Unlike last week, where I could blame my host for the lack of posting, this week I have no such excuse. The reason I didn’t have this posted yesterday is because… well… I forgot that it was Monday. Which is bizarre, but true. Apologies. Hopefully I’ll manage to finish up the month on-schedule.
There is, I believe, an often unvoiced discomfort that many people who are not deeply into immersion have with the idea of immersion. (Special thanks to Shreyas Sampat for being the first person to articulate this to me clearly.) This discomfort is caused by a fundamentally different understanding of how the activity of roleplaying is supposed to be undertaken. First I’m going to lay out the objection, and then I will attempt to explain why it isn’t as bad as it might first appear.
The objection is pretty simple, and can be simplified as ‘immersion is a selfish goal, and as such is likely to cause dysfunction’. I use the term ‘selfish’ because, I believe, that while it doesn’t get said, a lot of us (and I include myself) see immersion as a fundamentally selfish activity. At least while it is being undertaken. Let’s look at why.
Since immersion is a purely internal activity* it is not concerned with the other players. When you are immersing you are not thinking about whether your fellow players are having fun, you are not checking to make sure that you are not crossing any thematic lines which will ruin play for them. Further, to some degree, any breaks in immersion to discuss these sorts of things ‘ruin’ the fun of the immersionist.
This perception of how immersion works is not without foundation. In fact, I believe that it is generally accurate, though it is only one way of understanding what’s going on. Still, when looked at from this angle I think that it is pretty clear why people who approach roleplaying as an activity in which one of your primary goals is to make sure everyone else is having fun have a negative reaction to immersion.
All that said, I do believe that this view of immersion overlooks two very important factors.
First, selfish activities can be meaningfully undertaken in social settings. One example of this is eating. At least when you’re eating something you like to eat. Eating is a fundamentally selfish activity. You eating can not provide me with any direct pleasure (though I might feel pleasure because you are enjoying yourself). Yet we still eat together. We can all enjoy a selfish activity together, and that’s a completely functional mode of interaction. I think that immersion can work in similar ways (though it does not always do so).
Second, the dysfunctional understanding of immersion is built upon the premise that immersion is the entirety of play. In one sense, for serious immersionists, this is the case. If you’re not immersing, you’re not really playing. However, there is a certain amount of preparatory work that happens outside of play proper that is still part of the game. I’m going to illustrate this point with sports.
I really like playing ultimate frisbee. It’s an incredibly fun game, and I’m going to draw some examples from it, but I think most of the points will stand if applied to other sports.
The thing to understand is that ultimate frisbee is a fundamentally selfish activity, at least for some people. Enjoyment is derived from playing as hard as you can, from pushing yourself, and from exercising your skills. You don’t worry about whether other people are having fun, you just go out there and you do what you’re going to do, and you have your own fun.
Despite the self-absorption, ultimate frisbee does a remarkable job of making sure everyone is having fun. This is accomplished in two ways: 1) The activity itself is structured so that people achieve their fun by providing an environment in which everyone else has the best chance of achieving fun as well. 2) There is negotiation of the structure of play that is done outside of play proper.
That first thing is important. The fun to be had by playing hard is easiest to achieve when everyone else is playing hard too. The challenge goes up and there’s a sort of synergistic increase in energy among all the players as everyone does well. The fun is, in a sense, infectious and builds upon itself in a sort of feedback loop.
I had an interesting discussion with a player who really enjoys immersion the other day, and she suggested to me that one of the things the supports her immersion best is when other players are immersed. Or at least when they seem to be. She explained that there’s a certain ‘life’ to the characters played by immersed players and that that ‘life’ really helped her stay immersed herself.
The second thing is also important. A game of ultimate frisbee functions most smoothly when you agree before play begins where the field boundaries are and where the goals are. Once play begins it is assumed that, except in special circumstances, those things are fixed. By having an explicity, but closed, period of negotiation players are able to ensure that the structure of play will support their goals, but also ensure that they do not have to constantly renegotiate those boundaries play, which would be distracting.
All that said, I do believe that immersion can be dysfunctional. While I think it is clear that immersion is not necessarily dysfunctional, there are some conditions that must be met to keep it that way. Just as with ultimate frisbee, functional immersion requires that play be structured in a way that players support each other in attaining their goals and that all negotiation be handled outside of play proper. And neither of these conditions is guaranteed.
