Immersion’s not a particularly controversial word in itself, but it’s worth considering what you really mean when you use this term in relation to games. The Astronauts’ Adrian Chimielarz argues that is used in place of a number of other, more accurate terms. “Immersion is basically when you forget one reality, the real world, and you find yourself in another reality,” he explains. “You can get very immersed in a movie or a book; you’re very immersed in that world. It’s different to a sense of presence, which is unique to games, where you feel that you are physically somewhere else.” While we can’t see it catching on (it’s three words long as opposed to one, after all) ‘sense of presence’ is still useful and distinct when contrasted with ‘immersion’, letting you articulate why both Skyrim and a novel will fully absorb your attention, but only one will you make you feel like you are standing upon a chilly mountainside. Both are distinct from ‘engagement’, Chmielarz argues, which is the active participation of a person who happens to be immersed in a game.
Do you complete an album? Beat one? You finish them perhaps, but not with the level of finality that the use of the word within gaming culture would imply. ‘Beat’ in particular implies an adversarial relationship that seems outdated in an era of adaptive difficulty and regenerating health. These days, games want you to finish them. “‘Beat’ is a funny one,” chuckles Ed Key. “I got an email from someone recently saying he beat Proteus three times. He really liked the game and didn’t think he was going to like it, but that really amused me.” And Proteus, of course, offers a procedural world. “You can play through Proteus, finish it maybe, but you’re very unlikely to see everything in one playthrough. If someone says they’ve finished it, it means something different to me than it means to them… I mean they mean ‘I’m finished for me…’ I’m totally fine with that. But something I was hoping for was for it to be something [that] sort of nags at you a bit – that maybe you didn’t see everything, and you’ll play through it again and… see something that you didn’t see before.”
Art is, of course, the big one. People will argue indefinitely as to whether or not videogames are art. But rarely can they agree on what the term even means, either talking around the concept pointlessly or producing bespoke definitions to support their own point. Here’s Chmielarz’s take, for instance: “to me, art is basically when I experience something and it gives me a revelation”. It’s a definition that relies on the observer to decide for themselves, in other words. It’s very different to that of Brian Moriarty, who famously defended film critic Roger Ebert’s dismissal of games into the ‘not art’ pile by providing two artistic categories, ‘sublime art’ and ‘kitsch art’. “Sublime art is fragile,” he argued, “there’s nothing superfluous or out place.” Ridiculous Fishing co-creator Zach Gage would side with Chmielarz, telling us he’s only able to define art in terms of his own response. “The feeling I get from art is bordering on religious reverence,” he said. “The idea that something you’re looking at is connecting to so many parts of you and so many parts of the world that you can’t even begin to understand what it is.” Such indecision around the term rather invites the question – if no one can agree on a definition of what art is, then what on Earth are they arguing about in the first place?
The post Three difficult words: Immersion, Complete and Art appeared first on Edge Online.
via Edge Online http://www.edge-online.com/features/three-difficult-gaming-words-immersion-complete-and-art/