Ghost of a Tale

I just stumbled upon this game while scrolling through Tim Soret's twitter (@timsoret) - who makes, along with his brother, a beautiful pixel-art sci-fi adventure platformer by the way :)

Survival!

True survival theme in games was in my heart for a long time now. What else can make you feel like your character if not the basic needs, that is hunger, thirst, fatigue?
There are very few computer games that touch the issue! And I'm really trying to get familiar with each title that show traces of probability of survival aspect in it.
Unfortunately, most of them fail (for example, latest Tomb Rider - no comment there, since it's that bad IMO)
I've even created a mod for Stranded II game few years ago! (maybe in some time they will release Stranded III), though it's not really a decent game.
In the past months, along with the Indie Dev condition improvement, some niche themes such as this one, happened to get more attention! Just take a look http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/tag/survival-week

The Long Dark, very hard and realistic survival
simulator, the action takes place in Canada

There are some decent-looking in-development titles, such as The Long Dark, or Salt.
And also The Forest, but personally I thought it would be more survival-focused, not fight-focused. Plus, the horror setting.

Salt. Altough still unpolished, it shows
much potential. You roam around
procedurally generated islands.

From the older titles, I should probably mention Unreal World, and many others, that I'll add here later when I find some time. In the meantime you can check out Mobygames with this wilderness-survival tag: http://www.mobygames.com/game-group/genre-wilderness-survival

Unreal World, probably the most realistic wilderness
survival simulator out there. It's all set in Iron Age Finland-ish
(world is generated) setting, and it's an open sandbox game
Consider  making a donation for the devs,
 they are doing a really great job

Anyways, this is quite frustrating - while searching for survival-themed games, most of the titles you find are about zombie survival, or surviving the waves of enemies, which is not what I seek :)
On the other hand, there are some good games that are set in zombie-apocalypse setting and have strong true-survival base. From all of them, the most realistic is probably roguelike'ish Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead, in which you can even take a truck apart and build a vehicle from scratch (if you have food, time and tools).

Maybe - to distinguish from zombie-survival, games that focus on wilderness should use the (popularly used by survivalists) term bushcraft?

First Person

Gothic series is 3rd-person only, but would it be
more immersive while restricted to first-person view?

Gothic series had this very good atmosphere, the game even created an illusion of total freedom of exploring. Plus the inherent rural motif making the world even more believable. The thing is, the creators decided to limit the gameplay to third-person camera mode.




It's like, 3rd person camera games tend to focus more on arcade, expecting the players to learn certain moves and tactics. Swinging weapons is said to be looking better while you can see the whole figure. But the question is - is it really important to see your whole character, especially while performing some skill-requiring actions? Yet the majority of big-company productions are forced 3rd-person games, or 3rd-person with the option of 1st-person gameplay (for example Mount & Blade, which isn't really a big-company production, but achieved a great success nonetheless).

Mount and Blade 2: Bannerlord. MnB wasn't really
a game focused on immersion, more like
fighting and strategy.

Either Gothic or Dark Souls series could get so much more immersive feel when restricted to first-person view. Also giving the player the choice to switch camera modes is something that lowers the amount of spatial immersion that could be achieved. But this would lead to a total change in the gameplay and diffuculty, as field of view would be greatly reduced. This is the case especially in combat-oriented games like Deep Down or Dark Souls.

Dark Souls II is totally combat-focused, thus
restricted to 3rd-person view, and loses in terms of
immersion, despite masterfully created, dark world

First Person wouldn't work well here, because, for example, fantasy-driven spinning attacks player can make. Player moves wouldn't look that spectacular too. More focus would have to be given to the enemies, details of their animations and behaviour, as we would often see them way closer than in 3rd person view. A while ago first-person view wasn't used because of higher processing power requirements (in some older games camera was fixed so the player couldn't get a decent view of distant surroundings)

Skyrim hands, all the time in front of you,
always ready to catch a fish...

There are some things that could be bothering, like for example your character's hands directly in front of you in combat mode of Skyrim






Another case would be not seeing any part of your character except the weapon and the hand holding it, as seen in many games

Have you tried to hold a sword so far from the hilt guard for a while?

