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Gaze upon the cold steel maw of the imposing yet awe-inspiring stronghold. Note the trails of rust snaking through every fissure, every iron grate, every shattered window, as though an otherworldly ivy has ensnared the structure in its myriad tendrils. The coppery stains that litter the floors and walls as if an unseen painter allowed his brush to splatter across the canvas indiscriminately indicate that the souls of this once-bustling compound met a gruesome end.
Everything is so rich, the world so alive in its destitution. The fog is so thick that it almost seeps through your television screen. You teeter on the edge of the coach, pricking your ears at every hollow reverberation. You are so happy you sprung for that 7.1 surround system. As you ready yourself before plunging onward, you remark how you've never known true immersion until this very moment.
Horsesh*t.
As technology allows for greater visual and audio fidelity, as game developers further their pursuit of the perfect balance between narrative and gameplay, gamers grow excited at the prospect of greater levels of immersion. There is no reason to return to the old gaming haunts that can't provide an experience of the same awesome magnitude as today's hardware. The great holy grail of gaming is an immersive universe in which you cease to be a player and become a resident of the world. Immersion, immersion, immersion.
I keep hearing that word: Immersion. What does it mean? Why is it so damn important? Why does it appear, according to the rumblings on game sites, message boards, and blogs, to be a quality that is unattainable on anything other than the most high-end hardware available? Does that mean that games we consider immersive today will no longer be as immersive tomorrow? Why isn't there a clear-cut definition?
At the very least, "immersion" describes the state in which a person is completely absorbed in an activity. In the case of videogames, to be immersed is to be so totally engaged that we discard all our cares and worries in order to devote all our attention to playing the game. Sometimes we lose track of the time or put off necessities like eating or using the toilet just so we can get to that next save marker, that next town, that finish line.
But really, to what extent does atmosphere alone keep a player engrossed? I'm not downplaying the importance of presentation as an effective means of
drawing you into a game. Obviously, a game that is critically lauded for being having fantastic character models and a beautiful ambient soundtrack is going to be more immediately appealing than a game that is lambasted for looking like a graphic design major's first semester homework assignment. We are reminded every day of the benefits of making a good first impression whether it is in preparation for a job interview or in meeting a significant other's relatives for the first time. Outward presentation doesn't always reflect internal value, but it does inspire confidence that quality and care were heavily invested.
Once you have been enticed, after you have been drawn in, what guarantees that you remain engaged? One of several things can happen. You can grow bored or frustrated by the nature of play and lose your confidence, you can feel inspired to play for an extended period because there is just enough content to tickle your curiosity or because you hope that at some point in the future the game will ensnare you completely, or you can click with the game immediately and play until you will yourself away. Yeah, this sounds like the old "graphics over gameplay" cliché, but I want to stress how a game doesn't have to be fun or even all that good for it to be engaging, like watching a terrible public speaker lose his or her composure on stage and then anticipating what else could possibly go wrong. I think that's an important distinction to make even though it isn't as likely to happen.
You've heard of the
Tetris effect, haven't you? If you play
Tetris frequently, you may find yourself staring at ceiling tiles and remarking how similar they appear to tetrominoes or gazing towards a cluttered shelf and imagining how you could rotate books and knick-knacks to form neat and orderly lines. It's similar to when you see light spots superimposed on the backs of your eyelids after staring at a pattern of black dots on a page for a few minutes. While the same effect can occur with prolonged exposure to any game, it is most commonly associated with
Tetris because of its ubiquitous and addictive nature.
Contrast that game with any high-end Hollywood-esque production from the past few years.
Tetris is often hailed as one of the most engaging games ever made, yet it has no narrative and only enough graphical flourish for a player to distinguish among the different shapes. If a game about falling bricks can absorb players so deeply, wouldn't that imply that immersion relies very little on how "natural" a game looks or feels?
I know, not a fair comparison. Opposing genres, apples and oranges, all that jazz. There are different expectations for a puzzle game compared to an open-world shooter or a 3D platformer. If you are racing through a misty jungle, you have to
believe that it's a misty jungle. If you are launching through the cosmos, you have to
believe that you are hurtling through the cold vacuum of space. Surely, the less work required to suspend your disbelief then the more likely you will sync up with the heartbeat of the game's fictional environment.
