froghawk on 2/1/2017 at 20:16
In particular, what makes TES/bethsoft fallout a part of this category? They're RPGs, but other RPGs are not defined this way. They're sandboxes, but other sandboxes like GTA are not defined this way. Is it the combination?
Other open world games like Far Cry are sometimes defined that way, but I've also seen only FC2 defined that way. Not having played them all, what sets it apart from the later games besides its brutal grimness?
I've also seen that label used on Firewatch, which I kind of agree with based on the feeling it gives me.. but player choice is mostly limited to conversation trees.
So, what really defines immersive sims besides player choice in a semi-open world (or at least open levels)?
Nameless Voice on 2/1/2017 at 20:55
I wouldn't call any of the Bethesda RPGs immersive sims.
My definition would be a game that puts you into the role of a character in a simulated world. An immersive sim should feel like you are a person in that setting, able to take realistic (for the setting) actions and have logical outcomes.
Gameplay should generally come about via an interplay of the simulated game systems, rather than being pre-determined and "gamey".
For example, in Thief, you have simulated systems such as light and shadow, AI vision, and the effects of water/fire arrows on torches. All of those are simulated systems that combine to create gameplay in a logical way.
The gameplay may have been planned, but it was still built from generic simulated systems that make logical sense on their own, and because of that they lend themselves to a large degree of dynamic and emergent gameplay.
I think that, by definition, an immersive sim has an interactive environment where the player can manipulate objects in realistic ways, even if those are not directly related to the core gameplay.
In brief, an immersive sim is a game assembled from simulated systems, designed to be a "realistic" and believable setting, where actions have logical outcomes.
froghawk on 2/1/2017 at 21:07
I agree with all that, and in addition I'd add that Thief and all other games I actually consider immersive sims are not linear in their moment to moment progression - you're just dropped in a level and have to figure out where to go on your own.
I also do not consider the TES games immersive sims at all, which is why I'm perplexed that so many seem to lump them into this category. Hence this thread. There are lots of systems, but they are all kinda half assed and dont interact with each other to create a larger picture.
demagogue on 2/1/2017 at 22:03
Instead of calling entire games immersive sims or not, I think it's better to list features which contribute to being an immersive sim, which different games can have more or less of. I think it's an open world that doesn't railroad gameplay, but simulates events, and you make progress by interacting with that. The player finds their own ways to make progress interacting in the world by its rules instead of solving some puzzle the author came up with. Dishonored is the game that does that best of recent games.
Jason Moyer on 2/1/2017 at 22:04
You can block an NPC's line of sight in the post-Morrowind Bethsoft games by putting a bucket on their head. What is more immersive sim than that?
[video=youtube;bmI799kEOSk]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmI799kEOSk[/video]
icemann on 3/1/2017 at 02:46
I wouldn't call Fallout 4 a RPG. I'd call it an FPS. The rest though sure.
henke on 3/1/2017 at 07:08
In case ya haven't seen it, Mark Brown recently did a great video on Immersive Sims.
[video=youtube;kbyTOAlhRHk]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbyTOAlhRHk[/video]
Quote Posted by froghawk
Other open world games like Far Cry are sometimes defined that way, but I've also seen only FC2 defined that way. Not having played them all, what sets it apart from the later games besides its brutal grimness?
The later games do bring in more systems and makes stealth much more viable, leading to better emergent gameplay and the chance for some really creative, (
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TkgSGc_vg0) outside-the-box approaches to it's missions. But one thing that might make FC2 more of an immersive sim is the buddy-system. NPCs live or die largely dependent on your actions, which means the game has more
reactivity than the later FCs.
zoog on 3/1/2017 at 07:36
Maybe it's stupid but "immersive sims" is what makes immersion. That is, game makers create realistic and beautiful and exciting world which causes player to believe in it. That way is often non-commercial - publishers have to work not with the cheap, replaceable and obliging hindus but with talents, who may make bold, non-correct moves in game, make it non-incomprehensible to some individuals (while commercial product must fit 100% of audience, even the dumbest). That's why music producers don't work with talented artists anymore;)
So games are much over-produced now, half of gameplay is cut-scenes, pre-written 'dialogues' and qte and the other is rail shooter without any embranchments (or 2 or even 3 rails in games with 'freedom of choice'). Hard to make immersion or anything individual in such game model.
Judith on 3/1/2017 at 09:42
Immersive sim was typically described as series of systems and functions "listening" to each other, creating a simulation reacting to player's actions in more or less predictable manner, allowing for more "realistic", unique, non-scripted situations. How dense or sparse those systems are in a game world is a secondary issue. In that sense GTA provides the playground for such emergent situations as much as Deus Ex or Thief. Personally, I prefer smaller, more meaningful spaces, and, speaking of Mark Brown, he advocates basically the same thing.
[video=youtube;USVr936aKzs]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USVr936aKzs[/video]
Malf on 3/1/2017 at 10:07
I mentioned this in the "Best games of 2016" thread, but do games necessarily need to be first person to be considered "Immersive sims"?
I say this as a couple of games from the past two years have all the features of immersive sims, yet are third-person: Hitman and MGS V. Both have complicated, overlapping systems that the player can interfere with and have the game robustly react to said interferences, and the attention to detail prevalent in other immersive sims, yet they just happen to be third person.
Excluding them and choosing not to recognise their influence on the genre (or how said genre has influenced them), purely because of their POV seems rather petty.
