Does instant transportation effect game immersion?

[Rhomagus]

And I'm back. Here you go.

Your view is Mechanics > Immersion Ultimately yes. I've never advocated for the abolioshment of immersion., my view Mechanics need to be balanced properly with Immersion.But immersion is subjective. Content can add immersion. Immersion for immersion sake is not content. You don't need to balance immersion with content when your content is immersive. This is at the basis of my "Future Airship Content Ideas". They add content. A side effect of adding that content is immersion. You don't balance the two, one is a product of the other. You can have mechanics without immersion, but can you have immersion without mechanics. No you cannot. If you have no mechanics you have no foundation. "Mechanics" can be applied to any art medium i.e. the underlying structure. You talk of balance here and there but as you said it in your main view you truly don't believe in balance between the two at allYou're right, I don't. They don't need to be balanced, mechanics breed immersion. Context breeds immersion. Player involvement breeds immersion. Immersion is not a one way street. Trivial things, like waiting on an airship, can add to immersion but at the sacrifice of mechanics. Now giving you content (gameplay) to be utilized on the airship ride gives you the same amount of immersion as if you were just sitting there. A "Where's Waldo" style minigame, while adding immersion, is trivial, requires minimal involvement, and would not be considered worthwhile content in my opinion. Forcing someone to experience that when they don't want to is unnecessary. Add an airship content, maybe instance it or don't instance it, provide ample rewards that tie into other aspects of the game weaving a tapestry of gameplay then you have immersion. Forcing people to AFK sammich is not immersion. Choosing not pick the "load less traveled" is all fine and dandy, but don't complain about the game not being immersive when it gave you the option to use it and you decided not too. That's not the game's fault, it's not my fault, it's not the people who don't want to AFK on an airship's fault. It's your own fault for not immersing yourself when you had the chance. My proposal's give room to those who want immersion, those who don't want immersion, and those who want immersion sometimes and don't want immersion other times. In no way does this effect your gameplay, as you've been given the choice. , you want it your way just as i want it my way.I want it my way and your way. You only want it your way. You must show how I'm limiting your options first before making such a comment. So please again stop trying to play your posts off like your being the neutral partyI'm not the neutral party. I'm against people forcing tedium for immersion's sake. Immersion should never be the premise for making someone do something. Immersion is a side effect of game design, not the main goal. If you're game is fun enough people will willfully choose to expand their "suspension of disbelief". and the victim of my "snarky" attitudeI don't play the victim. I call people out on their rhetoric and logical fallacies. Unfortunately I don't play the "high" card either. I do not mind stooping to another's level. I don't pretend to be some hero of the hushed voices. I speak for myself, but I also try to keep other people's views in mind when formulating my own views. when you are just as guiltyI agree, but I don't deny it..

To further expand again with your view point being Mechanics > Immersion relating to the topic of airships and instant travel, i would venture to say you betray your own view. In the case of this airship discussion if we were to put both a qualitative and quantitative value to mechanics, more immersion = more mechanicsI've already stated how immersion for immersion's sake is not mechanics. You're mathematical equation is incorrect. Mechanics + aesthetic details = immersion. You want aesthetic details = immersion = mechanics and are confusing aesthetic details as being interchangeable with mechanics. It's like driving a Dodge Viper with no engine. It's frivolous and holds no value as an automobile. It can be an art installation but it is not an automobile.. If you were to just have instant airship travelAgain, and last time I'll state this, I've never advocated for only instant airship travel. I advocate for genuine airship content and the retention of an instant travel ability. This encompasses everyone's interests. The only group left out in this are elitists, or a more definitive subset of the elitist, the elitist immersionist. I too am an immersionist. If there is an option to ride the airship, especially if choosing to view the cutscene refunds any resources I had to spend in order to board, I will choose to view the scene 90% of the time. I am an immersionist, just like you. I'm just not and elitist immersionist. I don't need other players to be forced to do what I think is fun. I get value out of experiencing content not just achieving the goal. If someone else achieves the goal with "cheat" codes that doesn't lessen my accomplishment. The only time this is an issue is when you're dealing with party/economic/multiplayer content where it indeed effects other people. that would be the only said mechanicIt would be if the instant travel airship were the only option, but it's not so this argument is null., not only lacking in quantity but also id say quality. Now looking on the flip side increasing immersion would increase the mechanicsAlready showed why this is incorrect. so having an airship ride where you have to participateWrong. It should read "so having an airship ride where you can choose to participate" in dynamic content would only be increasing immersion and mechanics together.True. As my "Future Airship Content Ideas" actually lays out. It adds optional dynamic content with risk/reward mechanics while maintaining an option for instant travel. The downside to that option is that you don't get to experience content, and you do not have a chance to recoup your fee. The upside is that people can get to where they are going faster. Win/Win. Immersionists win, Casuals win. The only people who lose are dictatorial elitists. If they leave I'm okay with this. I honestly don't think they are a huge demographic.

