[arg_discuss] Topic of the Week Aug. 31: Umbrella Term + ARG/larp

[Christopher Amherst]

On Thu, Sep 3, 2009 at 10:23 AM, Brian Clark<bclark at gmdstudios.com> wrote:

> This is an important discussion, so let me dive in with you guys.

>

> >From a definition standpoint, my concern is when some of the labels stretch

> a familiar concept into unrecognizable territory. I find "pervasive gaming"

> challenging because of the edge cases that require the broadest possible

> definition of "game". Similarly, "transmedia" gives me concerns because how

> the ends up trying to define ringing telephones and live events as "media".

> Even "interactive storytelling" can suffer from over-generalization of

> everything into "story". That doesn't mean that I don't find these terms

> valuable in discussions with other practitioners (they certainly identify

> buckets), but are they the desired umbrella term?


Pervasive may be a misnomer.  To a player, it's not pervasive.  It
only touches their life and experiences at a couple of points.

Could Pervasive be a more apt description for the medium that the game
(or experience) plays out _in_?
Making pervasive an equivalency to transmedia or cross-media or
convergent, otherwise it merely becomes shorthand for describing an
experience that is super-imposed in a real time / real world
environment.

For story or narrative, perhaps that is more a quality or attribute of
the experience.  That the experience contains elements of narrative.
(Andrea P. in her blog post on January 13, 2009 uses an attribute
"Story Archaeology")

This doesn't mean that a simple game doesn't have a story after the
fact.  When you're 5, Candy Land is just the vehicle to some story in
your imagination describing the game play (usually during and after).


> Or stated another way: as long as you could imagine someone having to

> describe their work as "interactive transmedia storytelling" or "pervasive

> transmedia gaming" or some other combination of the labels, then we haven't

> hit the umbrella yet. If you could imagine someone saying "that's more

> transmedia than it is interactive storytelling," then we haven't hit the

> umbrella yet.


To me, the stumbling block is the interactive / game.  Is it an
attribute, a quality, or a genre?
Perhaps, it is just a fixed quality.  The audience knows it's a game,
they don't necessarily know the "rules" per se.

"I design [Transmedia Escapism | Transmedia Experiences | Pervasive
Escapism]" seems a bit flat.



> Or maybe ARG is a platypus.


Probably should propose that as a mascot for the next ARGFest or the
future SIG conference/festival.

Chris