Abstract: An interactive video menu system provides an economical method for the storage, transmission, and reception of data necessary for interactive video sessions, which allows high-resolution images to be broadcast to end users along with all the control information necessary to display and navigate through these images. A simple interpretive script is run on the end user's device which traps the broadcast information and allows rapid response time and control of the interactive session without requiring expensive high-bandwidth facilities. Buffer equalized coding is used so that still, picture-in-a-still; and moving video images can be compressed at rates below those typically used with the MPEG-2 standard and continuously transmitted as video backgrounds in a seamless loop saving bandwidth without degradation in video quality.