Chapter 5. Verb Thinking

The greatest obstacle to the advancement of interactive storytelling is the difficulty of verb thinking. This is an unconventional and almost unnatural style of thinking that is, nevertheless, central to understanding interactivity. Verb thinking can be appreciated only in the context of its yin-yang relationship with noun thinking.

Verb vs. Noun

What is the universe? Most people answer this question by describing a collection of objects existing in space. The universe is so many stars, galaxies, planets, and so forth. Our corner of the universe is composed of so many rocks, trees, animals, plants, houses, cars, and so forth. To completely describe the universe, we need to list all the objects within it. It’s an impossibly ...

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