[MUD-Dev] Levels of immersion

[Richard A. Bartle]

On 10 December 2000, olag at ifi.uio.no wrote:

> The avatar is the representation. The character is the intent which
> you try to impose on the avatar.  (badly worded) To me the
> distinction between personae and character is a matter of intent.

So basically, what I call a "character" you call an "avatar"; what I
call a "persona" you call a "character". You reserve "persona" for a
character that someone isn't role-playing, and you have no word for
what I call an "avatar".

Well I did say that readers of this mailing list liked to argue over
terminology <grin>.

For me, role-playing intent is not a direct component of immersion.
You can pull the strings of a puppet to make it act like it's a
Russian Princess and not feel like you are the puppet. You can design
a character and role-play it to the hilt without ever feeling you ARE
that character. Role-playing may well act as an aid to immersion for
some people, but I don't believe it's an essential component. You can
slip into a character or from there into a persona without consciously
realising you're doing it at all.

		Richard
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