As beautiful as a game like
God of War,
Heavenly Sword, or
Ninja Gaiden may be, what are you most focused on when you are beset on all sides by blood-thirsty hordes? Are you thinking of what variety of techniques you should string together in order to minimize health loss as efficiently as possible? Or are you admiring the stitching on your clothing, the individual beads of sweat running down your enemies' cheeks, the hollow sound of footsteps on the floorboards? Get distracted and you'll be dead within a minute. If you are serious about seeing a task to completion, you'll want to devote the bulk of your attention to that task. Everything else is superfluous nonsense.
Don't believe me? When you read, how much information do you retain? Can you recite an entire passage word for word on your first try? Unless you possess a true photographic memory, you'll only be able to recall the most important details. It's the key words in each sentence that are crucial. The more focused you are on the content, the less likely you will get hung up on spelling and grammar errors should you happen to notice them.
The same thing happens in videogames. Your brain can only process so much information at a time, so you remain on the lookout for visual and audio cues. That's not a
Mettaur, it's a little yellow blob. Those aren't
Locust, they're big gray guys that bleed. It doesn't matter how atmospheric or true-to-life the game is initially presented. Eventually, you are going to filter out nonessential data, after which it will be up to the game to lay a trail of breadcrumbs to lead you to the next objective.
If that's the case, why don't games revert to the Atari age? Aside from an appealing presentation, atmosphere provides necessary context. The pieces have to come together to form a cohesive, believable whole. What I argue is that the importance of minute details is overblown. It doesn't take much to fool the human mind. All it takes is a very convincing lie. Some game developers are able to pull that lie off with fewer resources than most while others can sink millions into a project yet make us feel so disconnected from the world that we shelve the game after half an hour.
Ultimately, what you and I believe encapsulates immersion varies wildly. That's where my big problem is. The concept is intentionally vague, left up to the interpretation of the individual. Its use within the gamer community picked up tenfold over these past few years as the rift between Wii and HD console owners widened. Whenever a Wii port is considered or the rare major third-party Wii exclusive is announced, I hear talk about how much more immersive it would be on the PS3 or the Xbox 360. It's as though gamers more or less understand that a lot of the output this generation is just spit-shined variants of earlier titles and thus they play the "immersion" card because no can argue against something so nebulous.
Why would games be immersive? No one can seem to answer that. People say that the world would be more vibrant and the game much more satisfying than a similar experience on lesser hardware. Is there some grading rubric you guys use to measure how much more involved you are with a game in which you can hear artillery fire a hundred feet out, 13 degrees north of east thanks to Dolby Digital magic? What about portable gaming? Is that a lost cause?
Claiming that higher-grade hardware will, all other elements being equal, yield greater immersion in gaming is as crazy as claiming that higher-grade paper will yield greater immersion in books. Just like "
vision," "immersion" is just another wall for console warriors to hide behind when what they really mean is that a game should come to
their machine and not to yours. I wish they would just be honest and admit that they need to justify the hundreds of dollars they blew during a wild trip to Best Buy. No one will hold it against you.
Or maybe I'm a just bitter Wii fanboy with an agenda and thus my argument is invalid.
Contest:
6:20 PM on 10.15.2009
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I would say a game is immersive when a game goes to great lengths to make you forget (to a point) that you are just playing a game. Some examples would be things like Half-Life never ripping you out of first person, or how FarCry2 has the most minimal HUD possible. You want to see the world map? You pull a map in front of your face. Want to aim at a bad guy? Pull up your sights.
When people talk about a game that is more immersive with all graphical settings on high that is usually in regards to games that rely on the graphical effects to immerse the player.
My $0.02
Always.
The thing with videogames is, a lot of vocal fans of the medium are obsessed with everything looking "real". They all have different reasons; some are in love with "trophy tech", some think that "realism = legitimate art form like Hollywood movies", others just think realism looks cool. It doesn't matter, because as as developers cater to these fans, videogames will have a lot tougher time gaining mainstream acceptance. With this generation though, we've already seen a lot of developers pull away from realism with pretty successful results.
