Immersion Breakers

[matchstick]

I was chatting with some friends, and we were talking game immersion. Where you feel part of the environment... A few games were bantered around, one of which was TLD. I'm amazed by how good and immersed we can get. Very enjoyable.

Question is, what game element breaks it for you? I was at camp office on ML, and realized that I can't take one step onto the porch. One step up. Even walking in the snow, a low mound stops your walking progress dead.

Anyone else get jarred by these small things, or am I just picking nits.

[turtle777]

Yes, I agree. This one gets me all the time. 
 

I think they just should put a railing up there, so it’s more clear. 
 

-t

[ManicManiac]

@matchstick, what I'm going to talk about is in general terms... that is to say I am not speaking about any one in particular or any specific examples.  So please bear in mind that as I write my view on the subject you brought up, I'm not referring to your original post so much as the topic of discussion itself.

My thoughts on the subject of "immersion breakers:"

Honestly I think most of the talk about things breaking immersion in this day and age falls into the category of "nit picking" (as you suggested).  It's an easy way for folks to find fault with literally anything... we see this type of thing in all media.  Take Cinema Sins for example: if you think about any movie hard enough, you are going to find tropes and irrational leaps of logic, and even sometimes no logic at all.  My point in relation to games and things that some folks say "break immersion," is that most of the time it's pretty silly... I would say there is never a time when you are not aware you are playing a video game.  So in my opinion it's most often a lame thing to complain about because just like a movie... sometimes a video just needs to video game.

Sometimes this kind or criticism really does have merit... I'm not saying it doesn't.  I am saying that it's become a lightning rod for those who just want to find things to complain about.  So they use it as a convenient cop-out when they just want to dump on something but don't really have anything to complain about.  Let's face it, people nowadays are never satisfied.  If it's not one thing, it would be something else.

For me there is nothing about this game that I consider to be immersion breaking.  I say that because, I choose to accept the world of The Long Dark for what it is... and if you treat any video game and it's constraints at part of that "reality," then it's not really an issue.  The story, lore, atmosphere, aesthetics, and characters (human and non-human) to me are far more important things to talk about when the topic of immersion comes up.

If you can really throw yourself into the world you are playing in, then those little things that can be limiting are not really a problem, it's just a part of the reality you are living in.  I think that immersion has as much to do with us as a participant, as the game does as a means of conveyance.  I also think that too many folks nowadays use anything they don't like about anything and cry "immersion breaking."

And sometimes I see posts discussing things like this, and I recall that wonderful observation from Inigo Montoya: "You keep using that word... I do not think it means, what you think it means..."
 

I couldn't stop thinking about that scene from The Princess Bride... so:

 

 

Edited October 7, 2019 by ManicManiac

[RegentRelic]

7 minutes ago, ManicManiac said:

sometimes a video just needs to video game.

Very well put. The first rule of game development is gameplay and story over realism. The equivalent is true for all forms of story telling

[matchstick]

ManicManiac, well put. And you're correct. 

However process improvement is also something to consider here. When you mention a movie for example, we're not in a cinema to experience reality. We're transported to somewhere/somewhen else. We enjoy the story (hopefully).

As an audience our expectations DO stem from reality - which is why The Martian was so good. As much care was taken to make that movie fit reality, while still being fiction. Filmmakers and game developers both choose to take liberties, however immersion breaking those choices may be.

A thought-provoking topic to be sure.

[odizzido]

I have to say I disagree with it just being a way to complain. For me anything that takes me out of the game world and gives me frustration, however small, is immersion breaking. Not being able to step over tiny things is frustrating for me, probably because it impacts me in the game world. 

[ManicManiac]

@matchstick, well it's not about right or wrong... and I wasn't even being critical of your post per se.  I was just sharing my thoughts and views on the invocation of the term immersion breakers with respect to video games in our present era.  Specifically my views on how the term tends to get abused for the sake of lazy/disingenuous critique.  *which again, I'm not attributing to you... you just brought up the subject... and I'm just talking about the subject.*

 

However since you followed up:

10 hours ago, matchstick said:

However process improvement is also something to consider here.

Of course... every update the team is improving things.  We have to remember it's their game, it's the experience they want to craft, and the story they want to tell... I think it's best if we accept the game for what it is.

 

10 hours ago, matchstick said:

we're not in a cinema to experience reality.

And I would wager that we don't play video games to experience reality either... if we wanted reality of this kind, I would imagine we would go camping and/or hunting.   
 

