Teaching with Videogames: Creative writing using Twine

In this unit, students deeply explore the features and context of interactive fiction (IF), developing their knowledge of core concepts including the role of the player as audience and how language can be structured and manipulated to achieve specific effects. These effects include the impact of language, devices, features and structure on core concepts of ambiguity, [player] complicity, and word/concept building through the expert use of prose. Students also explore the use of second person narrative perspective which is an important feature of this text type. Students engage with free-to-access playable interactive fiction texts. After deeply exploring, discussing and evaluating the features of these texts and the genre, students plan, develop, build and review their own playable interactive fictions using opensource Twine software.