So, immersion people, do you agree with the need for these two things? If so, how do you make sure they happen in your own games? Are there other things that are necessary for functional immersive play that I missed?
*: I say immersion is a purely internal activity, but this is misleading. Part of immersion is responding to outside stimulous. It’s not just an internal activity, but an activity of interaction.
Tags: Theory
I have been reading through the CC version of TSOY, which contains a nifty suggestion for Storyguides–try to incorporate an issue into the story that will resonate with a player’s issue. He acknowledges that this could be ‘touchy’ but it sheds some light on a different dimension of immersion and its risks. Also, complicate that ‘selfish’ description.
1. This sort of thing seems ready-made to help character immersers immerse–creates an almost visceral sympathy.
2. It creates a possibility for a new sort of dysfuction when that immersion goes unnoticed–namely, when the isue has ‘hooked’ a player in a deep way but the other players/GM don’t realize it. There is the possibility of real hurt feelings and misunderstanding–an almost therapeutic display of projection.
Won’t go into detail, but this reminds me of a game session I played in, where it was very clear the player had gotten into their character and was experiencing character railroading *very* personally due to life experiences. The DM was not cuing into this, but I very directly tried to engage player in the story with my character. It was a very strange session–no dice, lots of in-character talking, where the stakes ended up being something like “if you don’t convince my character to live, you don’t convince me to stay in the game” (not that we were articulating them in those terms–but there they were).
And I’m really not sure that wasn’t the right level to approach the problem, that dropping out of story frame might not have been more explosive. Like the game served a ritual containment function through which we could handle things. That player didn’t stay in the game, btw.
I’m not sure about the dysfunctional-thing; what kind of dysfunction are we talking about here? If players are not on the same page on what they are doing and why they are doing it, then yes, it can get pretty ankward.
With that, I’m still pretty much in agreement with your assumptions. Playing immersively is selfish in a way it’s selfish to be human in normal social interaction; first and foremost, you perceive yourself and you perceive others only through yourself. There’s no third person perspective here, you (mostly) lack the tools to communicate things about the “game” or the “story” or pretty much anything outside your character-self. You’re a person with likes and dislikes, faults and strenghts and you act upon them, without regarding what’s good or bad for abstract things like “story”. I suppose there are various levels of doing this; I’m used to disregard mostly everything outside the character-self. If things go toward the direction that my character is out of the picture after a hour of play, then that happens. It doesen’t make the game dysfunctional as such.
Which leads to the second point; there’s usually fair amount of structure in play, prepared beforehand. This can be traditional scenario-building, intensive character building by the GM alone or in collaboration with the players, or anything which helps to create the characters and the situtation (the point where playing begins, things leading to it and, if necessary, what happens after that) in such way that there’s a strong possibility for all of it to work out. I suppose that could be something learned from live-roleplaying games; you create a lot of structure beforehand, let the players to fill in the blanks about their characters, set things in motion and see what happens. Wheter you impose some kind of control to things happening during the game is pretty much matter of taste.
Couple thoughts:
1. Because in game communication is harder, it’s possible that experienced immersion players will more thoughly use between game communication. Non-immersionists, who can use in-game communication as a kind of crutch or subsistute might neglect between game communication. Sure in a perfect world non-immersionalists would do both, but….
2. I don’t want to claim immersion leads to universally better character portrayal, but I will claim that for myself it’s true. So if you want maximum-good-character-portrayal from me, you have to let me immerse.
3. Also, one of if the so flaws of immersion might be considered a bonus. That is, unpredictable behavior. Nobody, not even the player, can predict accurately how immersionalist will react. Whether this is random chance of game derailment, or makes things more spontaneous and interesting depends on your perspective and sensitity to risk…
William,
On your first point, I agree, sort of. To some degree there’s just a minimum amount of communication that needs to happen sometime for play to stay functional. The immersion-seeking player tends to avoid this communication while immersed (which makes sense), and also often defines ‘play’ as the time when immersion is happening. Thus, in order to get that minimum level of communication, there is little choice but to do it outside of ‘play’. (I want to note that this may be one of the things that has led to some confusion about the boundaries of when we are and are not playing that has arisen with many Forge-style games. We have not come up with something to replace ‘immersion’ as the signifier of ‘this is how you know you’re actually playing’.)
