Exploring narrative interactivity in the digital gaming experience: the case of Stardew Valley

Digital innovators in English have been arguing for some time that “[c]omputer games are texts” and deserving of a place in the curriculum (Beavis et al., 2009, p. 169). It appears that many English teachers agree with this proposition in principle. However, there remains some distance to be travelled before their presence in the classroom is normalised. Where game-based learning has been embraced, the emphasis has mainly been on purpose-created educational games, rather than authentic games of the kind that people play recreationally (Ahmadian et al., 2023, p. 2717). The producers of educational games generally have far smaller budgets and fewer resources than those of mainstream commercial game producers. Expansive story worlds, complex multi-layered narratives and sophisticated game play of the kind found in the most highly developed commercial games still rarely to find their way into classrooms, even for the purposes of discussion.

Experienced educators of Subject English have access to a rich repertoire of theoretical and analytical tools which they draw on to shape students’ interactions with literary texts. Adding to this repertoire by drawing on theories from digital gaming studies, and particularly digital narratology, may support educators to engage more deeply with digital games as texts. This paper describes an empirical case study of a digital game text, which focuses on aspects of emergent narrative creation, dynamic characterisation and text-player interactivity – all aspects with direct relevance to the English classroom. The paper has two interconnected aims: first, to develop a conceptual toolkit for understanding narrative interactivity in digital games and second, to demonstrate the application of these tools through a sustained case example.

As an English educator, literacy researcher, teacher educator and keen gamer I aim to acquaint readers with the conceptual tools I have found most useful in analysing and interpreting dynamic digital narrative games. Section 1 of the paper presents this framework, which brings together elements from gaming scholarship (particularly digital narratology) with transactional theory. In Section 2, this framework is applied through an analysis of interactive narrativity in a specific digital game, Stardew Valley (SDV). The story world of SDV will be described in terms of its affordances for emergent narrative creation, responsive to player interactions. The approach to game play, and to the analysis of SDV emergent narratives through multiple playthroughs will be explained and illustrated. Finally, insights gained from this analysis and interpretation will be presented and implications for English educators will be considered.

The experience of reading conventional literature can take readers into imagined spaces, which is part of what makes reading immersive. In narrative digital games, stories unfold in designed spaces. Gaming scholars frequently cite Carson (2000), a designer who worked across physical and digital spaces. He highlights two important questions which each game must answer for the player: Where am I? And: What is my relationship to this place? (Carson, 2000 n.p.).

Environmental storytelling in digital games refers to the ways in which spaces, and the objects within them, are imbued with narrative potential. Interactivity is one of the key features distinguishing digital game narratives. Narrative interactivity is a form of dynamic story production in which “emergent narratives come into being as a result of the players interacting with the game through the gameplay” (Markocki, 2021, p. 75). Stories unfold as the player mobilises her character to explore the story world, encountering characters and scenarios, seeking out or being presented with challenges, and making choices. One of the key mechanisms for narrative interactivity is choice. Designers create “multiple possible endings for the very purpose of immersing the player/reader as fully as possible in the narratives they present” (Powell, 2020, p. 102). The connection between nonlinearity and choice makes passivity impossible for the player. As Nitsche points out: “Players have to interact in some way with the fictional world” (2008, p. 50).

While the model of “choose your own adventure” is often used for digital games, the term is misleading. English educators associate this term with very simple branching plots incorporated into beginner novels to engage reluctant readers. Interactivity in narrative game play is rarely so simple and can be demanding, subtle and thought-provoking. Suter (2021) takes us into the design thinking involved:

“Random” in this sense does not mean meaningless filler content. It refers to the inclusion of elements that introduce an element of unpredictability. If every choice made by the player has an easily predictable outcome, immersion is subverted. An example 80 Days (2014) is based on Jules Vernes’ (1872) novel Around the World in 80 Days (Suter, 2021). In the role of Passepartout, the player must plan each stage of the journey. Actions and interactions influence decisions made, their consequences and the narrative resources which subsequently become available. Here we see the integration and interpenetration of ludic and narrative dimensions where ludic refers to elements that advance the game play while narrative elements advance storylines and characterisation. Suter advises that: “Ludic and narrative elements should not simply be thought of separately or as one after the other, but should be planned in a networked way” (Suter, 2021, p. 52).

