Lyric Suite
Converting to Islam
- Joined
- Mar 23, 2006
- Messages
- 56,648
While it is arguable whether immersion is measured entirely by the degree in which a game successfully imitates real life, to confine our experience of reality solely on how we perceive our surroundings is where the fallacy with the modern notion of "experience" in gaming lies. Human beings are conceptual creatures, they are not just walking sense machines. This very conversation is a primary example of a type of interaction which does not hinge on sense perception as its entire raison d'etre. It is this conceptual dimension which defines not only how we interact with the world but even how we define our very subjective experience of it. A primary example of the fallacy of reducing experience to sense feedback alone can be seen in a game like Trespasser, specifically, the infamous Trespasser arm. The notion of an actual appendage by which we can physically interact with our virtual environment in a game may make sense on paper, but in practice the experience was extremely unrealistic. See, while it is true that we interact with our physical surroundings using physical appendages, our actual subjective experience of this interaction is a far cry with the type of shit we had to deal with in the game, when even picking a simple object was a struggle. See, when i pick shit up in real life, my subjective experience of it does not include being constantly aware of the physical properties of my arm. The act is so natural, so effortless that my subjective experience is actually similar to that of a game where picking stuff up is as simple as pushing a button.
But like i said, there is far more to interacting with reality than simple sense perception. The experience of commandeering an army, the experience of thinking up strategies and employ tactics, goes far beyond mere sense feedback. Much of the work of a general is purely conceptual in nature, and in many cases a commander doesn't even see the actual battles he wages. And it is this aspect of strategy and decision making that is simulated in a turn based war game for instance. And in this case you cannot even argue that it is merely because of the limitations inherent in the process of game making that we cannot emulate every single aspect of the experience of being a general, all though that is also part of the problem and the reason games have to specialize in the type of experience they want to offer, of which aspect of our interaction with reality they want to focus on. In such a game, you don't want to experience everything a general experiences during the course of his career a priori, for that would be absurd and at any rate completely besides the point. The entire idea is precisely that of allowing a person to engage in that aspect of strategy and decision making in and of itself. Everything else would simply be an actual hindrance to the experience. What do i care about actually watching scenes of soldiers marching into battle when all i want to do is think up strategies and enact tactics? If i wanted to experience that, i'd play a completely different game, but according to your argument, my desire to single out the mere conceptual elements of being a general while eschewing any experience based on sense feedback is retrograde and a primitive way of looking at gaming as an entertainment form. As if people were playing shit like Risk before video games were invented simply because they secretively wanted to drive a Panzer tank, but couldn't. But lo, now that video games have evolved enough, we can (sort of), so away with Risk! Away with all those boring strategy games. Now we can just don our Oculus Rift headset and actually experience what it is like to be a general for the first time. Behold the amazing first person visuals as your eyes are fixed on a mahogany table as your incredibly articulated digital arm pushes pawns on a cloth map, just like a real general would! Such progress, much immurshun.
But like i said, there is far more to interacting with reality than simple sense perception. The experience of commandeering an army, the experience of thinking up strategies and employ tactics, goes far beyond mere sense feedback. Much of the work of a general is purely conceptual in nature, and in many cases a commander doesn't even see the actual battles he wages. And it is this aspect of strategy and decision making that is simulated in a turn based war game for instance. And in this case you cannot even argue that it is merely because of the limitations inherent in the process of game making that we cannot emulate every single aspect of the experience of being a general, all though that is also part of the problem and the reason games have to specialize in the type of experience they want to offer, of which aspect of our interaction with reality they want to focus on. In such a game, you don't want to experience everything a general experiences during the course of his career a priori, for that would be absurd and at any rate completely besides the point. The entire idea is precisely that of allowing a person to engage in that aspect of strategy and decision making in and of itself. Everything else would simply be an actual hindrance to the experience. What do i care about actually watching scenes of soldiers marching into battle when all i want to do is think up strategies and enact tactics? If i wanted to experience that, i'd play a completely different game, but according to your argument, my desire to single out the mere conceptual elements of being a general while eschewing any experience based on sense feedback is retrograde and a primitive way of looking at gaming as an entertainment form. As if people were playing shit like Risk before video games were invented simply because they secretively wanted to drive a Panzer tank, but couldn't. But lo, now that video games have evolved enough, we can (sort of), so away with Risk! Away with all those boring strategy games. Now we can just don our Oculus Rift headset and actually experience what it is like to be a general for the first time. Behold the amazing first person visuals as your eyes are fixed on a mahogany table as your incredibly articulated digital arm pushes pawns on a cloth map, just like a real general would! Such progress, much immurshun.
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