras clave: narrativa transmedia; narrativa interactiva; medios de comunicación;
historias multimedia con ubicación; tecnologías conscientes del contexto; interacción
Hombre-computadora.
Abstract: Since the early days of civilization, the way we tell and consume stories
defines how do we make sense of the world. Every new technology has an impact on
our narrative artifacts. Nowadays ubiquitous digital technologies allow us to structure
and distribute our narratives in novel and unprecedented ways. This paper discusses
the evolution of interactive storytelling brought about by the advent of mobile Interfa-
ces. I will exemplify this shift reviewing a series of case studies highlighted from my
own research path.
Keywords: transmedia storytelling; interactive narrative; locative media; location
aware multimedia stories; context aware technologies; human computer interaction.
Résumé : Depuis l’aube de la civilisation, la façon dont nous racontons et consom-
mons les histoires définit le sens que nous donnons au monde. Chaque nouvelle tech-
* University of Madeira, Department of Exact Sciences and Engeneering, Madeira
Interactive Technologies Institute. 9020-105, Funchal, Portugal.
E-mail: valentina.nisi@gmail.com
Doc On-line, n. especial, dezembro de 2017, www.doc.ubi.pt, pp. 43-68.

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44 Valentina Nisi
nologie implique un impact sur les artefacts narratifs. De nos jours, les technologies
numériques omniprésentes nous permettent de structurer et de diffuser des récits de
manière nouvelle et sans précédent. Cet article traite de l’évolution du récit interactif
découlant de l’avènement des interfaces mobiles. Je vais essayer d’illustrer cette évo-
lution à partir de l’étude critique des études de cas et prendre en compte ma propre
piste de recherche.
Mots-clés : récit transmédia ; récit interactif ; locatif média ; histoires multimédias
avec emplacement ; technologies contextuelles ; interaction homme-machine.
Introduction
Stories and storytelling are pervasive and ubiquitous. Storytelling is a cre-
ative process through which people share and reflect on life experiences, solve
problems, or teach lessons. Stories were considered central to society long be-
fore humans could read and write and are a fundamental component of human
experience (Slaney, 2012; Smith, 2000). They perform a critical function in
society, allowing for dialog between people, culture, and time (Madej & Krys-
tina, 2003). A story has a beginning, a middle, and ending, it is a journey that
follows a trajectory, a human life or a hero’s journey. A story is told by some-
one to someone else (Alexander & Levine, 2008). Today, with digital mobile
networked technologies, this pattern is changing. Stories now are open-ended,
branching, hyperlinked, cross-media, participatory, exploratory, and unpredic-
table. Today, narratives flow through games, interactive platforms and many
other digital tools available through the internet. Listening to and reading sto-
ries has become a dynamic and participatory process, where the lines between
the author and the audience are blurred (Spanoudakis, et al., 2015). The trajec-
tory of interactive storytelling followed the pace of digital technologies from
hyperlinked cybertexts to transmedia mobile stories. In this article I will ou-
tline a possible trajectory of interactive storytelling illustrated through a review
of my own research and creative work. This is a personal view of an evolving
field which spans many areas of creative work, research and technological de-
velopment.
Interactive storytelling, a changing panorama
Storytelling with digital tools dates back to the 90s, the early days of per-
sonal and networked computers (Alexander & Levine, 2008). Pioneering work
on hypertext explored new ways of creating and experiencing narrative, often
nonlinear and multi branching. Espen Aarseth calls these kind of narrative "er-
godic literature,"from the Greek words for "work"and "path” (Aarseth, 1997).
For example, 253, a hypertext novel created by Geoff Ryman in 1996. In this

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The changing panorama of interactive storytelling: a review from locative to
transmedia 45
novel 253 passengers of the London underground are travelling between Em-
bankment and Elephant and Castel. Each character is introduced by a 253
words text, that gives access to his or her details and thoughts (Ryman, 1996).
Each reader has her own experience of the story depending on her journey
through the hypertext. The reading experience reflects the preferences in cho-
osing which character to follow and which path to explore within the collection
of story fragments proposed by the author. Space, at least as a metaphor, beco-
mes the editing strategy of the narrative text. At the same time, some hyperlin-
ked digital narratives are created offline and then published on the web using
HTML or proprietary multimedia formats (e.g. Adobe Flash). During these
years, interactive stories explore the use of traditional channels and digital for-
mats such as CDs and DVDs. A successful example of the emerging poetics of
interactive narrative (Bizzocchi & Woodbury, 2003) is the “Cerimony of Inno-
cence” CD-ROM adaptation of Bantock’s mystery novel of Griffin and Sabine,
dating back 1997.
With the explosive growth of the world wide web in the late 90’, storytel-
ling on the internet flourished and with it the online distribution of multimedia
rich hypertext. Multimedia and its implications in design and production be-
came object of study and research. Projects like MIT Athena provide examples
and latest trends in Multimedia Computing and its potential (Arfman & Ro-
den, 1992). In the early 2000, mobile devices became ubiquitous, many of
them work with GP S modules, enabling location and context aware services.
Artists and storytellers are fascinated by the potential of tracing, distributing
and crafting stories that inhabit the real world, migrate content fruition from
the screen into the real space, treating “the world as a game board” (Falk et al.,
2001). Projects such as AmsterdamREALTIME 1and the Milk project by Esther
Polak become examples of how to creatively subvert the use of GPS technolo-
gies by tracing citizens movements through the city or the milk journey from
Latvia producers to Netherlands consumers (Polak, 2002). Hyperlinked nar-
rative structures already brought about the importance of the spatial metaphor
in constructing narrative texts. With the integration of location awareness in
our personal devices, spaces became physical branching structures for the au-
diences to walk through. The use of mobile technologies as connection inter-
faces blur the traditional borders between physical and digital spaces (Souza
e Silva, 2006). Urban spaces as intertwined fabrics of memories, current visi-
tors and future perceptions, contain rich material for the potential of the new
media (Lynch, 1960; Stevens, 2007) and they become the stage of many loca-
tive media experiments, from authoring platforms to documentary and fictional
1. http://realtime.waag.org/