History has shown that the guys that want their fantasy art to look "real" always end up in the minority. Sure, their are people out there who will insist that Boris Vallejo or the guy who does Cry for Dawn are the greatest artists of the twentieth Century, but neither has created characters with the world wide appeal of Charlie Brown, Mickey Mouse or Homer Simpson.
I mean, is there any chance in hell that Maus would have won all all those awards if it looked like this?
I think other people are confusing good graphics with immersion.
What keeps gamers coming back to a particular game has to be something beyond the surface. The act of being totally engrossed in game ultimately has little to do with how "rich" the environment is and more about what sleight-of-hand tricks developers use to make you think you are in a rich environment.
When there are characters and relationships and events happening that I want to get swept up in then I'm willing to suspend my disbelief for a lot of things, graphics included.
They will once this hits front page.
Anyone who's been playing games awhile would have to agree with that - personally, for whatever reason, something about the way Soul Blazer on the SNES is presented always allowed me to get lost in my surroundings, even though the graphical quality wasn't even all that impressive back in the day. Rez is another example I'd cite, even though it's highly abstract. In any event, I would say that "immersion" is indeed important, but as you say, it's not what a lot of people think it is. Good article.
Since I'm doing a terrible job at explaining this, look at Uncharted. During a gunfight, you don't feel so immersed, because you're mind is ignoring the super detailed textures since it's processing your next action and what enemy to kill next. But right after the gunfights final headshot, your mind goes right back to absorbing all the graphics and you get sucked right back into the world. If Uncharted looked as it does during non gameplay intensive parts, then switched to a simple wire-frame like super low polygon count appearance during gunfights and whatnot, shouldn't it be as immersive? On paper it should, since the mind will focus on the gameplay and it may not even mind the graphical drop. Also, in most multiplayer games people always say the grpahics aren't as good as in singleplayer. I'll bet that's true, but I never noticed it, because I'm too focused on not dying instead of trying to see if it looks as good as the singleplayer aspect. So I guess it's different for everyone. Maybe some people can play Heavenly Sword and they notice all the realistic physics for every little object and whatnot in addition to paying attention to the gameplay.
But going back to Uncharted, I do think that overtime gamers would become accumstomed to the graphical immersion and they will notice during gameplay eventually. For example, in Bioshock, I didn't notice that you don't cast a shadow until someone told me. Bioshock was one of the first FPS's I really got into, as in, I played it a ton, it was an easy game as well. But when I played FEAR 2, I noticed my shadow right away, even though I was playing on hard and every fight was me frantically trying to survive and just ignoring all the visual fidelity and just focuing on the enemies. See? overtime you will notice the 'immersion'.
Great write up, even if you are clearly just a hack :p
What your saying is that when the reigns let up a bit and the action slows to a standstill, you are given enough breathing room to just enjoy the breathtaking vista. The game deliberately shifts into first gear so that it can say, "Check this out! Isn't it cool?" At that point you aren't playing the game, you are watching a set piece. You have a look around, admire the features, then get back into the game. I suppose if the game was all about stopping to smell the roses then I could understand why all the excess was important, but why is it necessary to relinquish control in order to experience the promised "immersive locales"?
Besides, after playing a game for a few hours, whatever shine the game had is going to wear off. After a while, you accept the world for what it is and you stop going, "Oooh! Look at that!"
It's like in the first God of War when you walk across that bridge as the camera pulls back. Impressive moment, admittedly. As the game progresses, it would have to deliver even more elaborate set pieces in order to strike you. It's diminishing returns, man. On a second playthrough, you aren't going to care all that much anymore.
In the sequel, the same scene plays out, only this time the bridge is a giant link chain (I hope I'm remembering this correctly). It doesn't have the same impact, if any.
"It doesn't take much to fool the human mind. All it takes is a very convincing lie."
I like that.
I don't think so much that its the quality of any individual stimulus that "pulls you in" with a game. I think its a developer's ability to give you enough things to constantly fill up your cup.
