Nearly all the prep work is done and I can get on to Dreamweaver really soon.
Gives me the whole of half term and the 2 weeks after to finish it.
Would like to finish a little earlier, so I can go through it all and double check everything, need it to be perfect.

Header Banners

Different layouts for different parts of the story.

Thought out the story you go to many different locations

• Castle
• Elfish Castle
• Underground Kingdom
• Mage Tower
• Final Battle Area 

For all these locations, i want a different background and colour scheme, something that symbolisms them.
This is a lot better than just having one continuous background, will make it look a lot better.

Castle-

 Background for when there in the main castles, you start here and have the choice to return later on in the game.
Used red and gold because there very royal colours, the gold in the boxes might change, need to see what its like with text.





Elfish Castle- 

Background for when you're at the Elfish Castle, you're only here for a little time but its still a new area, so it needs a new background.
I used dark colours because Elf's are known to originate from forests, so there castle wouldn't be very colourful.  




Underground Kingdom-

Underground Kingdom, where the dwarfs live, like the Elf city, your only here once but a new background is needed.
I chose a dark, dirty wall for the background because you're underground and it would look like that.




Mages Tower-

Mages Tower, made it a smokey blue, to go with the mystery of the Mage.
Like the others, the colour in the text boxes might change, once i see what it looks like with writing in.








 Final Battle Area-

Final Battle Area, I've made it very dark because its a very dark point of the story, the final battle with the great evil.
The background will stay dark if you fall to different the evil but if you succeed, it will turn back into the Castle Layout, royal red and gold.

Background + Layout Tests

Background Ideas

Layout Ideas

 

The look

To get ideas for the look of my site I've been looking through other online gamebook sites,

• http://www.onlinegamebooks.com/
• http://www.ffproject.com/
• http://www.ffgamebooks-online.com/

I've look through most of the gamebooks on all these sites, to see how they layout there stories, going through them will really help me to design mine.

Found this one on Onlinegamebooks.
I like the simplicity of it,  you just have what you need there. The background goes with the theme of the story too and I really like it, its a fantasy adventure, like mine, so its been a big help. I like the extra box on the left, has your inventory and amour in it and the restart button. I don't have to worry about the inventory and amour with my story but i could have some background information about the character you've choose or just about the story but I will defiantly have the restart button there, with stories like this you're bound to go wrong, so having it there helps. 
The one thing that I'll change though is the font size,  there is a lot of space underneath that is not used, just seems like a waste.

Also found this one on Onlinegamebooks.
Its very similar to the one above but a different background and they've join the two boxes together, they defiantly look better separate.
Also the title at the top doesn't go with the whole look of the site, seems very out of place.

Found this one on ffproject.
Like the ones above its very simple and I like this, I don't like cultured websites, they don't look good.
One thing I don't like about this site is the background, plain black doesn't look good, a picture or something would look a lot better, they also haven't through about the colour scheme much, grays and blacks are boring.

Also found this one on ffproject.
I really like this one, they is some problems but that's the same with everything.
What I like is the layout, all the others I've seen have the info on the left, not right, also the picture on the left is really good, some visuals to go along with the story really helps.
What I don't like about it is again the plain background and colour scheme, the picture makes up for not having a background one but it would make it look nicer with one.  Also there is far to much writing, you don't want the reader to get bored before they have to make any choices.

I found this on ffgamebooks.
I hate the look of this gamebook, i picked it because its different from the others but i can't see anything i like about it, the white background is worse than the black, its far to plain and it makes it look horrible, you need a good look or people aren't going to want to go through your story. Designing the look is a big part of it, you need to put time into it. 

Also found this on ffgamebooks.
This one is a lot simpler than the rest and i like that about it, i would still change some things to do with it.
Like I've said about the rest, the background is to plain, a picture will be best but out of the rest of them, i do prefer this one. 

Other forms of interactive stories

They're are many forms of interactive stories,  I've already spoke about Gamebooks and interactive story websites but you can also get interactive story videos. You can find a lot of these videos on Youtube.