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46 Valentina Nisi
stories. However, while some efforts are focused on facilitating content cre-
ators, such as the locative authoring Urban Tapestries platform (Angus et al.,
2008), other works focus on the creation of drama and narrative experiences
for the mobile audiences. Examples include many of the prototypes develo-
ped and tested within the ‘Mobile Bristol’ initiative (Cater et al., 2005) and
the ‘Equator’ 2research project. In Riot1831 for example (Reid et al., 2005)
public reactions to the media scape are collected and distilled in a series of gui-
delines for designing location-based drama (Cater et al., 2005); (FitzGerald et
al., 2013).
As locative media evolves, GPS inaccuracies are often reported as negati-
vely affecting the user experience (Bell et al., 2006); (Crabtree et al., 2004);
(Nisi & Oakley, 2006). Efforts are made into the design ever seamless experi-
ences for the mobile audiences (Chalmers & Galani, 2004); (Bell et al., 2006).
In some cases, GPS is replaced or supported by other means and technologies,
such as position self-reporting, RFID tags, Markers, QR codes, iButtons or Be-
acons (Benford et al., 2003). During the first decade of the new millennium,
technology progress enables the tailoring of ever complex and specific expe-
riences for the mobile users (Paay et al., 2008); (Bell et al., 2006). Public
spaces are increasingly augmented with layers of information and multimedia
content (Zheng et al., 2014). Audiences can participate and generate content
that is published in real time. One of the most recent narrative phenomena
that make use of this feature is transmedia storytelling. Put simply, transmedia
storytelling is a technique that uses current digital technologies to turn stories
into immersive, multilayered experiences that can be delivered to a range of
different audiences through different media channels. Despite the concept and
a definition, transmedia was anticipated by Jenkins back in 2006, thanks to the
rapid uptake of mobile networked technologies. Today transmedia takes on a
new life used for marketing and promotional tourism campaigns as well as for
activism and behavioral change. No matter what the answer is, the storytelling
panorama is in continuous flux. New technologies allow new modes of crea-
tion and distribution, and artist and engineers have never been better equipped
to fuel our imagination constructing imaginary worlds in the same time and
space where our lives unfold.
Case studies
The remainder of this paper explores the changing panorama of interac-
tive storytelling by exemplifying and reflecting on a collection of case studies.
2. www.equator.ac.uk/

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The changing panorama of interactive storytelling: a review from locative to
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These projects are selected from the body of my own creative and research
work, resulting from many fruitful collaborations from the year 2000 until to-
day at Media Lab Europe in Ireland, Fattoria Mediale in Amsterdam and M-ITI
in Madeira. The case studies cover from desktop based site specific hyperme-
dia interactive narratives (Weirdview), which reveals the power of real place,
as a real physical site and community (as a connected social networks) in In-
teractive Narratives structures, to several location-based multimedia projects
developed in different cities and cultures that highlight the power of locative
media and community to capture a grass root felt atmosphere of the locale. The
last case study is a transmedia storytelling ongoing research project (Echoes of
Nature) where location aware storytelling merge with participatory web pu-
blished journalism, opening avenues for future forms of narratives, connecting
fiction, science and local history and traditions.
Weird View (2000) – Location and community ties as a narrative journey
Weird View is a multibranching interactive narrative, resulting from the
collaboration with artist and researcher Jo Briggs (Nisi & Haahr, 2006). Buil-
ding on the power of hyperlinked structures and oral storytelling. Weird View
attempts to capture community folklore and represent it in the form of an in-
teractive, nonlinear narrative. True stories were collected by word of mouth
from inhabitants of a row of terraced houses in Dublin, Ireland. The collected
anecdotes were then scripted and produced to form a set of narrative audiovi-
sual fragments available through clicking through a desktop based graphical
user interface (GUI) representing the row of houses in which the community
lived (see Fig. 1). The anecdotes could also be browsed through the social
network that linked the inhabitants one another. Short texts supplied the visual
fragments. Such texts would succinctly tell the story, name the protagonists
and hyperlink their stories. When shown back to the community, the Weird
View project resulted in awakening community awareness through re appropri-
ation of local, social and personal stories. Technically, Weird View draws upon
storytelling traditions in a number of ways. First, the oral tradition, as stories
were collected by word of mouth, casting the community members in the role
of storytellers while the authors functioned as the audience. Secondly, when
the interactive story was presented to the community, the roles were reversed,
i.e., the authored Weird View application played the role of storytellers and the
community members became the audience.

