Chapter 4: Immersion Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace

Immersion “more real than reality” –Addresses inner desire to be more than we are The age-old desire to live out a fantasy aroused by a fictional world has been intensified by a participatory, immersive medium that promises to satisfy it more completely than has ever before possible. CU0chttps:// CU0c

Immersion What is immersion? –The experience of being transported to an elaborately simulated place is pleasurable in itself, we refer to this experience as immersion – Metaphor = submerged in water – We enjoy the movement out of our familiar world and the feeling of alertness that comes form being in this new place.

Immersion Taking over all of our attention – Entail a mere flooding of the mind with sensation, overflow of sensory simulation “A good story gives us something safely outside ourselves upon which we can project our feelings.” Fragile nature –Langer’s discussion of watching Peter Pan

Establishing Distance The challenge of participation –Audience involvement is awkward How can we enter the fictional world without disrupting it? We need to define the boundary conventions that will allow us to surrender to the enticements of the virtual environment –Boundary conventions = art is dependent on establishing distance

The Fourth-Wall Convention Playing with boundaries –Discussion of reception of the first part of Don Quixote at the beginning of the second part –Tristram Shandy (blank pages, renumbered chapters, etc.) –War of the Worlds – m/watch?v=nAA3DCEk VHshttps:// m/watch?v=nAA3DCEk VHs

Structured Participation Participation in an immersive environment has to be carefully structured and constrained –ELIZA structure conversations in the format of psychiatric interview –Zork constrained responses to the adventure game –Simplest ways to structure is to adopt the format of a visit metaphor to establish boarder between virtual word and ordinary life

Structured Participation as a Visit Jurassic Park Ride – qtUhttps:// qtU –What is the structure? Is it enough? – Boat is the forth wall = threshold object Rocky Horror – _qQhttps:// _qQ –Learning socially-developed structures

Active Creation of Belief Act of reading is far from passive –Alternative narratives –Cast actors or people we know into roles –Perform voices in our heads –Adjust emphasis of the story to suit our interest –Assemble story to match our own knowledge and belief.

Structured Participation Bounding the allowable behaviors –Make them appropriate –Don’t frustrate the participant Set the right context –Give a metaphor, tools, context, etc. –Provide a mask through back-story, world, roles –Regulate arousal

Structuring Participation with a Mask The mask sets of the participants from the nonparticipants –Creates boundary of the immersive reality and signals we are role-playing rather acting –It is the threshold marker = Jurassic Park Boat –In digital world?

Structuring Collective Participation with Roles The presence of other participants poses special challenges to immersion LARP games rely on explicit mechanisms of participants to sustain the illusion of fictional world –“Specific character profiles” provide the player the ideas on how to act and how to relate to other characters – Certain goals to achieve.

Immersion vs. Engagement Engagement –Analyzing the creator’s goals, methods, etc. –Problem solving (whodunit, what does it mean) –live "whodunit" experiences, including game form, where guests at a private party might use cards, a board, or video from a pre-packaged box, to perform the roles of the suspects and detective; Immersion + Engagement = Flow –The goal of video games