10 hours ago, matchstick said:

As an audience our expectations DO stem from reality

Let me defer to the source on this one: Raph from Milton Mailbag Dispatch #40

Quote

Wait wait -- please don't use "realism" as an argument for or against a game mechanic (or any tuning around it). You've played this game long enough, or been in this community long enough, to know not to do that. We don't design for realism, and we don't use it as a metric to determine how something should or should not work in the game.

---

10 hours ago, matchstick said:

A thought-provoking topic to be sure.

Definitely, and it's good for folks to discuss things like this.  There is always more than one point of view, and I really do enjoy good conversation.  Naturally we can feel however we want to about things... I'm just sharing my point of view and the reasons behind it.  There are plenty who don't agree with me and that's okay.  I really enjoyed discussing it.

Edited October 7, 2019 by ManicManiac

[ManicManiac]

5 hours ago, odizzido said:

...anything that takes me out of the game world and gives me frustration, however small, is immersion breaking.  Not being able to step over tiny things is frustrating for me, probably because it impacts me in the game world.

Seems to me that the meaning of the terms used are a little confused.  Lack of frustration is not the same thing as immersion.  I think a lot of people erroneously think immersion means "enjoyment" and that's not the case.  I suspect that most people using the word don't know what it means.
 

im·mer·sion
/iˈmərZHən,iˈmərSHən/
Noun: deep mental involvement
 

[Here is where I will try to explain my point of view again based on your specific example - so again before anyone get's their dander up, this is just how I see this particular subject.]

So when folk say not being able to step up/jump breaks our "immersion" (a.k.a. - deep mental involvement) in the game, I would posit... no it doesn't.
(I'm using general terms now)

Sure it might frustrate us and even impact our enjoyment (if we choose to let it), but I bet at the same time we are even more deeply mentally involved in what's going on at that moment!  

Here's how I see it... the particular rules so far seem very consistent.  Like I was saying earlier, it's all just a part of the reality your character exists in.  All of the other creatures in The Long Dark can't jump/step up either (no I'm not counting attack animations, because it's just an animation and not an actual method of locomotion around the environment).  Everything in the world appears to be on equal footing, so it's fair (I acknowledge I can't see the code so I can't know for sure).  Even with the system set up the way it is, a player can still scale up many surfaces and inclines in ways that the animals can't (because they are not capable of being creative, they just have pathfinding algorithms).  In that regard the player always has the distinct advantage of being able to think creatively and use the mechanics to the utmost that the world allows.

For another example just because you're conditioned to have a jumping mechanic from other games does not mean it's "immersion breaking" just because you don't have a mechanic that you expected in another game.  It's just a design choice.  We can either accept the "reality" we are playing in, or we can choose to let small perceived inconveniences ruin our experience; and that's a personal choice.

The point is... we can't just look to the sky and fly off in the air, and we accept this because that's just part of the reality we live in.  Likewise, in the world of The Long Dark we can't jump/step up, that's also just part of that reality we're playing in.  We may certainly not like it, that's our right.  If we really don't like it we can play something that we like better.

I just think all the use of buzzwords is really tired and in most cases kind of a cop-out, especially when the meaning of the words being used is lost or deeply confused.
 

People playing Super Mario Brother's 3 didn't take a look at the swimming mechanics and clamor, "Oh that's not how swimming works... Immersion Breaking!!!"  I think the problem today is that we are spoiled, nothing is ever enough, and so many people always have to have something to nit pick and complain about.

Edited October 7, 2019 by ManicManiac

[devamadhu]

I think generally, people are aware we're playing a game that provides a simulated experience of fantasy survival, guided by the rules the devs choose to implement. However, the devs *also* welcome respectful feedback, and they regularly change aspects of the game based on that feedback. There is an entire Wish List subforum, for example.

Whether our suggestions are related to realism, or consistency of mechanics, or just cool ideas that might make the game more fun or challenging, there's literally a place for them in this forum. If the devs decide not to implement our suggestions, then that's up to them. There may even be a ton of factors that I can't consider since I don't work for Hinterland. But given that the game is still currently in development, I think that the devs' openness to suggestion results in TLD feeling more like a living, evolving thing, which is exciting to me.

To specifically respond to the OP's comment about the single step issue - playing in Pilgrim at least, the room in Carter Hydro Dam with the mountaineering rope has metal debris on the floor that you *can* step over. I don't know if this is a recent development, but I remember when I started playing the game over a year ago, I couldn't do that, at least while playing Wintermute (since that room is designed as a puzzle during the aurora). 

