Realism vs immersion

Drethon · 2006-04-20T11:14:56

I've always been one of the people pushing the realism boat. I've always felt that more realism can make the game more immersive. Then I just started thinking, does realism cause immersion or does immersion cause a game to feel more realistic? Now that I've seriously confused everyone I'll go into an example. I'm working on a (not so) simple text based RPG. Being text based everything has to have descriptions. Since I'm only building up the game engine right now my descriptions are utilitarian: North Dock, Hanger, Control Room Hanger Entrance, etc. While this works just fine, it isn't very immersive. You feel like a third person perspective reading a map. On the other hand, the eventual descriptions might be less specific: A room with a desk, a large room with many ships, a small door, etc (though with more thought). Is it possible this is part of what is causing the conflict between realism and fun? Say for injuries, a simple % guage for health with healing powerups work but how much harder would it be to add to this injuries to specific locations and choose to heal a specific location with that health powerup. So am I just crazy or is what people are craving is a more immersive environment to increase fun, not so much a more realistic one?

Game Design and Theory Game Design

Started by Drethon March 27, 2006 02:46 PM

24 comments, last by Sandman 18 years ago

RanmaruX

122

April 07, 2006 11:11 AM

Quote:Original post by Nytehauq
Well, you can't be immersed in the unbelievable.

You can't be immersed in a game of Tetris or Lumines? :) I think the word "immersion" is a bit too vague for a simple answer to realism vs immersion. I like the idea of identifying different types of immersion in this article http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20040709/adams_01.shtml

Quote:Concepts like death, life, victory, defeat, good, evil, energy, spirit, "mana," health and the like are almost universal in fantasy games (as one example) - and they are realistic. You can take so much of a beating before you die, you can dish out a certain amount before you tire (mana).

I'm not sure I agree with the idea that reality works like this :) In real life you don't have hitpoints... The number of blows with a sword it takes to kill somebody is a lot more complicated and unpredictable than that!

Quote:Pong isn't ever going to be as deep as a game like Metal Gear Solid, for example.

Quote:Deeper games (those that tend to draw on storyline and emotion) require realism as the player has to relate to something for the game to be more involving.

If you include "tactical immersion" in your definition of immersion then you could argue chess is a lot deeper than Metal Gear Solid. Puzzle games are usually on the more abstract end of the realism scale but some of them are incredibly deep and immersive but in a more tactical sense.

Quote:Coherence then requires realism

What could be more coherent than Pong? :)

My point is, the realistic way my jeep gets stuck on small objects among the foliage in Battlefield Vietnam breaks my immersion because it distracts me from the gameplay. So I think there are situations where realism and immersion do oppose each other but sometimes it works the other way round.

I get the impression that the kind of immersion in question here is only relevant to games that favour fantasy/roleplay over tactics/gameplay (eg. Elder Scrolls). Abstract games can be immersive too!

Kallisti

184

April 07, 2006 01:31 PM

I think that we not only have some disagreement about the definition of the term "realism", we also now have that same disagreement for "immersion".

Some threads are useless with pics - this one is useless without linguistic precision.

Discordian, yo.

Deleter

169

April 08, 2006 11:53 AM

I am no expert game developer, but I did write a small article on my site that covered this exact subject. Basically I argue that some realism is necessary in order for the player to be able to understand your game and its world, but too much in fact gets in the way. For the article check this link.

http://deleter.phatcode.net/article5.html

Nytehauq

328

April 12, 2006 12:11 AM

Quote:Original post by RanmaruX
Quote:Original post by Nytehauq
Well, you can't be immersed in the unbelievable.

You can't be immersed in a game of Tetris or Lumines? :) I think the word "immersion" is a bit too vague for a simple answer to realism vs immersion. I like the idea of identifying different types of immersion in this article http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20040709/adams_01.shtml
Quote:Concepts like death, life, victory, defeat, good, evil, energy, spirit, "mana," health and the like are almost universal in fantasy games (as one example) - and they are realistic. You can take so much of a beating before you die, you can dish out a certain amount before you tire (mana).

I'm not sure I agree with the idea that reality works like this :) In real life you don't have hitpoints... The number of blows with a sword it takes to kill somebody is a lot more complicated and unpredictable than that!
Quote:Pong isn't ever going to be as deep as a game like Metal Gear Solid, for example.

Quote:Deeper games (those that tend to draw on storyline and emotion) require realism as the player has to relate to something for the game to be more involving.

If you include "tactical immersion" in your definition of immersion then you could argue chess is a lot deeper than Metal Gear Solid. Puzzle games are usually on the more abstract end of the realism scale but some of them are incredibly deep and immersive but in a more tactical sense.
Quote:Coherence then requires realism

What could be more coherent than Pong? :)

My point is, the realistic way my jeep gets stuck on small objects among the foliage in Battlefield Vietnam breaks my immersion because it distracts me from the gameplay. So I think there are situations where realism and immersion do oppose each other but sometimes it works the other way round.

I get the impression that the kind of immersion in question here is only relevant to games that favour fantasy/roleplay over tactics/gameplay (eg. Elder Scrolls). Abstract games can be immersive too!