Your second I’m willing to concede, but I do want to point out that ‘better character portrayal’ is remarkably relative. It might be ‘better’ for the game if your character does not engage in certain activities, for instance. What you probably were thinking is ‘more realistic’ or ‘more believable’, right?
On your third point I’m going to have to flat-out disagree. Unpredictable behavior is not a function of immersion, but is instead a function of interacting with other people. I would suggest that the immersed player is no more surprised by his response to an unexpected input than the non-immersed player. Or were you getting at something else?
Thomas
Merten,
We probably disagree on some minor points, but I think for the most part I’m right there with you.
Actually, I want to ask you a question that’s perhaps not related to immersion that this comment sparked:
The Forge paradigm of game design (and play, really) suggests that roleplaying is a fundamentally creative endeavor. The point of play is creativity of one sort or another. Is the same true of an immersion-focused LARP, or is there something else that is considered the primary ‘point’ of play?
Thomas
To be perfectly honest, I don’t know – or rather, I haven’t though about it. I’d think that the (most) creative part is done before the actual playing starts, when the GM’s/larpwrights/writers create the scenario and the characters, and when players finalize the characters by making them into full-fledged persons.
The playing itself could be, I suppose, be more like reacting to what happens in the imaginary world, through the character. You’re not actually creating anything new; most things are already there and you don’t usually bring anything new into it. Immersion-focused LARP’s, as I know them, try to emulate the imagined world and like in our world, everything’s already there – you don’t get a firefight right here, right now, outside your window just by thinking that it would be a cool thing to have. They don’t appear from out of nowhere.
So, in summary, I’d say they might be about emulation/simulation and exploration.
“would suggest that the immersed player is no more surprised by his response to an unexpected input than the non-immersed player. Or were you getting at something else?”
Since you are making a claim about my experiences, I can confidently say you are wrong. My immersion regularly results in my character’s doing things I could not of predicted the day or hour before. This sort of phenemonon is also repeated regularly on RGFA.
In fact, it goes at the heart of why some think immersion is dysfunctional. If I play actor stance, I can safely predict that I will not disrupt a GM who is trying to force a particular plot. Regardless of what the GM does or what the other players do, I will try to play nice. If I play IC or deep IC, who knows what the hell I’ll do. Not I.
You can also do it on your own. I’ll experiment with getting in character on my own, let my mind wander, and end up in wierd mental places sometimes. It’s the same phenomon of doing anything subconsciously. Let’s say I sit down and write 5 pages of stream of consciousness. Then I go back and read what I wrote. Almost surely going to be some wierd things in there. Some things I might be able to ex-post rationalize, but could not have predicted beforehand. And some things I had no awareness of at all.
If I maintain conscious awareness of what I am doing, I can consciously manipulate my behavior to conform to my inital expectations. Can’t do that while deep IC.
William,
I’m not trying to say that no one is surprised by the way you react when immersed, though it may have sounded that way. What I’m trying to say is that you can be just as surprised when you’re not playing immersed.
An example from my own play of this sort of thing: I played a nearly-two-year campaign of HeroQuest that recently wrapped up (sort of). I was playing a pretty cerebral character, and not doing much in the way of immersion. The GM tossed something totally unexpected at me (he had my character’s love-interest mind controlled). I was surprised by this development, and was further surprised by my own reactions (both my in-character and personal emotional reactions).
I wasn’t immersed, but due to the emotional resonance of the interaction my response was pretty instinctual rather than considered.
My point isn’t that immersion doesn’t surprise people, but rather that the sort of surprise we’re talking about isn’t dependent upon immersion.
I think the key lies in your final paragraph. I don’t tend to immerse in the traditional sense, and you’re right, I can consciously manipulate my behavior without ‘breaking out’ of my mental state. However, and this is important, I don’t do so all the time. Sure, sometimes I stop and thing ‘which choice is better for the story’, but most of the time I just choose whatever pops into my head first.
I sort of get the feeling that we agree with one another and that I’m just communicating poorly, but I’m pretty bad at evaluating that sort of thing…
Thomas
Hi, this is the place to make the comment I wanted, I guess, – it’s about creative and immersion-is-rp.
I’ve been trying to analyze the current way people around me play RPGs, escpecially when I finally clearly understood that it differs from ‘Forge’ way.
Now I consider main thing about immersive play that it is not necessarily a creative endeavor. Players mostly enjoy creative part, it may influence their fun, but it doesn’t define their fun.
