Late addition of two workshops for June 21st:
Learn the Basics of Writing Branching Narratives with Yarn Spinner – Paris Buttfield-Addison
This workshop will teach attendees how to use the free, open-source interactive narrative and game development tool, Yarn Spinner. In 90 minutes, you’ll learn how to write stories in …
more ...A few updates:
Last year we had online workshops Friday afternoon and in-person workshops Friday evening. This year, the schedule has worked out differently: all our workshops will be online. The first set will be Saturday, June 8th; the second set will be the Friday afternoon of NarraScope (June 21st …
more ...The Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation education committee is pleased to announce that in addition to the education-centered programming that will take place the Friday before NarraScope begins, there will also be a day of online workshops on Saturday, June 8.
These workshops will help kick off a game jam that …
more ...Time for an update!
First, our heartfelt thanks to everybody who has donated money to support NarraScope. We know that it's been a bumpy ride. For a while there we weren't sure whether we had enough to run the event at all.
We are happy to say that question is …
more ...We are excited and delighted to announce our keynote speaker this year will be Nat Clayton! Nat is a long-time game designer and former journalist, most recently known for the level design on Inkle's A Highland Song.
We look forward to letting Nat bring us into the NarraScope conversation for …
more ...The schedule page for Saturday and Sunday is now complete. Take a look!
Friday workshops are still being worked out. Like last year, we intend to have a program of remote workshops for online attendees and a (separate) program of on-site workshops. Both sets will be free for registered attendees …
more ...Registration for NarraScope is now open!
Here's more info on the event venue, travel, and hotels. Also our COVID policy, which is pretty much the same as last year.
A couple of things:
First, we are charging for online registration this year. That's just how the finances work for our …
more ...Greetings, narrative-gaming folks, friends, and family! We are delighted to announce the fifth NarraScope conference – at our most appropriate venue yet.
NarraScope 2024 will take place June 21st to 23rd at The Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, NY. We hope to see you there, if you can make …
more ...We've posted the schedule for Friday workshops!
Please note that there are two groups of workshops this year. Friday afternoon (US Eastern time) will be a sequence of online workshops:
Assorted news:
The CDC has updated its COVID vaccine guidelines. Nothing much has changed if you’re already up to date. (“Up to date” means you’ve gotten the bivalent booster.) However, if you’re over 65 or are immunocompromised, you are eligible for a second bivalent booster. Booster effectiveness …
more ...Here we are, two months out from the first in-person NarraScope since, well, the first one.
As we said at the beginning, all of NarraScope’s talks will be streamed live and will remain viewable after the conference. We don’t want to disappoint our remote participants.
But -- we also …
more ...We are pleased and delighted to announce our keynote speaker for this year! Brianna Lei will kick off our annual conversation in June.
Brianna is the author of the visual novels Butterfly Soup and Butterfly Soup 2, high school dramas about gay girls playing baseball and falling in love. The …
more ...Registration is now open for NarraScope 2023.
Both online and in-person options are available. Online is free! In-person costs money, because we have to cover space and lunch costs. (But we have low-budget options if you need them.) See the registration form for prices.
Want to know what you're getting …
more ...A quick note that we're still looking for talks for NarraScope 2023! Anything to do with narrative games and interactive fiction. Discussions, analysis, storytelling technology, connections to other storytelling communities – whatever you've got, we want to hear about it.
The submission deadline is the 20th; this is your final-week reminder …
more ...Greetings, narrative-gaming folks, friends, and family! We are delighted to announce the return of NarraScope — now in hybrid form.
NarraScope 2023 will take place June 9th to 11th at the University of Pittsburgh in Pittsburgh, PA. We hope to see you there, if you can make it! But we know …
more ...With the conference just a few weeks away, we'd like to drop you some updates and ask a few questions to help us make this the best NarraScope since the last NarraScope.
We've received feedback from a few attendees about potential snags concerning accessibility at the conference …
more ...Registration for NarraScope is now open!
We're going to be on the Gather platform this year. This means a small fee for registration. Please contact us if this is a problem.
Donations will first go to cover platform costs and other NarraScope event expenses. Of the net revenue above that …
more ...Do you have a narrative game that you'd like to show at NarraScope 2022? We have a limited number of spaces available in our virtual conference hall for developers, designers, hobbyists and anybody else who has a game they'd like to show. If this applies to you, please check out …
more ...Greetings to you, narrative games fanatics!
Over the past months as the pandemic has raged, we have received many questions and requests for updates about NarraScope. When will NarraScope return? Will NarraScope return? What is the committee’s favorite sea shanty? The time has come to provide at least some …
more ...We're sorry to announce that there won't be a NarraScope conference this year. (Online or in-person.)
You might already have guessed, since we haven't posted a call for talks. Usually we have that up by the end of November.
The fact is, NarraScope 2020 was a lot more work than …
more ...As of March 12, NarraScope 2020 is an online-only conference.
This is sad news but probably no surprise. Many universities in the US have announced that they will switch to online classes for the spring semester, and have cancelled all large on-site events. Yesterday, UIUC announced that decision for their …
more ...Like everyone else on the planet, we're paying close attention to the spread of COVID-19 (aka SARS-CoV-2 or the "novel coronavirus").
