Aesthetics of Holarchic Narrative Design: Participatory Pleasures of Game Storyworlds

Abstract

Many contemporary video games distribute narrative information across fragmented, optional elements rather than presenting a single, linear sequence. This paper examines this design approach through the concept of Holarchic Storytelling (HS), a narrative system in which players construct meaning by engaging with interconnected yet self-contained narrative units such as notes, recordings, environmental details, or short sub-stories. Based on Arthur Koestler’s holon theory – a part that is simultaneously a whole – the paper argues that these fragments function as autonomous narrative experiences while contributing to the coherence of a shared storyworld.

Rather than framing HS solely as a structural technique, the paper approaches it as an aesthetic system shaped by player activity, emphasising the interpretive labour involved in exploration, pattern recognition, and narrative inference. Situating HS within theories of storyworlds, systemic narrative, and participatory aesthetics, the paper shows how games such as Alan Wake II, Elden Ring, and P.T. mobilise fragmentation and coherence to make interpretation itself a central aesthetic experience.