#it was my way of avoiding the town vs wild conflict that's a theme in obt. respect to obt for tackling that but i'm personally not

[margarittet]

“Tombstone” (1993): cowboys and gay subtext

Disclaimer: I wrote this text long time ago, when we first heard the title of the episode, and we knew perfectly nothing about the plot - I just somehow never got to posting it. Back then I never DREAMED that we will be getting Cas and Dean roleplaying Texas rangers, and running around in cowboy hats. (What a time to be alive!) Anyway, I hope this little rant about how “Tombstone” (1993) is relevant to tomorrow’s episode will still be fun to read.

Disclaimer 2: I do not equal effeminate/weak bodied/flamboyant = gay, just different from the surroundings in the context of this movie. At the same time, the movie uses cheap stereotypes to characterize their characters in subtext.  It is 1990s, and this is not good, but it happened back then.

File it under the “Things I do because of my “Supernatural” obsession”: I watch and read stuff I hadn’t expected to before I started watching the show - you know, like a 1993 western telling the story of the legendary gunman Wyatt Earp and his two brothers, hunting and killing some Old West gang of outlaws in a frontier town.

Nevertheless, I did watch it, and now I will write about it because I am painfully aware that episode 13x06 is called “Tombstone”, that it has a western theme, and that it’s an episode by the writer who gave us “Stuck in the Middle with You” (12x12). It is therefore quite possible that the source material is relevant to the final product - plus with Tarantino being a western buff, it all connects nicely.

I will not speculate about the actual episode since we have almost nothing to go on at the moment - besides a few pictures from which we can gather a couple of facts:

The boys are most probably in Dodge City at some point (we saw pictures from the set saying “Dodge City” on one of the buildings). The city is about 3,5 hour drive from Lebanon - where the bunker is - and it was here Wyatt Earp was the sheriff before he moved to Tombstone. It also is “the cowboy capital of the US” because of it being the main city on the old “cattle trail”, famous for its cow markets and for its gunfights. We saw Dodge City on the show once before when Krissy’s dad was attacked in “Adventures in Babysitting”, but otherwise this is the first time we visit it,

We also know that at some point we will visit a cowboy-themed motel.

[While all of this gives us no story hints whatsoever, I think it’s safe to assume that the keywords for the episode are “cowboys” and “western”. Since Davy Perez’ most noteworthy episode last year was Tarantino themed, I am not remotely surprised this season for him is “westerns” (he is also bringing us the train heist episode later this season - yes, please.)]

I can, however, present the movie “Tombstone” that may or may not have something to do with the final episode (we’ll see). As I am aware that not everyone is as dedicated (read: bored and obsessed) as me to check out every pop culture reference on the show, I decided to share my newly aquired wisdom with the class.

Ok, so the story. The movie tells a (rather idealized) version of the shootout that occured in the frontier town of Tombstone, Arizona, between Wyatt, Virgil and Morgan Earp (plus their friend, Doc Holliday) and the gang of outlaws who called themselves “the Cowboys” - known as the gunfight at OK Corral. I will talk just about the movie here (since the historical truth is a little different, and a compare-and-contrast historical analysis is not what we need right now).

So, Wyatt Earp got famous being the marshall of Dodge City, while also being a pacifist and trying to avoid starting conflicts as much as possible. Tombstone was supposed to be his retirement - he wanted to settle down, finally having his family around, and earn some money for a comfortable and silent life. He came to Tombstone together with his two brothers and their wives; upon arrival, he found out that his best friend, Doc Holliday, also ended up in the town, searching for his luck and trying to cure his TB - an illness that will later kill him at the age of 35. 

We meet Wyatt Earp when he has people closest to his heart right around him, and is very content with his life. He is also very adamant to leave the past and the fame behind, and start a completely new chapter in Arizona. The Earp brothers find out very quickly, however, that Tombstone is very far from the sleepy abode the name might suggest. The town is full of colourful characters - gamblers, gunslingers, preachers, prostitutes, outlaws etc. And of course there is a conflict boiling just below the surface.