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Figure 1. Weird View Graphical User Interface
The Weird View story fragments are organized in a branching structure fol-
lowing two main criteria: the social network and a spatial metaphor. The social
network naturally ties together some of the characters that feature in the sto-
ries. Members of the same family and friends and neighbors that appear in
more than one story are hyperlinked to the other stories in which they feature.
The second navigational criterion is the spatial distribution of the stories. The
intention is to provide the readers with a map of the story space that illustra-
tes the relation of the content to specific locations. Readers can access stories
related to each house by clicking on doors and windows on the drawing. Es-
sentially, each story is a self-contained unit that is independent from the others,
but which maintains a link to a specific house and to recurring themes or cha-
racters. Due to this modular structure, the reader can end the experience at any
time without missing the sense of closure. The cursor is thought of as a probe
that allows the reader to knock on doors and windows of the houses, and the
act of knocking is used to release the appropriate story fragments. The reader
is free to choose whether to follow the textual links that related theme or cha-
racters together or continue to explore the houses by knocking on more doors
and windows.
Reflections
A story is an act of interpretation of the world, rooted in the particular per-
ception of the author and aware of the difference between the object of study of
the anthropologist and of the narrative critic. There is no mechanical or digital
way to substitute this and no reason for wanting to do so (Martin, 1986). In
order to exercise her craft, the author must be able to retain control over the
many levels of artistic choice. The choices and the interpretation of the story
fragments made by the authors of Weird View during the production phase, cre-
ated a starting point for the people to intervene, remember more anecdotes and
criticize the ones already produced. Nevertheless, Weird View artistic reinter-
pretation of the stories itself raises some interesting issues. During the public
exhibition of the piece, questions about the boundaries between public and pri-
vate came up. The Weird View authors explained intentions and methods to the
community during the collection of the content, but many choices still had to

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The changing panorama of interactive storytelling: a review from locative to
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be made along the way and often with little time or means for consulting or
agreeing with community members on all the issues that come up while the
work was in progress. In any case, the experiences described above are encou-
raging preliminary results that motivate further steps in the area of interactive
narrative and community’s stories.
Ultimately, on the nature of interactive storytelling, and navigable structu-
res, our path through an interactive work reflects our choices back to us, like a
mirror, making us more aware of and responsible for our experience (Rokeby,
1995). The Weird View narrative acted as a mirror towards its audience in two
different ways. First, it allowed the general public to learn about life in Weir
View by exploring the community story collection and choosing their own path
through it, leaving with a very personal idea of the community and of the work
itself. Second, the audience that belonged to the Weir View community expe-
rienced the work literally as a mirror of themselves, against which they could
compare, discuss and redesign their past, present and future. In conclusion the
Weird View projects set the ground for further artistic explorations in two main
directions. On one side, pushing the combination of digital technologies and
narrative structures even further, taking advantage of the latest developments,
in mobile connected devices, with narratives possibly breaking out of the com-
puter screen, and inhabiting the real world. On the other side continuing the
investigation of the power of location, cultural heritage, capturing the grass
root spirit of a place by rendering it’s more site specific atmospheres through
a narrative experience.
Hopstory (2002) – A narrative distributed in space and time
As computing and communication technologies evolved, the potential for
new forms of digitally orchestrated interactive narratives emerged. In this con-
text, Hopstory (Nisi; Wood et al., 2004) was a distributed story incorporating
portable wireless technology in the narrative process. The story develops with
a linear progression of the plot mapped to real time and unfolding in space
using the architectural layout of the building as a navigation tool. Depending
on the time and the space the audience is situated in when interacting with the
Hopstory, they retrieve parts of the story, relating to different characters points
of view. Through physical contact with locally distributed sculptures, the au-
dience collects cinematic scenes for later viewing. Inspired by the history of
the installation space the story narrates a day in the life of four characters,
focused on their different points of view on the same events, taking place du-
ring a single day of work in the installation building, originally a brewery. An
additional character with a different role to play, a cynical brewery cat, wan-