Jenkins views digital games as connecting with “a much older tradition of spatial stories” including the epic, quest and picaresque tale. Suter explains that quests “can transform narrative structures into activities” such as searching, exploring, working through confusion and battling opponents (2021, p. 60). The protagonist’s journey may take on psychological characteristics, “processes of personal growth and maturing,” reflected by designed narrative spaces which evoke inner states (Nitsche, 2008, p. 59). As players navigate game worlds, they create “a cognitive map of the space” (op. cit., p. 227). This map is not simply a set of depicted features of the landscape but the accumulated history of events in these spaces and the affective associations the player-character makes with these spaces and events.

Evocative narrative elements are designed objects that have the potential to influence the unfolding story, depending on how the player interacts with them (Nitsche, 2008). Maps are one category of evocative narrative element in digital games, and can also be found in conventional fiction texts, particularly fantasies. They assist readers/players to orient to complex and expansive story worlds. Portals are another, often requiring the player to complete a challenge to gain the right of entry. Gateways to new, unpredictable and possibly dangerous domains are also found in conventional fiction. These elements can be considered as storying resources provided to the player.

One of the functions of evocative narrative elements is to assist the player to orient to the story in time. Any scenario or event within a digital narrative game can potentially be understood in terms of its history, or backstory. What a player understands about the histories of a game world is a function of how she interacts with storying resources. For instance, the player may observe an altercation and put this observation together with archival documents unearthed in an abandoned building to hypothesise about a history of conflict between two forces.

The “density” of such elements has been identified as an indicator of the strength of the narrative dimension of a game (Nitsche, 2008, p. 229). Discussing a highly interactive narrative game, Marcocki writes:

The experiential nature of gaming has prompted me to reach to a domain of literary theory that centralises the in-process experience of reading. Rosenblatt’s transactional theory has been called the “explanation of how readers respond to texts […] most often cited by school literacy authors” (Dressman, 2001, p. 112). For this reason, I will briefly describe the key elements of this theoretical perspective and gloss over its decades-long uptake in relation to the reading of literature in print. My interest is in the application of elements of transactional theory to multimodal, digital, and more recently gaming, texts.

Rosenblatt (1978) examined the relationship between three elements of the reading encounter: the reader, the text and the poem. She proposed that the text was brought into being through the interaction between the reader and the work of literature (in this case a poem). That is, the text was understood to be a third element that was created anew with each encounter between a reader and a literary work. Rosenblatt was particularly critical of the abstraction of meaning, which lifted it out of a literary text for scholarly examination. To understand emotion, for instance, the reader should:

This is a highly active concept of reading, which strongly emphasises its experiential nature. Rosenblatt also referred to the reader as “a performer” analogous to a musician who brings the text – the musical score – to life by committing to immersion in the reading experience. Consistent with this musical analogy, she emphasised the multimodal nature of reading a print text, which involves the reader:

Rosenblatt referred to the clustering of such associations as the “linguistic-experiential reservoir” (Rosenblatt, 1993, p. 382).

More recently, scholars have extended this perspective to consider experiences with contemporary multimodal and digital texts. Simpson and Walsh (2014) investigated children’s responses to versions of a narrative text presented in conventional print form and on a story app. When commenting on the app, children noted how its various “effects” including music, movement and visual images added more meaning and contributed to their sense of immersion in the story. Drawing on Rosenblatt, the authors proposed the concept of the “multimodal-experiential reservoir” (italics added) to reflect that readers’ resources for experiencing texts include their prior experiences with, and the meanings they associate with, the full array of semiotic modes in texts.

Tactile and embodied dimensions of meaning-making are particularly relevant to the experience of gaming. Some scholars have drawn on transactional theory to consider these aspects of multimodal reading (Whitmore et al., 2004; Marmolejo-Ramos et al., 2009; Mackey, 2011). Shimek (2020) observed groups of kindergartners interacting with nonfiction picture books, noting how their gestures and movements were vital in negotiating the meaning of depicted objects. They noted that:

There are some transactional accounts of gaming specifically. In her gaming study Sanders (2016) drew on a classification of reader response using Rosenblatt’s concepts of “efferent” and “aesthetic” reading, where the former is more analytical and information oriented and the latter is more immersive and emotionally engaged. It should be noted that these are not descriptions of types of readers, as any reader’s stance “may vary in a multiplicity of ways between the two poles” during the reading experience (Rosenblatt, 1978, p. 35). Sanders concluded that playing games in which the protagonist is controlled by the player were associated with experiences of immersion, emotional engagement and the formation of memories which she saw as aligned with the aesthetic stance.

