Narrative Foundation

Purpose and ownership

Define how authored meaning reaches an audience through voice, order, action and discovery.

Shared thematic/conflict tests, viewpoint, voice, continuity, exposition, revelation and pacing. Novel conventions include tense, distance and narrator reliability. Game conventions include agency, state and discovery order.

Questions

What carries conflict and change? Who perceives and knows what? Which choices change what? How can the audience understand outcomes?

Inputs and outputs

Inputs: Creative Direction and relevant world, setting and lore contracts; game actions/state only where interactive.

Outputs: Narrative contract, voice conventions, revelation/continuity tests and applicable agency rules.

Prerequisites

Relevant shared rules. Coordinate game consequences with Game Design; prose does not depend on game or level rules.

Stability and evolution

Keep stable: Viewpoint/voice promises, thematic boundaries, agency meaning and continuity conventions.

Can evolve: Specific plots, scene order and branch topology are Content and can evolve inside those rules.

Reusable rules

Separate truth, testimony, character knowledge, audience knowledge and simulation state. A novel reveal can occur after the event. A game choice may affect expression, information, relationship, local outcome or global state; do not promise consequences for cosmetic branches. Essential understanding cannot depend on missed optional content.

Acceptance test

Can both a linear chapter and an interactive scene be reviewed under applicable rules without prescribing their outcomes?