Sydney/Vicki Austin: Do the Uru community a favor and GET LOST.
Sydney, it's time this ended. You may think you are doing something good by getting people to react, but in essence the only thing you are accomplishing is making people uncomfortable. fiery abyss, no one could have a straight conversation with Cate today without you constantly interupting with your storyline. It is causing people to react to you harshly. No one wants you to get lost. But your storyline is abrasive and hostile, and even the Cyan actor has pointed out that WE hate it.
Please read this, this was a review of the original Live, before cancellation:
[spoiler]
Quote:
Improv is Hard
Second point: interactive drama means improvisation, and improv is hard.
A couple of days ago, I ran into a guy named Vormaen in one of the popular Uru neighborhoods. He was, well, preaching to the crowd. His viewpoint was (interestingly) not aligned with either Sharper or the DRC. He seemed to approve of Sharper's vision of a new D'ni world, but not of the dissension that Sharper was fomenting. (Fair enough.)
I don't know whether this Vormaen is a Cyan actor, a player working with Cyan in the storyline effort, or just a player who is enthusiastic about his own chosen role. In this context, that doesn't matter. The interesting aspect is, he wasn't really responsive to what his audience was saying -- and there were a bunch of us replying to him.
Several players expressed the opinion (quite common among Uru players, I estimate) that we don't know enough yet. Neither Sharper nor Watson (nor even Henderson) has given a specific plan for the restoration of D'ni. None of the factions are talking details; they all seem to be concealing their true motives. Nobody inspires trust: the DRC kidnapped a guy, Sharper likes to incite mobs, Yeesha may just be nuts. So a lot of players are holding off, and waiting to see how events develop.
Vormaen didn't seem to accept this. When someone expressed reticence, Vormaen would respond with a generality; he'd say the speaker "didn't understand yet". Or he expressed sorrow that the speaker was under the DRC's sway. "True knowledge comes from within"; "those who are called will sense the truth"; and so on.
(I apologize, by the way, if I'm misrepresenting Vormaen's argument. I failed (again) to log the chat session, so I'm working from memory here. I think I've described the dynamic accurately, though.)
When Vormaen left, my comment was "I don't think he heard a word any of us said." Another player noted, out of character, that we didn't fit into his script.
Which is an excellent point. Vormaen was coming off as, well, as a religious fanatic: not absorbing anything which didn't fit into his worldview. Or, equally: as an actor with a script that didn't include other people. If your task is to wander through the audience and represent a point of view, it's hard to get into a real discussion. How do you engage in an argument when your character is pre-defined as having a particular belief?
Truly interactive drama would have to feature characters who are responsive to members of the audience. Of course, that's hard. (I'm certainly not slamming Cyan for doing it imperfectly. I have no idea how to do it.)
Now, maybe I'm setting up an impossible standard. Single-player adventure gaming has a long tradition of constraining the player to a well-defined storyline -- while still providing the sensation of freedom. (Or, I should say, providing true freedom of action -- but at a lower level, which never seriously derails the storyline.) Perhaps that's the road for on-line multiplayer drama. If so, the arsenal of technique has yet to be developed.
I think I'd better leave that topic for another essay. Possibly an essay written by someone else who knows anything about theater.
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Yeah, I was guilty of the same garbage, so long ago. You are acting out and ignoring everything coming back. You have no direction, no facts, and no play. Acting like anything but yourself brings nothing but misery. Take it from someone who knows. If you are not going to even roll with the ball Cyan JUST handed to you, then don't roll at all. It's time to end this. Cyan seems to not like it, the Explorers definitely do not like it, it's time to play things quietly.
Article source:
http://www.eblong.com/zarf/uru/rj/rev-2.html