Maine (2017) examined children’s engagement with the digital game Monument Valley which presents an enigmatic puzzle-driven narrative in which the protagonist Princess Ida progresses towards an unknown destination. Following Rosenblatt, she was interested in the transaction “between the reader and the text within a game” (Maine, 2017p. 139). Coming from a literacy studies background, she was particularly interested in whether, and how, the children actively constructed a narrative through their gameplay. Maine observed that children’s stances varied according to their primary interest in either the gameplay or the game’s story world. Two boys, show she described as “story finders” took to documenting their ideas in notebooks, speculating on the protagonist Ida’s motivations, back story and possible future actions. Other children’s repertoires drew more on prior gaming experiences, contributing to a strategic stance. Maine’s study, though small, takes seriously what Rosenblatt (op. cit.) has called the “moment to moment participation” in the reading encounter (in this case, gaming encounter).

To explore the narrative affordances of a digital game using interactive narrative analysis, from a participant perspective, the game Stardew Valley was selected. Several features were considered to make this game suitable. It is an open-ended story world, peopled by multiple characters with whom the playing avatar can interact. It is rated 10 + by the ESRB and therefore can be used and discussed in upper elementary and secondary school contexts. It combines elements often found separately in other games including farming, friend-making, combat, environment shaping, crafting and challenges. It is a long-form game which enables various storylines to unfold over time. Stardew Valley has also attracted critical scrutiny for its underlying social and cultural assumptions and values, thus providing opportunities for diverse perspectives to engage in debate (Kuo and Lai, 2024; Cook and Semaan, 2024).

The premise of the Stardew Valley story world is established by a prefatory scene showing a clerical worker in a generic open-plan office which is visually characterised by uniformity and repetition. Its ice-blue colour scheme will become significant later as the brand colours of the Joja corporation, which can be understood as the primary antagonist in SDV’s story world.

Returning to the opening scenario, a letter arrives from a grandfather bequeathing a farm and predicting that one day the player character will become tired of the daily grind and seek an alternative. The prequel goes on to depict the predicted series of events – the decision to leave corporate drudgery and subsequent arrival in Stardew Valley (the place) at the site of the grandfather’s farm.

In addition to the farm, the SDV world comprises a village, coastal area and mountains with caves where minerals can be mined and monsters slain. The game has a distinctive visual aesthetic. Colour saturation with a predominance of greens and blues evokes natural abundance of farmlands, forests, rivers and lakes. Topography is indicated by steps and stairs connecting different levels of the landscape. The styling is strongly illustrative, reminiscent of picture books.

The term “game time” refers to the temporality of the story world within a narrative game (as distinct from “play time” which is the time gamers devote to sessions of gaming). SDV depicts time through diurnal rhythms of day/night and seasonal changes across the year. Autumn leaves, snow cover and drifting blossoms signal cycles of nature and passing of game time. Sound design is another important feature which cues the player as to changes in time and place. Each season has its own soundtrack, and different locations are also given evocative scores, such as the mysterious ambient sound in the Secret Forest.

The player is faced with a series of challenges, some compulsory and others optional. One of the first of these challenges is to meet every member of the SDV community – in other words to locate and interact with all the non-playing characters (NPCs). Each time an NPC is interacted with, he or she will speak in one or two sentences. These scripts enable the player to begin to build a picture of the personalities of the characters, their roles in the community and their relationships with each other.

One of the means by which the writers of SDV invite narrative participation from gamers is the routine use of the second person when NPCs address the player’s avatar. Examples are:

Although players do not have freedom to respond in their own words, these elicitations can prompt imagining of possible dialogues.

Multiple choice scripts are another means by which the game invites narrative participation. Depending on the narrative context, these response options could be light-hearted or more ethically-based. For instance, when witnessing a senior character experiencing difficult with a task, one of the NPCs says, “It must be difficult to grow old.”. The player is given four response options:

1. I’d rather not think about it.

2. It’s just a different part of life.

3. That’s why we should respect our elders.

4. I’d rather die young …

Progressing in the game can be achieved in a number of ways: by becoming increasingly proficient at a skill (e.g. foraging, mining, fishing); by battling monsters in dedicated locations (e.g. caves, mines, the sewer); and by gaining social capital by amassing friendship points (hearts). Player actions are consequential both in terms of progress and in terms of the unfolding storylines.

Interactions with NPCs are not only a means of progressing storylines; they also feed into the game play. That is, they have both ludic and narrative value. Table 1 below summarises the ludic functions of NPCs in SDV, noting that a character may have more than one ludic role that becomes salient in different contexts of gameplay.

Stardew Valley, in summary, is a dynamic multi-layered digital game in which ludic and narrative dimensions are interwoven. As an extended game, it incorporates multiple storylines and character developments which unfold over game time. These storylines are designed into the game but become available dependent on the gamer’s actions, contributing to narrative immersion.

