World-State Transformations for Neuro-symbolic Interactive Storytelling

2026-05-23

AI Summary

This work addresses the challenge of insufficient narrative coherence in purely large language model (LLM)-driven interactive storytelling by introducing a neuro-symbolic architecture that bridges neural and symbolic approaches through a world state transition mechanism. Specifically, Llama 3 70B and Gemini 1.5 Flash are employed to predict state changes within a rule-based system, thereby triggering predefined narrative transitions. This design ensures global consistency of the story world while enabling users to express creative intent through unconstrained natural language input. The system supports both English and Spanish, and user studies demonstrate that the proposed method significantly enhances narrative coherence and fosters more engaging, creative player interaction compared to baseline LLM-only approaches.

Abstract

Large Language Models (LLMs) have changed the possibilities of Interactive Storytelling systems that process free-text user input. However, as more of these systems are built, evidence continues to mount regarding the story coherence problems that arise when relying solely on them. Recent research suggests that LLMs can effectively predict state changes within rule-based Interactive Storytelling systems, triggering pre-programmed world-state transformations. In this paper, we conduct an exploratory evaluation of whether such transformations can serve as a catalyst for player expression while aiming to address the incoherence issues typical of purely LLM-based approaches. Building upon a neuro-symbolic architecture, we conducted experiments using an open-source model (Llama 3 70B) and a closed-source model (Gemini 1.5 Flash), with testing conducted in both English and Spanish. Eight participants played two scenarios, carefully designed to assess different evaluation objectives. Our observations suggest that transformations offer a way to maintain world-state consistency while encouraging players to interact creatively through their written inputs.

Problem

• Interactive Storytelling
• story coherence
• world-state consistency
• Large Language Models
• neuro-symbolic

Innovation

• neuro-symbolic
• world-state transformations
• interactive storytelling
• large language models
• story coherence