"It subjects the argument, not the opinion.." my argument is based and supported by my opinion the two are synonyms in this respectthere is a communication breakdown here and I should've been more descriptive. "The argument" refers to "our argument" the "argument we are having", not "your argument". I was not downplaying "your argument" to semantics, I was downplaying "our argument" to semantics. There is no personal attack here, but I should've been more descriptive in my description of "the argument"., thus you are in fact subjecting my opinion to nothing more then semantics whether you meant to or not.I'm subjecting "our opinion" to semantics. This suggests something entirely different and doesn't nullify your main argument but is being used as a tactic to get back to the main argument as the semantical argument we were getting into was derailing the topic at hand.

You are missing the big pictureI'm taking the photograph of the earth with the hubble telescope. You're taking a photograph of the place you live. everything i have been discussing plays into: the lack of immersion being FF14's major problem.This is where I disagree with you. Lack of immersion is not FF14's main problem. Lack of content, thus a perceived lack of immersion, is FF14's main problem. Instant teleport, instancing all contentTo be fair, not all content will be instanced. There's a reason they are changing the claiming rules. I have a feeling large scale PvE will be a highly utilized feature in FF14. I also never advocated for making all content instanced., instant airship ridesNo problem if it's added as an option. You still retain the choice whether or not to utilize said feature., and so on are all parts of what i view as FF14's main problems.I've shown how suggesting actual content and reducing timesinks will not only help the game, fix your problems, but also create a more dynamic world for everyone. I also never advocated for abolishing non instanced content or that they should only implement instanced content.

No but we can add suggestions and promote particular design philosophies. An open "laissez faire" design philosophy opens up the game to a wider audience rather than a restricted one in the MMO genre. If you're able to attract more demographic areas, you're better suited for sales and retention of customers. I noticed you updated your post with this and in rebuttal i state: "You can not please all of the people all of the time"You can't, you'll have losses. I'm okay with these losses as an open game will be conducive to more people's interests as they'll be able to access it more. No matter how hard you try you can not make everyone happyThis is obivious. As even when you cater to a person's whims it's still not good enough for them, i.e. including immersive elements. that is why video games focus on target demographics.MMO's have greatly expanded those supposed "target demographics". You'd be surprised how many people are included in the MMO demographic. When you focus on all demographics or to many, you create a half assed product and look at what we gotWe got a rushed product, not a half assed one. There's a difference. Also, including more demographics does not mean that the content is half assed. That's an improper correclation. Pleasing multiple people will not please everyone fully, but you can still maintain the interest of a larger group of people as those individuals will like some aspects and will reject others. Providing options for a larger group is different than providing content to a niche group. You can keep your options open for the large group while making sure that among those options contains focused niche group content. Shutting out options in favor of the niche group is tunnel vision when you could provide content for more groups than the niche market..

Probably when you pick this back up i wont be online, but i too pick up my posts from where i left off so post away when you come back if you so feel inclined.

[Bled]

And I'm back. Here you go.

I do not know why you think Immersion is subjective but here i will quote myself back slew of pages with what psychological gaming immersion is.

Immersion aka Spacial Presence

Completeness of sensory information (aka visuals) means that the fewer imperfections about the mental model of the game world that the player has to fill in, the better like big arrows for quests, and instant teleports with no travel time to speak of. Abstractions (there are no people in this town because of, uh, a genocide!) are the enemy of immersion. Assassin’s Creed 2 was immersive because its towns were filled with people who looked like they were doing people stuff, actual daily tasks. Dealing in a familiar environment also allows everyone to comfortably make assumptions about those blank spaces without being pulled out of the world to think about it like copy pasting areas over and over again in FF14. Knowing that the world is not a copy paste but rather a different piece of a puzzle allows you to be more immersed in the game.

