Steps Towards a Computational Theory of Interactive Narrative in Virtual Worlds

Department of Computer Science North Carolina State University Raleigh, NC, 27695 [email protected] 919.513.3038 In this paper, we set out a basic approach to the modeling of narrative in interactive virtual worlds. This approach adopts a bipartite model taken from narrative theory, in which narrative is composed of story and discourse. In our approach, story elements – plot and character – are defined in terms of plans that drive the dynamics of a virtual environment. Discourse elements – the narrative’s communicative actions – are defined in terms of discourse plans whose communicative goals include conveying the story world plan’s structure. To ground the model in computational terms, we provide examples from research under way in the Liquid Narrative Group involving the design of the Mimesis system, an architecture for intelligent interactive narrative incoroprating concepts from artificial intelligence, narrative theory, cognitive psychology and computational linguistics.