Loominary

A new installation for the Arts Festival for the 2017 Electronic Literature Organization conference that speaks to the translation of player story into a visual narrative in a tangible artifact. The installation “Loominary” invites the reader to interact with a text-based Twine game through a digitally augmented physical tabletop loom. “Loominary” was created as a reaction to the impermanent nature of player’s choices in games. Player choice is the basis for interaction and the decisions made are the building blocks for stories players retell about their experience with the game. These player narratives are frequently more interesting and important to the player than the story created by the designers. While players create their own narratives, their choices are rarely captured by the game in a form that exists beyond the end of play, and instead rely on the player to memorize or capture the details of their choices. With “Loominary”, each choice in the game is color-coded and the player makes their choices by weaving with the appropriate color on the loom. Throughout play, the player’s choices are translated into a visual and tangible narrative artifact that can be worn as a scarf when the game is completed. Every scarf is unique to each player’s set of choices, and can be used as a way to visualize and remember their decisions within the game.

Presentation format: The setup includes a Raspberry Pi, a monitor, and a 13” wide x 18.5” long loom and base for stability. Optimal format would be the loom in front of a large desktop monitor. Ideally the monitor should be large enough to read from a small distance given the loom’s size. Alternatively, the loom to the side of the monitor could also work. Materials and Equipment: Request an HDMI-capable monitor. Technical notes: The user interacts with the work by weaving on the loom. Tools for weaving, yarn, and all electronics will be provided, except for the monitor.

(Source: ELO 2017: Book of Abstracts and Catalogs)