Iconic elements of the immersive sim

Judith on 6/7/2012 at 16:57

You might want to take a look at Randy's GDC lectures on design in stealth games. Basically it's about systemic design that responds well to player's actions rather than authoring the experience. Lately he was talking about that while presenting Dishonored so that's probably his favorite design approach :)

Here are the two lectures in .ppt format: (http://www.sendspace.com/file/4nnky1)

Jason Moyer on 6/7/2012 at 17:58

I'd use the soda machine from the Unatco HQ. It's all about giving the player choice, then totally ignoring it.

(or the Unatco soda machine with LAMs all over it)

demagogue on 6/7/2012 at 18:02

"You will be working with Agent Orange."

SDF121 on 6/7/2012 at 18:12

I recommend reading the following articles:

Postmortem: Ion Storm's Deus Ex
(http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3114/postmortem_ion_storms_deus_ex.php?print=1)

Ten Years of Deus Ex
(http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/tag/ten-years-of-deus-ex/)

Dark Futures: Where Now? For the Immersive Sim.
(http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/tag/dark-futures/)

I would also recommend checking out Warren Spector's series of lectures for his Master Class in Game Development that he taught at the University of Texas.

(http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLC4AF467F9391D767&feature=plcp)

Quote Posted by demagogue

That reminds me, somebody was making a visual plot diagram to help them outline their fan mission, and it ended up being this total spider web looking thing with boxes and lines going everywhere because it was so non-linear.

I remember seeing a diagram of every possible route/approach to completing the second mission at Battery Park. It included every fine detail whether it was picking a lock or destroying the door to hacking turrets among other things. I really wish that I had saved that image. Would anyone here happen to have it?

Although not a representation of the the open level design typically found in an immersive sim, the following image is still somewhat relevant.

Inline Image:

http://static.arstechnica.com/Gaming/leveldesignclassic.jpg

In addition to the articles that I have made available in my previous message, I would also like to direct your attention to Arkane Studio's manifesto on game design.
(http://ttlg.com/shownews.asp?id=902)

Here is another article with regard to Arkane Studio's that also delves into Harvey Smith's previous work on games like Thief, System Shock, and Deus Ex.
(http://www.theverge.com/gaming/2012/6/27/3115822/arkane-dishonored-bethesda-origin-crossing-deus-ex-arx-fatalis)

june gloom on 6/7/2012 at 18:39

I love how you're all responding to Koki's post seriously as if he was actually curious in asking that question.

Koki on 6/7/2012 at 18:43

Seriously.

It was a rhetorical question. Of course you don't "design" immersion. That's like designing a game to be "good". You could argue that everything works for this, sure, but why bother. How about stop using silly buzzwords instead.

I have no idea what "immersive sim" is supposed to be either. And how is it different from a normal sim? Is Deus Ex an immersive sim? PROTIP: It's not even a sim. ArmA or Falcon 4.0 are sims.

You used to just say "emergent gameplay" and call it a day, what is all this newspeak

SDF121 on 6/7/2012 at 18:48

Quote Posted by dethtoll

I love how you're all responding to Koki's post seriously as if he was actually curious in asking that question.

I was simply responding to the OP.

Quote Posted by Koki

I have no idea what "immersive sim" is supposed to be either. And how is it different from a normal sim? Is Deus Ex an immersive sim?

Warren Spector coined the term in his Postmortem for Deus Ex. You may find a link to the article in my first reply to this thread.

Renault on 6/7/2012 at 18:52

Quote Posted by Koki

You used to just say "emergent gameplay" and call it a day, what is all this newspeak

Fine, but the term "Immersive Sim" isn't exactly newspeak, it's been around for a while.

june gloom on 6/7/2012 at 18:52

Dude, it's Koki. He doesn't care.

ThePhotoshop on 7/7/2012 at 05:09

Uh, thanks for the first few replies, but I think this thread has kind of veered off topic a little. I wasn't asking about how Looking Glass games / immersive sims are designed, but how you could represent that design philosophy with iconic visual elements from their (and Ion Storm's / Arkane's) catalogue.