As usual, we don't really have a problem with the fictional; we have a problem with the real. Reality is unsatisfying and scary; fiction about reality fixes those problems. It's much easier for us to navigate reality if we can reduce it to simple, digestible patterns: if our public institutions and our fellow human beings can be flattened into imme

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In Into The Woods, John Yorke suggests that the way we tell stories is indicative of our desire to find order in the world. Stories are an attempt to tame the terrifying randomness that surrounds us. As we go through life, we are constantly absorbing chaotic information that we make sense of through narratives. Yorke writes that “every act of perce

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Alternate reality games dictate what is and is not important in the unending deluge of information — what gets points and what doesn’t. What falls outside of or challenges the story of a given game is not so much disputed as ignored, and whatever fits neatly within it is highlighted.