Unwillingly, one by one the Earp party is pulled back into being the law officers again, and into the bloody frontier war.

SPOILERS AHEAD (you know, if you wanna watch the movie yourself)

So many themes here that remind me of SPN!

We have a duty bound man who meets a maverick and outgoing woman. She offers him excitement and adventures, and of course he falls for her, but doesn’t let himself have what he wants because of his mission, his situation (he was married at the time), and the need to act honourably. He is, however, perfectly aware of his feelings and that a part of this behaviour is fear of following his heart because he had never done this before in his life;

It takes a death of his closest friend to realize life is too short, and he should go for what he wants, which he does;

Before this, however, he follows the murder of one of his brothers by going on a shooting spree, and killing every bad guy he can find until they all are eradicated,

There is also so much gay subtext between two of the characters that the movie is always mentioned when “gay westerns before Brokeback Mountain” are discussed.

“Tombstone” as a lesson in gay subtext:

It is never mentioned in the movie that Billy Zane and Jason Priestley’s characters are gay. Yet, it is so obvious from the way they are portrayed that even people who are not used to reading subtext are perfectly aware the two characters are most probably lovers.

The characterization

The first thing we notice is the look of the characters. The two man are both dressed in a way that differenciates them from the enviroment around them - Billy Zane’s Fabian is completely different from the masculine world of the Old West, with his soft hair, boyish good looks, clean shaven face, and elaborate outfits.

Jason Priestley’s Billy is more in accordance with the tough world of Tombstone - he is the deputy sheriff after all, and can be tough when needed - but still, in his time off he is portrayed as soft, effeminate, especially while contrasted with the criminals he usually runs with. His outfit is not too different from everyone else’s, but he is the only person to wear a bowtie (everyone else wears neckties or bandanas) and spectacles. He is portrayed as a slightly weaker and more vulnerable person.

Exposition in relation to other characters

The two characters sexuality is shown, not talked about, especially through the kind of interractions they have with other people.

We meet Fabian when he steps out of a carriage, all confident, flamboyant, well-groomed and witty. His person awakens the reaction in the manly-men of the West, which is shown by Morgan Earp asking the local sheriff “What kind of town is this?” (at which point Wyatt shushes him, as if he said something offensive). 

To hammer the point home, Fabian is an actor who travels with a gorgeous woman, but obviously has no sexual interest in her - they are best buddies who ogle the Earps together, and comment on their attractiveness.

As for Billy, we meet him when he arrives at the theatre to see the actors’ performance, and right away he is shown bullied by the Cowboys. The quips obviously refer to his sexuality (“Hey, sister boy, gimme some!”). He doesn’t try to shoot them down, just tries to avoid being touched. Quickly he is “saved” by the leader of the gang, and seated beside him. Shortly afterwards the camera shows us the difference between the Cowboys and the deputy sheriff’s approach to Fabian onstage (mocking vs in awe).

Later, during a blink-and-you-miss-it moment, Billy grabs Fabian in the saloon, and cordially invites him to his table. This is the last time we see the two men together, alive.

Fast forward to the end of the movie: Billy is riding around with the Cowboys while Wyatt Earp runs around, shooting everything he can find. The outlaws stop a carriage and find the actress and Fabian in the back: the actor is dead, shot by the Cowboys. Everything here happens completely beside the dialogue and the rest of the scene. Billy watches dead Fabian while the actress holds her dead friend, and angrily discusses the war with the leader of the gang.

(Just for your viewing pleasure, I created THIS GIFSET of the scene)

It is never said out loud that Bily and Fabian are lovers. It is still pretty damn obvious. It is perfectly clear from the way they are presented, their interactions with other characters, and the (very limited) onscreen interactions with each other.