So I agree that a single step in certain areas would be more consistent and immersive. But in contrast, it does make the game more challenging - like say if you're being chased by a wolf, and have to line up your path of entry to the Camp Office in a more skillful way. 

Edited October 7, 2019 by devamadhu
minor edit

[matchstick]

My intention was not to open a can of worms... I hope everyone enjoys TLD. It was a topic to discuss what kind of things we experience in game that jar us out of the enjoyable appreciation of surviving in this game. That's where I was going.

[matchstick]

My intention was not to open a can of worms... I hope everyone enjoys TLD. It was a topic to discuss what kind of things we experience in game that jar us out of the enjoyable appreciation of surviving in this game. That's where I was going.

[Guest jeffpeng]

@matchstick You will quickly realize that discussing anything that might be aiming at improving the game is a can of worms as of late. 

[Raphael van Lierop]

Let's keep it friendly, people. No need to dogpile on other people's comments, or the reaction to those comments, and let's try to minimize the passive-aggressive stuff while we're at it.

[RegentRelic]

It is true your probably not on the look out for making non fine tuning episode three changes.

[devamadhu]

On 10/8/2019 at 1:13 AM, matchstick said:

My intention was not to open a can of worms... I hope everyone enjoys TLD. It was a topic to discuss what kind of things we experience in game that jar us out of the enjoyable appreciation of surviving in this game. That's where I was going.

Omg LOL at the immersion blender!  I hope my comments didn't come across as negative or passive-aggressive. I was mostly agreeing with some of the points you made, and responding to parts of Manic Maniac's post. I think it's a really good topic and I like being able to explore it in the forum. 

[tsrs]

for me it's all the make-work maintenance , the ridiculous decay rate of some objects and drop locations.  Food goes bad , clothes rip and axes dull but i have a sharpening stone and axe i got from my grandfather that he bought in the 1930s.  For that matter most stones will work as a blade sharpener in a pinch so why carry anything at all?  Likewise my parents have a can opener that is used most days and has a decidedly 1970s feel to it. It works every time and never once have they had to maintain it.  In real life any cabin with a  gun will also have ammo for that gun.  Also pencils ubiquitous and don't need electricity so why do we need to bother with charcoal?

I get that some maintenance/spoilage/strange drops make sense and are part of the game but ultimately the game is a sandbox for the story but the story isn't served by having to stockpile sharpen stones, can openers, cleaning kits, etc.

 

[Guest jeffpeng]

@tsrsI get that it's hard to draw the line that decides that not being able to take a 10 cm step is not okay but axes being worn down after chopping up 20 tree limbs is. But by your logic pretty much any sandbox game falters. I guess an intrinsic challenge of TLD's design has always been that it tries to be both a narrative driven adventure and a loot driven survival sandbox. Maybe I might entertain my own view on the subject:

When you play it as only the sandbox it would make no particular sense - from a gamplay perspective - to remove durabity and adjust food spoiling of, let's say, canned food to more realistic levels of "best before 2050". I mean you can try that. Play a custom difficulty sandbox with Pilgrim loot settings, and you quickly realize that loot essentially becomes meaningless since everything is available in excessive abundance and processed food hardly spoils at all. But an essential part of the challenge is that you have to manage your resources. If you remove that you remove the "survival" from the equation almost entirely, which would make this mode completely pointless.

If it were only a story driven adventure, like, for example, "Life is Strange", your argument would have more merit, as, indeed, it probably doesn't fit a story that you need to stockpile this or that or even have gameplay challenges that are not directly tied to the narrative, and I would probably tend to agree with you. But if think a lot of the allure of TLD's Story Mode comes from the fact that it is this rather unique genre blend of a "narrative driven survival sandbox". And I reckon as such compromises have to be made. I think it's not a mistake that even the hardest Story Mode difficulty is rather generously populated with loot, exactly to alleviate some of the focus on survival and shift more attention to the storyline.

I recently mentioned somewhere that I think that the universe of TLD is big enough for another, different game, one that my wife in particular might enjoy more (since she is a pretty fanatic fan of the franchise, but not very much into games that require fast reactions). What I was thinking of was indeed a game that in many respects looks more like an adventure/interactive movie game. In such a setting .... I would absolutely agree with you.

As a side note: I also just realized that the idea of what adds to or distracts from "the experience" really might differ very much depending on where you are coming from, and what your inital expectations of the game might have been. I'm pretty much a sandbox-only player, as you might have guessed, so those aspects are fine for me, expected even. But someone looking at this from your angle really would think very differently about all this.