Browser ate my response! >.<

In any case, just because it's new doesn't make it realistic. Your jeep getting stuck on objects isn't very realistic - in real life, it'd be much easier to control, especially if you were trained in offroad driving. The problem here isn't too much realism - it's half done realism. If you had a great jeep physics simulation with VR and lots of wonderful stuff and it was easy enough to play, it'd be perfect and very realistic. The problem is that you've got a jeep that gets realistically caught on objects that you can't control worth a damn because of your mouse and keyboard limitation. Doesn't mean they should simplify the simulation - it needs to be easier to control.

::FDL::The world will never be the same

GemuhDesayinah

132

April 13, 2006 12:16 PM

Quote:Original post by Deleter
Basically I argue that some realism is necessary in order for the player to be able to understand your game and its world, but too much in fact gets in the way.

Hardly anything is realistic in Checkers: you have purely abstract representations on a two dimensional board. Yet millions of people understand that game and its world, as well as the worlds of several other abstract games.

All a good game needs is an internally consistent ruleset. Realism is unnecessary.

sunandshadow

7,435

April 13, 2006 02:38 PM

Quote:Original post by smitty1276
I personally believe that realism in graphics would tend to enhance the immersiveness of a simulation, but so far the research apparently doesn't support that.

Realistic graphics have irrelevant details which can be distracting and confusing, which is of course bad for immersiveness. Icomic graphics (which are simpler than realistic ones) are more easily recognizable and easy to remember what their meaning/value is and thus how they can and should be used/reacted to in the game. But graphics that are too iconic or abstract can also interfere with immersion because they become more difficult to consider meaningful and combine into the impression of being in a story/world, which is how I would define immersion.

I want to help design a "sandpark" MMO. Optional interactive story with quests and deeply characterized NPCs, plus sandbox elements like player-craftable housing and lots of other crafting. If you are starting a design of this type, please PM me. I also love pet-breeding games.

Way Walker

745

April 13, 2006 07:23 PM

Quote:Original post by GemuhDesayinah
Quote:Original post by Deleter
Basically I argue that some realism is necessary in order for the player to be able to understand your game and its world, but too much in fact gets in the way.

Hardly anything is realistic in Checkers: you have purely abstract representations on a two dimensional board. Yet millions of people understand that game and its world, as well as the worlds of several other abstract games.

All a good game needs is an internally consistent ruleset. Realism is unnecessary.

I agree completely, but just wanted to point out that the benefit of realism is that it's an internally consistent ruleset we're already familiar with. It can reduce barrier to entry.

However, I think there's something of a paradox. For me, the closer to realism you get, the less real it feels and the less immersive it becomes because the deviations from reality become even more apparent. I found it easier to be immersed in the world of FFVI than in that of Deus Ex. I haven't played any recent 3D games (my computer would just laugh at you if you tried to install one), but the screen shots are just surreal. The people look like wax figures. I might do a double take (Was that a photo?), but after a few moments examination things just look creepy. Don't get me wrong, I love surrealism, but when that's not the effect you're going for....

Way Walker

745

April 13, 2006 07:31 PM

Quote:Original post by Nytehauq
The problem is that you've got a jeep that gets realistically caught on objects that you can't control worth a damn because of your mouse and keyboard limitation. Doesn't mean they should simplify the simulation - it needs to be easier to control.

Agree and disagree. I agree that that's the problem, I disagree that it doesn't mean they should simplify the simulation. In real life you wouldn't get caught up on every little thing, so you're just drawing attention to the poor interface by making it "close, but not close enough". We're far from being able to provide a proper interface with all the required situational tools (directional sound, 180+ degree views, force feedback to the entire body, etc.), so, for the time being, we should simplify simulations.

That's similar to how people justify hit points. It's not a measure of your "health", but of how "worn out" you are, of your ability to keep dodging and just scrape by (It's only a flesh wound!).

Edtharan

607

April 14, 2006 12:53 AM

Quote:We're far from being able to provide a proper interface with all the required situational tools (directional sound, 180+ degree views, force feedback to the entire body, etc.), so, for the time being, we should simplify simulations.

This is what I was saying about the interface being the problem. The more realistic you make the game the more complex the interface needs to be to communicate the level of detail to the player. With outnthis fidelity of feedback and player input, then you loose the sense of playing a game, and then start fighting the interface. Once you stop playing the game and start fighting the interfcace, the player can not become immersed in the game because they are no longer playing it.

However, a realistic game with an adiquate interface can work together to increase the immersion that a player feels.

Dragoncar

517

April 14, 2006 10:29 AM

I think that there are two different ways to look at realism.
There is realism in terms of how close it is to the real world, but there is also how real things seem in the sense of the world that you've created (consistency).

For a game to be immersive it deosn't need to be realistic in terms of being close to the real world (unless your trying to recreate the real world), but the things in the world need to appear real for that world. For example if I see lots of goblins running about then this becomes real for this world and I become more immersed in the world becuase I understand something about it (ie. that is has goblins), but if I see a spaceship in a world that has given me no indecation that they exist or no reason for this one being here i'll feel that its not real and lose my sense of the world thus becoming less imersed.

I guess what i'm really trying to say is that a game can feel real without having to have things from the real world in them if it makes sense to the person brought into the world for them to be there, so by meeting expectations. This means that by providing well written stories and descriptions will immerse the person into the world by making things real rather than them actually being real.

Events of the past are real if you saw them yourself or believe fully that they happened. (eg. religion)

Edit: Corrected ie. typo

[Edited by - Dragoncar on April 14, 2006 8:29:42 PM]

Realism vs immersion

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