Blog Post #5
Plimpton + Unconventional Forms of Interactive Fiction
Throughout this entire semester, we've been looking at interactive fiction and the games that really pioneered the genre and defined what it was. Classic interactive fiction games (especially the ones we've looked at in the past) have typically included the type-in-text command format where the main way you further playthrough in the game was through typing in key phrases that advance your gameplay.
This week, however, we've started to veer away from games that hold the typical format of most interactive fiction pieces. This is especially true with Mr. Plimpton's Revenge. First of all, the game -- which isn't really a game -- takes place on a platform that most would not consider to use: Google Maps. In Mr. Plimpton's Revenge, you explore this map made by Dinty W. Moore with locations specific to the narrative he is trying to tell. It is a charming, and quirky short story told through expanding each layer of a location. The location typically has a description - some lengthy, some shorter - of the author's several interactions with George Plimpton.
Although this post is meant to be about exploring something that is not interactive fiction, I have to disagree with that sentiment. Sure, it is not similar to the type of interactive fiction we've been looking at and discussing in class HOWEVER I feel that excluding it from the interactive fiction genre completely is a mistake. Also, yes, technically this body of work is not fiction -- so I would refer to it as interactive NONfiction. I would argue that a writer could easily make up a story involving geographic locations and plug it into Google Maps just like Moore did with this story.
While a reader does not get to interact with the actual story itself, they get the added element of being able to observe locations on a map and see how that ties into the story. Sure, the story itself isn't interactive but I feel like the ability to play with the map portion at all makes it interactive. You get to look at realtime places where characters in the story have gone and you get to explore graphics such as media of the locations. Google Maps might not be as flashy or technologically impressive as some of the counterpiece platforms we've viewed, but I still think it qualifies under what interactive fiction is at its core.
I really enjoyed looking through Mr. Plimpton's Revenge and thought it was a fun story to read through.
Here's a video of me playing it below (you might have to run flash):
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