Written by Ruby, 2021 Cohort
Interactivity changes the material
Interactivity has been seen as one of the significant criteria to differentiate the traditional and digital media. The communication of specified content is one of the prominent features of storytelling in traditional media. Traditional media, such as books, paintings, and TV, all exclude audiences from the possibility of changing the content. For example, the audiences can’t participate in TV productions. However, the strength of digital media is reflected in its strong sense of involvement. The audiences have the opportunity to contribute to the “creative process”. Players are craving to create various strategies to solve one puzzle. Furthermore, interactive movies allow viewers to create – generate their own unique stories. Interaction is a powerful tool, even traditional media transplanted to digital media gives users a certain degree of participation. For example, by reading novels on mobile APP, users can see comments and highlights on specific sentences from others.
Interactivity changes the experience
When talking about traditional media, we also hear a lot about the term “mass media”. That is because the experience related to traditional media often reaches a massive group of people via mass communication. However, digital media, by comparison, are profoundly different from the former. By adding interactivity to the storytelling, the story can be rendered in a non-linear fashion. Thus, users are allowed to create their own narrative, therefore, forming a unique experience. The magic of interactivity is found in choice-making. By giving the choice to users, designers give them the power to control and alter the narrative.
Interactivity brings immersion
Interactive videos with immersive experience often have some gamified features, such as Wizard School Dropout. It is the interactivity of the game that possesses real-time feedback, bringing the audience into a fully immersive experience. On a similar note, an appealing story needs to engage with the audience. To deepen the involvement, storytelling in digital media also requires showing feedback based on some input from the user.