I don’t consider it too large a gap – between immersive and creative play, but it seems to be there and confusing one for another was a constant problem for me and once I solved this ‘mystery’ I’ve had much less problems. One of the most confusing things there in ‘immersive’ play, for ‘forge’-based investigator is that presence of creative part in such play is undefined – it may be there or it may be not. It’s part of the game, but it may be not the point, or it may be the point, or whatever.
And it looks like the answer people give you about point of play depends more on their mood then on their actual play %)
Sorry it took so long to get to this…
This is an excellent point. People who play primarily for immersion are not worried primarily about creative engagement. I think we could stand to have a lot more discussion of immersion as a goal-in-itself, but as far as I know it’s not being discussed currently.
Thomas
I don’t know, really. If I wouldn’t found out that there is creative play I would have quit playing rpgs. Those people I know, who play immersive and are happy with their play (regardless of me believing them), are not too entuasiastic about analysis and changes. I’m not too eager to force them too :)
Those I know who play immersive and are not entirely happy are looking forward to creative play.
That’s why I’m a little pessimistic about analysis and discussion of immersion-play.
That doesn’t mean I would not talk about it or that I’m not interested in understanding it, though.
(Answering Thomas and jmac at once).
I’m afraid that this characterization is far from matching my own experience, or the reported experience of others.
First, it looks like you’ve just defined creativity in a sense that would exclude Steven King’s novel-writing process (as I heard it described in a quote a couple of days ago) from creative endeavor.
Also, a lot of people who immerse develop characters in play. There are people whose character development approach is what we used to call Design At Start (DAS) in rgfa (Sarah Kahn is one, IIRC), and they have most of the character worked out in advance; but there are also people whose approach is Develop In Play — they start with a rough idea of the character and it takes on definition and develops as play progresses. My approach is primarily DIP, not DAS; if I’m remembering correctly, Mary Kuhner’s was fairly DIP too. Immersion is the method by which we discover things about the character.
Aside from the character development question, as a GM I also do a lot of developing the world in play via channelling.
You can call discovering the further reactions of a character whose background and initial attitudes are largely known uncreative if you like, at the risk of removing much fiction-writing from the domain of the creative arts; and you can call my developing characters in play uncreative if you like; but after you’ve done this, we won’t be able to use the word ‘creative’ for anything between us, because the gulf will be unbridgeable. I can’t accept a usage of ‘creative’ that excludes the working development of fiction in any medium from creative endeavor.
Theory developed in rgfa, but it developed in an attempt to describe or name things that people had observed (their own play preferences) and things they were doing (like immersing). Rgfa was a haven for the the immersion-favoring Threefold simulationist crowd, and there are an awful lot of discussions in the archives between people who favored immersion and did it under varying conditions. One of the reasons we never had a Big Rgfa Model, but had a couple of smaller models and assorted other terminology, is that we found in the course of discussion that few of the generalizations and predictions that people want to make about the play experiences of people whose styles and methods differ pan out. For instance, while there’s a certain amount of correlation between a preference for Threefold simulation and a preference for immersion, Kevin Hardwick (I think) blew the generalization we were about to make out of the water by describing his achievement of strong immersion in a dramatist game, assisted by dramatist techniques.
http://www.google.com/advanced_group_search?hl=en group: rec.games.frp.advocacy
Some fruitful search terms: immersion, deep IC, DAS DIP, channeling, world-oriented delusion, Sarah Kahn, Mary Kuhner, cardboard character, narrative stances
The opening posts in my journal, http://keransrpjournal.blogspot.com/ are a summary of rgfa theory, which may assist anyone who wants to follow the discussions in the archives — although I should note that both the theory and the terminology developed over time, and also note that Threefold terms had a broader use in practice than they did in the “correct” statement of the theory. Forgites will notes the use of some familiar words with different definitions. Ron Edwards appropriated rgfa terminology and changed the definitions, thereby inaugurating lasting confusion; he also discounted the existence or validity of styles and techniques common in rgfa to the point where I would consider Forge theory strongly contraindicated as a path to understanding them.
Keran,
You have a strong point, and if I implied that immersion is not/can not be creative then I did not mean to. What I was saying (or trying to say) is that people who are primarily playing for immersion are not primarily playing for creativity.
That is, if you’re playing for immersion, you might be doing creative stuff too, and that’s cool. But if immersion is why you play, then if for some reason you aren’t being creative or whatever, it’s not a big problem: you’re still getting what you came for.