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ders around the story providing historical anecdotes in what we called ambient
scenes where no human character appears.
Hopstory is novel in the way in which it chains physical navigation th-
rough the installation with character point of view. As Rokeby points out the
story space can be conceived as a navigable structure or world (Rokeby, 1995).
In the case of the Hopstory the architectural metaphor can be taken literally.
Furthermore, the story connects to the audience’s sense of time. As the story
progresses, the characters move through the building, living out their day in
the early 1900s. Similarly, as the audience wanders through the same building,
experiencing the installation, they encounter the four characters at different lo-
cations and times. Moreover, the audience encounters sculptures modeled after
a brewery cat, a special character in the story. The sculptures indicate the loca-
tions where the story content is available. Using a simple RFID enabled object
for interacting with the sculptures the audience is able to collect scenes. When
a scene is collected, an audio segment from that scene is played. Essentially,
through contact with a cat, a participant receives a new scene and uncovers a
character, who responds orally by revealing a part of his or her story. The ins-
tantaneous audio response may encourage audience members to seek out more
scenes to add to their collection. The audience controls the number of clips
they collect but do not know what events they will witness before they make
contact with a sculpture. Much like wandering through an actual building and
choosing to eavesdrop on chance conversations, audience members edit their
own movies by navigating the building space. However, rather than viewing
each scene at the moment it is encountered, the audience saves up their collec-
tions for later viewing, allowing interaction with the system while carrying out
other tasks and experiencing the movie when it is convenient. We found that
the location-focused nature of the story provided a creative playing field for
developing content. In the case of our installation (see Fig. 2), designed to be
housed within a culturally significant brewery building, the historical inspira-
tion was natural. Access to the physical setting of the characters’ lives provided
a concrete starting point for research, visualization of scene description, and
conception of plot events.
Reflections
Hopstory was exhibited at MediaLab Europe in 2002. The events attrac-
ted a large and diverse group of academics and corporate representatives to
the facilities. The audience was interested and curious about the distributed
structure of the narrative; they appeared to find the concept of a location based
narrative fascinating. The audience also responded well to the physical form

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The changing panorama of interactive storytelling: a review from locative to
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Figure 2. Hopstory installation
of the sculptures, finding them appealing. The separation of story navigation
and story viewing provoked mixed response among the users. While some
had difficulty relating the collected fragments to the experience, others repor-
ted a relaxed experience. They pointed out that not having to stop and view
the story at every node created a less disruptive experience that contributed to
a more coherent plot. Many visitors, whose main objective was to visit the
lab facilities, kept the RFID objects with them and collected story fragments
when they casually happened upon a cat sculpture. When these visitors came
to the playback area to cash in on their story, we usually had to refresh their
understanding of how the experience worked. Other visitors focused fully on
the Hopstory installation, actively searching for all the cats. These visitors
collected story segments rapidly and then came to the playback area to review
the story they had collected while navigating the floor. Few wanted to go back
and experience more stories because they were aware the story was unfolding
in real time. Finally, the visitors passing by the playback area usually stop-
ped and watched movies that others had collected and were curious to know
more about the project. An advantage of using RFID objects for interaction
with Hopstory was the non-intrusive quality of this technology. They could
remain in a bag or pocket, easily accessed if a participant chose to engage with
Hopstory.
The Hopstory experience has inspired new research directions within the
form of physically distributed interactive storytelling. The idea of linking a
story to place can be taken further. The story content could be rigorously
mapped to specific location-while the scenes in the movie could depict the
exact spots where the story fragments are available, creating surprising “magic

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52 Valentina Nisi
moments” effects (Reid et al., 2005). The sculptural objects could also be
enhanced to reflect story content, taking the physical form of objects or events
in the narrative. The Hopstory installation had been an exciting step forward
in developing new forms of computational interactive narrative, which weds
story content organically with enabling technology.
Media Portrait of the Liberties (2004), Trading Mercator Stories (2006) and
Placewear (2006) – Locative Media at the service of disadvantaged neigh-
borhoods
The Media Portrait of the Liberties (MPL), Trading Mercator Stories (TMS)
and Placewear (PW) are three different hands-on investigation of site specific
forms of narrative that makes extensive use of mobile location aware compu-
ting technology and multimedia. Multimedia content is superimposed on a
map based Graphical User Interface and rely on GP S sensing for location awa-
reness (see Fig. 3). Such projects were designed to make stories, in form of
short multimedia video, available to viewers at particular geographical locati-
ons and thereby contribute to a community-related story map of the area.
Figure 3. Trading Mercator Stories
The MPL is a collection of historically inspired video stories mostly adap-
ted from Maireen Johnston written accounts of life in the “Liberties” a depri-

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The changing panorama of interactive storytelling: a review from locative to
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ved but culturally cohesive inner city area of Dublin, Ireland (Nisi & Oakley,
2006). The project completion dates back to 2004 when location-aware adap-
ted Personal Digital Assistants (PDA) were the latest technologies in terms of
mobile devices. The narrative collection was designed so that each story frag-
ment could only be viewed when an audience member is situated in the physi-
cal place where the story once happened. Several years later, in 2007, invited
by the Dutch government through the Digital Pioneer initiative 3we produced
Trading Mercator Stories (Valentina Nisi et al., n.d.), in order to offer “a sense
of place” of the Amsterdam’s multicultural and disadvantaged neighborhood
of the Baarsjes. This area is home to a diverse contemporary community made
of immigrants from different countries such as Turkey, Morocco, Indonesia,
Suriname to name a few, as well as a broader base of Amsterdam residents.
The area is also visited by occasional tourists due to its special Architecture
style 4and variety of food shops and restaurants that map out the wide variety
of nationalities inhabiting the neighborhood.
Similarly, Placewear, commissioned by imagine IC, a Beijmermeer ba-
sed community heritage focused agency, was designed with the intention of
stimulating visitors awareness of the social cohesion and cultural qualities of
the Beijlmermeer neighborhood. Stories were collected locally and produced
in cooperation with community members themselves and local published wri-
ter Pierre Heijbor. The stories disclose a lively and proud community that
defeated disadvantaged and segregated conditions by becoming a strong and
culturally rich neighborhood. Bijlmer, is one of the neighborhoods that form
Amsterdam-Sud. Following the Suriname independence in 1975 many immi-
grants of Suriname were placed in social housing in the Beijlmer. The neigh-
borhood had a relatively high crime rate but this has decreased dramatically
in the recent years, while his reputation with the general public still remained
somehow disadvantaged.
The common objective of these three projects is to provide its audiences
with a nuanced and evocative sense of place as they walk the streets of these
striking neighborhoods. The projects approach to community stories is de-
signed as a layer of content superimposed to the physical space, presenting
visitors with grass root community accounts in stark contrast with the portrait
offered by the mainstream media. The approach proposes an inspiring starting
point for the locals to take ownership of their history and possibly continue to
feed the projects collection of stories. Despite the intention this final stage was
never implemented due to lack of funding.
3. www.kl.nl/en/cases/digitale-pioniers/
4. The Amsterdam School style of architecture (1915-1940).

