To create a stronger relationship with the Halloween theme, the heritage of the hall, the opera and the videogame, I want to explore the narrative experience and explain how the VR narrative fits within this.
I want to then go on to develop a single encounter with the visitor, in the VR environment that will illustrate an example of how this connection can be made. This single encounter should demonstrate how the game can be developed further to continue the connection throughout the experience.
This single encounter, will be an encounter with Death (not literally you will be relieved to hear) but the encounter with a VR death character, in a room just off the labyrinth.
Real Space Narrative
The visitor has received a mysterious invitation to attend an Opera House on the eve of Halloween.
As they arrive up the long driveway, lined with trees they see signs that read… Welcome, You have travelled far.
The Visitor should be directed to park their car and then proceed to the hall entrance.
The gates of the Hall are hung with playing cards depicting strange ominous characters that relate to the halloween theme or the event and will be later encountered in the Lunarium game. Music from the Danse Macabre can be heard in the distance.
The visitors are met by characters from the Opera, including Don Giovanni (A bad boy of Opera!) and the visitors are advised that they can wanter around the enchanted gardens until they are requested to meet up again at the doors to the Opera House at 12pm.
Among the many tents the visitors can explore is a mystic tent. This is where the Lunarium adventure begins and where Opera meets Videogame. The live actor ‘Mystic’ invites the visitor to take a bite of her toffee apple, the player wanters through a short corridor walled by paper blades of black grass in which the smell of toffe aaple is being piped. One by one a headset is placed on their heads which is shaped like an operatic mask.
As they do so they enter the Lunarium VR App.
Virtual Narrative
As the visitor ‘opens their eyes’ they find themselves in a small virtual room which is similar to the corridor they have just left, they can still vaguely smell the smell of toffee apple, but they now realise they are in a different world.
On the wall ahead of them is a sign that reads.. you find yourself in a strange world. In this room they can try out their headset and controller so that they can get their barings before they start the game. A voice will be heard repeating the mystics words… (so that they now understand that they are trapped and must pay the mystic to return to their own world again).
The player should understand that their objective is to collect coins so that they can ‘escape the mystics world and return to their own’. The coins can be earned by playing games or solving puzzles or simply collected as ‘weinies’ that entice the player around the game world.
Ahead of them is an enter button, which they must pressed to start their journey when they are ready…
The game begins.
The player walks out of the room and finds their selves at the top of a very tall tower. From this viewpoint they can see the whole of the labyrinth. They should be able to understand that they must now navigate the labyrinth to find the access to the fairground arena. As they do so, they may enter three rooms. In one of these rooms is Death.
Death Character
[This is where our Death character enters the game play. It is Deaths purpose to connect the teenage visitor to Opera in a way that is accessible and fun. the aim is to connect to the heritage of the hall (Through Nancy Cunards Poetry), Operatic production, the depiction of Death in Opera, and the teenagers experience of the videogame. The development of the death character and the death room will begin in the next blog post. A 2 week period has been allocated for character development and installation into the game].
Real Space Narrative continued…
After playing Lunarium the visitor will receive a paper card which they can present to collect a real life toffee apple and on which will be an access code to continue their play at home. After exploring the grounds the visitor will attend the Opera House at 12pm. Here they will continue the Halloween experience, meet other actors playing characters from the opera performances, see the props, sets and costumes and hear an orchestra play music from the video game.