General / Off-Topic The Emergent Immersion Paroxysm

Lucid dreams not withstanding, our dreams seem rather "immersive" perhaps in part due to a separation of our logic driven, conscious brains not over-analyzing things and getting in the way. Now it's just a simple matter of recreating that in video game format in a compelling way with game mechanics. [hehe]
It's called "flow". Goal is to keep your mind following a continuous patter of both stimulating and relaxing activity that makes you drift into a kind of lucid, automatic state of mind where you just go along with the game without reflecting (much) on what you're doing. Flow can also be observed in monotonous activities that still require concentration, like assembly line work.
 
It's called "flow". Goal is to keep your mind following a continuous patter of both stimulating and relaxing activity that makes you drift into a kind of lucid, automatic state of mind where you just go along with the game without reflecting (much) on what you're doing. Flow can also be observed in monotonous activities that still require concentration, like assembly line work.

Along with that, I presume our dreams are driven in no small part by our expectations within the dream and we don't break away from the dream's "immersive content" (at least not right away, usually), so I think continuity to match Commander expectations given various scenarios and ways of advancing and interacting with the game is also a relevant factor here.

But back to your point, I do tend to do more exploration in the game (such as it is) when listening to good tunes and having a few beers, and without the risk of injuring myself or others. Conversely, I think the game could do with a bit more risk or at least seemingly meaningful challenges to placate my couscous brain.
 
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so i read the OP. The OP is wrong.

He's <silly british censors> that people are mis-using the english language sometimes. Boo hoo.

He's <silly british censors> upset that people want a strictly multi-player game vs this opt-in option they're working with and that defenders of that desire use the words that make him angry. Again, boo hoo.

Forum posts that are about other people's forum posts are stupid wastes of space and should just be moved to off-topic or closed.

There are plenty of reasons to complain about immersion in a game that caters to a niche of players that value escaping reality and markets itself that way. What makes the game fun is surrounding yourself in a universe created around the game and being part of that. Immersion in a game like this is no less important than an actual game mechanic and when it's not working as it should, it's a problem no less annoying than when a game mechanic is not working as designed. Many of those things aren't a matter of having a better or different imagination.

So lets take the example that the OP seems really butt hurt about. PvP/pvp-only advocates.

The common complaint is that it's immersion breaking that players can do things that circumvent player activity (like blockading a system).

Fdev can address this a number of ways vs what they currently do which is ignore the issue. Perhaps they can represent players activities not in your instance but in your areas/system by spawning a certain number of NPCS that represent them using a low resolution sampling of player activities over time. Then a human player's activity can be negated with an opposing action against an X number of NPCS that have been spawned to represent their activity. This can be highly effective in BGS manipulation. And this can be done across modes.

That's just one example where the answer doesn't mean fdev has to force all the scared players who dont want to go against dedicated PvP'ers to pvp.

There are plenty of other areas that dont have anything to do with combat that break immersion unnecessarily, like in how mysteries are handled in the game, how you socialize with other players, how you log important info in the game, how you deal with the utter boredom of traveling in the game.

This post tries to trivialize the concern over how the game fails to provide the escape that many players in this genre feel is a high priority. Unfortunately, if you didn't want that to be a very high priority, you shouldn't be playing these kinds of games that are favored by these kinds of players.
 
META is an acronym for Most Effective Tactic Available.
It's not the Greek prefix. Hence cometh the confusion. People using the acronym don't capitalize, and spell it interchangeably with the prefix.

Best tactics should be " the META", not the metagame.

Oh, that ridiculous backronym created by the ignorant and the arrogant to cover their tracks. It's no coincidence that that they have the same spellings, the term meta has been thrown around wrongly for years before that backronym became a thing as many players weren't able or willing to admit that the tactic they were using was due to a balance problem rather than being due to forces beyond the game. Over time, the term devolved beyond meaning beyond the game into simply what is popular, even if said thing was popular due to broken mechanics rather than the players themselves, which then led towards players who wanted to feel smug mislabelling the tactic as meta rather than just calling it OP. I'm all for new words being implemented for new things, but outright lying about the definition of a word to maintain perceived superiority, which then picks up and causes an ever descending spiral of linguistic breakdown to the point where people parrot the incorrect form rather than looking at the truth just really grinds against my sensibilities. It's like the whole thing with fake news nowadays, except that it isn't just about overhyped sensationalism but instead a complete failure of the very fabric of our communication.
 
