Researcher: Awesome, alright, so as you're both done with the multiplayer story... it went a little bit wrong as one of the orderings on some of those pages was off. But it doesn't matter, as we'll have to talk about the experience you did have. Researcher: So, when did you first notice the other player when you went through? When did you first notice them changing something for you, or you changing something for them? Or just.. them in general. Participant 1: i dont rmemeber the exact place in the story, but its just because it said at the top, you know, 'the other player made that decision', i was like "Ah, I see", so. Yeah, so that was sort of yeah, so up until then i was just like yeah, im just like reading this thing, and just had this impression that we're just like reading the same thing but then was like, probably not reading the exact same thing Researcher: so what about you [p2]? Participant 2: yeah, same, i dont remember the exact point but... it just said at the top. Researcher: cool, alright, was there any part of the story that you remember, where you particularly noticed the presence of the other player? Participant 2: no Participant 1: that conversation, you know, the showdown sort of between Sarah and Todd or whatever. not really showdown because it kept saying 'Sarahs thinking about what to say' and i just had to sit there, waiting, so. Researcher: ah, okay Participant 1: yeah, so that was like the main thing, when i was like yeah, this is really someone else who is actually directing that ? Researcher: okay, so what exactly was it that gave that sensation? Participant 1: i mean, i was trying to make a decision, and it was like "Sarah is making a decision, todd will be able to speak after" Researcher: so the fact it overtly told you? Participant 1: yeah, yeah Researcher: cool, i just had to check that. Alright, so you said you didn't feel like it was... you didn't notice at any other point really? Participant 2: no Researcher: okay, so what sort of expereince did you have with the story? Participant 2: well, everything was in a really weird order, and nothing made sense, so, i don't know what you read or anything but mine didn't make any sense whatsoever, it was just like, a load of random paragraphs that didn't have like a story, so i didn't really know what was going on. Researcher: that's unfortunate, that is actually where it went slightly wrong, the ordering got slightly messed up. but that's fine, we'll just work with what we've got. Participant 1: it made sense, i mean, on my side it made sense. Researcher: so you visited it in the right order [p1], yours worked fine, im not quite sure why it broke for [p2]. So... we'll work with this anyway. So, was there any part of the story that particularly stood out to you [p1]? Participant 1: yeah, as i said, that conversation Researcher: just that bit? Participant 1: yeah, because all of the other stuff was kind of like, yeah, you know, kind of like a normal story, and that was actually where it got interesting, because of that interaction between the two, and you know, determined that and also i was, about to make a decision then all of a sudden it took away the control from me and said 'sarah made this decision' and i was like ah, okay. so i can't actually do this now. Researcher: interseting, did you feel like you were in control during the finale, during that conversation at the end? Participant 1: no, i felt very much just at... at, you know, not really mercy, but i was basically just sat there and reacting and there were so many times when i had to sit for a really long time and it said, you know, you'll be able to make a decision once sarah has spoken. So it was very reactive. Researcher: what was that experience like for you reading it then? Participant 1: what, during that... Researcher: during that bit in particular Participant 1: it was interesting because when you're reading something you're normally not... you normally think you're the one that's completely in control, especially if you're doing an interactive narrative, because you're the one, by definition that should be more in control than anything else and it was quite interesting to, to see actually the text actually react as a story, not just as a... you know, ifyou're playing a video game that's different, but i think because erm, because reading something is more of a static experience, because you know you have the pages there so you dont normally expect it to be massively interactive, so it was really interesting. Researcher: ah, okay, so you say its interesting... did it make you think about the other player at all? Participant 1: yeah i think at some point it put me in sort of a competition mindset, because i knew that, you know, once the control taken away from me, maybe i just need to try and read faster. to be able to make my decisions more quickly before she makes her decisions Researcher: interseting, so why were you making them faster, what were you aiming for? Participant 1: just having more control, i think? Researcher: okay, so, what was it like giving away that control, or having that control taken away from you as part of the reading experience? Participant 1: i mean, it was cool, it was nice to see how the