Interactive videos are videos where when you're done watching, you get a few options to how you think the video should continue.  Just like gamebooks but with visuals.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9p1yBlV7Ges
This interactive video is called Deliver me to hell- Real zombies attack.
Its a zombie interactive video, where you make choices to see if you can survive and deliver a pizza to a stranded lady.
Its a good video, well made but it takes a while to get into the choices, you get bored of the wait, they should of made it shorter.

Watching this video, I now know, not to write lots between choices. Don't want the audience getting bored.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7gWVA3lts4&feature=related
This interactive video is a anti-knife crime video,  you have the choice to take a knife or leave it at home or join in with the fight or not.  Its a video to make teenagers understand the dangers of carrying a knife and they made it interactive to made teenagers more interested and it made me interested, so it worked.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8rJ1WML60Y
This interactive video is awesome, all about a time machine, you have to travel through time to get away from agents. Its really good, well done and the choices a lot more thought out, its not just 'go left' 'go right'  its whole choices, which makes it more fun.

Elf Rogue Final Design

Peasant Boy Final Design

High Mage Final Design

Dwarven-King Final Design

Human-Knight final design

Peasant Boy

High Mage

Dwarven-King

Elfish-Rogue

Human-Knight Storyline

This is the story part for the Human-Knight, he's the main character, so its a lot longer than the others.
I made this using Bubbl.us but this is just the first draft, I may add more by the time i get to the creating stage.

My Story

(The story is set in different parts, whatever character you choose at the start, you play his or hers story, there will be 5 characters you can choose. The whole story will have multiple paths you can take, you make all the decisions and that will affect the storyline and the ending, you make the story.)

Background

Fantasy story, set in another land, a land where magic, dragons and monsters all exist.  A great threat is destroying the kingdom and it needs to be stopped, the king asked for the strongest fighters from every faction around the land. One from the Elf’s in the north. One from the Mages in the east. One from the Dwarfs underground and the king’s son will take this quest and save the land from doom. 


Inspiration 
I got a lot of inspiration from the video game Dragonage:orgins. A fantasy adventure game, where you pick a race and play through their story, a lot like my story but just not in so much detail. 

Online gamebooks

http://www.onlinegamebooks.com/

This is a website where people can make or join in writing gamebooks and others can view them and review them after.
All stories on there are fantasy based, like my story, so its a big help.

The thing I like the most is the look, its simply but effective, I want this for my site. I like the background picture as well.

This is another story from the website, with a similar look and story but with more detail.
The box on the left, explaining things about the story is a very good idea, I think i will use this in mine, I'll have maybe some background information to do with the story and character your have chosen.






All stories on that website are very similar, I've went through a few of them to get some idea of what I could do for mine, its been a big help.

Similar gamebooks to mine

My story idea is a fantasy adventure, with knights/dragons/warriors etc
I've looked for gamebooks similar to mine and I found a series called Wizards Warriors & You

'The books were invariably set in Medieval England, which was ruled by King Henry. They all starred a nameless Wizard and Warrior, and began with the reader choosing which of the two characters (s)he would "play", with the other character providing a supporting role. At the back of the book the reader would find individual inventories for the characters: The Book of Spells for the Wizard, The Book of Weapons for the Warrior. The two characters' paths through the book were independent of one another, diverging after the introduction, and only reconverging at the end' 

1. The Forest of Twisted Dreams (1984)
2. The Siege of the Dragonriders (1984)
3. Who Kidnapped Princess Saralinda? (1984)
4. Ghost Knights of Camelot (1984)
5. The Haunted Castle of Ravencurse (1984)
6. Revenge of the Falcon Knight (1984)
7. Challenge of the Wolf Knight (1985)
8. Conquest of the Time Master (1985)
9. The Dragon Queen's Revenge (1985)
10. Tournament for Terror (1986)
11. The Imposter King (1986)
12. The Scarlet Shield of Shalimar (1986)
13. Cavern of the Phantoms (1986)
14. Carnival of Demons (1986)
15. Invaders from Darkland (1986)
16. Attack on the King (1986)
17. Conquest of the Barbarians (1986)
18. Warrior Women of Weymouth (1986)

I have more characters in my story but its still a similar storyline, the fantasy medieval setting.