And a good bit of harmless fun, with maybe a slight hint of thought-process stimulus as well.

You expect too much from the trolls around here. Whining is not about intelligence; it's about the ignorance and self interest of infants who use these forums as their own personal baby stroller.

"Emergent"? Just another buzz word (and if some uses the the phrase "let's 'drill down' into this topic" I will punch them out).

As for "parrot"... I do get your point on attribution error; particularly around here.
 
You expect too much from the trolls around here. ...

Water off a duck's back. Not sure who the ducks are here though, so I try not to dwell on it. For my part, I'm just trying to have a reasonable if not constructive conversation about the points I have some interest in. Sorry if that's getting a bit off topic though. :eek:

Heh. I just noticed this is in the off topic section of the forum now, so it looks like I'm covered.
 
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Water off a duck's back. Not sure who the ducks are here though, so I try not to dwell on it. For my part, I'm just trying to have a reasonable if not constructive conversation about the points I have some interest in. Sorry if that's getting a bit off topic though. :eek:

Heh. I just noticed this is in the off topic section of the forum now, so it looks like I'm covered.

I respect your interest. Unfortunately "that word" tends to be used an excuse for just about everything around here. I didn't see this thread before it was in OT.
 
Language does require some immutability, or we'd all sound like we're suffering from aphasia. It wouldn't work, and civilization would still be pointing and grunting at things - which at times can be more clear than actually speaking, but not so good for the written word.

Only to the extent that it allows you to accurately and efficiently communicate with your audience. If you find yourself listening to a discussion and wondering why some words are being used in a manner utterly alien to you, that would be because the discussion is taking place in a different language, one that is tailored for a specific group who has assigned a different meaning to those words through their shared values and experiences. This happens all the time and at every scale, from private jokes shared only between friends, professional jargons and subcultures slangs, regional dialects, idioms and coloquialisms (I'll leave out the obvious fact there are different proper languages out there as we've all at least agreed to use English in here).

Are all of these wrong? They might be ill-suited to convey information to you, but how likely is it that the whole conversation was aimed specifically at you? If it allows communication within the intended group, then it's all good.
 
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Emergent content was a term used in gaming to describe mechanics in a game (or the use of those mechanics), which created game play the designers didn't necessarily think about when designing the game originally.

A simple example might be a game created about building bridges over rivers, in which players figure out how to use the bridge building tools to create castles with weaponised draw bridges.

Another example might be a mechanic that allows you to create mine carts for your dwarves to use to move items around their underground fortress more efficiently, which is subsequently used to create a means of catapulting various sharp implements out of the front of the fortress when under attack, to hail incoming goblins with various weapons, and even the mine cart itself.


That's what it was originally intended to describe, when used in the context of game mechanics.

It's actual literal meaning is sort of irrelevant when used in this context, in a similar way, various subjects alter the meaning of words during their development.

Orthogonal Unit Differentiation has been used by game designers to describe enemies which have distinct and unique characteristics, whereas orthogonal doesn't exactly mean that in a literal sense.
 
so i read the OP. The OP is wrong.

Wrong about what, exactly?

He's <silly british censors> that people are mis-using the english language sometimes. Boo hoo.
Forced parlance is more offensive than forced meme.

He's <silly british censors> upset that people want a strictly multi-player game vs this opt-in option they're working with and that defenders of that desire use the words that make him angry. Again, boo hoo.
No, I don't care what anyone wants - we all have the same game. We may play it differently, but it remains uniformly the same for everyone.

Forum posts that are about other people's forum posts are stupid wastes of space and should just be moved to off-topic or closed.
What about forum posts about forum posts about other peoples' forum posts? What does that say? What was it Gandalf said? "Who's the more foolish, the fool or the fool who follows him?"

There are plenty of reasons to complain about immersion in a game that caters to a niche of players that value escaping reality and markets itself that way. What makes the game fun is surrounding yourself in a universe created around the game and being part of that. Immersion in a game like this is no less important than an actual game mechanic and when it's not working as it should, it's a problem no less annoying than when a game mechanic is not working as designed. Many of those things aren't a matter of having a better or different imagination.
I don't disagree at all. When something doesn't work the way it should, that definitely interrupts one's state of deep mental involvement - such as Hyperspace jumps that either never end, or end with a black "Connection to Matchmaking Server Lost" screen. But when a system works, exactly as intended, such as the buying and selling of commodities, but it is merely inconvenient that you cannot simply leave said commodities in your space-truck to jump in your murdermobile... that's all on you.

