Abstract
Games are commonly designed to assist players in their progression, maintaining their attention and motivation until they achieve closure while presenting challenges that need to be overcome to progress. But not all games are designed with this in mind, and players do not always play to progress. When that happens, we call it stalling. In computer games, stalling is when players or the game system try to maintain a particular state, impeding player progression and the game from developing. This chapter explores stalling as an act of players and, alternatively, as an act of the game itself that can be designed or result from emergent behaviours. It presents a model composed of two axes—Player/Game and Transitory/Permanent—that generate four types of stalling: Squandering, Casting-off, Lingering, and Taunting. This model leads to the conclusion that stalling is a legitimate playing tactic and versatile strategy for the design of games. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2025.

Abstract
The interaction between code and language shapes emergence and innovation in computational systems, turning them not merely into a series of connected structures but into narrative spaces. Interactive Digital Narratives (IDNs) are characterized by a tension between the control exerted by the system to engage readers and the autonomy that readers desire over the narrative's direction. This results in a ludic paradox, where the role of the narrative system is to enable and facilitate play while simultaneously being capable of communicating the outcomes of the readers' actions. On the other hand, the reader must be able to participate actively by playing along the system's rules. Based on the notion of interpassivity, which refers to the delegation of the cognitive activity to the object, thus transforming the reader into a passive observer of the system's interactions, this paper aims to explore the interplay between interpassivity and interactivity. As we navigate IDNs, we engage with narratives that challenge and empower readers, that create immersive and enriching experiences, and transform their relationships with the computational system. This contributes to understanding the pleasure of playing and the reader's role. Based on the premise that readers can derive pleasure from automation but also yearn for control over the narrative, we can investigate the playful interaction between humans and machines. This paper will analyze Emissaries (2015-2017), defined by its creator, Ian Cheng, as a video game that plays itself, and where the reader can seemingly only visualize the work. In this case study, we will look for narrative mechanics and the specificity of the medium in which the IDN is instantiated. We will discuss how the computational system actively shapes the narrative without direct reader input and consequently propose a reconceptualization of the concept of interpassivity and its relationship with interactivity.

Abstract

Abstract
Language-guided generative models are increasingly used in audiovisual production. Image diffusion allows for the development of video sequences and some of its coordination can be established by text prompts. This research automates a video production pipeline leveraging CLIP-guidance with longform text inputs and a separate text-to-speech system. We introduce a method for producing frame-accurate video and audio summaries using a virtual timeline and document a set of video outputs with diverging parameters. Our approach was applied in the production of the film Irreplaceable Biography and contributes to a future where multimodal generative architectures are set as underlying mechanisms to establish visual sequences in time. We contribute to a practice where language modelling is part of a shared and learned representation which can support professional video production, specifically used as a vehicle throughout the composition process as potential videography in physical space.

Abstract
Computational media allow the development of very particular relationships with readers. Their nature allows them to register static information but also complex and contingent behaviours that they are capable to operationalise, thus becoming interactive and immersive. These media exist in a dual state between a surface layer and a subface layer. These two are inextricably connected, with the subface often becoming a black box that can only be peered at through surface effusions that both mediate and isolate it. The procedural layer of the subface can be discovered through a process of virtuosic interpretation that allows readers to form a theory of system, breeding empathy with it, and ultimately, transferring some of its processes to their minds. This paper focuses on how virtuosic interpretation is developed, and how from it stems the development of a unique kind of aesthetic experience. It explores how computational media, through anamorphosis and a dialectics of aporia and epiphany, become narrative games. © 2018 Universidade da Beira Interior.All right reserved.