[Morrick]

Okay, I'll go on and say it.

For me, the immersion breakers are… the crows. I can't kill them, even when they are close. When I shoot at them, they're completely unfazed and just keep circling over corpses and carcasses. Their behaviour is perhaps the least realistic in all the game world. And I'm not even talking about realism as compared with real life. They're an outlier even within the rules of the game world.

*caw caw caw caw*

Grrr.

[Tohono O'odham Man]

On 10/8/2019 at 9:55 AM, Raphael van Lierop said:

Let's keep it friendly, people. No need to dogpile on other people's comments, or the reaction to those comments, and let's try to minimize the passive-aggressive stuff while we're at it.

Raphael van lierop when episode 3 is released will the update mess up any saved items or stock piles of items collected? 

[Blankshield]

I've always liked the extreme wear because it is essentially just a compression factor.  Everything decays 'too fast' and so forth - but it stays balanced so that your choices are maintained - repair this jacket and watch my cloth dwindle, or have supplies for another day, and risk going out with poor condition clothing?  It's the same kinds of choices you'd get in a real post-apoc survival setting, just on a scale of weeks/months instead of years.

The only real thing I've struggled with is that broken window in the Carter Dam control room, and it's mostly a factor of when I first encountered it.  I picked up the game after Chapters 1 & 2 were released, so I started in Story mode (and let me tell you, as a new player, that gauntlet from the crash to Milton was *brutal*).  So I'd learned in the ravine part that I can clamber up walls just with the help of a couple vines.  Then when I got to the dam and was supposed to follow the plot and do the whole elevator thing, I was sitting there in the control room, looking at the broken windows and thinking "really?  I can climb out of a ravine two days after a plane crash, but I can't hop this table and get into the other room?"

It doesn't really bother me any more, and I later learned that the climbing thing was a new mechanic for that release, so it made sense that some of the older environment designs didn't really line up with the new mechanic.

Edited October 15, 2019 by Blankshield
forgot to finish what I was saying

[Jolan]

On 10/5/2019 at 10:23 PM, matchstick said:

and realized that I can't take one step onto the porch. One step up. Even walking in the snow, a low mound stops your walking progress dead.

That sort of thing bothers me too.  Mind you, I'm usually carrying 80 lbs, so I'm good with having to go the long way.  Have you tried it recently?  They fixed things like the railroad tracks not being crossable, and you can now walk up a lot of things you didn't used to be able to.

[ThePancakeLady]

21 minutes ago, Jolan said:

That sort of thing bothers me too.  Mind you, I'm usually carrying 80 lbs, so I'm good with having to go the long way.  Have you tried it recently?  They fixed things like the railroad tracks not being crossable, and you can now walk up a lot of things you didn't used to be able to.

Yeah, you can't step up on that need of the porch.  You can step down, but not up. You can use the stairs on the other end, or in the front. But for "realism's sake"... stairs typically have a 7 inch rise. The front stairs are 3 stairs up, and a slight height more for the decking. That's 21"-24" approx. The side with no stairs looks to be deeper (further down/up) and you are standing in snow that does not look terribly shallow. So... fully loaded, standing in slippery snow, trying to step up a 2 foot "step". It just makes sense that you would use the front steps, the other side steps, or the door around the side just a few feet away.  If you are sprinting from the tracks to the CO, with a wolf on your tail, you should be sprinting to that back door, not the front porch. Just my thoughts on it, and how it generally works for me in Stalker mode... where I am often trying to sprint to a door to avoid a struggle. 

"picks nits with the OP*

[Jolan]

15 hours ago, ThePancakeLady said:

trying to step up a 2 foot "step".

I'd say probably closer to 12 inches 16 inches (if you go with the bigger bottle) with the snow with no slope.  Still too big of a step fully loaded, but you can't step it even naked.  Here's a pic from where I'm getting the idea of height from snow.  (2 liter bottles are around 12-15 inches depending, 1 liter bottles around 9) That and the fact that since we're all short my family tends to us 5 - 5 1/2" risers for old outdoor buildings without a cellar. This place reminds me of a wreck.... er camp one of my cousins own.  Basically, I understand where @matchstick  is coming from.  Its like some of the other things you should be able to climb but can't.  You just want to.  

Edited October 16, 2019 by Jolan

[ThePancakeLady]

4 hours ago, Jolan said:

Its like some of the other things you should be able to climb but can't.  You just want to.

I won't disagree  there. I look at every hill and mountain top that way, lol.