Interactive Space Rationale

My main idea in this project was for my images to act like a first person activity where they can walk around a house. I also wanted to bring a sense of mystery through using cut outs (doorways) to hide what was coming next, as well as giving the images a dark mood and including quite interesting uses of typography. I am quite interested in this darker style of design and film, particularly animation by Tim Burton. For instance, his dark, gothic style of typography in his work inspires me, as well as a dominant use of black and dull colour tone throughout some of his imagery.



In my first idea/attempt at linking pages, I gave the user total choice of which part of the house to go to. For instance, they would go through the front door, then get a choice of 3 pathways and then 2-4 choices beyond these. I also included links back to the original hallway to carry on the exploration.

I showed this version in my seminar group presentation with Simon, and it was brought up that this was quite confusing and frustrating as a strategy of getting around the pages. It was also mentioned in other presentations that it would be a good idea to give the user a reward for progressing correctly (e.g give my sequence an actual end, rather than just linking in random orders).

I did this by only giving each image a maximum of 2 choice hotspots, so my sequence wasn't too complex or confusing for the user. Although this meant, after the first few pages, my interactive space is quite linear in structure (not many choices for the user to make), I think this was more successful than my previous attempt, as it is more obvious what is needed to progress to the end. I also made sure the end page didn't give a link back to the hallway, but only to "play again" in the corner. I think this was a good way of rewarding the user - by suggesting they have completed the "game", as it were.