Take a world as simple as Canabalt. That game is addictive! And I think the main thing is that its poking all the right buttons at a very regular clip:
-You're told you're escaping, so you want escape
-The game screen shakes violently, emphasizing the magnitude of what's going on
-The sound track thumps and smooths to its own rhythm
-You've got to watch for obstacles
-There's a dynamic background
-You don't know what's coming next
-Occasionally, there are those "oh look at that" moments, like the shattered glass effect and the disturbed birds
-You're given a score, and easily allowed to play again, and try to beat that score
You're down right assualted by stimulus, but at a good mix to make you want to play "just one more time". When a game keeps giving you new reasons to have at it, you're more or less blocked off from seeking other stimulus. I'm being massaged on so many different levels, why would I want to stop?
Graphics are a part of it, but I think the ability to keep dangling some sort of pleasure reward (story, powerups, gil, music, unlockables, etc) at a regular pace is what really makes up this thing we call "immersion".
Overall, a good read, but I think .. I disagree. I agree on the PR speak/buzzword part, but disagree that it is nonsensical, because Miyamoto has spoken on immersion before.. So, in essence, your stance seems to be sideways with Miyamoto's view that immersion exists.
Immersion isn't something Nintendo defines.. Although they'd like to say they did, probably.. It isn't something Sony or MS defines either. It is too scientific for a single company to "define".
I think only a scientist, professor, teacher or other instructor should use the word immersion or true immersion. It isn't a word that was originally used to apply to technology. It was, and is used to talk about books, readers (imaginations being able to fully experience setting, characters, events, etc.), works of fiction and/or how science experiments closely approximate, or is reflected in/of real life, or in a virtual world. Obviously it has some application in the telling of story in video games, 3d virtual world simulations, physics, math, etc. But it is an element of suspension of disbelief, and is something built-up (more over time).
Of course PR folks will grab at straws sometimes, even if it makes them look obviously misinformed, but, there is immersion & there is true immersion as well as immersion 'units'. Too complex without me writing 8 more paragraphs and/or my own c-blog I guess.
Bottom line: immersion exists, it is just a basic word & concept that is very important for things to make sense to a player or audience, (in the case of movies). If you don't believe me, don't just take my word for it, though, and do your own research. Publishers, developers, technologists, scientists, engineers & Miyamoto all know the value of immersion. Whether it is right use of the word, or even wanted by a retro-gamer, or modern gamer, it is coming more every day nevertheless.
As a side note, even if we were talking about something non-video-game-ish .. Something that is, or was as exciting as watching the movie The Matrix for the first time.. I would explain what I think people "really want" by "jacking in".. But, I think that is better for another time. I'll just say, that at the root of that, people need real life experiences. But they want dreams as well. Where the two collide, BOOM, complete and total immersion! But, therein, does the player have total control inside total immersion? That is, I think, why it is even talked about, or even used for PR purposes.. It is what everyone thinks we (or, more modern gamers) want from the future of video games.
And, I forgot to mention something before in paragraph 4 (due to my edits)..
But it is an element of suspension of disbelief, and is something built-up (more over time).
Immersion in scientific circles is a term/word used mainly for experiments and labs for education, learning and teaching purposes.. Not just to experiment in virtual reality.
Actually, this post ( while well written ) is just another graphics Vs gameplay rant. To me your choice of the word immersion and the chastising of it, seems out of place.
Are you guys sure? The word "immersion" has been bandied about quite often these past few years. You must have heard it in the context I've presented it in. Do a quick Google search: I'm not the only one who thinks it's a marketing buzzword.
To be perfectly honest, I haven't. People have bandied about plenty of words these past years but just because a few want to write a piece about what they think the word really means to them or their perception of it doesn't necessarily make it so.
Again your post, to me was entertaining and well written. I have always liked the way you write. But you were using the word "immersion" as a generalization here that doesn't fit the real reason of your blog which is graphics Vs gameplay.
BTW: The smoke and mirrors that game developers may use to achieve the act of immersion in a player is irrelevant if they succeed. Here the application of the word in your post, again to me, seems at odds with what you were trying to convey. Which reminds me...I wrote a blog about immersion, videogames and what it meant to me a long while ago. I may repost it again in lieu of your blog here. I'll see if I feel like touching it up and making it live.