Now, it’s entirely possible that this is not, in fact, in line with your own play. It is entirely possible that creative stuff is your primary goal, and immersion just happens to be your most effective tool for accomplishing that goal.
Part of the problem is that most of my understanding of people seriously pursuing immersion comes from reading stuff like the Turku Manifesto, which is pretty extreme.
So, to restate my original thing: I’m not trying to say that immersion can’t be creative, but that it doesn’t have to be. Does that match up with your own experience? I ask in all seriousness because I simply don’t know how you play.
Thomas
Well, no, it doesn’t match my experience.
I haven’t had much use for the Impossible Thing Before Breakfast heretofore, but let me put it in those terms: how is it even possible for me to be controlling a main character in a work of fiction without exercising a creative influence on the work?
Does anyone do any creative work in any RPG? If they do, why should making up the setting and NPCs be called creative while making up and developing the main characters is not creative? Why is the NPCs’ contribution to the plot a creative work by the GM, but the PCs’ contribution is not a creative work by the players?
If no one does any creative work, at the end we have a fictional work that didn’t exist in the beginning, and we made it; isn’t that a strange use of ‘creative’?
Or is creative work only work that is done invita Minerva? Am I writing creatively when I’m slogging through my lines of blank pentameter, trying to write something halfway decent by conscious effort, but writing uncreatively when I seem to be inspired and when the lines flow smoothly, as if I were taking dictation rather than torturing them into shape? That would be a very strange notion of creativity in poetry, surely; and it strikes me as equally odd to apply it to character portrayal, character-development, and the making of plot.
Why does thinking and feeling as my character thinks and feels change actions that create parts of a fictional work from a creative to an uncreative act?
Claiming that, in playing for immersion, I am not thereby seeking to exercise creativity impresses me as being analogous to claiming that it is my goal to walk only by using my right leg, and that whether my left leg is involved is strictly incidental.
I don’t want to comment too deeply on Turku because I never played with those people, and therefore I don’t have sufficient context in which to understand some of their remarks. However, I will note that Turku’s a direct descendent of rgfa theory, not of the Forge, and if you bring to that manifesto the assumptions Forgites are likely to make about simulationism, I think there’s a good chance of seriously misconstruing some of the manifesto comments. There are many respects in which, from an rgfa simulationist’s viewpoint, the Forge take on simulationism is halfway inside-out, three-quarters backwards, and wholly muddle-headed; and, while there are deep IC players who favor other styles than Threefold simulationism, there seems to be a pretty marked clustering of simulationist and immersive preferences.
Keran, it seems to me that you are again stating that there is creative work done in any RPG.
Creating subjectively new is some kind of definition for creative work, right? So it’s done all the time, of course
What I do say (and, I guess, Thomas does too) is that this Creative Part is not really point of play for immersive players.
When people remember moments they liked in a game (whatever they verbalise it or not) they rarely talk about cool things someone did, they talk about ‘feeling’ of reality, about ‘being character’, they say ‘i did’ and such things – and thats what they like about playing, that is the thing they call RPG.
There happen games in which there were no ‘cool things done’ one can remember, but they were fun – immersion was there and it seemed to be enough to consider game fun. Again, no cool things to remember doesn’t mean there was no creative work done – GM’s work and all the stuff you mentioned is always there of course.
I am an immersive player. You can try telling me about what the point of my own play is if you really want to, and you can tell me about my own methods if you really want to, but I’m having a certain amount of difficulty figuring out why I should believe you over me.
There are two motives I can think of for this claim that creativity is not part of the point of immersive play as it takes place in RPGs. I’m mostly going to ignore the possibility that I’m looking at an apparent deprecation of certain playstyles and approaches while attempting to maintain plausible deniability (too common a vice among theorists), after noting only one thing: the plausible deniability part does not work.
In case anyone is unaware: saying “My style of play is creative, as opposed to this style over here, which isn’t” is not going to come out sounding complimentary or neutral to practitioners of style 2. There is no possible way to escape the “Your style is uncreative. Therefore my style is superior” implication. If you want results like Ron Edwards gets as a result of his dubious pronouncments, or results like we simulationists got in rgfa when we often spoke as if it were commonly accepted that a good story violates the integrity of the character and the setting (say what?), then continuing to divide creative play from immersive play is a good game plan. If you don’t want results like that, this use of language is not a good idea.
