Research and Comparisons
Before we could start production on this interactive video, we had to research how to do it and how others have created similar content in the past in order to get a good idea of how we could execute it to the highest standard. The research also proved as inspiration for our own project because they each had unique creative concepts.
We discovered many games which incorporate the idea of ‘choose your own adventure’ into their narratives, these games we thought captured the essence of the concept much better than a video could since the user can have a lot more control and ultimately more freedom to take the character on the adventure they would like. One of the games we found that did this well was: “Detroit: Become Human” released by the developer Quantic Dream[13].
Within the game, you control multiple different characters within the same city, seeing how each of their lives differs. However, throughout the 85 unique endings the game offers, some endings allow each character to meet each other and help one another, linking each story together.
Detroit: Become Human was released in 2018, originally as a PlayStation exclusive game. Since its release, it has sold over 5 million copies over multiple platforms. On the platform Steam, the game has received a “Very Positive” review score, as 90% of users recommended the game to other people, despite being released 2 years later on this platform[14].
Another game we found that explores this ‘choose your own adventure’ concept well is: “The Henry Stickmin Collection”[15]. This is a great example since it is not only low budget, but it also has a more streamlined story, meaning it is less complicated to execute whilst still giving the user options to choose how their own adventure goes. This also approaches the concept differently compared to the other games of this nature, as humour seems to be the key feature behind the majority of the choices in the game.
One of the highest budget and possibly the most well-known examples of the ‘choose your own adventure’ concept is: “Black Mirror: Bandersnatch”[16]. This feature-length film was produced by Netflix in 2018. There are hundreds of branches you can go down in the movie, taking the character down various rabbit holes in the plot. The film was highly praised by fans and critics alike for its incredible attention to detail and storyline
Markiplier has been producing content on YouTube since early 2012 and has grown a large following from all over the world (as of March 2021, he has 28.7 million subscribers). As his fan base grew, he began to tailor his content to what his followers wanted to see. Markiplier first released a “choose your own adventure’ video in 2017 titled “A Date with Markiplier”[10] which was one of the first items of “YouTube Original” content to be produced by the platform. This video was a huge success and since release, has accumulated a view count of over 19 million. After the widespread support this mini-series received, YouTube reached out again and went on to produce an even higher budget ‘choose your own adventure’ production titled “A Heist with Markiplier”[11].
“A Heist with Markiplier”[11] was a huge success on release and is still a fan-favourite in his community. The like, dislike ratio is currently about 75:1 and in the introduction, there are over 57,000 comments left by fans.
In 2019 Parrot Analytics carried out a study, showing how the series did compare to other big TV series within the United States[12]. This article illustrates that the audience demand was 1.5x higher than the average TV series, and marked in at the 78.8th percentile in the reality genre.
Target Audience
Target audience was a big talking point when we were discussing what ideas and themes we wanted to go with. At first we discussed if we wanted to make it “family friendly” and for kids, as there is a very large audience for this type of content. However, we decided that this would be too difficult to do, not only due to us not knowing how to properly engage with this audience, but also we would not be engaged ourselves making this type of content. We felt that to produce something of good quality, we would have to have fun making it, and be able to personally relate to the content.
This led us to set our target audience to students and other people similar to our age (18-25). This would allow us to create engaging content whilst still retaining a consistent level of professionalism. Being constantly around students allows us to understand not only their humour, but also what they engage with plus content that they return to on a day to day basis. This will allow us to focus our story on these elements, and think about features such as mature language, humour and discrete but powerful messages embedded into the project.
Uploading Techniques
How we uploaded different content to different platforms
We decided that Instagram would be uploaded with images and short videos, as this is the resolution that the interface was designed to thrive on. Also, videos would be uploaded in 1080p. This is because mobile phones screens are (usually) not 4K, therefore 4K video would be wasted here, increasing file size and upload times for no reason.
Instagram Reels/YouTube Shorts
These will be uploaded in 1080p and in the orientation portrait. This is suitable as they are short videos.
YouTube
YouTube is a platform that is widely used across multiple devices such as PC’s, mobile devices and tablets. Therefore, even though many people can’t support 4K resolutions due to 4K monitors being quite expensive, this still slightly increases the quality of 1440p and 1080p, as it downscales from 4K. This will give the viewers the best viewing experience, and support people who have 4K monitors.
Comparisons
Subjective comparisons between the work we produced and the content we researched
Markiplier
A Date with Markiplier; A Heist with Markiplier
Comparing our work with Markipliers, there are clear similarities and differences. One similarity is how the viewer progresses through the story, as Markiplier also uses YouTube cards at the end of his videos. These videos (except from the first) are also unlisted, stopping people from skipping parts of the story, or accidentally starting half way through a storyline. Another similarity is the starting video’s success. Markiplier's first video has countless more views than the other storylines, which is a similar situation to ours, even though it is on a significantly lower scale regarding viewership. Our main video managed to gather 170+ views within the first 5 days of being published, whereas our other videos afterwards trail with the highest being “Wake Up” with only 60 views.
One difference that we spotted is viewership. This was never going to be close due to us being a newly founded group, whereas Markiplier already had a massive fan base due to his large amount of uploads and already established fanbase. However, despite this, we still managed to gather a large amount of views within a small timescale, showing that people engaged with both the social media pages, and shared the video with others indicating that they enjoyed the content that we have created. Another difference that we noticed was the difference in budget. Due to this, Markiplier was able to create a large amount of content for his interactive video, having 31 endings compared to our 5. Even though we wouldn’t have had nearly as many, we did restrict ourselves to minimal endings and decisions due to poor time management.
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Games
Henry Stickmin Collection; Detroit: Become Human
Comparing our work with the Henry Stickmin Collection, there are mostly differences as the Stickmin collection mostly runs off of small references to other popular games and movies, whereas ours was not. However, there are elements that we took inspiration from, for example the sleep ending. This ending was purely meant for comedic effect, whilst also being very short and straight to the point, following the format of each decision in the game.
Comparing our work with Detroit: Become Human, the biggest similarity is the simplicity of both. In both productions, the viewer gets 2 choices that appear on the screen, and depending on which choice you choose, they are led down different paths. A big difference is that Detroit: Become Human’s storylines have much more depth to them, and provide a stronger message to the viewer.