Regardless good stuff megaStryke. This made it as one of my Topsauce picks for the recaps.
With Heavenly Sword, COD4 and FarCry 2 there was for me a sense of "wow". While the gameplay itself is essential to immersion, the graphics can also definitely contribute to immersion. In Oblivion I loved to climb to the top of the Anvil lighthouse and just watch the sun go down - it gave me a sense of peace... which is pretty immersive! It was also "part of the game" for me. If I noticed the sun going down and I was near Anvil, I would often head over to the lighthouse.
You are quite right that there are many things that can contribute to a feeling of immersion in a video game... gameplay, music, characters ... but the graphics and scenery can also be a definite factor for many people.
Personally I only find myself immersed when I've been playing a game for several hours straight. This is as long as it doesn't have, what I feel are, intrusive loading times and/or frame rate issues. Sadly now days I rarely can put aside a whole afternoon to really sink into a game. I would imagine however that people more prone to flights of fantasy are easily immersed with any game, they've probably thought of some deep meaningful narrative to Tetris too.
However immersion can be defined in many different ways, but I think there is definitely something to be said about technical 'immersion'. However immersion is an adjective, which people use objectively to describe an experience they had with entertainment whether it be books, games or film so you you won't ever be able to define it for universal experiences. For me having rich graphics, realistic, good and rewarding gameplay and perfect sound really brings out the realism whore in me. But in no way do I only enjoy games centered on realism, but if they're done well I can certainly appreciate them. A poignant recent example would be Demon's Souls. That game would not be as awe-inspiring, vile or disturbing without the graphical edge today's consoles have, and I think having a quality 7.1 surround sound system would actually give me a legitimate advantage as well as sounding AMAZING ZOMG!!!
As for realism turning people away, I think that there aren't actually that many developers aiming towards realism for the casual market. I think they understand what they like more or less. Also hyper-realism is way more en vogue than realism.
The argument here is the definition of atmosphere and immersion. Simply put, I would say it is the aesthetic behind the game.
The same glory can be felt in empowering Pacman to eat the blue-and-white ghosts upon consuming a power pill as it can in getting into a helicopter and flying over Algonquin at night for the first time in GTA IV. Both are aesthetic. Neither necessarily greater than the other. To do either a disservice is ridiculous.
Ok you do have a point, but my concept of immersion is when you are deeply affected by the game in some way. Half-Life 2 sucked me into its world, and I honestly felt a connection.
Persona 3 and 4 are immersive to me in the same way.
My ideal game would be a realistic battlefield simulator that would allow for an online battle of two opposing battalions divided into according companies, platoons, squads and fireteams, with each soldier being an actual person playing online. And with one or more GMs who would be able to change the environment in real time (allowing artillery fire, sending vehicles for reinforcement, changing the weather conditions, redirecting civilian AIs, sending occasional status reports on enemy movement, changing global objectives, etc.). Think extremely polished Virtual Battlespace 2 with tons of features, realistic graphics and on a greater scale.
Or a realistic driving sim. And by realistic I mean a sim with perfect graphics mimicking reality (including realistic sun glares, dust, debris on windshield, visual rubbering of the track [and of course each piece of rubber that sticks to the track would be an actual piece of virtual rubber that will be missing from the tyre from that point on), brakes red from the heat with smoke coming out of them, realistic damage model with each dent being translated into recalculated aerodynamic efficenty, etc.), realistic physics (inluding all the forces affecting the car, tyre degradation, changing track conditions /rubbering, debris/, temperature affecting grip and cooling of car parts, humidity, realistic setups, accurate car interiors, water droplets and smears on the windshield and mirrors, etc.). And this all coupled with a 180 degree dome display and a motion simulator cockpit with an actual dashboard, and wheel transmitting each and every shock and bump in the road thanks to a pneumatic/hydraulic system...
That wasn't entirely on topic, but I just had to let it out. I will shit on my own head once such games appear and will be available for an average consumer.
Great article!
I feel like I'm missing something. You seem to be waffling between a bunch of ideas based on a misconception that "pretty grafx = immersion". And I think something like Super Metroid would prove that wrong. That's more "immersive" and ambiance rich than a lot of recent games I've played.