“Tombstone” is a cowboy movie that takes a step towards the actual reality of the Wild West, and makes it almost textual. Homosexuality was a natural part of the cowboy lifestyle - it was after all a society full of men, where the men to women ratio was around 8:1. Everyone had needs, not everyone had money, and love and sexual encounters between men were as common as in any other, similar enviroment. There is a reason why the uber-masculine cowboy stereotype is one of the main figures in American gay iconology - think everything from “Midnight Cowboy” to The Village People and “Brokeback Mountain”.

Why Davy Perez chose to call his episode after the kettle-market town in Arizona, but also after the movie with such a strong gay subtext?

WE MAY NEVER KNOW!

[daleisgreat]

Jay and Silent Bob Reboot

The time has come to put a bookend to keeping up with Kevin Smith with today’s entry focusing on his latest film, 2019’s Jay and Silent Bob Reboot (trailer). Before we get there, I feel obligated to say I was a huge fan of his first half of his career, primarily of his old ‘View Askew-niverse’ days when he first started off with affable stoner characters, Jay & Silent Bob being carryover characters in his first several films. I think I saw Clerks and Mallrats at least five times each and feel safe in saying those two would stand the test of time, especially Clerks. I dug Chasing Amy, Dogma and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back when they originally released in my teenager days, but cannot help but think I outgrew Smith’s style of verbiage and humor he honed in on by that point, and have a feeling I would cringe at going back to them. I think I would like Zack & Miri and Clerks 2 more if some certain scenes got nixed. I thought Jersey Girl and Copout were not among his best, but both solid studio comedies and a nice way to mix it up from his regular output at the time. Red State felt like a hard left turn for Smith, and some parts I detested, but it kind of came together towards the end. Tusk however was absolute dreck and upon hearing how his follow up Yoga Hosers was an all-in spinoff of Tusk caused me to avoid Yoga Hosers at all costs and casually back away from the Kevin Smith fandom. This brings us to Jay and Silent Bob Reboot. The sequel/reboot to 2001’s Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back. 18 year-old Dale, eagerly anticipated Strike Back, rushed out to see it opening weekend and poured through the DVD in multiple viewings of it and all its extras in the weeks after it hit home video. 37 year-old Dale however ignored Reboot during Smith’s nationwide tour where the only way to see it for several months was when Smith was touring it to boutique arthouse theaters and doing a Q&A afterwards for around $50-80. I only reluctantly picked up Reboot a few weeks after it hit video when I noticed it was on sale for half off and thought for that price I could get my fill out of it with some expected callbacks and cameos that were a big standout in Strike Back and I hope would save Reboot….and that is essentially what happened.

Reboot kicks off with Jay (Jason Mewes) and Silent Bob (Kevin Smith) up to their old shenanigans loitering outside the Quick Stop, until they are promptly arrested, but saved in court thanks in part to their attorney. The attorney then informs he just tricked them into signing away their names to big budget Hollywood studios who want to reboot the Bluntman & Chronic movie Jay & Silent Bob failed at preventing in Strike Back. Worst of all, the reboot will be directed by Kevin Smith who is advertising fans to attend a fan fest in Hollywood to audition for a cameo! This leads to the duo condemning Kevin Smith, and travelling across the nation to stop Hollywood once again. Conflicts arise during their journey when they run into Jay’s old flame, Justice (Shannon Elizabeth) who informs Jay that he is now a dad. He soon meets his daughter Milly (Harley Quinn Smith), who brings her friends to tag along in order to win that cameo spot in the movie contest. I do not want to be a downer, but the actual core movie I did not care for that much. Jay’s potty-mouth humor had me in stitches in its small doses when he was a side character in the early Smith films, but it is agonizingly overkill here. There are the occasional gags that landed, like a certain free bonus a cab driver offered that appeared a handful of times throughout and Kevin Smith is legitimately good at portraying a kind of over-the-top grating version of himself at the fan convention. Jay eventually putting in an earnest effort at being a good dad in some of the final scenes culminated in some touching moments with Milly. These core parts of the movie that I enjoyed though are only peppered throughout, but what wound up saving Jay and Silent Bob Reboot was the avalanche of cameos littered from beginning to end.