Cognitively demanding environments where you stop and think causes the player base to focus on what’s going on and getting by in the game will tie up mental resources. This is good for immersion, because if the brain is used for understanding or moving around in the world, it’s not free to notice all its problems or shortcomings that would otherwise remind them that they’re playing a game like instant teleport forces on people.

Finally, a strong and interesting narrative, plot, or story will suck you in every time no matter who you are. In fact, it’s pretty much the only thing in a book’s arsenal for creating immersion and look at the long running of books! it works in games too! Good stories attract attention to the game and make the world seem more believable. They also tie up those mental resources I spoke of earlier in avoiding notice of other game flaws.

Your aspect of immersion you keep bringing up "ideling" is a portion of time were you are taking in sensory information allowing you to use more of those mental resources. Today's crowd of gamers is so impatient, so greedy, and so ignorant that they cant help but not appreciate immersion; does this lack of patience and appreciation of quality come from something outside of the gaming world, yes i do believe so... i pin this on American culture.

I just don't understand how a person of your intellectual prowess could think that immersion can not be measure and defined aka subjective. I do not agree with your statement "Content can add immersion. Immersion for immersion sake is not content", Content does not all ways add immersion for instance insta porting is content and yet creates no immersion. yet you are correct immersion is developed in a game through content so you can not have immersion without content; Immersion is a product of content, however content can have no immersion.

they don't need to be balanced, mechanics breed immersion. Like i said mechanics do not always breed immersion.

there is a communication breakdown here and I should've been more descriptive. yep i agree with that.

I'm taking the photograph of the earth with the hubble telescope. You're taking a photograph of the place you live. i do not agree with this and again maybe this was a result in a communication break down. I am advocating IMMERSION! in Final Fantasy 14 not the whole game, in this discussion. When i stated you are not looking at the big picture i meant you are disregarding a legitimate game mechanic (immersion) all together by stating it is a subjective mechanic.

You can't, you'll have losses. I'm okay with these losses as an open game will be conducive to more people's interests as they'll be able to access it more. Yes and when you open your self up for more interests you can shut everyone out at the same time. It is just not smart marketing to try and target every demographic and expect to even please half of each demographic thus resulting in profit, that is just not realistic. "We got a rushed product, not a half assed one." It was half assed because it was rushed, but even still how do you define rushed seeing as Hiromichi Tanaka had 5 years to develop the game.. and a previous game under his belt. When you target to many demographics you are more apt to create a sloppy product. Simple marketing strategy you play to your strengths and you develop a product that has a target demographic not all demographics...

[Rhomagus]

I do not know why you think Immersion is subjective but here i will quote myself back slew of pages with what psychological gaming immersion is.

Immersion aka Spacial Presence

Completeness of sensory information (aka visuals) means that the fewer imperfections about the mental model of the game world that the player has to fill in, the better like big arrows for quests, and instant teleports with no travel time to speak of. Abstractions (there are no people in this town because of, uh, a genocide!) are the enemy of immersion. Assassin’s Creed 2 was immersive because its towns were filled with people who looked like they were doing people stuff, actual daily tasks. Dealing in a familiar environment also allows everyone to comfortably make assumptions about those blank spaces without being pulled out of the world to think about it like copy pasting areas over and over again in FF14. Knowing that the world is not a copy paste but rather a different piece of a puzzle allows you to be more immersed in the game.

Cognitively demanding environments where you stop and think causes the player base to focus on what’s going on and getting by in the game will tie up mental resources. This is good for immersion, because if the brain is used for understanding or moving around in the world, it’s not free to notice all its problems or shortcomings that would otherwise remind them that they’re playing a game like instant teleport forces on people.

Finally, a strong and interesting narrative, plot, or story will suck you in every time no matter who you are. In fact, it’s pretty much the only thing in a book’s arsenal for creating immersion and look at the long running of books! it works in games too! Good stories attract attention to the game and make the world seem more believable. They also tie up those mental resources I spoke of earlier in avoiding notice of other game flaws.