story would change, and i think also i would have made different decisions if i had just read that story and just made all of the decisions, i think i would have had slightly different decisions, i think that because someone else was controlling sarah made it more... personal, so i think, if it had just been me, i might ahve just like shot her, but like this i was just like oh, you know. it kind of felt more like a... on the one hand a competition, but on the other hand, we're working together to make this story, so i didn't really want to kill sarah, if that makes sense? Researcher: yeah, that makes sense. Researcher: so, you didnt want to.. your main reason behind not killing Sarah off was Participant 1: i mean there were a lot of different reasons Researcher: please, go into them Participant 1: on the one hand, like, i did like the character of sarah, i thought the story would probably turn out better for todd if i had shot her, but then i was also thinking probably something else is going to happen, and then i was thinking about their relationship so i was thinking in terms of, i guess, if this was a video game, so taking that comparsion, so if this was a video game, might have shot her because that would have been more in line with my objectives, but because this was actually a written narrative, it felt a bit more like... it meant more, in a way. Because yeah, i can't really describe why, but also, i did not really like todd that much, so you know, i kind of was, a little bit more inclined to let sarah do her thing because she seemed to have a, to have it together a bit more than him so. so there were a lot of different reasons, so some of them being that we're in a multiplayer experience, some of them just being character based Researcher: okay, thank you. alright, im going to try and do something a little bit different now, which is im going to try to explain to you [p2] how the story was meant to go together Participant 2: okay Researcher: so, the way it was meant to go together is, all of those memory points should have happened one after the other, more or less, but when you went into act 3, and started having the conversations, which was the todd says, sarah says, so forth, those were meant to be by themselves, so the way in which the story was meant to take place was having those memories as flashbacks to previous events and having that sort of final showdown at the end of the... and the end of the speech and the actual decision, if that ties things together a little bit more. Participant 2: sort of, i suppose Researcher: no worries if not, ive had quite a few people say that the actual structure of the narrative made things kind of confusing to read Participant 1: was it supposed to then afterwards go back to, because for me, i had given the, you know... i don't remember, i think first it said something about sarah decides to stay, then it had a bit after that where they were just hanging out and planning for another heist and i was reading that and then all of a sudden it took me backt o the conversation and then i had to actually make a different Researcher: no, it shouldn't have Participant 1: no, i was wondering if that was intentional or if that was a.. Researcher: no, that was unfortunately a bug, its happened a few times now. Researcher: okay, so, yeah, sorry that im mostly going to focus on [p1] here, it seems to have worked better... or at least broken less! so were there any decisions you made [p1] that were particularly difficult? Participant 1: difficult... as in? Researcher: as in, challenging for you to make, were there any decisions that you had to pause to think about? Participant 1: i think just the ones in the final conversation, because the rest, where you had to think a little bit about whether to, whether to tell sarah about the data on the usb stick, so i was thinking oh, how could that go because i couldn't, at that point, i didn't really have a feeling for Sarah yet... and i was like, i didn't really know how that was going to pan out, but then I was like well but also, the organisation is not like the most friendly people anyway, so i think that was the one where i took a little bit more, because i was just trying to figure out how it would fit in the story better but i think mainly, it was just at the end, i think most of them were fairly intuitive. Researcher: fair enough, okay. so how much do you think the other player affected your story in general? Participant 1: you know, i didn't notice it until that point where it said, you know, the other player has made that decision, so, so it didn't really feel... i kinda felt like we probably would have made similar decisions, so it didn't feel like it impacted it that much. Researcher: okay. so let's skip to some of the bookkeeping questions for a second. So just for the record, before this story happened how well did you know each other? Participant 2: not at all Participant 1: nope Researcher: cool, i just needed that on the tape, that was all! Participant 1: yup! Researcher: okay, so, while were you playing, how often did you end up thinking about the other player? Participant 1: I think it was just when i was waiting for her to make a decision because i literally was not