Evaluation

The aim of my artefact was to create an interactive narrative that would raise awareness of the dangers of social networking to young adults. I wanted my interactive narrative to be creative and unique, combining elements of ludology and narratology to attract and engage a young audience. 

Girl Online does successfully raise awareness of the dangers regarding strangers and the online world. The project highlights the risks of being careless online and shows the consequences of these actions; the ending also shows users the extreme of what could happen if they don’t take care online. Throughout the piece I have included statistics and facts to raise awareness of Internet safety, these statistics will hopefully surprise and shock users - influencing them to take care when online.


I feel that my artefact fits its intended target audience well; young adults will be attracted to the piece through the visual style and connect with the artefact through the relatable protagonist and storyline. I wanted my narrative to be fun and engaging but also educational, and I wanted to do it in a way so users wouldn’t feel as though they were being lectured. I do feel as though Girl Online successfully manages this through the high level of interactivity intergraded into the project; it makes the artefact fun to travel through and explore.


A weakness of my piece would be the narrative. Although I feel it still gets the point across, because of time constraints I had to sacrifice and cut down some of the story, I feel this makes parts of the narrative slightly unrealistic. If I had more time I would include more frames and extend certain scenes, this would make my project more practical and realistic to audiences.


My artefact does suit its intended market and would fit well on a site which raises awareness of Internet safety, such as the NSPCC or NSTeens. From my research I found that most Internet safety games and digital stories were primarily designed for young children, they were typically drawn in a cartoon style and for older children they probably seemed quite patronising in the way they came across. I couldn’t find one interactive narrative targeted at the young adult market. This makes my artefact unique and causes it to further develop campaign media, as it is attracting a new audience in a new and exciting way.

Girl Online sticks to the typical conventions of an interactive narrative, “interactive narrative design combines ludology, narratology and game design” (Dinehart, 2008). I have included elements of ludology through the interactivity of my piece; the user can interact with objects and explore different pathways, discovering and interacting with a range of different content along the way. There is also a strong narrative and themes that run throughout Girl Online, the story develops the further along the user goes. Overall I feel Girl Online is a fun and engaging interactive narrative, successful in both entertaining and educating.


References 

• Dinehart, Stephen. (2015). Transmedial Play: cognitive and cross-platform narrative | The Narrative Design Explorer™. [online] Available at: http://narrativedesign.org/2008/05/transmedial-play-cognitive-and-cross-platform-narrative/ [Accessed 14 Mar. 2015].

Girl Online - Final Project

Here is the final version of Girl Online:

New Learning

Throughout the development of Girl Online I have learnt a lot.

My skills of Adobe Flash have improved a lot, and I have also developed skills of Adobe Photoshop (through photo editing) and Adobe Audition (through sound editing). Looking back at my previous interactive narrative work I can tell that the quality of my work has improved greatly.

Things I've learnt:

• I am more confident in my coding ability. I have learnt various new skills in Adobe Flash through tutorials with tutors and developed my code from previous work.
• I can now edit sound and sound effects in Adobe Flash and Audition.
• I have learnt more photo editing techniques through taking my own photos and editing them in Adobe Photoshop.
• I have learnt how to successfully manage a project from start to finish. Undertaking necessary steps such as user testing and designing prototypes. 

Final Structure

To show the complexity of my project I have included a simple map of my project below. It shows all the frames and how they link. Altogether there are 31 frames.

Improvements made from User Testing #2

Bedroom Scene:

It was commented that the bedroom looked too neutral and the user couldn't tell the character was a girl. To correct this I added a heart poster to the wall, just to hint to the user that this is a girls bedroom, I didn't want to add too much and overwhelm the user so I feel a simple poster works well. 

Diary Scene:
Feedback received was that the diary scene looked jumbled - there were too many arrows and the user got confused. Also one user commented that the sliding content over the book looked strange. Changes I made were to add a 'cross' instead of a back arrow, to symbolise the closing of the diary and dots that symbolise the turning of a page. I feel this works a lot better and now users will understand how to navigate. I also made the book fixed so the content no longer slides over the book.

Phone Scene:

Comments I received on the phone scene were that users were overwhelmed by the amount of buttons on the phone (they also didn't understand why some of them worked and others didn't) and again they didn't like the use of the arrow as a back button. To correct this I edited the phone so only active buttons were shown, I also changed the arrow to a cross like for the diary scene. I feel this makes my piece coherent and helps with user navigation.

   

Button Changes:

It was mentioned during user testing that users thought I should make my buttons more obvious that they were links. From this feedback I changed the look of my buttons - I added a boarder and made the background colour change when hovered over. This should make navigation easier and it also makes my project look more tidy and professional.

Final Scene:
The final improvement that was mentioned during user testing was that some users didn't quite understand the relevance of the last scene - after the confrontation between Charlie & the female protagonist the scene cuts to a phone and a voice-mail message from the girl's mum. User's mentioned that they felt my project would be more effective and dramatic if this scene was cut out.

Sound:

In terms of sound users mentioned that more was needed. I have corrected this issue and have now implemented sound all through the project.

User Testing #2

For my second user testing I decided to conduct a focus group. The focus group comprised of four third-year students from the University of Hertfordshire. I let them play around with Girl Online, asked them a series of questions and listened to their feedback.