And the Wii is in bad shape, but not for a lack of graphical power or "immersion". It's just that "waggle" doesn't add anything in most cases and most Wii developers get lazy and don't take full advantage of the console's power (ie "shovelware"). It's like the PS2 was last generation, only sans the sheer quantity of worthwhile exclusives. And I was a Nintendo fanboy until the Gamecube, but yeah... I finally saw the Wii for what it was.
hell no.
But their art styles are very well desifned, and within their space, theyve carved out some amazing looking visuals and gameplay.
fixed this for you
That said, I loved the article and completely agree. Note: This is coming from a 360 fan.
I wish this could be put to the test. Perhaps having two identical situations, but both with hardware at opposite sides of the spectrum. For example take the mission in CoD4 where you have to crawl through enemies and tanks and get rid of the textures and bring down the poly count. This would be a good test since it allows the user ample time to admire the stunning (or lack there of) visuals yet provides a good balance of tense gameplay where youre still making decisions.
I remember a Zero Punctuation where Yahtzee said that Wind Waker was better than Phantom Hourglass because WW had more "immersion." Um, yeah, WW is better than PH, but the idea that it is because of "immersion" is total horseshit. It is because there are so many more things to do and so much more good gameplay in WW that it is better.
I guess I should note that immersion doesn't have to do with realistic graphics (which many have already pointed out), but it doesn't have a thing to do with the quality of a game, either. So, yeah, who cares about immersion?
Will a game look better on more advanced hardware? Of course. Will it be more immersive? Possibly. And here's why. A better CPU will allow you to have more sophisticated AI. It will allow you to create a better physics engine, one that may be closer to real life. It's not just the graphics as anyone familiar with the Uncanny Valley will tell you that graphics are nowhere near photorealistic and the animations even further from their real-life counterparts.
Now let's be certain that creating a cohesive and immersive world does not necessarily mean that it be realistic. It is entirely possible to create a completely stylized world that is equally immersive. The most important thing is that once you create the rules of how the world is supposed to look and act, you cannot violate it. That would ruin the illusion of the cohesive world, and thus the immersion.
Is the Wii capable of creating a really good immersive experience? Absolutely. It has its own strengths, particularly in the area of control. And when a developer understands how to create a fully stylized, cohesive world, the game would be as immersive as any 360 or PS3 game. On the flipside, the other two systems do not have the luxury (yet) of the type of immersive control the Wii has to offer. But their strengths lie in their inherent power for things like the aforementioned CGI and physics engines.
Tetris effect is alive and well here for sure.
And your high quality paper argument at the end doesn't make any sense. When you read a book you aren't looking at the paper to understand what's happening. You are reading the words and using your imagination. A better comparison would maybe be difficult to read vs easy to read printing (and it WOULD break your concentration when you have to spend several seconds making out each word).
None of those games are exactly "super duper high graphics" in definition, but they have visual immersion unlike anything before.
I truely felt scared in System Shock 2, even though the graphics are from 1999 and I played it in 2007. How does that happen? It's immersion, and when it works it's amazing.
The problem is people look at games like Ninja Gaiden and assume it's purpose is to be immersive. It's not, and people really shouldn't use the term for games like that. It's purpose is to be a graphically pretty brawler more or less.
And smart or minimal user interface, and straight-forward responsive controls. Graphics are pretty much irrelevent, which is not news. Good graphic design is very very different to maxing out hardware capabilities.
I disgree that we shouldn't place value in that graphic though.
There is downtime in games; In Tetris you really didn't have downtime where you would sit, catch your breath, and admire that pile of colour on your screen.
Conversely in God of War, and COD4 after you've just dropped something huge, or pulled off something amazing, you often just sit back and take in the scenery.
The graphics allow you to be Immersed even when you're not knee deep in the action. It keeps you reeled in, even when you're not being kept busy.
I agree that if we just settled on a standard and stayed there, it wouldn't hurt the games; but in all honesty, we're human and we compete... At the end of the day if I can make better graphics, and a better screen shot, I will cause I can.