There are some expected cameos from Jason Lee and Ben Affleck coming back as their former View Askew-niverse personas as Brodie and Holden, respectively. I feel safe saying that is not a spoiler since those two had extended cameos relative to the core plot in Strike Back and more-or-less do the same in Reboot. However for the rest of the film, well….I think Kevin Smith dialed in a lot of favors because this is one of the most impressive deluge of cameos in a film yet. Some play amped up versions of themselves, while others are quirky shillers for Funko Pops. During those struggling first two acts of the film, the saving grace was seeing who would pop up next and what Smith had in store for them. There are countless blink and miss it callbacks and references to other View Askew lore and Smith fandom throughout, especially at the convention in the end. I remember Kevin Smith’s early movies being loaded with extra features, and while there is a fair smattering here, it is comparatively lackluster to the deluxe sets from yore. I was stunned the BluRay omits a commentary track which are usually present in most of Smith’s home video releases. I do not blame him since he re-watched it dozens of times on his nationwide tour, but……hold on scratch that after a quick Google search it appears a month ago Smith released a special quarantined-themed commentary track for the film for free on YouTube that can be found right here. Good on him for that! Actual extras on the BluRay are highlighted by a near hour-long bonus merely titled ‘Cast Interviews.’ It is a barrage of two-to-three minute interviews from nearly all the major and minor/cameo players from the film. Lots of good little anecdotes in there and well worth your time! Following that is a half hour extra where Mewes and Smith interview a variety of the cast and crew which a third of is dedicated to….one major cameo I shall not name here. I will give props to Mewes for randomly getting quick interviews from some of the behind-the-scenes crew to make sure they get their proper due. Wrapping up the bonuses is the requisite blooper reel that does not disappoint and a two minute Hair Reel which is solely of Smith and Mewes adjusting their hair between takes.

Part of me wanted to say Reboot was the ideal farewell film of Kevin Smith to watch, but I see he has Clerks III in the pipeline, so I will ultimately have to cave and check that out too. Regardless, if you are a lapsed Kevin Smith fan and wanted one last trek with his style of comedy you grew up with, you kind of get that here and you also get why you left that in the past too. Regardless, Jay and Silent Bob Reboot does have its moments, and the cameos make it well worth riding this out until the end….including all the bonus shots/alt footage in the credits, lots of gold in there too including one last cameo I did not anticipate. Other Random Backlog Movie Blogs 3 12 Angry Men (1957) 12 Rounds 3: Lockdown 21 Jump Street The Accountant Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie Atari: Game Over The Avengers: Age of Ultron The Avengers: Infinity War Batman: The Dark Knight Rises Batman: The Killing Joke Batman: Mask of the Phantasm Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice Bounty Hunters Cabin in the Woods Captain America: Civil War Captain America: The First Avenger Captain America: The Winter Soldier Christmas Eve Clash of the Titans (1981) Clint Eastwood 11-pack Special The Condemned 2 Countdown Creed Deck the Halls Detroit Rock City Die Hard Dredd The Eliminators The Equalizer Dirty Work Faster Fast and Furious I-VIII Field of Dreams Fight Club The Fighter For Love of the Game Good Will Hunting Gravity Guardians of the Galaxy Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 Hercules: Reborn Hitman Indiana Jones 1-4 Ink The Interrogation Interstellar Jobs Joy Ride 1-3 Major League Man of Steel Man on the Moon Man vs Snake Marine 3-6 Merry Friggin Christmas Metallica: Some Kind of Monster Mortal Kombat National Treasure National Treasure: Book of Secrets Not for Resale Pulp Fiction The Replacements Reservoir Dogs Rocky I-VII Running Films Part 1 Running Films Part 2 San Andreas ScoobyDoo Wrestlemania Mystery The Secret Life of Walter Mitty Shoot em Up Slacker Skyscraper Small Town Santa Steve Jobs Source Code Star Trek I-XIII Sully Take Me Home Tonight TMNT The Tooth Fairy 1 & 2 UHF Veronica Mars Vision Quest The War Wild Wonder Woman The Wrestler (2008) X-Men: Apocalypse X-Men: Days of Future Past