UPDATE: As of March 12, NarraScope is an online-only conference. See this post.
(Original post below. The following information has been superseded.)
As of March 7, NarraScope is still …
On Friday evening, GDC announced that their conference is "postponed". They'll try to do an event later in the summer, but everyone's plans for SF in two weeks are drifting smoke right now.
This is a tremendous disruption and disappointment for everybody involved -- attendees, indie devs, speakers, event volunteers, corporate …
more ...Narrascope 2020 will be held this year on the University of Illinois campus in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois.
The conference’s campus host is Playful by Design (PbD), an initiative of Informatics Programs. PbD is the U of I’s interdisciplinary games and gaming community, which coordinates academic game studies and design …
more ...The registration page for NarraScope 2020 is now open. It works pretty much the same as it did last year. Here are the highlights:
The event is limited to 500 attendees. The venue rooms only hold so many people.
This year, registration stays open until May 22. That’s just …
more ...We are delighted to announce our keynote speaker! Xalavier Nelson Jr. will kick off NarraScope in May.
Xalavier Nelson Jr. is an IGF-nominated game developer, writer, ex-PC Gamer columnist, IntroComp organizer, and MCV Rising Star. You might know him from his work on Hypnospace Outlaw, SkateBIRD, Can Androids Pray, or …
more ...Our Call for Proposals closed last weekend, with a final tally of more than 100 submissions! We are so excited by how many potential talks, panels, and discussions we received. Huge thanks to everyone who submitted! We are working hard to look over the proposals and we hope to announce …
more ...The NarraScope planning process continues! We've just posted a call for proposals for talks and panels.
The details are all at the "Call for Proposals" link above. We're looking for cutting-edge discussions about adventure games, narrative design, interactive fiction, and anything else that falls under our umbrella. NarraScope represents a …
more ...Save the date! We are very excited to announce that NarraScope 2020 will take place May 29th to the 31st, at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, IL. Stay tuned for more information about the call for proposals, accommodations, and registration.
Today we’re also announcing the NarraScope podcast, Through the …
more ...We threw a wing-ding, all right!
NarraScope 2019 came out better than we could have dreamed. No, strike that: NarraScope was exactly the conference I dreamed of. But you don't expect your dreams to work out perfectly.
This weekend, mine did. I'm still floating.
I have many thank-yous. Thanks to …
more ...With the end of conference registration only two weeks away, we want to make sure we have all of our volunteers lined up for NarraScope. Will you be one of the them?
What does a volunteer do?
Show up at MIT on the weekend of June 14-16 and help out …
more ...We are delighted to announce our keynote speaker! Natalia Martinsson of Killmonday Games will kick off NarraScope in June.
Natalia is an illustrator, animator, and the designer of indie hit Fran Bow and the upcoming Little Misfortune. Together with her partner Isak Martinsson, she creates adventure games with a sparkling …
more ...NarraScope registration is still open, but please be aware that Friday, May 17 will be the end of the registration period. You have four weeks left to sign up, or live with regret forever!
We will not have at-the-door registration.
We hope to work out late registration (and even at-the-door …
more ...Because I miss you all and want to see you.
Maybe that's not the whole reason. (Maybe it's just 27.5% of the reason.)
I've spent a lot of years in what I used to call "the interactive fiction community". It was never the only such community. A lot of …
more ...The IFTF Education Committee (EdCom), is excited to be hosting three workshops at NarraScope on Friday June 14. Early sign-in begins at 6:30 pm in MIT building 32 (the Stata Center). The hour-long sessions will start at 7:30 pm, also in building 32.
All workshops are free for …
more ...Some more tidbits from NarraScope's schedule...
Chris Klimas on "Twine: Past, Present, Future". Chris invented Twine, so he can talk about it.
Cat Manning on "Writing Within the Lines: Designing IF Without Scope Creep". How to write small; what to drop from your prototype.
Mike Spivey on "Mathematics Through Narrative …
We've outlined the schedule for NarraScope, but we haven't said much about what will be on the program.
Time to leak some more exciting rumors! Let me dig into our confirmed program list...
Ian Thomas (Talespinners) on "Making Horror: Hacking the Brain In Games". Getting into the player's head and …
The registration page for NarraScope 2019 is now open.
That’s the news! But there are a few more things you should know.
The event is limited to 500 attendees. The venue rooms only hold so many people.
We expect registration to sell out well before June. There will be …
more ...A quick note to say that registration isn't open yet! No, that's not interesting. But registration will be open later this week! See, that's interesting.
We have an amazing program coming together. Not to burble too much about our own event... but this is going to be a fantastic conference …
more ...The NarraScope planning process continues! We've just posted a call for proposals for talks and panels.
The details are all at the "Call for Proposals" link above. But to sum up: we're looking for cutting-edge discussions about adventure games, narrative design, interactive fiction, and anything else that falls under our …
more ...Six months ago, we waved around the idea of hosting an interactive fiction conference in Boston. Then -- six months of silence.
Surprise! We still exist!
...Apologies for the delay. Nailing down a venue turned out to be a more protracted and painful process than we expected. It's still not entirely …
more ...