The second motive, which is the only one that indicates any point to continuing conversation, is very likely a mistake about the general nature and point of immersion. For the nonce, I am going to assume that this is what’s going on.
I believe I have already shown that it is not possible to play in deep IC in an RPG without engaging in at least some creation, even in the worst of railroaded games. The idea that this creation is not part of the point of immersion can come from only two places that I can see: one is an unusual metaphysical view, and the other is thinking that the process is more passive than it is in fact, owing to not having experienced the phenomena that the metaphorical descriptions refer to.
In the case of the unusual metaphysical view: I suppose that, if you believe that our channelling metaphor is no metaphor at all — that we actually are perceiving the thoughts and feelings of characters in some otherworld, or some pre-existing archetypes — then you can consistently say that, inasmuch as creation is not taking place during immersive play — inasmuch as we really are discovering, not creating — that creativity cannot be an essential part of the pleasure. If you say that, then we agree to disagree: I have no particular reason to believe that this is the case, and no desire to argue the metaphysics.
In the second case: the point of immersion is the experience, yes — and that experience is intrinsically creative. Since the process is subconscious, my language is to say that I channel — I discover — I perceive — I apprehend: I often speak as if the source of the experience is wholly outside myself, as if it is something I passively sense or passively encounter. But this is metaphor intended to convey a subjective sensation: it should not be mistaken for an assertion of literal truth. When I have the pleasure of “discovering” the answer to a longstanding mystery concerning why my lich-enchanter did not attempt to contact anyone he knew when he was alive after his reanimation, when this seemed out of character, I am in fact experiencing the pleasure of creating a beautiful interlock between previously created background and new background whose effect I did not consciously foresee. That this creative act takes its most satisfactory form when it is subconscious, when the results of creation and not the process are most prominent in the foreground of my attention, in no way diminishes the essential creative nature of the act.
Years of comparing notes with other immersive players have not left me with any reason to think that this understanding of immersion is not a valid general understanding. Different people best achieve immersion under different circumstances, but if I ever encounter anyone whose ‘immersion,’ by their own description, does not seem likely to be fundamentally creative, then I will perforce believe that they are using the same word for a different phenomenon.
I appologize if there was offence or negative implications in my words, I really didn’t mean it.
I’m not answering most of your post – your explanations are convincive and as I’m not too far from immersive play myself, the meaning is quite familiar.
About use of language. I think I understand your point. The word ‘creativity’ itself is denying possibility of it’s neutral use?
English is not my native language and when I use a word which is translated as “creativity” with relation to rpgs, people around me (immersive) often apprehed it as negative. They react like “this is not like writing a book, it’s roleplayng” and such. I mean I agree to try to find another choice of words for this … difference.
Do you agree there is a difference?
I am sorry; I have been too testy, and probably sound even testier than I really was because I was terse. And I’m afraid I’m too tired to be systematic now, or even very clear (but I’ll try).
Yes, there’s a difference between roleplaying and writing a book — I haven’t written an entire book yet, but I did sell a novelette (a long short story).
Yeah, ‘creativity’ is decidedly a non-neutral word. It wouldn’t be in a context that doesn’t demand any original thinking of any sort — nobody would bother to describe my washing the dishes as uncreative, but I wouldn’t care if they did — but I’ve never played in a game that didn’t demand any kind of original thinking.
I think (tell me if I’m wrong) that you mean that you enjoy the roleplaying as a story, and are (at least part of the time) consciously working to produce a story?
One of the complications with enjoying things as stories as that there’s more than one kind of story enjoyment. You could enjoy the atmosphere of the setting; the interaction between the characters; the author’s vivid descriptions; contemplation of a powerful theme; a suspenseful plot; the tone of the writing; or any of these in combination. (Or maybe something else I forgot.) Chances are, you like more than one of these. Chances are, some of them are more important to you than others. Chances are, in the books you like the very best, the particular kind of story-pleasures you value most are well-executed.
Now I happen to value very highly, as an important part of story-pleasure, the “you are there” sense, the compelling description, the character that intrigues me, or powerful wording. The books I like best do at least some of these well. Which doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate a dramatic plot. But the book often will affect me most strongly if it causes me to vividly imagine at least parts of the setting, and if it presents me with characters that capture my interest for who they are, rather than for anything in particular they might happen to be doing. And this is an important part of my experience of my very favorite written fiction.