Participant-researcher approaches which produce detailed case studies are common in digital gaming studies (Kleinman et al., 2019). This involves an iterative movement between game play, documentation, analysis and interpretation. The narratological focus of this case study required me to activate and follow multiple storylines. A key strategy was to create multiple playthroughs of the game. What I am calling a play-through is taking an avatar through the times and spaces of the game world and seeking out actions and interactions which can open various storylines. A play-through takes years of game time in the story world and many hours of gameplay.

Avatar creation involves selecting characteristics from a menu to craft an appearance consistent with the character the player wishes to take in the game (Lange, 2017). Three major play-throughs were enabled by creating different player-avatars (see Table 2). To provide a deeper sense of different worlds in creation, I also chose different environments for each avatar’s home base.

For the purpose of this analysis, and because of personal preferences in gaming, I took a maximalist approach to interactivity in each playthrough. This meant that when my avatar encountered a character, I often chose to interact.

Documentation of game play took the form of screen shots, taken at key moments and interactions. These screen shots, numbering 475 at the time of writing, froze the play at moments of space-time. Screenshots were stored in files created for specific characters and topics. Each character folder contained snapshots of that NPC’s interaction with each of the player’s avatars. For instance, the “Alex” folder contained Alex-Susan Mary, Alex-Nick and Alex-Meenie interactions. Because of the branching nature of the interactive narrative, this enabled the reconstruction of multiple divergent narratives featuring particular avatars and characters.

Gamer-participant inquiry is inherently dynamic and emergent. In SDV (as with many other narrative games) qualities of characters are revealed gradually and interactively. It is necessary to commit to sufficient play time to enable insights to be gathered. A point arrived when I had experienced sufficient interactions and cut scenes to enable me to describe characters beyond initial impressions. At this point, I employed a system of categories of digital game characters based on a continuum from the least to the most fully realised (Aarseth, 2012). The lowest level is the bot. These entities are given a limited repertoire of actions and are given formulaic linguistic expressions. Shallow characters are described as having “individual appearance, but little personality” while deep or “round” characters are closely linked to the narrative dimension (Aarseth, 2012, p. 132). Discussing this distinction, Aarseth draws on the literary theorist and author E. Forster (1927) who links characterisation and plot. From this perspective, shallow or “flat” characters are those that “stay the same no matter what happens to them” while “round” characters “change and develop as the story progresses” (Aarseth, 2012), op. cit.). The results of this analysis are shared below.

It should be mentioned that a primary resource for many players is the Stardew Valley Wiki (Link to StardewvalleywikiLink to the cited article). However, to ensure that my experience of unfolding storylines arose from the game itself, I did not read the detailed transcripts of character dialogue available in the Wiki. That would be like having someone tell you the plot of a mystery before you had a chance to finish reading it. I did use the Wilki to help in understanding and resolving challenges of game play i.e. for ludic rather than narrative reasons.

Initial travels around the Stardew Valley world reveal the existence of a number of abandoned, ruined and dysfunctional objects. These include the remains of a farm building, a non-operational mining cart system, a bus and the ruined former community centre. As evocative narrative objects these help to create the story world’s history, suggesting that the community was once thriving. Character interactions reinforce this sense of fallen fortunes. For instance, Willy the fishmonger tells the player:

The community centre is the primary nexus of this story, symbolising the past strength of the community and holding the potential for its revival, conditional on the player accepting the challenge. As such it connects the ludic and narrative dimensions of the game.

A cutscene triggered early in game play reveals this double function. The player is invited into the abandoned building by Pelican Town’s mayor Lewis who bemoans its fallen state. Tiny creatures appear which subsequently turn out to be magical “Jumino” which progressively repair the broken infrastructure as the player completes challenges or “bundles.” Completion of the final bundle sees the community centre restored to its former glory and result in the player receiving praise and reciprocal rewards.

The divergent storylines which open from player decisions in, and about, narrative spaces are key to the multilinear narrative quality of SDV. For instance, as discussed below, the player can take an alternative path to restoring the community centre, a decision which if taken will result in its destruction and replacement by a warehouse. This will be explored below in relation to the transgressive playthrough.

