Virtual Intimacy™ and the Male Gaze Cubed: Interacting with Narratives on CD-ROM

Interactive narratives on CD-ROM have the potential to make us feel more a part of the stories we experience than do either film or print. Yet, as some early offerings in this fledgling genre reveal, the use of subjective camera and the constraints on the user’s interaction with the narrative can conspire to make some readers feel straitjacketed by the text, rather than transported by it. The author analyzes one of these early offerings in depth and presents some alternative possibilities for this new genre.