Transforming Game Narrative through Social Media: Studying the Mass Effect Universe of Twitter

Abstract

This paper explores the world of social media as a tool for interactive narrative in video games. From the perspective of fan fiction, this paper looks at ways games can be transformed through Twitter as a narrative tool. We perform a textual analysis on selected characters’ Twitter accounts drawn from the Mass Effect series. We show a number of findings having to do with how authors balance their character’s identities, Twitter as a narrative tool despite its unique constraints, the mutability of narrative time in this medium, and the ways authors create and navigate impossible situations created because of the conflict between their authorial intent and what occurs in the games. We argue this participatory and interactive form of narrative is a factor game designers must acknowledge and understand as social media continues to evolve and the boundary between consumer and producer deteriorates.