Or holding the weapon in awkward way, like seen on a screenshot from Morrowind below



There's a decent discussion about first-person and 3rd person views in the games, and its influence on immersion here:
<LINK TO DISCUSSION>

Graphics and Immersion

Some people think that the better the graphics (i.e. more realistic), the better the immersion. While this seems not to go in pair, one can even say that "too real" in a visual game played on a PC (I never tried Oculus Rift, I guess it must be an interesting experience) is not in fact what we should strive for. Check out this article:

<LINK (opens in new tab)>

Minecraft's lighting and sounds make it immersive
despite lack of realism

Thus a question arises: do we really need good graphics for decent player immersion in the virtual world? The answer is yes, the graphic needs to be good (i.e. good looking, pleasant to the eye. Lighting and shading are of key importance on the topic), but not necessarily realistic. For example, Minecraft. the groundbreaking hit that shook the whole industry, has this simple yet perfectly balanced lighting system, which together with ambient sounds, growls coming from the dark, make you feel immersed. In fact this could be two basic things that build the proper immersive atmosphere - the lighting and the sounds. (of course, Minecraft's main advantage is the freedom of changing the world and multiplayer, and it also adds to immersion!)

All the time I'm talking about, more or less, the 'spatial' aspect of immersion

<WIKIPEDIA LINK>

Getting used to ASCII "graphics" can be tough,
but its worth it, considering so many decent
roguelike games in development, such as
Dwarf Fortress or Cataclysm DDA

But there could be more than that in a video game. We can become involved so much into the plot, becoming completely immersed, and even the complete lack of graphics won't stand a problem. For example, roguelike games like ADOM (<LINK>), which base on your imagination instead of graphics, or MUD's - multi user dungeons, meaning the text-games, where sometimes people get really involved into their characters and roleplaying, to an extent I've never seen in other video game.

Games with great storyline, such as, from the more recent ones, Mass Effect or The Last of Us, also fall in this category, but also those based more on emotions and mood, like, for example, Papers, Please, where you really get to feel the position of immigration inspector in a fictional communist state.

Papers, Please - recent indie production

I guess it depends. Some people will be hooked up to a one story more than to another, and get sentimential about some games others would never think about. The goal is just to involve the player into a good story, at the same time preserving attention to little details (both story-wise, and gameplay-wise), plus maintaining the proper atmosphere with lighting and sound. First-person should be a must. Or not?

First thoughts

Dirty textures, dark mood built by lighting and

creepy ambient sounds make Arx Fatalis one of the best

games in terms of atmosphere

When I think about immersion, first title that comes in mind is Arx Fatalis. Achieved due to dark, claustrophobic mood of underground dwellings, illusion of living societies, creepy ambient sounds - it all makes Arx Fatalis one of the best games I played in terms of player immersion.

No, you cannot ride horses in Dark Messiah.
It's only for the cutscene

There are few gameplay elements that in my opinion make Arx even better than its spiritual successor, Dark Messiah of Might and Magic, basically being the "RPG elements". Little things, like ability to cook over a fire, or to organize your belongings the way you want, or just the nice textures and icons - attention to detail, lacking in later titles.

So, when talking about Arx Fatalis, it's important to name older game series, which affected later game development greatly - Ultima Underworld I and II

Ultima Underworld II, where underground world

filled with its dwellers make
the perfect (pixelated) feel

Again, we have dark and sinister mood, achieved partially by setting the game plot deep underground. The same works for Metro:2033, also set mainly in the undergrounds of Moskow's Metro tunnels...

First Metro game, based on Dmitry Glukhovsky's novels,

though short and linear, it got players hooked up

with the story and dark atmosphere

Interestingly enough, I was not so immersed playing the sequel, Metro: Last Light. It might be because of the "artificiality" of gameplay, like, you have to stay and listen to all this dialogue. No freedom = less immersion. This topic was raised also on the Astronauts' blog (makers of The Vanishing of Ethan Carter game, which, estimating from their posts and screenshots, could be the best title in case of immersion ever) The Astronauts Blog

The Vanishing of Ethan Carter. The Polish team is putting
so much effort in polishing the details - thing we don't
see in the game production nowadays

So the conclusion for now is, that horror-like setting raises the feeling of immersion. But is it the only way?

The purpose of the blog

This blog's purpose should mainly be two things:
- backuping the information about interesting video games, in the means of player immersion, mood and also gameplay, for the use of myself and my friends (I hope so), to easily recall the game, either very old or new, from big company productions to indepentently developed ones.
- and maybe sharing this "list" and short thoughtful notes with anyone else interested.
As for me, there are not so many really good games in this whole industry, so I guess the blog will be kept rather small, evolving, I hope. I'll try not to spam this page with "unworthy" titles, yet there are no flawless games. In most cases it is just one or two features that make them good, and the word is so subjective. What I value the most is said immersion of the player - ability to make you feel the character you're playing, and really get into the environment, achieved most likely by grim, dark mood and ambiance, and also innovation. And, most importantly, randomness (which also has to do with immersion, but most of all, gameplay!).