Keywords

1 Introduction and Backgrounds

Game is different from narrative by nature. While combining narrative structure (such as character development and drama) with game design (e.g., interactivity and player’s agency) is challenging and debatable [2], various suggestions and clarifications have been made to represent or explain narrativity in games. For example, Aarseth proposed four common aspects between narrative structure and game design - world, objects, agents, and events [1]. In this paper we explore game design issues in developing a mobile storytelling game application for young children.

Emotion is a key factor both in game design [6] and narrative understanding [4]. Lazzaro [3] suggested the concept of four keys that are related to invoking emotions in playing games: (1) the internal experience key for controlling the player’s mental state (e.g., escaping from boredom); (2) the challenge and strategy key for hard fun; (3) the immersion key for easy fun (e.g., exploring game environments); (4) the social experience key for playing with other players. Our proposed game design is mainly based on these four keys to fun.

We developed a prototype digital story-reading game application based on Aesop’s fable titled “The lion and the mouse”. The prototype features chapter-divided storytelling sequences, mini games including quizzes and puzzles, player interaction, and voice recording, based on the concept of Lazzaro’s 4 keys to fun.

2 Design and Implementation

We consider four design factors in our mobile storytelling game app - narrative sequences, interaction, mini-games (such as quizzes and puzzles), and socialization, which are based on the concept of the 4 keys to fun.

2.1 Chapter-Divided Narrative Sequences for Easy Fun

Curiosity is a crucial emotion in game design. Curious players will keep exploring the game world, eager to see what will happen next. Curiosity is associated with the immersion key and easy fun by providing ambiguity, incompleteness, and detail [3].

For the immersion key, we consider two narrative constraints in game design - local and global. While the former applies locally to a part of narrative, the latter applies to the whole storytelling structure.

First, in this paper, we define a term ‘local constraint’ as having an effect on the “pace” of the narrative: Using simple heuristics, key scenes that are related to emotions such as suspense are depicted in slow-motion or close-up with more details. Figure 1 shows an example of the image sequences that are rendered in detail with close ups such that the young players can digest the story with easy fun in immersion, maintaining their curiosity and tension about what will happen next.

Next, as a global constraint, we design a chapter-divided storytelling structure to attract the young player’s attention through curiosity. This storytelling structure allows the player to comfortably follow the unfolding story, wondering how the story will run in the next chapter. In our prototype app, the only action a first-time player can take while playing a chapter is to pause. If the player chooses to play the chapter again, he or she will be given other control options (such as skipping and fast-forwarding), to the extent that they feel in control of the story progression.

Fig. 1.
figure 1

Examples of narrative sequences with detailed close-ups

Full size image

The proposed game application consists of 11 chapters in total, as seen in Fig. 2, where the full story is divided into 4 sections mainly based on Preytag’s dramatic arc [3] - exposition (Chaps. 1–3), development or rising actions (Chaps. 4–6), climax (Chaps. 7–10), and denouement (Chap. 11). Each chapter is maximum 20 s long with at least two main characters, in order to maintain the tension of narrative. The player, who plays a chapter for the first time, cannot move on to the next chapter unless the reward option is unlocked, which is presented only after completing the current chapter.

Fig. 2.
figure 2

Divided chapters based on Preytag’s Pyramid structure

Full size image

2.2 Interaction Design for Serious Fun

Giving the player a sense of agency without harming the story progression is critical in the design of a storytelling game. Player’s sense of agency can be obtained through “compelling interactions” using visual or auditory feedback, which is associated with the internal experience key and serious fun [3].

Limited interactions with audio-visual feedback were included, particularly associated with emotional expressions or behaviors such as being surprised, yawning, crying, etc. The key interactive scenes are drawn differently from the previous chapters to prevent the players from feeling bored with repeated stimuli. Figure 3 shows two examples of visual feedback with sound effects, focusing on emotional interactions.

Fig. 3.
figure 3

Interaction examples with audio-visual feedbacks

Full size image

2.3 Mini-Games (Quizzes and Puzzles) for Hard Fun

Hard fun refers to a type of fun associated with challenge and strategy [3]. For the players who like challenges, we designed some mini games containing quizzes and puzzles.

In both quizzes and puzzles, the story characters (i.e., the lion and the mouse) play the role of teachers with two opposite types of empathic expressions - happy-for and sad-for [5]. Happy-for expressions are displayed for correct answers with excited voice, animation effects (e.g., fireworks), and appropriately-chosen complimentary remarks (e.g., “Good job!”, “Awesome!”, “Great work!”); sad-for expressions appear for wrong answers and give encouraging remarks (e.g., Try again!) (See Fig. 4).

Quizzes are currently designed to have two difficulty levels - normal and hard, mostly depending on the player’s age. For instance, questions on weather and movement are aimed for children age 5–8; questions associated with animal’s behaviors or story conclusion are designed for children more than 8 years old. In addition to the internal reward (such as compliments) for the correct answers, we are also designing external rewards (such as collecting virtual coins and using them for customizing) to further motivate the players.

For the puzzles, players are engaged to drag-and-drop 9 pieces of jig-saw card images to the right window on the screen (See the image sequences below in Fig. 4). Images on the right side are selected to represent key scenes of the corresponding chapter, which are designed to help the player remember important scenes of each chapter.

Fig. 4.
figure 4

Mini-game examples with empathic expressions of a story character (above: quiz example; below: puzzle example)

Full size image

2.4 Socialization for People Fun

One of the key reasons for playing games is to have social experiences with other players through competition, cooperation, etc., which is associated with people fun [3].

When the players complete all 11 chapters, they are rewarded by being able to unlock the Rec (recording) button on the main page. With this voice-recording feature, players can record their own voices (or the voices of friends or parents) and then play them in the main voice streaming in each chapter. The duration of each dialog is approximately 10 s, and the player can maximize the fun of social experience through cooperation and (possibly) competition (Fig. 5).

Fig. 5.
figure 5

Screenshots of voice-recording feature

Full size image

3 Conclusion and Future Work

In this paper we introduced our mobile story-reading game app that is designed to incorporate the four types of fun - easy, serious, hard, and social. We implemented chapter-divided narrative sequences, interactions with audio-visual feedback, mini games with quizzes/puzzles, and voice-recording feature for each type of fun.

While our prototype app is mainly aimed at helping young children learn English as a second language, we were not able to consider any pedagogical standards or criteria due to time constraints. We intend to include them in the next version (e.g., design of quiz questionnaire with different levels according to children’s cognitive development).

Another further study will adopt gamificaiton for educational purposes to increase the player’s motivation. After completing the adoption of gamificaiton, we plan to conduct a pilot study to investigate the effects of gamification elements and player experiences with various age groups.