Here is the Girl Online file my focus group viewed:

________________________________________________________________________________

Feedback

Question asked: How easy is the navigation through Girl Online?
Feedback:

• Overall users were happy with the navigation, they liked the different pathways and options they could pick and said it kept them interested - they also said it made them want to explore the piece again and again.
• There were a few issues they noted with the navigation which they explained futher down.

Question asked: Did the interface react as you expected to your input?
Feedback:

•  Yes, users all agreed that the interface did what they expected it to. They noted that they particularly liked the beginning where they could enter their names as it added a "personal touch".

Question asked: Did its appearance communicate its function clearly to you?
Feedback:

• On the phone scene there were too many images, users were confused on where they could go and what they could click on.
•  They also said that the diary scene was puzzling as there were many arrows, they said they were unsure on what arrow did what.

Question asked: What do you think of the visual style of Girl Online?
Feedback:

•  All participants said they liked the visual style - they noted that the collaging was fun and interesting and they liked the simplifying of images.
•  However, it was noted that in some places the visual style was different (for example - buttons and links sometimes looked different on different pages). They said that this caused my project to lack consistency.

Question asked: What are you opinions of the sound in Girl Online?

Feedback:

• All users agreed that more sound was needed - sound effects to add interest but also ambient sound to set the scene and mood.

Other feedback received:

•  Bedroom scene "lacked interest" and it was mentioned that users couldn't tell the gender of the protagonist from the bedroom - it was only until they opened the diary that they knew the main character was a girl.
•  End scene of voicemail & phone looked a little out of place and one participant mentioned that they "didn't understand the relevance" of it. Participants noted that it would be better to get rid of the scene and leave the ending on a cliff-hanger.

Coding: Memory

Another piece of code I wanted to incorporate into my project was memory. I wanted the artefact to remember the users name and then use this information throughout the piece. I remembered that in second year we learnt how to code memory and preferences so I referred back to my old work.

I managed to re-create memory in my final project, now the user can enter their name at the beginning and the artefact will remember it. Throughout the piece the users name will be displayed. I feel this brings in a level of interactivity and connects the user to the piece.

Below is the code in action:

Hitting Problems!

My original plan was to have the user able to interact on the mobile phone by typing in words, these words would then trigger a reaction on the phone from 'Charlie'. Resulting in a conversation that the user would be involved with.

However, I found that doing this was near impossible and very time consuming. I managed to code one 'trigger' word, but found that the user would have to type in the exact word and spelling for it to trigger correctly, this may cause users to get stuck on that certain part. So I decided to change my tactic and instead use buttons.

Although buttons are not as effective, they are 100% more reliable. Users now choose their path by selecting the option they want. Below is a picture of my buttons in action:

Even though I would have liked to have stuck with my original plans it would have taken a lot of time (pushing me behind schedule) and also would have also jeopardised the reliability of my project. I am happy with my overall decision to change this part of my project, and I feel the design change doesn't compromise the project too much.

Sound

My project has various sound effects throughout. For a lot of the sound effects I used royalty free music (found on FreeSound.org and Youtube) and manipulated the tracks.

Making my own sound
I used Adobe Audition to manipulate sound. Using this program I could add various tracks together, record my own sound and ajdust the volume, tempo and various other options. Below is a photograph of my sound in Adobe Audition.
Importing sound into my project 
Once I had my desired sound I then added it to Adobe Flash. I added music to both frames and buttons. The photo below is of my sound on a button, as you can see I made it so the sound would work when the user hovered over it, but when hit the button would stop the music.

I used a Republic of Sound tutorial to help me understand how to manipulate sound.

Republicofcode.com, (2015). AS3: Sounds. [online] Available at: http://republicofcode.com/tutorials/flash/as3sound/ [Accessed 27 Apr. 2015].

Sound Research: The Empty Kingdom

One project that I looked at to get inspiration for music was The Empty Kingdom by Dan Goodbry.

The Empty Kingdom uses minimalistic sounds which I really think is effective. The sounds of nature can be heard throughout the piece but get louder when the character is outside and quieter when the character is inside. There are subtle sound effects throughout - such as the rushing of water when the character is by the river but these sounds come in gradually, there are no abrupt or sudden sound which I think makes the piece very soothing and satisfying.

Sound Research: Hollow Documentary

Another project that I looked at to get inspiration for music was http://hollowdocumentary.com/

 

Hollow Documentary use continual sound throughout, when the user scrolls through the piece the music develops and more sounds get introduced. I feel this is effective and makes the user want to continue exploring the piece. They also use sounds on buttons and links when hovered over to symbolise that they are click-able.

Daniel Goodbry Tutorial: 1st April 2015

Today I had a tutorial with Daniel Goodbry regarding the coding for my project.

I wanted to know how I could trigger an animation when it was on a certain part of the screen. With Daniels help we manged to code an example that I could then re-create within my own project.

Code used:
addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, checkHit);

function checkHit (e:Event):void{
if (scroll.anim1.hitTestObject(hitChecker)){
scroll.anim1.play();
}
if (scroll.anim2.hitTestObject(hitChecker)){
scroll.anim2.play();
}
}

Tutorial Example:
Use the arrow keys to move the boxes.
The red boxes animate when they are moved across the blue line.