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54 Valentina Nisi
A multidisciplinary team of several people worked on each of the projects,
researching social issues, making contact with the local community and its
organizations, developing software and interaction design, scripting and pro-
ducing the video story segments. The methodology for all three projects was
largely based on the Media Portrait of the Liberties (Nisi; Oakley & Haahr,
2008). Nevertheless, TM S and PW took advantage of the MPL guidelines and
evolved in terms of methodology and technology used. Firstly, TMS and PW
made use of more advanced technologies, instead of the GP S equipped PDA,
they were able to use smartphones with integrated GPS modules, much easier
to acquire and to use. Also the content production models were slightly diffe-
rent for all three projects. On the one hand, they all involved a series of local
stakeholders, but while for MPL the author retained control over the selection
and production of the video stories, for TMS and PW story collection and pro-
duction was based on seminars and workshops conducted by the authors with
the local community members. Local adults and children were coached and
tutored into the production of their own short stories. Another method, utili-
zed by MPL as well as PW, involved a close relationship with a local writer,
who provided content about the community mainly form her or his published
work and helped with the scripting of the narrative fragments. Maireen Johns-
ton for the Liberties Portrait and Pierre Heijbour for the Beijlmermeer helped
selecting story fragments from their published work and adapted it for the mo-
bile screen. On the other hand, local organizations such as the Mercator’s local
library and Imagine IC agency were deeply involved in embedding the projects
in the local fabric, supporting participation in art festivals and providing visi-
bility and publicity during the whole initiative and even some time after the
project was concluded and funding were finished.
Reflections
Interactive Location Aware Multimedia Stories (LAMS) are an ambitious
interactive art form, combining narrative, visual art and interactivity. It uti-
lizes site specific stories to design transformational experiences that convey
the atmosphere and grassroots history of local communities influencing the
audience perspective on the neighborhood. To fulfill the interactive narrative
properties of the project, each story is available to the public in the specific lo-
cation where it happened. The areas became a geographical tableau of stories
where the audience can physically navigate the narrative by walking the streets
of the neighborhood.
Similarly to what we noticed happening with Weird View, the audience is
left transformed by the experience. This transformation results from the ope-

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The changing panorama of interactive storytelling: a review from locative to
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ning of new perspectives on the neighborhood for visitors and locals as well.
The mechanics of the projects enable the local community to witness their re-
ality reflected back on themselves highlighting the mundane and every day.
Unfortunately, we were not able to conduct formal studies about the quantity
and quality of these transformations. On the other hand, we were able to collect
qualitative feedback from audience members, in the form of post experience
comments made directly to us or to the local supporting staff, which was often
asked to extend or replicate the projects public exhibition periods. Moreover,
audience members volunteered a range of suggestions from recommendations
for the interface design, such as the need of guided paths for nonresidents to
extending the project to include the possibility of adding their own stories after
experiencing the project. The Liberties local agency Digital Hub, the Mercator
library and Imagine IC all expressed interest in purchasing several devices in
order to keep the project available to the public indefinitely. While Imagine I C
did purchase ten devices for them to keep onsite and keep the project alive, for
the Mercator Library funds did not free up for such purchase and the project
was available only for several months during the summer 2007, when we were
able to lend two mobile devices for them to keep at their desk. Regarding the
MPL we left the original PDA and GPS module available for the public at the
local Digital Hub office, situated in the heart of the Liberties. Unfortunately,
the technology was quickly outdated and since the research project was con-
cluded and the research team moved on and out of Dublin, we were not able
to transfer the software and content to more updated devices for them to use.
Moreover, retrospectively analyzing the project’s conception, we noticed that
there was a crucial strategic missing step. All three projects, did not originate
from an uncovered need or desire of the local community. Although the Media
Portrait of the Liberties concept was successful in Dublin, it was produced and
conceived as a research project rather than a community project. Similarly, in
both the other case, the projects were funded before research on how to con-
textualize them could be conducted. In fact, despite the successful completion
of the projects as a LAMS transformational experiences, we observed the lack
of opportunity for the projects to remain alive when the initial funding run out.
However, the involvement of local stakeholders early in the story production
process for both TMS and PW was one main successes and innovation in our
strategy from the early MPL version. We like to reflect on this issue by high-
lighting the benefits of early use of ethnographic methods and field research
before the creative concept is fully formed. This approach can reveal oppor-
tunities for design and innovation in LAMS projects. The discovery of such