The narrative landscape of SDV has been described as presenting an idealised vision of rural utopia (Mackay and Roberts, 2025). Lush green pastures, waterways teaming with fish, tidy town streets and gardens and quaint buildings support this impression. However, the environment also includes areas that show signs of disorder and neglect. A sewer outlet releases a stream of green sludge onto a small beach onto which litter had been scattered, as if thrown from the cliff above. It is this cliff edge which serves as the stage set for an NPC’s binge drinking session, which reveals the extent of his depression. Coming across these signs of disorder and neglect can prompt an interpretive shift, away from viewing SDV as a bucolic rural idyll to a community which pushes its problems to the margins. By setting cut scenes in a range of locations, the player is invited to consider some of the less ideal aspects of life in the Valley, including poverty, mental health struggles and marginalisation.

In digital game narratology, the evocative narrative object (Nitsche, 2008) is a flexible concept that can refer to an “actual” object in the game world (something that can be found and handled by a character), ancillary elements such as maps, or even signal events, such as a storm. For brevity I will use the acronym ENO to refer to these items. The narrative design of SDV introduces a number of ENOs at different points of storylines, depending on the player’s actions. Or, an ENO may be present from the outset, but its significance may only be revealed later in game play, again dependent on the player.

An example in SDV is a dog kennel which stands in a small fenced enclosure between a house and the saloon. At certain times of day in game time, the character Alex will be seen standing near the fence looking toward the kennel. However, a dog is never seen. Early interactions with Alex reveal him to be a boastful, sports-obsessed and apparently shallow person: his language is full of “I” statements e.g. “I’m pretty dedicated, aren’t I?” There is a disjuncture between this arrogant character and the pensive looking person standing by the kennel every day. The story that sparked in my mind was that the empty kennel signalled a loved pet which had died.

If the player has amassed enough friendship credits with Alex (e.g. by responding to his requests) and subsequently initiates interaction while he is standing at the kennel, a cut scene will open. In this scene, Alex is talking to a dog which is lying in the kennel. His words appear on the screen a line at a time to be read by the player:

The player’s avatar will then appear in the scene and serve as a listener as Alex explains why he lives with his grandparents. We learn that Alex’s father – an alcoholic who told Alex he was “worthless and wouldn’t amount to anything” – left the family and his mother subsequently died. The resolution to this narrative is expressed in Alex’s determination not to “dwell […] on this stuff” but to “look on the positive side of things.”

The kennel serves as a story marker which the player can attend to, or not, depending on their orientation to game play. Unlocking Alex’s backstory will reveal layers previously hidden from the player, likely prompting an interpretive shift and re-assessment of his character.

Another example of a category of ENO in Stardew Valley is books. “Lost books” are scattered around the landscape, their presence signalled by tiny waving shoots. If the player “digs up” a book, it appears in the library in the form of a book icon floating over the shelves. Clicking on a book icon will open a text box showing the book’s contents, which may be practical tips, snippets of memoir or archaeological information. Some of these texts are written in an imagined Dwarvish language, which will become legible to the player if (s)he collects four scrolls. These scrolls are also ENOs.

Interactivity is an inherent but complicating factor when analysing digital game narratives. Access to information on which to base interpretation of characters is to some extent dependent on player decisions regarding interaction. In SDV, character interactions become richer as the player amasses more “hearts,” or social credits, in the game system.

The complete analysis is presented in the  Appendix. As well as level of character it includes ludic (gameplay) roles, locations, an overview of the journeys of transforming characters and key quotes. This analytical scheme is comprehensive, however aspects of it can prompt exploration of specific aspects of characterisation in digital narrative games.

Certain NPCs are fixed in their location and limited in their dialogue. Examples include a racoon which enters the game following a player’s decision to donate wood. After this time the racoon’s actions are limited to making demands for specific items of food, and granting rewards for the delivery of these items. Some of these bots fulfil the role of sentry or gatekeeper, associated with challenges to gain entry to specific zones.

Although all the non-bot characters in SDV have a degree of personality, some of them are much less fully written than others (though the game developer Eric Barone is continuing to develop characters so their status can change with updates). This category includes magical characters who tend to remain in one place (Krobus the Goblin in his sewer and Rasmodius in his tower). The two child characters, Vincent and Jas, are also in this category, which may reflect ethical concerns about encouraging adult gamers to interact with, even imagined, children.

Round characters are those that reveal layers of their personality and histories as the game progresses. An example of a rounded character is Robin, the town’s builder. Through progressive interactions, the player learns that Robin’s parents did not approve of her choice of career, that she clashes with her partner Demetrius on questions of aesthetics, that she is worried about her young adult son, and likes to dance on a Friday night.

Certain characters in SDV are given a transformative narrative arc, for instance Alex (see above). These characters initially present as unappealing in some way, and thus potentially attracting judgement. If the player chooses to persist in interacting (a course of action which is encouraged by the game’s friendship points system), these characters will either undergo change or reveal aspects previously hidden.