So lets take the example that the OP seems really butt hurt about. PvP/pvp-only advocates.
My butt is just fine, thanks. Advocates of one play style or another do not concern me in the least. But go on about my butt. I'll ask why you seem to know so much about it later.

The common complaint is that it's immersion breaking that players can do things that circumvent player activity (like blockading a system).

Is THAT what the common complaint is? I'm pretty sure there are well over 1000 individual pages filled with a completely different complaint, and it's not "but they can play in solo or private groups, and completely ignore the fact that my little group is sitting outside this station shooting at everyone who gets close." I'm slightly over 100% certain that the Common Complaint is: "I tried to murder this clueless kid and he logged out on me, and I didn't get to see the pretty explosion." Since you're totally unaware of someone's presence when they're playing in a different mode, this cannot have any effect on your state of mental involvement, unless you are devoting so much energy to worrying about it that you are unable to focus on the game you're playing, in which case your "immersion" is not in the game, but in worrying about what other people are doing.

Fdev can address this a number of ways vs what they currently do which is ignore the issue. Perhaps they can represent players activities not in your instance but in your areas/system by spawning a certain number of NPCS that represent them using a low resolution sampling of player activities over time. Then a human player's activity can be negated with an opposing action against an X number of NPCS that have been spawned to represent their activity. This can be highly effective in BGS manipulation. And this can be done across modes.
Can you show us the Cobra source code that clearly shows this isn't already happening, and that your efforts to stir up Civil Unrest in some system are not being thwarted by the counter-actions of NPC's already? Bet you can't.

That's just one example where the answer doesn't mean fdev has to force all the scared players who dont want to go against dedicated PvP'ers to pvp.

There are plenty of other areas that dont have anything to do with combat that break immersion unnecessarily, like in how mysteries are handled in the game, how you socialize with other players, how you log important info in the game, how you deal with the utter boredom of traveling in the game.
Wait, how you socialize? Really? As far as I can tell, you have three methods available to you - your actions, your text and your voice. You can act aggressive, passive, friendly, hostile, indifferent. You can send someone a message via chat, or you can send a voice comms request. But bare in mind, not everyone is going to speak your language, and not everyone is going to want to play-act their character. That's the chance you take with a public game. You might talk like a pilot, someone else might talk like a pirate, and I might talk like some guy sitting in front of his PC playing a game. Your level of mental involvement is no one else's responsibility but your own.

This post tries to trivialize the concern over how the game fails to provide the escape that many players in this genre feel is a high priority. Unfortunately, if you didn't want that to be a very high priority, you shouldn't be playing these kinds of games that are favored by these kinds of players.

Ever hear the saying: "You cannot MAKE anyone happy?" Or perhaps "You cannot help someone who does not want help?"

They're both true. It's not Frontier's job to provide anyone with an escape from their reality. It is their job to provide a stable, working game environment. Some will find it more entertaining, more engaging, more immersive than others. Some people are simply able to "detach" themselves from the world around them, others remain deeply rooted in the real world. Both are perfectly acceptable. I'm not here to "trivialize" anyone's personal problems. I am here to poke some fun at the way people try to communicate them and how hard they buck against the possibility that they might not be The de-facto authority on All Things, especially Linguistics.

But thanks for playing.
 
I think the term comes from another use of the term "emergence" in systems theory to denote a system arising based on the interaction of lower-order systems. The higher-order system is not predictable based on the properties of the lower-order components.
 

verminstar

Banned
Im stayin outta this one...I misuse grammar all the time without even realizing Im doin it...sure ye know what I mean most the time anyway.

Me wee girl hates it, shes like you OP, gets OCD triggered when she reads anything I rant about on here...its funny watching the ticks in her face when she comes across words like 'yer' but to her credit, she has learned to just ignore it cos she knows its not intentional.

Thats the way the world works...its even incorporated into languages with borrowed words here and there, and lets not dwell of the yanks changing what they wanted to change and still calling it english. Worlds a weird place...if yer normal, yer never gonna be happy and chilled but if yer in the top 1% of intellectuals who think its an issue, then I suppose its an issue.

So how do we fix it and set the world to rights? Ye dont cos ye will burn out trying so ye live and let live...way more chilled now ^
 
watch
[video=youtube;8Gv0H-vPoDc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Gv0H-vPoDc[/video]
 
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