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opportunities might even contribute to the overall sustainability of the LAMS
as a service
7 Stories (2011-2015) – From urban computing to location based services
By the end of the first decade of the year 2000, smart, mobile and context
aware became the norm for mobile phone users. In particular with the boo-
ming of location based services, in the context of highly touristic places, we
saw an opportunity to design a location-based experience focused on a touristic
destination local culture. 7 Stories is a mobile application, which treasures tra-
ditional folklore and makes it available mostly to foreign residents and tourists
of the city of Funchal, in Madeira Islands. The first outpost of the Portuguese
discoveries, Madeira Island is rich in history and traditions, superstitions and
folktales. A well-known European touristic destination, the island is visited
monthly by thousands of tourists who are not aware of its lore, albeit when
offered information they are very interested in further investigation (Dionisio,
Nisi, & Van Leeuwen, 2010). 7 Stories capture some the Madeiran most tradi-
tional folktales often collected by word of mouth, and functions as a repository
of local culture against memory erosion. To offer a contained experience in a
traditional setting, easy to navigate by non-local people, we chose to set the ex-
perience in Rua Santa Maria, a long and narrow street located in the old town
which still maintains its traditional atmosphere. Old anecdotes and folktales
from the local tradition were researched and collected to serve as the content
for the narrative experience. In order to create a connected journey through the
narratives, the adaptation also emphasized links between the different story
fragments. The video material was produced with amateur actors and film
crew and took approximately four weeks to complete, including the final edi-
ting time. Seven short video-based stories were completed, with a duration
ranging from one to three minutes each. The audiovisual medium was cho-
sen because it allowed us to render the traditional story plots, and complement
them with further local traditional elements such as costumes, used objects
and typical locations, such as interiors of houses and courtyards, embroidery
practices, the local countryside, traditional milk cans and so on.

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Figure 4. 7 Stories
All the stories have strong links to the locations in which the audience is
able to retrieve them. Connections are made in particular through the visuals
of the video material. For example, for the story where a Santo Antonio statue
is thrown from the window of a balcony, the real window and balcony in the

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street are referenced by the narrator during the recounting of the story, thus
functioning as an anchor point in the setting where the audience experiences
it. Technically, the 7 Stories application is available for all main Android plat-
forms. 7 Stories maintains all the content offline, translates the user position
from the GPS coordinates into pixel coordinates displaying the user position as
an icon on the graphic interface so that the application can work without inter-
net connection. When a user is in range of a story the phone vibrates and an
audio clip with the narrator’s prelude is automatically triggered. The narrator
is kept in audio format to limit the demand for visual attention to the device
screen, especially since the narrator himself would verbally describe and point
at features in the real environment to help users orient themselves and find the
next piece of content. Moreover, once the narrator has greeted the audience
and pointed them in the right direction where to find story content, the system
works so that the story video clips are triggered by scanning visual markers
through the smartphone camera, rather than by pressing a GUI button on the
phone’s screen (see Fig. 4). The d-touch markers technology (Costanza & Hu-
ang, 2009) allowed us to design our own visually and semantically meaningful
markers, (see, for example, Fig. 4). Markers were then distributed along the
street where the stories were designed to be viewed. Moreover, the markers are
very inexpensive and easy to print, making it uncomplicated to replace them
in case of damage.
Reflections
As another interactive story conceived as a research project, 7 Stories was
evaluated in depth, which allowed us to confidently asses that the overall the
experience was largely successful. We observed that participants, engaged in
the experience, were appreciating the guiding function of the narrator and con-
sidering the markers as a tangible feedback and reward. No feelings of being
overwhelmed or lost were reported. In particular, the integration of the nar-
rator and the visual markers as a support to the GP S position system seems
critical for making the experience overall successful. The adoption of d-touch
markers adequately compensated for GP S glitches: seeing the markers provi-
des users clear, tangible feedback that they are in the right place. The markers
demonstrated to have the potential to balance between the physical and digital
elements of the experience. Markers highlight details of the physical space,
before audiovisual clips are played. Using a narrator seems to support users in
the exploration of the narrative space and physical environment, and helped in
delivering a more satisfying and contextualized location-based experience to
our audience. Building on the analysis of the user studies, we have highlighted