able to do much. But i think that was... once, whenever it sort of said, the other player has made that decision, i was like oh yeah, right, there was another person doing. But then it just sort of went on, but it was just like in that final conversation because that took a really long time, and i'm guessing that was because it was jumping around Participant 2: reading the paragraphs, yeah Participant 1: like, you were going through all the other weird things that they were throwing at you at that time, so it was mainly during that time, and i think tat's when it made it more personal i guess, because up to then it was just like, oh yeah, this is a story, just like reading the story, and then it became more yeah... just became more impactful and you actually noticed the other person made a decision for you and you were just like "ah!", but also cool, yeah. Researcher: Gotcha, okay, so, hypothetically, if you had been... if you imagine someone that you are good friends with, and went through the story with them instead, are there any decisions you would have changed? Participant 1: probably not to be fair, because, you know, i don't think so, but it's difficult to say because it depends on who that other person is and what kind of gaming realtionship you've got, you know. So, i think i probably would have made similar decisions because the decisions i had made were based mainly on the story anyway. okay, so depending on how the story would have gone, based on the other person's decisions i guess i might have done it differently, but i think, because i made decisions partly as narrative and character decisions and that really was not anytihng to do with, with her, because, yeah Researcher: Gotcha, okay, so, what i'm going to do... So, overall, how much do you think having another player there affected your experience? Or how did they affect your experience? Participant 2: can i? Researcher: yeah Participant 2: Yeah, i don#t think it made a difference to my experience, no offense. I just read at the top of the screen sometimes that the other player chose this, in little blue text, and that was the only thing that was actually different for me. Researcher: Ah, why? Participant 2: i don't know if it was a bug or not, but i didn't know i was supposed to be sarah, i didn't know any of that, because i was making decisions for todd and sarah at some points, so i don't really understand what happened there. so i didn't really have that "I'm sarah, so i'm going to make this decision", so i don't know if that was a bug, or if that was supposed to be like that, but i dont think it made a difference because i was acting as both of them. Researcher: okay, fair enough! Don't worry, that is perfectly useful! Participant 2: okay! Researcher: So what i'm going to do now is explain to you how the narrative was actually structured, and we'll go from there. So, the way it would work in terms of interaction between each other, is whenever one of you amde a decision in one of those memory nodes then the sort of, precursor node, the first memory node and the choice you made, just those two, would become available to the other person to read. so whenever you were making one of those decisions within a memory, then the other person would see either result of those decisions and then... during the end of the narrative, so you got this much more [p1] than i think [p2] did [p1], so whenever you'd say something, control would pass to the other person to say something, and then, so you'd have this conversaiton, and then after a certain amount of time, you'd get the ability to make a decision outside of that that would push the narrative towards one of its endings. Does that help clear things up at all as to how things work? Participant 1: i mean, that's what it felt like Researcher: yeah? Participant 1: for me, yeah, because for me it seemed to work.... better Participant 2: yeah, i had no idea that was a thing... so... it helps me to see what it was supposed to be like i suppose. Researcher: well in that case, i suppose we'll go onto the last question, which is just, how much experience have you both had with interactive narratives, choose your own adventures, telltale games, any of this sort of narrative heavy gaming experience before? Participant 1: i mean, i'm doing my PHD in it, so.. a lot. I would say, yeah. A lot. Researcher: what about you [p2]? Participant 2: maybe less so? i used to have those book where you can turn to a different chapter and then like read who can choose in that chapter if you know what I mean? Researcher: yeah, i know what you mean. Participant 2: yeah, i quite liked those, you know, when i was younger and stuff. and i've done like, the online narrative choosing games like the books, really, but that's the limit of my experience Researcher: what were the online games that you tried, do you remember? Participant 2: i don't offhand, but was kind of just like the books, so you're reading a certain thing and you can kind of go to this chapter or this chapter or this chapter Researcher: alright, well in that case, unless either of you have any more comments..? Participant 1: it was fun. Researcher: then i'll end it there, thank you very much! Participant 2: thank you.