Multimedia Design from the Perspective of Embodied Interactive Narratives

Abstract

The integration of narrative design and multimedia design has become a major trajectory in recent developments within the field of digital art and design, marking a shift from technology-driven production toward experience-oriented creation, and from visual centrality toward contextual and situational participation. This integration not only extends the typological evolution of exhibition-based works, but also serves as a critical path through which contemporary creators articulate concepts, generate affective resonance, and construct mechanisms for audience engagement. Especially under a cultural condition that increasingly values interactivity and immersion, the dynamic coupling between narrative and multimedia design has emerged as a core issue across disciplines such as digital art, interactive design, and exhibition curating.Since the 2020s, the rise of AI-generated content (AIGC) has exerted a profound influence on content production processes, modes of expression, and even the authorship paradigm. On one hand, AIGC has significantly enhanced the efficiency of content generation, leading to an unprecedented explosion in the quantity and diversity of virtual media modalities. On the other, audiences now expect more sophisticated narrative engagement within immersive cultural environments. Faced with the dual pressures of content oversaturation and experiential fatigue, multimedia design practices reliant on a single-mode virtual narrative have begun to reveal their limitations in both effectiveness and participatory appeal, falling short of audience expectations for embodied, site-specific, and resonant forms of expression.Against this backdrop, Chapter 1 of this study begins with the concept of embodied interaction, revisiting two decades of theoretical development around key topics such as interaction design, human–technology relations, and material mediation. This forms the basis for an archaeology of knowledge focused on interactive narrative mechanisms. Through a review of landmark literature and representative works, the study defines embodied interactive narrative as a design strategy in which narrative meaning emerges through the affordances of embodied interaction, or through real-world objects assuming partial narrative functions. In such works, the narrative no longer resides solely in text or image, but in the systemic coupling of body–space–object relations, generating what we term a participatory narrative grammar of situation.Chapter 2 presents a multi-layered analysis of three recent, representative embodied interactive works from China, selected for their narrative construction and interactional mechanics. These works not only integrate site-specific spatial contexts and sociocultural settings, but also draw upon traditional Chinese temporal frameworks, including seasonal rhythms and the solar terms (节气). This enables the construction of hybrid narrative configurations across spatial, temporal, and behavioral layers. In these scenarios, audiences are no longer passive receivers of meaning; instead, they become active participants and co-constructors of narrative through embodied movement, tactile feedback, and real-time decision-making. This shift from author-centered to audience-co-constructed narration enhances both the clarity of conceptual expression and the depth of emotional transmission.Building upon these insights, Chapter 3 proposes a triadic narrative framework—Space–Time–Action—as a core theoretical model for embodied interactive design. Within this model, the temporal dimension is articulated as non-linear and collage-based, allowing audiences to reconstruct narrative perception through disrupted sequence and fragmented plots. The spatial dimension takes the form of juxtaposed and experiential layouts, enabling multi-directional narrative unfolding within physical environments. The actional dimension maps audience behaviors onto narrative progression: through interactive gestures and responses, latent narrative nodes are activated, and behavior itself becomes a structural component of storytelling—disrupting the traditional unidirectional logic of “work–spectator” relations.In conclusion, this study aims to offer a referential theoretical and methodological framework for contemporary multimedia creators exploring embodied interactive narratives. It responds to the structural transformations of content creation under the influence of AIGC, while also opening up new narrative pathways grounded in locality, materiality, and interactivity. Such approaches not only deepen audience engagement and on-site immersion, but also signal a potential future direction for the development of narrative-centered multimedia works.

Keywords: Embodied Interaction, Interactive Narrative, Multimedia Art, Interaction Design, Human–computer Interaction, AI-generated Content (AIGC)

DOI: 10.54941/ahfe1007637