Sulphur on 23/5/2017 at 12:55
I was joking in my previous post, but I did mean part of it. I really do think you folks should give 'immersive' a rest - it's a thing with different thresholds to different people. Something with as many different tolerance points as that shouldn't be a criterion. For instance, I always felt Crusader: No Regret was super immersive because of how it had primitive precursors to systems design that let me futz around with levels in a tactile fashion, but I doubt that's a popular opinion. Also, now that you have VR, it's a fair bet that anything in VR can be, by default, 'immersive'.
We don't define film by its perspective/ability to place you inside a person's head because it's subjective; with literature, the person used to narrate the story is a stylistic choice that may or may not work enhance the experience for the reader, but it is the product of specific authorial intent. 'Immersion' similarly may or may not lead on from stylistic choices in a game's design like perspective, which is authorial intent, and it certainly means different things to different people. Why fall into that trap?
Starker on 23/5/2017 at 13:19
With immersive sims it's more about about verisimilitude than realism. It doesn't matter whether something is real, it only matters that it's plausible.
Also, film is a passive medium, whereas video games are an active medium where players have a sense of presence. And immersive sims use verisimilitude and spatial presence as a way to allow the player to lose themselves in the world. It is in this specific way that immersive sims are immersive, not in the sense that, say, Tetris is immersive.
Thirith on 23/5/2017 at 13:34
Quote Posted by Starker
Also,
film is a passive medium, whereas video games are an active medium where players have a sense of presence.
I have to say that statements like the bolded are a bugbear of mine, because it's simply not true. Watching a film is an active process, it's just a different kind of activity; cognitively you're doing so many different things while watching a film, even the dumbest kind of popcorn movie. Also subjectively, watching a Kubrick or Tarkovsky film feels like a considerably more involved, active experience than playing, say, something along the lines of the aforementioned
Operation Wolf. At the very least I'd consider "film is an active medium, video games are a passive medium" the kind of statement that needs to be followed by
[citation needed].
Starker on 23/5/2017 at 13:43
Quote Posted by Thirith
I have to say that statements like the bolded are a bugbear of mine, because it's simply not true. Watching a film is an active process, it's just a different kind of activity; cognitively you're doing so many different things while watching a film, even the dumbest kind of popcorn movie. Also subjectively, watching a Kubrick or Tarkovsky film feels like a considerably more involved, active experience than playing, say, something along the lines of the aforementioned
Operation Wolf. At the very least I'd consider "film is an active medium, video games are a passive medium" the kind of statement that needs to be followed by
[citation needed].
Fine, film is an
inherently passive medium. Happy? The communication between the author and the viewer only flows one way, whereas in video games the player has direct input into what's happening.
Quote Posted by Abysmal
With all due respect, that just sounds like grasping at straws. Many games are designed with verisimilitude in mind, and many so-called immersive sims don't have it. I think there is too strong of an emotional attachment to the quality of being "immersive" with some here (I get it, I played LGS games too). Which is actually a great thing, but it's not a category by any stretch. Things like player agency and emergent gameplay are design philosophies designed to improve existing genres.
What straws? Verisimilitude is a commonly used term when talking about fantasy and secondary belief. The difference between reality and verisimilitude is the difference between whether something is true or real in the real world and whether something is true or real in the fantasy world.
Sulphur on 23/5/2017 at 13:45
Quote Posted by Starker
With immersive sims it's more about about verisimilitude than realism. It doesn't matter whether something is real, it only matters that it's plausible.
Also, film is a passive medium, whereas video games are an active medium where players have a sense of presence. And immersive sims use verisimilitude and spatial presence as a way to allow the player to lose themselves in the world. It is in this specific way that immersive sims are immersive, not in the sense that, say, Tetris is immersive.
I beg to differ. Verisimilitude could go as far as object detail in an Uncharted game, which is fantastic, but the rest of the game is hardly what we'd call immersive. 'Losing yourself in the world' is once again a fairly subjective phenomenon. I lost myself in Okami's world -- it had a great amount of verisimilitude when compared to ukiyo-e/sumi-e paintings, but I don't think you'd call it an immersive sim. Like I said, this is a very subjective thing and debating it is tantamount to trading opinions. Fun, but not useful.
Anyway, while we're at it, a suggestion if I may. I think I'd prefer expanding on the term 'diegetic' instead of debating over 'immersive'. With film and TV it has to do with sound sources, but for video games it could do with some expanding to encompass specific ways information is presented to the player. Let's call it diegetic integrity - a term which isn't snappy at all, but helps outline systems that
potentially help with immersion.
Take, for example, Dead Space. There's no HUD, so instead elements like character health and ammo counts are readouts on the weapons or a meter built into the suit Isaac wears. It's conceptually daft (if I wanted a vital signs indicator on my body, I'd like to have it where I can see it), but when you play the game it makes for great intuitive shorthand. More importantly, you feel part of the game world because there aren't permanent floaty meters occluding your vision. Other things that fall into this category: first person perspective games that overlay a HUD as part of the fiction (most cyberpunk - Deus Ex, System Shocks), have more granular control over body positioning like leaning and stance modification (Arma, most LGS games), body awareness (Crysis, T: DS, Mirror's Edge), and elements of third person perspective games like DS with its holistic no-HUD approach.
Just an idea. Feel free to tear it apart. :)
Thirith on 23/5/2017 at 13:49
Quote Posted by Starker
Fine, film is an
inherently passive medium. Happy? The communication between the author and the viewer only flows one way, whereas in video games the player has direct input into what's happening.
It's not about me being happy; I simply disagree with you on this. Happy to go into it in PMs in more detail, because I don't want to derail the conversation, but the generation of meaning isn't a one-way street and interaction isn't restricted to pushing buttons. Games offer a *specific* range of interactions with the medium that other media don't offer, but I remain unconvinced by the argument that other media *are* passive, inherently or otherwise.
Malf on 23/5/2017 at 13:52
In Media Studies, they don't teach "Active" or "Passive", they talk about "Hot" or "Cool". But to be honest, all those definitions need revision in the face of the Internet and videogames.
Are we navel-gazing yet?
Sulphur on 23/5/2017 at 13:54
I'm not sure. Are we an innie or an outie?
Thirith on 23/5/2017 at 13:54
I spent six years getting paid to navel-gaze; I'm not just gonna give it up like that. :p
Renault on 23/5/2017 at 13:58
Quote Posted by Malf
But I can't regard it as an immersive sim, no matter how hard I try. And this make me think about why, which is really hard to define, but I'll try anyway.
With Breath of the Wild, it comes down to lack of first person perspective, and the fact that you're playing as Link, a very well known video game character. I never felt like it was me doing these things.
