Interview | Christine Love on Digital

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Interview: Christine Love on Digital: A Love Story

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Clearly it turned out to be something more than that. Interactive storytelling’s not really something I have much experience with, but, until recently, I only thought of it in shallow terms, like stories with branching plots. And I’ve just never had an idea for a story that had two satisfying endings, so, well, branching plots are out. But I’ve since realised there’s more to it than that: there’s just a whole lot of emotional power in immersing the player in the story by making them interact with it.

RM: I think that’s absolutely key, too: although interaction was minimal, your involvement really drew you into the world. And I think having the setting as “person sitting in front of computer” can’t have hindered that, either. Was that a conscious decision?

CL: Oh, absolutely. That’s why I couldn’t make the idea work without the silent protagonist: if the “player character” had a voice, it wouldn’t have been quite as immersive.

So many mystery games are about watching someone else solve a mystery. But the fun part of that – any mystery story, really – is solving it yourself.

RM: This might sound odd, but the game I was reminded of when playing Digital was System Shock 2. Obviously there are enormous differences. But the development of a relationship with a sentient AI really reminded me of the admittedly hate-fuelled love-hate relationship with SHODAN. Does that make an ounce of sense?

CL: I’m afraid I’ve never actually played System Shock 2! I’ve really wanted to, but the game is unbelievably hard to actually get working on a modern computer, for some reason.

RM: You’ve never played Shock 2! Man! But you’re right: it’s basically absolutely impossible without a hell of a lot of work. Were there any videogame-oriented influences at all on the storytelling?

CL: Uplink was easily the biggest. Definitely Uplink. It’s the comparison I think everyone’s made at this point, and for good reason.

Originally, Digital was going to have way more mechanics directly pilfered from it. Thankfully, by the end, I’d managed to streamline everything but the dictionary hacker out. Which gives the “hacking” you do in it a very different feel, even if it’s obviously doing a very similar thing.

RM: That was going to be my next question, actually – whether you considered deepening the mechanics. Is “deepening” a thing? Anyway, while my initial reaction was to wish there’d been more complexity to the interaction, on reflection I’m glad there wasn’t. It gave the story a chance to really shine. This question isn’t going anywhere. Segue time! Tell us about the ideas behind the story.

CL: Man, that’s a pretty vague question, isn’t it? I’m not sure quite where to go with that!

RM: Okay – broad themes? Characters? I don’t know. Like I said, I am embarassingly and unprofessionally unprepared for this interview.

CM: Basically: it’s a cyberpunk story that’s romantic instead of gritty, with a gay love story and people having incomprehensible family. Also, a fixation with making the computers a little more realistic than in most stories of its sort, unless it’d get in the way of the UI working. Those’d probably be the most important ideas behind it.

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