Your aspect of immersion you keep bringing up "ideling" is a portion of time were you are taking in sensory information allowing you to use more of those mental resources. Today's crowd of gamers is so impatient, so greedy, and so ignorant that they cant help but not appreciate immersion; does this lack of patience and appreciation of quality come from something outside of the gaming world, yes i do believe so... i pin this on American culture.

I just don't understand how a person of your intellectual prowess could think that immersion can not be measure and defined aka subjective. I do not agree with your statement "Content can add immersion. Immersion for immersion sake is not content", Content does not all ways add immersion for instance insta porting is content and yet creates no immersion. yet you are correct immersion is developed in a game through content so you can not have immersion without content; Immersion is a product of content, however content can have no immersion.

they don't need to be balanced, mechanics breed immersion. Like i said mechanics do not always breed immersion.

there is a communication breakdown here and I should've been more descriptive. yep i agree with that.

I'm taking the photograph of the earth with the hubble telescope. You're taking a photograph of the place you live. i do not agree with this and again maybe this was a result in a communication break down. I am advocating IMMERSION! in Final Fantasy 14 not the whole game, in this discussion. When i stated you are not looking at the big picture i meant you are disregarding a legitimate game mechanic (immersion) all together by stating it is a subjective mechanic.

You can't, you'll have losses. I'm okay with these losses as an open game will be conducive to more people's interests as they'll be able to access it more. Yes and when you open your self up for more interests you can shut everyone out at the same time. It is just not smart marketing to try and target every demographic and expect to even please half of each demographic thus resulting in profit, that is just not realistic. "We got a rushed product, not a half assed one." It was half assed because it was rushed, but even still how do you define rushed seeing as Hiromichi Tanaka had 5 years to develop the game.. and a previous game under his belt. When you target to many demographics you are more apt to create a sloppy product. Simple marketing strategy you play to your strengths and you develop a product that has a target demographic not all demographics...

Cite your sources. Then we'll talk. You'll have to show that your Immersion v. Spatial Presence is not an idea of your own and support it with outside sources in order to persuasively make me think that immersion can be objective. I also already read it when you posted it the first time. I just didn't buy it.

I also said that mechanics can be immersion, not necessarily that they always are. Pong can be immersive, the mechanic of a dot being bounced back and forth is the catalyst for the consumer's imagination. The level of immersion in Pong is defined by the player. They could choose to focus solely on the manipulation of their "paddle" to make sure the ball stays in play. They could choose to play defensively or offensively (taking immersion a step further). They could utilize a mixture of both in order to confuse their opponent (even further). They could even pretend the match was table tennis (even further). They could roleplay as their favorite pro tennis athlete (even further). The last is common in youth sports. In childhood pickup games before going in for a lay up or a jump shot from beyond the three point line the player may shout the name of their most admired professional athlete in an attempt to emulate them.

"Jordan!"

I've shown, and many other posters have already shown, how a person's level of immersion is primarily chosen not given. I suggest you read Konachibi's posts. They accurately show how immersion is subjective. Game mechanics act as the catalyst for immersion. Immersion for immersion's sake is considerably less immersive than if it were to involve player input as well.

[Azurymber]

Cite your sources. Then we'll talk.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain < all sources cited
set + match

[Aenarion]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain < all sources cited
set + match

quoting wikipedia = fail

quoting unrelated wikipedia page = double fail

you set+match'd yourself

[Bled]

Cite your sources. Then we'll talk. You'll have to show that your Immersion v. Spatial Presence is not an idea of your own and support it with outside sources in order to persuasively make me think that immersion can be objective. I also already read it when you posted it the first time. I just didn't buy it.

I also said that mechanics can be immersion, not necessarily that they always are. Pong can be immersive, the mechanic of a dot being bounced back and forth is the catalyst for the consumer's imagination. The level of immersion in Pong is defined by the player. They could choose to focus solely on the manipulation of their "paddle" to make sure the ball stays in play. They could choose to play defensively or offensively (taking immersion a step further). They could utilize a mixture of both in order to confuse their opponent (even further). They could even pretend the match was table tennis (even further). They could roleplay as their favorite pro tennis athlete (even further). The last is common in youth sports. In childhood pickup games before going in for a lay up or a jump shot from beyond the three point line the player may shout the name of their most admired professional athlete in an attempt to emulate them.

"Jordan!"