[symbianosgames]

The following blog post, unless otherwise noted, was written by a member of Gamasutra’s community. The thoughts and opinions expressed are those of the writer and not Gamasutra or its parent company.

Over the course of my senior year in college, I've been hard at work on a visual novel dubbed Streams of Nurture. As both a passion project and academic piece, Streams of Nurture represents an interesting case study for transforming one of my most ancient interests, food production, into an interactive affair that combines the dramatic qualities of an entertainment title with a real-world topic characteristic of serious games. In other words, I wanted to leverage the concept of "learning through play" to create a game that felt both purposeful and engrossing.

With my project officially submitted to the Worcester Polytechnic Institute database, I can now share with you the report detailing the development cycle for the visual novel. Throughout the coming weeks, I shall be publishing a subsection of the paper penned for Streams of Nurture. Each part will focus on a particular design and production aspect of the game, from the way the storytelling was conceived to the iterative art process that governed the title's presentation.

This week's post in a series of design articles explains the narrative development of Streams of Nurture. If you're interested in reading about the pre-production and research phase for my visual novel, feel free to peruse the first article I published on my title's development cycle.

NOTE: I didn't single-handedly develop the game. Although I handled the narrative design, coding and writing for Streams of Nurture, my partners Liam Miller and Dave Allen were wholly responsible for the art and audio respectively. As such, the pronoun "we" will be used to acknowledge their invaluable contribution to this project.

As a game design major with significant writing experience gained by authoring numerous development articles and a previous visual novel, Michel saw the task of weaving Streams of Nurture’s narrative as an opportunity to hone his storytelling skills. With the preparation completed before the formal beginning of the project in the 2016 fall semester, Michel felt ready to flesh out the characters, settings, and themes that would constitute the visual novel’s structural framework.

Characters

Logically, the personalities the player would be interacting with throughout the game had to be prioritized in order to properly determine the kinds of scenarios and story arcs that would drive the experience and complement the aquacultural topic with a dash of dramatic tension. As with the priority list of farming facts, Michel initially concentrated on building and enriching the physical, sociological and psychological facets of the main characters, more specifically the protagonist and the following individuals who comprise their circle of friends (see Figure 13):

Figure 13. Game characters Daphne, Joshua, and Olympia.

Original images by Liam Miller

Daphne Crosby, the chipper if somewhat aloof daughter of the town’s mayor who is an advocate of open-net farming.

Joshua Norton, a wayward but well-meaning Native American student who embraces artisanal fishing practices.

Olympia Crammer, an eloquent workaholic hoping to realize a salmon tank project.

For each of these characters, as well as secondary ones utilized for the game’s prologue and branching paths, personality templates provided by Professor Lee Sheldon were used to detail the unique traits, quirks and flaws of the entire cast. The goal was to make each major character seem distinct in both their appearance and demeanor. Devising and thoroughly documenting their characteristics in advance allowed Michel to keep their behavior and development consistent throughout the game.

World design

In addition to creating the characters for the visual novel, Michel was responsible for coming up with the in-game setting and lore for world-building purposes. Given the time and scoping constraints of the project, a “less is more” approach was adopted that prioritized density over scale.