I carry this taste over into roleplaying. In roleplaying I find that I can get an even more compelling sense of character and place than I can get either in writing or in reading. In writing, I end up paying to much attention to word choice and structure to think as the character thinks; when I’m reading, I’m not determining the character’s actions, and I don’t have nearly as strong a sense of who the character is. So my pleasure in immersive play is not contrary to the kind of pleasure I take in stories — it’s a tighter focus on the most important pleasure.
I frequently find that trying to make the character conform to an externally-imposed dramatic plot, or to various other considerations that don’t spring from the character’s own nature, lessens the believability of the character, and thus my engagement with them. Since I value engagement with the character more highly than I value having a plotline with a dramatic pattern of rising tension, I set aside having a dramatic plot in favor of character engagement.
There are other people who value the dramatic pattern of rising tension in a suspenseful plot most highly. Or people who value exploring a theme. Or — what is most important to you in play? That is probably what I’d call your favored style after. And I don’t think it matters whether or not it fits into somebody else’s theory or not — what seems to be more important is whether people can get a rough idea of what you mean by looking at what you called it.
(My preferred style needs a better name than it has, but I haven’t figured out anything clear that’s short. Although maybe ‘immersionist’ would be better than ‘simulationist’ (which is misleading) or ‘world-oriented’ (which is incomprehensible), after all. I don’t think, even with the multiple meanings of immersion, that it suggests anything that’s incorrect.)
Concerning me, I quite rarely use (and used) the word ‘story’ describing my interest in rpgs.
I guess I’ve made another confusing question in previous comment :-/ I meant difference between one kind of play and another kind of play – the one for which we will not use ‘creative’ anymore and another – ‘immersive’ kind. Do you agree there is a fundamental difference between them?
From your words I estimate that you don’t agree. You say that this is just a style of play and difference lies in kind of ‘story enjoyment’ or something like this. Right?
Here in this comment I will call immersive I-play and other kind of play C-play. Forgive me for this.
I will try to explain that difference as I see it. Part of this difference is what is considered a play and what is considered something wrong and not worth continuing as a rpg.
As far as I know in I-play you continue to play as far as you are ‘in’, as you are immersing. If nothing happens or ‘story’ is not satisfying, you can say it’s boring or whatever, but game is still considered to be going on, it is an rpg and it is being played. If a ‘story’ is happening, but players are not ‘in’, it can be fun, but it is not an rpg, it is not a game (from point of view of I-player). As far as I know and feel and understand from my own experience.
In C-play things are other way around – it is not a game when nothing interesting happens. It also may be considered bad or something if there is no immersion happening. In short.
Well, I’ve played games to see how particular techniques or approaches work. In those cases I’m expecting to come away with information about the technique, rather than entertainment or insight about the subject matter of the game, although if I get those too, it’s all to the good. For experimental play like that I have a different standard of success.
But under most circumstances I play for immersion and wouldn’t consider a session completely satisfying if I didn’t get it at all, because immersion is the one thing I can get out roleplaying that I can’t get out of reading or writing: it’s the particular thing that makes the effort of gaming worth it. I don’t expect to be immersed all the time, though, particularly when I’m GMing: I’m not always playing an immersible character. And non-immersive play isn’t necessarily uninteresting — it’s just that I can get much of what’s interesting about non-immersive play out of writing or reading. Without immersion the payoff for putting out the cooperative effort necessary to roleplay isn’t big enough for me.
Now, about the style of play you favor — I’m not sure what you’re getting at yet. How are you defining ‘something interesting happening’ — what kind of things are interesting? One of the characteristics of Forge games that doesn’t get any explicit formal attention in the definition of narrativism, although it shows up in the “Story Now!” essay and is implicit in many portraits of satisfactory narrativist games, is a particular approach to pacing: a desire to plunge from one conflict-intensive scene to another to another with very little break. Is that what you mean? If it is, I wouldn’t describe that as an interest in the-whole-of-story-as-such either: it’s a concentration and intensified focus on yet another aspect of story.
Of course we shoud talk about ‘most circumstances’.
immersion is the one thing I can get out roleplaying that I can’t get out of reading or writing
I can’t agree.
Can you accept this as that fundamental difference?
Um … I said it was the thing I get out of RP that I don’t get out reading or writing. Do you mean you think I do get it out of reading or writing?
I mean there are other things person can get out of roleplaying that she can’t get out of reading or writing.