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general guidelines and implications for the future of the design of location-
based narrative systems. In particular, we highlight the importance of a careful
design for balanced and fluid user transitions from digital content to the phy-
sical aspects of the experience, and how technological (GPS and markers) as
well as narrative (the use of a narrator device) design solutions can help with
this. We hope that reporting on our experience and findings will help others
in designing successful location-based applications and cultural storytelling
experiences and, in general, encourage the both communities of artists and re-
searchers in interactive narrative systems to conduct comparative evaluations
of the specific features of such systems in order to learn, improve and innovate
in the field.
Yasmine (2015) – Immersive storytelling and urban computing
Yasmine’s Adventures (YA), is a LAMS based interactive story that levera-
ges on immersive media and urban computing strategies to create an interac-
tive trail across the Mehringplatz landscape surrounding the Jewish Museum
in Berlin. YA was created with the goal of engaging visitors of the museum
to explore the adjacent and relatively neglected streets of the area in which it
is situated. In our previous work we experienced that the conscious layering
of space and narrative provides a compelling, immersive experience with the
power to reveal a community that is often overlooked. Through YA the au-
dience follows the adventures of a free-spirited local girl named Yasmine as
she sneaks away from her class field trip to the museum and attempts to walk
home alone. The story is delivered through a mobile application that combines
the capturing of visual cues around the neighborhood with the delivery of a se-
quence of short animations tailored specifically to the Mehringplatz area. The
YA project was developed as part of the Community Now! Research project
and Symposium in order to investigate how a location aware and immersive
media can impact the audience perception of a neighborhood. Previous to the
project, the Community Now! research team worked closely with the local
community collecting impressions, desired and issues regarding the Mehring-
platz neighborhood. This material then served as a basis to construct the nar-
rative sequences. In fact, Yasmine’s perceptions of the area reflect the real
concerns of the community.

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Figure 5. Yasmine Adventures
Yasmine has positive experiences in the locations appreciated by the com-
munity, while she experiences fear, and discomfort where the community ex-
pressed negative appreciation of the locale. The experience was initially de-
signed as if it were a service provided by the Jewish Museum to its visitors.
Museum visitors are given a YA enabled phone and after a short introductory
video they are instructed to exit the museum and look for visual markers lo-
cated in strategic spots. The markers are A5 postcards depicting scenes from
YA (see Fig. 5). By pointing the phone’s camera and capturing the marker,
a 3D360 degrees’ reconstruction of the surrounding environment is displayed
on the screen and the user is prompted to scan the virtual environment looking
for story content by moving the mobile phone around the physical space. Once
found, the video animation is loaded and the user can watch it. The animation
depicts an adventure of Yasmine in that specific location. When the video clip
ends, the user returns to the 3Denvironment screen by clicking a back button,
and can scan the virtual environment for more stories. If no other stories are
available, the user is prompted to go back to the 2Dmap and follow the indi-
cations of where to find more content. The story fragments are sequential so
the locations must be visited in the correct order. Yasmine’s story ends with
a concluding video after all five locations highlighted on the map have been
visited. The walk lasts approximately 20 min. The project was evaluated on
site through a pilot study and a full user study with more than 20 users. Results
from the qualitative and quantitative evaluation of YA user’s experience sug-
gest that connection and perception to a location changes when locative media

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narratives include learning, understanding and discovery elements. We report
highlights form the study below.
Reflections
From the results and the analysis of the YA evaluation, we found YA to pro-
mote relatedness and exploration of the local neighborhood. Participants men-
tioned feeling absorbed in the story content, wishing to have extra visual mar-
kers and further information as they explored the space. The results indicate
that participants did experience a sense of presence generated by the LAMS and
this feeling allowed them to be immersed in the story. The sense of presence
in the story enabled users to gain a greater awareness of the neighborhood’s
physical space but also of the people living in it. This awareness expanded to
feeling empathy and a shared understanding for community issues, since the
story exposed issues identified by community members themselves. Examples
of participant engagement were the attention to and the awareness of the sur-
rounding space throughout the experience, and the reported desire to consume
more complex content, visual clues and information, to learn more facts and
expand the tour. Moreover, audience members often expressed the desire to
talk and interact with community members during the tour and manifested the
desire to learn more facts, testimonials form the locals themselves. We deduce
that LAMS with a sociocultural intent should include even more factual infor-
mation about the neighborhood to generate a stronger connection between the
audience and the local community. In summary, the findings uncovered th-
rough the YA user study suggest that locative media associated with story con-
tent is a successful strategy for generating engagement and connection to local
communities. However, these digitally mediated sociocultural efforts, need to
go beyond the individual engagement of a few people and perhaps even ex-
pand over longer periods of time. Users suggested that looking at historical
facts from a community perspective and adding testimonials from the local
inhabitants that allow others to understand the cultural and physical evolution
of a particular location, would be a very welcome feature in LAMS. Learning
by being in the place, discovering and connecting factual elements with the real
location, and ideally having direct contact with community members, seem to
be key elements for the successful engagement of visitors in the discovery of
socially marginalized, overlooked, or underprivileged neighborhoods.