Figure 14. The City from Thief: a small but highly detailed game world http://ift.tt/2qF8Epu

Luckily, Michel was familiar with a commercial game series that served as a consummate example of a compact virtual environment combining a rich backstory with uniquely designed locales. The City from the Thief series (Eidos/Square Enix, 1998-2014) embodied many desirable qualities for the visual novel’s setting, from the dialects and cuisine that varied across different social classes to the town’s governmental framework (see Figure 14). Thief’s elliptical approach to storytelling avoided explicit explication, with designers hinting at the backstory and letting players uncover it for themselves. Although the structure of the visual novel format meant that a lot of explaining would have to be done through dialog, the concentrated design of the City suggested that the world-building bits required to complete the project need not be as time-consuming as we initially thought.

Figure 15. Maps of the game’s fictional island, incorporating the town of Duntale.

Original images by Michel Sabbagh

Following this realization, it was decided that the game’s setting would need to be as thoroughly documented as its characters. For Streams of Nurture’s primary location, the town of Duntale, a comprehensive document that detailed the history, geography, culture and economy of the tight-knit fishing community was authored, supported by maps of the local geography (see Figures 15 and 16). Although not all of this creative information made it into the final game, the fact that it was available for reference meant that the team had a firm basis for determining how the Duntale populace would behave and interact with the player.

Figure 16. Sketch of the game’s island.

Original image by Michel Sabbagh

Additionally, other real world and fictional places were studied as inspiration for the atmosphere emblematic of coastal settlements. Fictional settings such as Morrowind’s Solstheim and Grand Theft Auto’s Los Santos provided suitable templates for the layout and shape of Streams of Nurture’s island. As for actual towns, Bar Harbor, with its rugged coastline and Norwegian-like fjord, and Gloucester, known as the oldest fishing port in Massachusetts, gave the team a concrete idea of the types of public and residential areas an actual fishing village might be expected to contain (see Figure 17). Michel mixed and matched these components to construct Duntale with the verisimilitude needed for players to accept it as a cohesive, lifelike environment.

Figure 17. Bar Harbor, ME and City Hall, Gloucester, MA.

Bar Harbor: http://ift.tt/2pYFntG

Gloucester: Original photo by Liam Miller

Themes, issues and farming methods

With the game world and its inhabitants fleshed out, Michel focused on incorporating the themes and issues that would define the scenarios the player will find themselves in, including the major plot points highlighting the story’s moments of crisis.

With regards to the Duntale community and their ambivalence towards aquaculture, Michel drew inspiration from several protest organizations around the world such as the Salmon Farms Protest Groups who wanted to raise awareness about the ecological woes of salmon farming in regions like Canada and Ireland (see Figure 18). Sea lice that infest the external surfaces of marine and brackish-water fish, overfishing, and pollution were other examples of the real-life factors pertaining to the salmon industry that caused public outrage across the world. Michel also looked at historical events such as the 1992 cod crisis, which led to fish becoming increasingly scarce in the once-rich waters off the Canadian province of Newfoundland, to emulate the kind of negative economic impact that can result from mismanagement of marine resources on the part of both the government and its constituents.

Figure 18. Salmon farming protests and sea lice.

http://ift.tt/2qFkdNo

http://ift.tt/2pYLopY

This anti-aquaculture mindset was baked into the personalities of the visual novel’s characters, who either eked out a living through fishing or wished to seek an alternative to the cheap but irresponsible open-net farming sites run by the in-game fish farming firm, “BioSalar”, which was inspired by real-life companies such as Marine Harvest, Cermaq, and Cooke Aquaculture.

The theme of “nature vs. nurture, economy vs. environment” also led to the exploration of the strife between both sides of the aquacultural debate in terms of the species featured in the story, even going as far as to have the fish symbolize the farmers and commercial/artisanal fishermen (see Figures 19-21). The Atlantic salmon, which is universally farmed (only about 1% of the species is produced from the wild), stands in stark contrast to the unadulterated Pacific varieties, such as sockeye and pink, which were being threatened by BioSalar. Coupled with the ethics of having Atlantic and Pacific species intermingle with one another and polluting the gene pool of the latter, forcing out wild salmon, the inclusion of different types of salmon provided a subtle metaphor to the troublesome coexistence between industrialism and artisanship.

