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Chapter 12
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-0477-1.ch012
ABSTRACT
This chapter is based on the analysis of previous cross-media game adaptations, on empirical research,
and on refection on practice with the design of a game concept for a fantasy book. Book-to-game adapta-
tions are particularly interesting examples of cross-media adaptation. They not only weave the literary
source text with intertexts from the game medium, but also require a modal transposition from the realm
of words to a visual, interactive, multimodal medium where narrative and ludic logics intersect. This
study proposes to look at diferent layers of cross-media intertextuality in the process of adaptation - at
the level of specifc texts, at the level of medium conventions, and at the level of genre conventions. It
draws on crowd-sourcing research with readers to demonstrate that collaboration operates through
multi-layered processes of collective intertextuality through which the intertextual repertoires of indi-
viduals meet to weave a fnal text.
INTRODUCTION
This chapter is based on empirical research and reflection on practice in the design of a game concept
for a fantasy book series, Nature Mage. It looks at intertextuality in operation when author, games re-
searcher and readers come together to work on a cross-media adaptation.
I met the author Duncan Pile in 2012, when we started thinking about possible adaptations of his
story into digital media formats, namely a game. This collaboration forms the basis of practice-based
research contributing towards the UNESCO Chair project Crossing Media Boundaries: Adaptation and
New Media Forms of the Book, lead by Professor Alexis Weedon at the University of Bedfordshire
1
. It
is an ongoing project, and here I reflect on the path walked thus far, focusing on our thinking and work
towards reader involvement and the design of a Nature Mage game.
Weaving Nature Mage:
Collective Intertextuality in the Design
of a Book-to-Game Adaptation
Claudio Pires Franco
University of Bedfordshire, UK