Between Storytelling and Storyliving: User Customisation of Virtual Reality Narratives

This chapter explores the notion of ‘storyliving’ that gained traction as a means of describing the experience of VR narratives in 2017, through the analysis of two fictional, scripted VR projects: Lustration (New Canvas 2022) and Fire Escape (iINK Stories 2019). These award-winning works feature a range of interactive devices, such as branching narratives and selectable vantage points of plot action, which encourage the user to tailor their narrative experience. This is achieved through processes of personalisation and customisation that allows the user to actively participate in the process of storytelling. With reference to the System, Process, Product (SPP) model of narrative production theorised by Koenitz (, Interactive Digital Narrative. Routledge, New York, 2015), the chapter argues that the two projects’ interactive devices encourage some measure of ‘storyliving’, and that this occurs alongside the delivery of a fully scripted narrative.