Loss, Undersea by D. Fox Harrell Web Site

About the Story

Loss, Undersea is a phantasmal media work in which a character dynamically transforms according to undersea metaphors and a narrative poem is dynamically generated according to user-selected emotional tone. The work evokes the poignant pathos of a civilization slipping into the sea, a transforming being losing more and more of herself or himself, and mindless traveling through life as if on a descending platform. Such visions for me capture a sense of dissolution of joy, daily struggle for happiness, and the conflict between the rich mental lives of all individuals and the narrow, prejudicial bureaucratic structures that constrain people to discrete boxes.

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Fox Harrell’s Loss, Undersea is a procedural narrative generated through Harrell’s own platform, GRIOT, which relies on cultural models of narrative to represent deep structures of semantics and allow for a responsive generated story that keeps the same central theme while proceeding uniquely for each playthrough. This system underlies a highly visual interactive narrative with game-like elements, including a playable avatar. The work itself follows a worker in a fantastical undersea Atlantean world through a week of trying to navigate everyday challenges even as the character’s physical self is about to be lost. Throughout encounters with other lost and troubled characters inhabiting the world, the player can make choices that ultimately shape their own avatar’s fate.

Game Details