Figure 19. Atlantic salmon.

http://ift.tt/2pYpnaS

Figure 20. Pink salmon.

http://ift.tt/2pYpnaS

Figure 21. Sockeye salmon.

http://ift.tt/2qFhxiG

Along with the conflict surrounding the issue of salmon farming and fishing, the themes of compromise and responsible stewardship are highlighted through the choice between three branching paths the player can take following the visual novel’s prologue. These routes correspond to the different farming methods practiced around the world to raise and harvest salmon in a potentially sustainable fashion (see Figures 22-24). Recirculating aquaculture systems (tank-based farming that allow for year-round growth of fish in temperate climates), semi-wild ocean ranching (the objective of which is to increase the ocean abundance of salmon for harvest by fishermen), and a more efficient version of open-net fish farming (a huge problem of which is the waste that flows out of the fish pens) are the three fish-rearing techniques that can be explored within the game. All of them offer a unique mix of appliances, processes, opportunities and implications, and are written in a way that attempts to highlight their advantages and disadvantages equally to avoid favoring one approach over others.

Figure 22. Open-net pens.

http://ift.tt/2qFn0pN

Figure 23. Salmon tanks.

http://ift.tt/2qFn0pN

Figure 24. Ocean ranching.

http://ift.tt/2pYQcfd

The salmon’s cultural and historical importance to the Native American characters featured in the game was also taken into consideration. Extensive research was conducted on artisanal fishing methods such as the dragnet, a possible forerunner of the reef net used by Coast Salish groups, in order to accurately portray their usage. Rituals and events like the First Salmon Festival were also incorporated into the narrative to highlight the salmon’s status as a traditional symbol of prosperity, nature’s gift to the indigenous people of the region.

Storytelling framework

With the storytelling elements in place, it was time to assemble everything into a comprehensive framework that would serve as the foundation for an initial, functionally complete iteration of the project — the alpha build. Throughout this process, an overarching narrative composed of smaller events that would comprise the scenes featured in the game was brainstormed.

A detailed document outlining all of the interactions and plot points players would encounter was produced to better visualize the framework (see Figure 25). Potential ideas such as flashback sequences and a subplot surrounding a college-funded VR program were considered and recorded. The narrative framework also allowed the incorporation of the research data gathered before the beginning of the 2016-17 academic year into the relevant scenes. These included details such as the composition of the fish feed used in farming operations, and the physical logistics of the farming methods featured in the three branches (e.g. artificial spawning channels for ocean ranching).

Figure 25. Word document containing all of the assembled in-game events.

Original image by Michel Sabbagh

Narrative modularity and kinetic design

With all of our research and story information collated, we realized that many of the aquacultural facts we wanted players to encounter overlapped across the three farming branches. This opened the door to modularizing the narrative as a strategy for streamlining the writing process. It was decided that common features of the three farming methods, such as the pre-saltwater stages, could be implemented as shared scenes (using the same dialog, code and imagery) without compromising the unique challenges posed by each farming practice. This approach significantly reduced the amount of time it took to complete the project.

Figure 26. Whiteboard sketch of Streams of Nurture’s narrative structure.

Original photo by Michel Sabbagh

Additionally, the choice to provide either a “kinetic novel” structure (highly linear, with little or no room for moral decisions) or a more conventional visual novel framework (frequent dialog trees and many explicit choices) had to be made. Ultimately, the former approach was chosen to avoid potential plot holes and confusion among players with regards to understanding the issues differentiating each of the aquacultural processes being presented.

And that's all she wrote (for Part II, at least)! As I mentioned before, more parts will be posted on a weekly basis.

Let me know what you think of my article in the comments section, and feel free to ask me questions! I’ll do my best to get back to you as promptly as possible.

Personal blog: http://ift.tt/2jHSIDs

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Email: michelsabbagh2003@msn.com