I've shown, and many other posters have already shown, how a person's level of immersion is primarily chosen not given. I suggest you read Konachibi's posts. They accurately show how immersion is subjective. Game mechanics act as the catalyst for immersion. Immersion for immersion's sake is considerably less immersive than if it were to involve player input as well.

If this conversation has come down to the "cite your sources" argument, which I'm sure would have turned into "unless your citing scholarly journals i don't buy it blah blah blah". I'm going to just walk away from this one, had I known in order to "humble" you i needed to develop a thesis with full work cited i would have reconsidered this conversation as a whole (this is a forum for the love of god). What would be the next thing you asked for, an annotated bibliography?

You seem to me to be a decent person just not very humbled is all, i wish you fun and great times in FF14.

P.S. I apologies for not reading your link directions earlier, i must have skimmed over that accidentally.

[Charismatic]

If this conversation has come down to the "cite your sources" argument, which I'm sure would have turned into "unless your citing scholarly journals i don't buy it blah blah blah". I'm going to just walk away from this one, had I known in order to "humble" you i needed to develop a thesis with full work cited i would have reconsidered this conversation as a whole (this is a forum for the love of god). What would be the next thing you asked for, an annotated bibliography?

You seem to me to be a decent person just not very humbled is all, i wish you fun and great times in FF14.

P.S. I apologies for not reading your link directions earlier, i must have skimmed over that accidentally.

wtf am I reading?

[Konachibi]

wtf am I reading?

Something with a lot of long and complicated words.

[Rhomagus]

If this conversation has come down to the "cite your sources" argument, which I'm sure would have turned into "unless your citing scholarly journals i don't buy it blah blah blah".That's actually not necessary. I think I asked too much of you for this particular argument. What I should have said is, "Can you cite a source?". I'm actually fine if you don't. The "spatial presence" argument doesn't completely trump the "immersion is objective" argument though. I've got to go to work right now but I'll be back later to expand on this. I've shown how immersion can be subjective and Konachibi has given actual examples. The downside of "immersion for immersion's sake" is "The uncanny valley". I'm not sure if you've heard of it but I'll link information to it later. I'm going to just walk away from this one, had I known in order to "humble" you i needed to develop a thesis with full work cited i would have reconsidered this conversation as a whole (this is a forum for the love of god)Understood. You don't need to cite scholarly sources to humble me but that would an excellent job. A very well reasoned argument would humble me. An argument where I'm stumped and can't respond would humble me.. What would be the next thing you asked for, an annotated bibliography?Completely unnecessary.

You seem to me to be a decent person just not very humbled is allAs I've said before, I can be humbled, I just haven't in this thread. I've even shown my faults at times. I've even shown my faults in this post. Shouldn't have asked for sources, miscommunicated once., i wish you fun and great times in FF14.

P.S. I apologies for not reading your link directions earlier, i must have skimmed over that accidentally.

I did notice though that you were starting to quote mine my responses and juxtapose them strategically to make it seem like I was referring to something else. This will get me to remove myself from the argument just as Azurymber's misuse of the same logical fallacy did. I need to start seeing as much care as I put into my responses as I've been putting into yours. My method of putting red text into your quotes along with an overall response to the post as a whole leaves no room for the "you didn't read what I said." I've noticed that I bring up several points in a response but only cherry picked ones are used in your rebuttals. I can show this when I get back from work, as I can show how you began to quote mine me and pull my words out of context.

I wish the same for you and your enjoyment of Final Fantasy XIV. I don't think our needs are mutually exclusive.

[Konachibi]

I did notice though that you were starting to quote mine my responses and juxtapose them strategically to make it seem like I was referring to something else. This will get me to remove myself from the argument just as Azurymber's misuse of the same logical fallacy did. I need to start seeing as much care as I put into my responses as I've been putting into yours. My method of putting red text into your quotes along with an overall response to the post as a whole leaves no room for the "you're didn't read what I said." I've noticed that I bring up several points in a response but only cherry picked ones are used in your rebuttals. I can show this when I get back from work, as I can show how you began to quote mine me and pull my words out of context.

I wish the same for you and your enjoyment of Final Fantasy XIV. I don't think our needs are mutually exclusive.

He's got the Collins English Dictionary Of Long Words at his disposal... it's going to be a tough battle.