[MUD-Dev] Levels of immersion

[Tess Lowe]

Jeff Freeman wrote:

> Maybe it just depends on what your goal is.  I actually prefer for
> the players motivations to be "real".  Their character's goals are
> their goals, and they do things (for themselves and others) because
> they really do want to do those things (vs. merely pretending that
> they want to do whatever it is they are doing).  My opinion is that
> this makes the world more compelling.  I'm shooting for the
> persona-level of immersiveness (and based on the poll below, missing
> the mark).

I do wonder how much control a world designer could really have over
whether roleplayers are immersed at the 'character' or 'persona'
level. Isn't this really down to the propensity of some players to
become more attached to the world than others - some to the extent of
really seeing their puppet as a projection of their personality into a
(virtual) extension of the real world?

At the persona level it is *you* in the gameworld, pretending that you
lived there. At the character level it is *your puppet* in the
gameworld, being controlled as if they lived there.

Both of these probably look like they are roleplaying to external
viewers, that's why I classified them as 'in character' types. You can
only tell the difference when they are placed under stress/accused of
wrongdoing etc.

> I posted Tess Lowe's description of the four player types along with
> a poll.  While a few people took issue with the "it's only a game"
> statement in the definition of "player", most of them voted for
> that.

This doesnt really surprise me at all. (I rather doubt the veracity of
self-definition in this case *g*). After all, except for the 'player'
type, most of the definitions were faintly derogatory. Perhaps you
should have asked your players to estimate the percentage of *other
players* in each category in your MUD?

For example, when playing Dark Ages I would have put the percentages
as: Character - 10%, Persona - 40%, Avatar - 20%, Player - 30%

Looking at Achaea I would say:
Character - 20%, Persona - 40%, Avatar - 0%, Player - 40%

Then EQ:
Character - 0%, Persona - 0%, Avatar - 50%, Player - 50%

All are subjectively from my perspective. YMMV.

But *shrug* the types I suggested are just a first stab. I'm not
really completely happy with them myself. For example, who is *really*
more attached to the gameworld?- the quakelike dood 'avatar' who gets
mad about every nerf, or the 'player' type who sees the gameworld more
as irc/icq with a game attached...

Maybe the 'player' type is just an emotionally more mature version of
the 'avatar', thus collapsing the system back down to the three
originally suggested by Dr Bartle?

best wishes,
~Tess


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