If you agree – if you play for those other things, you play one way, if you don’t agree, if immrsion is the one exclusive thing, then you play the other way.
Well, yeah. I was saying what I get out of it that I don’t get elsewhere, not what everyone gets out of it that they don’t get elsewhere. Not to mention that it doesn’t necessarily have to be something they can’t achieve at all in any other medium that inspires someone to play — it could be that roleplaying delivers kinds of fun they can have elsewhere in a satisfying combination.
I’m still not clear on what it is you play for, though. What would make a game particularly good or particularly bad for you?
I’m not sure what practical sense would my description of what I consider good or bad bring to this … discussion.
From where we started (I guess) my point was that much confusion with imersion play arises from wrong assumption about what it’s driven by – about part creative interest plays in such games.
What I really understood from your comments is that I shouldn’t use word ‘creative’ because it’s provocative. Then, I think, you are saying that you can’t divide or categorize styles of play, just describe your own.
In short, it would be nice if you would directly state your opinion on subject of this our little discussion, and then we would agree or disagree and then we could talk about our experience and use other arguments.
maybe we should do it elsewhere though :)
I had an answer for you, but it isn’t posting, for some reason.
(OK, let’s see if this posts.)
You mentioned ‘creative’ play. I can simply assume, given the Forge reference, that the style of play that tends to be lauded over there as empowered, daring, and innovative is what you mean; but I thought I’d ask, in case the assumption is incorrect.
The answer to your previously asked question of whether there’s a fundamental difference between immersive play and style X is, I suppose, a given — yes, of course, or why are we calling them by different names? — but I cannot comment on what I think the difference is without knowing what style X is. Your choosing to call it ‘creative’ suggests that you’re not at the table mere to hang out, or to merely beat the challenge of a game-as-game; it suggests that the satisfaction you take in play is tilted toward the aesthetic. But I think there are at least three different styles that might be characterized as primarily aesthetic. So — creating what, why, how? seems to me to be a valid question to ask, at least if I’m to answer your fundamental difference question in a useful fashion. (Darn it, this isn’t as clear as I’d like.)u
As far as categorizing styles goes: I think we can categorize other people’s styles to a point, but only to a point: once we throw out an initial series of guesses about styles we don’t play in or don’t appreciate, we need to be willing to let the people who do play in and appreciate those styles say “Yes, you’re right about this, but you’re wrong about that; and this distinction here that you’re downplaying? It’s crucial. No, this other guy is not playing in the same style as I am, even if you don’t see the important difference between them. And I don’t agree with your idea that I can’t be doing Y if I’m doing X: in my experience they’re compatible.”
If we don’t do that, we’re adjusting the data to fit the theory, not the theory to fit the data. And of course the theory will seem to work, if we always adjust the data to fit it; but then we’ll be preventing ourselves from seeing any patterns that we aren’t already aware of — we’ll be preventing ourselves from learning anything new, and we may cause ourselves to see things that aren’t really there. So I think that categorization can be useful, but it needs more cautious use than it gets at times.
Your assumption is correct. And I must say that it was and is ‘empowered, daring and innovative’ for me, mostly. I personally may have some disagreement or misunderstandings with theory, but practical sense and results I had are really precious to me. And practice is what I am really interested in.
About categorizing styles and about adjusting data, you are right, I agree completely.
About style X and the question, I have a further explanation.
With this purpose I divide things in RPG in two parts – the way we engage in play and things happening in play. About the way we play there are two distinct ‘modes’ – immersive and not immersive.
To describe things happening in play people use GNS, other theories and models, it doesn’t matter. What matters, in this context, is that these things can be boring, absent, bad or they can actually happen, be interesting and likeable.
So there are these two parts, each binary – yes or no, for the purpose of this ‘explanation’.
What does immersive style is ensuring that immersion happens. Good immersive game works in such way that players expirience immersion. Either immestion is there or its not a game and its so obvious that people just stop playing. What people actually call good game also includes something interesting happening, I don’t deny it of course.
What does style X is ensure that second part (things happening) are good. Good style X game either has good things happening or its not a game at all, it can’t be played anymore.
What I mean is that these two kinds of play are dealing the same way with these two aforementioned parts, one with first, another with second.
Immersion play [i]is[/i] immersion, so immersion is there for sure.
In the same way creative play is creation and so, creation is there for sure.
(glad it posted in the end)