The character of Shane is a case in point. A regular at the saloon, Shane presents as somewhat unkempt and solitary, standing apart from other townsfolk, beer in hand. Initially when approached, Shane responds negatively, saying things like “What do you want?”, “Leave me alone.” If the player decides to befriend Shane by buying him a beer or coffee, he will respond with thanks but will continue to communicate antisocial sentiments.

After enough friendship points are amassed, Shane appears on a small jetty of a lake, offers the player’s avatar a beer, and asks: “You ever feel like […] no matter what you do, you’re gonna fail?” If the player chooses to reflect on the character of Shane, they may conclude that his life has been hard and he may possibly be suffering from depression. If this storyline is off-putting, the player does not have to keep interacting with Shane.

If the choice is to keep interacting, the player will witness scenes which show Shane’s depression getting worse until he reaches a crisis point. Collapsed near the edge of a cliff, he demands of the playing character: “Tell me why I shouldn’t roll off this cliff right now.” Each of the response options provided to the player is life-affirming but reflect different orientations or philosophies. For instance, one states “It would be a sin” whereas another evokes his young niece who “needs you.” This scene closes with Shane asking to be taken to hospital.

This narrative arc was not in the original version of SDV. Lange (2017) reports that requests from the gaming community influenced the game’s designer Barone to further develop the character of Shane:

Other characters whose story arcs connect with social issues are Pam and her daughter (poverty, inadequate housing and a parent’s alcoholism), Linus (social exclusion, harassment), Kent (PTSD following military service) and George (disability cause by industrial accident). It should be emphasised that the revelation of these layers of characterisation is dependent on the gamer’s choices.

One way to understand this kind of interactive storyline is as a form of character testing for the player. The game teaches the player that persistence in interacting with initially unresponsive NPCs is rewarded with access to more of their unfolding story. When a game’s story world establishes an ethical framework, player decisions take on an ethical dimension.

Like most digital narrative games, SDV presents players with choices that become consequential to unfolding storylines. After playing the game once to learn it, and a second time to maximise success, I decided to create a new avatar that would make counter intuitive (to me) choices. To reinforce my freedom to transgress from the game design’s implied ethical basis of action, I named this avatar “Meenie.”

Meenie immediately carved a different path through the story world when I directed her to attain membership of Joja Mart. Because other avatars had avoided going into Joja Mart, it was not until playing as Meenie that I viewed this clinical commercial space in which workers moved rapidly as if on the clock. These workers included NPCs who I had previously encountered in other locations, notably Shane (mentioned above) and Pam, another NPC with a drinking problem. The interpretive possibility arose that the dehumanising work environment of Joja Mart was meant to be understood as an element in their unhappiness and alienation.

The Joja corporation, which can be considered the antagonist in narrative terms, was seeking to expand its control of commerce the Valley. The consequences of Joja membership were both narrative and ludic. In narrative terms, a key part of the story world – the town’s community centre – was transformed into a Joja warehouse in the brand’s ice-blue colours, filled with boxes and with an eery white noise soundtrack. This change prompted responses from characters that further revealed their stance on the conflict between commerce and civics. The disappointment of village elders was clearly expressed in dialogue such as:

• I guess times change, and good things come and go […] Yet I can’t help but feel a sense of loss. (Lewis, mayor)

• This is a sad day for Pelican Town […] The stronger Joja becomes, the closer I move towards bankruptcy. (Pierre, shopkeeper)

While it was still possible to repair town infrastructure, such as the mining cart and bus, by paying currency to Joja’s community fund, these acts were treated as “strange” occurrences. There were no expressions of gratitude or gifts of resources from townspeople as had happened when I directed my other avatars to complete community-oriented tasks.

In ludic terms, this choice released the player from earning key resources through giving service to the restoration of the community centre. For instance, the repair of the bus, which provided access to a new story place, the Cactus Desert, could now be purchased from Joja Mart. In practical terms, taking this option removed the imperative to locate special items and fulfil multi-step challenges. On the other hand, the player now had to maximise spending power through prioritising revenue raising activities such as selling ore, fish or farm products.

Committed to exploring the game further from the perspective of the transgressive player-character, I took advantage of choice options to select the most unfeeling, harsh or dishonest responses to NPCs.

When the NPC Alex states his goal of becoming “the first professional gridball player from Stardew Valley”, the player is given two response options:

1. I believe in you!

2. Wow, you’re really arrogant.

Ignoring my ingrained values, I directed Meenie to choose the second option. Alex responded with restraint: “Hmmph […] I think someone’s a little jealous. I’m out of here.”

