Högskolan i Skövde

In the evolving industry of games, environmental storytelling using visual elements that are gradually built, and that progressively signify change, remain undefined and underexplored. This study provides a literature review of the common definitions of environmental storytell-ing and its’ trends, origins, and describes relevant influences from other media. Using a new definition, “gradational environmental storytelling,” to describe a common trend in contem-porary games to support the gradual development of visual elements, the term is first devel-oped in detail, and then the technique itself is supported and applied through the use of a case study using two 3D, linear, single-player games. The findings conclude the varied presence of the technique within virtual environments.