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Echoes of Nature and Fragments of Laura (2014-ongoing) – Transmedia at
the service of Natural Capital
With the increasing importance of interaction for sustainability, new oppor-
tunities for designing meaningful interactive narrative interventions are conti-
nuously emerging. Started back in 2014, from the Future Fabulators 5Culture
Europe project, Echoes of Nature investigates how storytelling, coupled with
mobile interactive and transmedia technologies, can be used to design inter-
ventions that bring awareness and engage people in understanding the benefits
of the local Natural Capital, its ecosystems and their underlying biodiversity.
This work was conceived as a way of inviting visitors to the island of Ma-
deira in valuing the local natural resources through transmedia storytelling. As
mentioned before, transmedia storytelling is a technique of providing a story
experience across multiple platforms and formats. Following this approach,
the Echoes takes shape through two different interdependent channels. On one
side a location aware fictional mobile story: Fragments of Laura (FoL). Using
real historical events as the background, the story develops as a location based
playable story, where, as Ryan’s describes it; the user actions are subordinate
to the narrative meaning (Ryan, 2009). FoL engages its audience in exploring
les known areas of the city of Funchal and learning about its history and the
island natural capital wealth. The audience follows the adventures of Laura, a
local heroine, who acted as a proto pharmacist in the early 1800. On the other
side, the “Echoes of Nature” platform, designed to complement FoL, connects
Portuguese and foreign visitors - with local scientists, traditions, and day to
day events that happen on the island. Drawing on principles of community
journalism, our goal is to make Echoes of Nature participatory by encouraging
users to view its content and inviting the public to send questions, comments,
or user-generated content (such as photos, videos, or posts. At the same time
shorter teasers related to relevant themes are to appear at the end of each ficti-
onal episode on the mobile FoL app (see Fig. 6).
5. http://futurefabulators.m-iti.org/

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Figure 6. Echoes of Nature and Fragments of Laura

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64 Valentina Nisi
Reflections
The originality of the project resides on the exploratory approach of inter-
secting a fictional transmedia storytelling with journalistic style interviews wo-
ven together towards the common goal of fostering environmental preservation
on a small island. The focus on a fictional character allows for the interwea-
ving of varied facts (cultural, historical and scientific) that would be difficult
to incorporate if not for the liberty that fictional writing affords. Through our
transmedia experience, visitors to Madeira will embark on a quest to find the
ancient book of knowledge and its author, Laura. The mobile platform (due to
its positioning service) will play a crucial role in the experience in helping tou-
rists to discover the story locations. It will serve to display rich media content
that allows the recreation of the 19th century way of life including architectural
features, clothing and behavior. The web features on the other hand, will con-
nect fiction with the reality of the natural capital of the island, its community of
scientist and naturalists, through a growing repository of video interviews and
podcasts. The project is now on its second prototyping stage. The prototype
is being tested and refined as we speak. Finally, both Fragments of Laura and
Echoes of the Nature are part of the ongoing Beanstalk research project.
Conclusions
The trajectory highlighted in this text highlights how mobile interactive
devices changed the panorama of interactive storytelling in the past 20 years.
The notion of Location Based Multimedia Stories emerged, braking out from
the desktop and moving into in to the real world.
The first project, Weird View, a site specific hypermedia interactive narra-
tive attempts to capture community folklore and represent it in the form of an
interactive, nonlinear narrative. The Weird View story is organized in a bran-
ching structure following two main criteria: the social network and a spatial
metaphor. The project raised interesting issues, in particular questions about
the boundaries between public and private, memory recollection and preserva-
tion.
In the second project, Hopstory, the story develops with a linear, plot, pro-
gressing in real time and unfolding in space, using the architectural layout of a
building as a navigation tool. In Hopstory the architectural metaphor is taken
literally, providing a navigable structure through the articulation of space, real,
virtual or conceptual. The Hopstory experience inspired new research direc-
tions within the form of physically distributed interactive storytelling. Media
Portrait of the Liberties, Trading Mercator Stories and Placewear are three

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The changing panorama of interactive storytelling: a review from locative to
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successive projects which make use of site specific narrative, mobile location
aware computing and multimedia content. The common objective of these pro-
jects is to provide its audiences with a nuanced and evocative sense of place as
they walk the streets of neighborhoods. The projects approach to community
stories is designed as a layer of content superimposed to the physical space.
The intervention areas become a geographical tableau of stories presenting vi-
sitors with grass root community accounts in stark contrast with the portrait
offered by the mainstream media.
The experimental nature of the previous projects was taken further with
the ubiquity of location-aware mobile devices. In two projects (7 Stories and
Yasmine Adventures) an Android platform deploys new location-based experi-
ences focused on touristic destinations and local culture. Proper research on
the use of these systems provides a framework to encourage the both com-
munities of artists and researchers to conduct comparative evaluations of the
specific features of such systems in order to learn, improve and innovate in the
field.
Finally Echoes of Nature explores how LAMS can lead to transmedia de-
sign interventions that bring awareness and engage people in understanding
more complex issues such as the benefits of the local Natural Capital, its
ecosystems and their underlying biodiversity. In this project we are inter-
secting a fictional transmedia storytelling with journalistic style interviews al-
lowing for the interweaving of varied facts that could foster sustainable tourism
and environmental preservation on a Touristic Island destination.
The art of storytelling is a fundamental need of human society. Thanks to
the advances in digital media technology, cheaper creative tools, agile produc-
tion processes and novel and wider distribution channels, the narrative pano-
rama is continuously challenged. Nevertheless, old storytelling crafts are not
dying, but merely evolving, expanding, integrating new technologies, taking
up new challenges, changing the way we see and relate to the world. Yielding
new opportunities to the contemporary generations of storytellers.
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