Another cut scene involves George, who is elderly and a wheelchair user. After assisting George to retrieve items from his letter box, the NPC Penny comments “It must be difficult to grow old.” Four response options are offered:

1. I’d rather not think about it.

2. It’s just a different part of life.

3. That’s why we should respect our elders.

4. I’d rather die young …

As Meenie, I chose the fourth, despite my personal preference for the second. Penny is shown with a shocked face as she responds:

Because my previous avatars had behaved like good citizens, I was able to compare the outcomes of prosocial and antisocial actions in the game’s story world. There were both narrative and ludic consequences of these actions. In ludic terms, my good citizen avatars earned more friendship points and received gifts and helpful advice which could help progress gameplay. In narrative terms, increased friendship points opened more cut scenes, which unfolded more layers of characterisation. The transgressive choices were not rewarded with points, gifts or advice. On the other hand, I was released from some of the less interesting challenges associated with restoring the community centre.

More than this, I felt different playing as Meenie compared to the good citizen avatars. My resistance to transgressive choices made me strongly aware of my ingrained assumptions about the nature of friendship, civic duty, politeness and accountability. Through the scripted responses of the NPCs to my transgressive actions, I was made even more aware of the values woven into the game. Playing as Meenie, I began to feel judged and excluded. On the other hand, my inner rebel enjoyed the experience, and I found myself identifying more with this independent, freewheeling character.

According to transactional theory, meaning is created in the encounter between a reader and a work of literature. The product of this experiential meaning-making is what Rosenblatt means by “text” (Rosenblatt, 1978). She emphasised that meaning-making (i.e. text creation) happens in the process of encounter, “moment by moment” (1928, p. 28).

Digital narratology scholars explain that narrative games are designed to provide a multi-layered story world, within which gamers travel and construct storylines interactively. In games with a strong narrative dimension, the ludic elements (such as puzzles and challenges) are interwoven with opportunities for storying through interaction with spaces, objects and characters. Consistent with transactional theory, meaning-making within digital narrative games is a continual and dynamic process. Moment by moment decisions are made – whether to follow this path, enter that cave, interact with an NPC – that cumulatively produce storylines, as well as ludic effects.

In sharing my gameplay with Stardew Valley, I aimed to explore how these dual conceptual perspectives can enrich our understanding of digital narrative games and the storying dimension of the gaming experience. To enable this exploration, I created three player-characters and directed them to take different paths through the story world of SDV. I considered the contribution of spaces, evocative objects and interactions with characters to producing my sense of immersion in a story world. Within the game environment of SDV, multiple storylines are possible. This multiplicity is produced through an interaction with the designed affordances of the game, the gamer’s orientation to these affordances, and their decisions in the process of play. By gamer’s orientation I mean whether (s)he is primarily focused on the ludic aspects, the narrative aspects or both (Maine, 2017).

Orientation to the text is considered by Rosenblatt (1978) in terms of two main stances: the aesthetic and efferent where the former is more immersive and emotionally engaged and the latter is more analytical and information oriented. Sanders (2016) found that the experience of gamers was aligned with the aesthetic stance, which she associated with their experiences of immersion and emotional engagement. Interestingly, Sanders found that this was less true of world building games than first person shooter games, which she attributed to the player’s strong identification with the protagonist in FPS games.

It should be noted that Rosenblatt understood the process of reading to involve both orientations:

This perspective aligns well with the experience of playing Stardew Valley which, like many digital narrative games, draws forth the player’s ability to analyse, notice, recall and connect (aspects of efferent reading) as well as to feel, identify and empathise (aspects of aesthetic reading).

A recent survey found that although most English teachers “believe that digital games are legitimate texts to use in English programs”, only 15% had actually used games as a primary focus, and just 33% had used them as a supplement to traditional texts (Gutierrez et al., 2023, p. 5–8). It is hoped that, by demonstrating the complementarity of perspectives from digital game narratology and transactional theory, this paper will encouraged educators to extend the place they offer to digital narrative games, as part of the contemporary landscape of narrative creation. In the section that follows, some suggestions are made for exploring digital narrative games in the English classroom.

“Setting” is commonly taught as one of the basic elements of fiction. However, particularly with younger grades, setting tends to be considered in simple terms as the primary location – the “where” – of the story. Spaces in narrative games are more than stage sets on which stories take place. They are generators of narratives through the interactions of players as they explore and act in designed spaces. This means the concept of setting in narrative games needs to be understood in terms of story world design.

An orientation to a digital story world should provide students with a sense of the evocative nature of designed spaces and awake curiosity as to the narrative possibilities of these spaces. Students need to at least see the visual design of these spaces but ideally experience moving within them as a player. Teachers can introduce students to a digital story world using a set of screenshots of key spaces, or a video of a portion of game play in which spaces are explored. Presenting this material, educators can prompt questions as to the kinds of stories that could take place in such a world.

Intertextual connections to other story worlds, whether in the form of other games, movies and/or conventional literature can also be elicited. Questions might include: Have you ever played/watched/read a story taking place in a space like this? How does your experience shape your expectations?

Maps are common paratextual features in digital games, as they are in conventional novels, particularly in the fantasy genre. Starting with the map provided to the player, which can be displayed on screen or converted to printout, students could begin to imagine scenarios which might take place in different spaces. They could be asked to come up with an overarching quest, that would take the player-protagonist through this narrative world.

In digital game narratives, the more fully written (or “deep”) characters reveal more dimensions of their personalities and backstories with progressive interactions. That is, the more the player-character interacts with deep characters, the more is learned about them. This creates the impression of character development.

Selecting one or several deep characters from the same game, the teacher can prepare one set of materials (screen shots or dialogue transcripts) from early interactions and another set from later in game play. Students could be asked about their impressions of the character from the first set, including whether they would feel motivated to continue interacting with the character. They can then examine the materials from the second set and consider whether their perspective on the characters has changed.

The experience of progressively getting to know a character is, of course, common to readers of conventional fiction texts, as well as to moviegoers. Students could discuss how they felt when a character, or their perspective on a character changed, for instance from dislike to empathy.

Authors of digital narrative games often continue to develop them, including by extending character backstory, actions and dialogue as we have seen from the example of the Shane character from SDV. Interactivity here extends to the broader context of the gaming community, in which stories, characters and challenges are discussed. Game author perspectives can prompt questions for discussion. Students who are gamers could consider which characters they would like to see further developed and why. Equally, those who are readers could speculate on the possibilities for development of characters in novels, if book authors were responsive to readers in the manner of game developers.

A critical perspective on digital games has often been shaped by assumptions about the inferiority of these cultural products compared to traditional literature. I hope that the conceptualisation and analysis in this paper has helped shift readers away from a binary of high/low culture in which digital games are on the low side. Critical analysis of digital game narratives – particularly those that take the form of extended, complex story worlds – can take similar approaches to the critical analysis of conventional texts. By this I mean, we can ask questions about representation, inclusion and exclusion, subject positions and discourses. These matters can be considered through examination of both ludic (gameplay) and narrative dimensions of digital games.

Although Stardew Valley is often considered to embed progressivist values, it has been critiqued for depicting a vision of community in which racial diversity is very little in evidence (Cook and Semaan, 2024). While there is an interracial couple (Robin and Demetrius), and the library’s curator Gunther is dark-skinned, the majority of non-player characters are white. Normativity is also seen in the relative dearth of differently abled characters, apart from George who is wheelchair bound as a result of a mining accident.

Narratives of place increasingly are challenged to come to terms with the impact of colonisation including theft of land, displacement, marginalisation and impoverishment of a land’s original custodians (Addie and Fraser, 2019; Tomiak, 2017). Initial impressions suggest that Stardew Valley simply ignores these histories in favour of an idealised vision of rural utopia (Mackay and Roberts, 2025). However, extended gameplay gives the player access to various materials through which an alternative history might be assembled. For instance, one of the “lost books” describes the Goblin people’s interactions with humans in terms of “centuries of distrust and ill-treatment”.

Critical questions that educators might use to guide students in the English classroom are offered below:

• Are players able to create avatars from an inclusive menu of characteristics (gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, disability, age)?

• Is the cast of non-playing characters representative of social diversity (gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, disability, age)?

• Are positive/exciting storylines and gameplay opportunities equally distributed amongst characters with different identities (gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, disability, age)?

• Do our assumptions about gamers exclude any groups? If so, what impact might this have on participation and skill development?

• How did the residents of this narrative world come to acquire power (including ownership of land/property)?

• Are there dispossessed peoples/beings remaining and if so, what role do they play?

In conclusion, understanding interactivity is a vital element of engaging with digital narrative games and can be approached through the perspective of digital narratology in combination with transactional theory. Narrative game designers create story worlds to hold multiple potential storylines which can be activated through gamer actions. The player’s crafting of her own character and mobilising this character through decisions made in game play is a vital component of story building. These choices can take on emotional, analytical, ludic or ethical dimensions, depending on the player’s stance and the game’s design.