1. A Focus on Immersion

2. Technological Determinism
Termed coined by Thorstein Veblen in 1920s
Belief that technology is the agent of social change
– “You can’t stop progress”
Linked to the idea of progress and became a
common sense attitude during 19C
Technology defines its uses through its production

3. The openness
Technological of new media
Determinism (Technoculture)
“The effects of a technology… are not determined by its
production, its physical form or its capability. Rather than
being built into the technology, these depend on how they
are consumed”
Mackay, H. (ed.) Consumption and Everyday Life: Culture, Media and Identities.
(1997)

4. “…any theoretical engagement with this thing
called technoculture needs to be as dynamic
as its object. Theory needs to be supple, not
monolithic.”
Murphy, A. Potts J. Culture and Technology (2003)

5. Technology has now become so ubiquitous that
it is said we now live in technology
“technology has been generalised to the point
of abstraction: it suggests an overarching
system that we inhabit”
Murphy, A. Potts J. Culture and Technology (2003)

6. “Video games are a window onto a new kind of intimacy
with machines that is characteristic of the nascent computer
culture. The special relationship that players form with video
games has elements that are common to interactions with
other kinds of computers. The holding power of video
games, their most hypnotic fascination, is computer holding
power”
Turkle, S. The Second Life: Computers & The Human Spirit (1984)

7. “When you create a programmed world, you work in it, you
experiment in it, you live in it. The computer’s chameleonlike
quality, the fact that when you program it, it becomes your
creature, makes it an ideal medium for the construction of a
wide variety of private worlds and through them, for self-
exploration…computers enter into development of
personality, of identity, and even of sexuality”
Turkle, S. The Second Life: Computers & The Human Spirit (1984)

8. Becoming Cyborg
“*Digital+ games offer a singular opportunity to think
through what it means to be a cyborg”
“The perpetual feedback between a player’s choice, the
computer’s almost-instantanious response, the player’s
response to that response, and so on – is a cybernetic
loop, in which the line demarcating the end of the
player’s consciousness and the beginning of the
computer’s worlds blurs.”
Friedman, T. (1999) Civilisation and its discontents: simulation,
subjectivity, and space, http://www.duke.edu/~tlove/civ.htm
accessed - 09/11/08

9. Hamlet on the Holodeck

10. 3 areas of understanding
Agency Transformation Immersion
Murray, J.H. Hamlet on the Holodeck, New York: Free Press (1997)

11. Agency
“Agency is the satisfying power to take
meaningful action and see the results of our
decisions and choices”
Murray, J.H. Hamlet on the Holodeck, New York: Free Press (1997)

12. Transformation
“It *the computer+ makes us eager for
masquerade, eager to pick up the joystick and
become a cowboy or space fighter”
Murray, J.H. Hamlet on the Holodeck, New York: Free Press (1997)
Transformation refers to the computers ability to
create and simulate an environment to role
play.

13. Immersion
“The sensation of being surrounded by a
completely other reality”
Murray, J.H. Hamlet on the Holodeck, New York: Free Press (1997)

14. Immersion
“The experience of being transported to an
elaborately simulated place is pleasurable in
itself, regardless of the fantasy content. We
refer to this experience as immersion.
Immersion is a metaphorical term derived
from the physical experience of being
submerged in water.”
Murray, J.H. Hamlet on the Holodeck, New York: Free Press (1997)

15. Immersion
“…in a participatory medium, immersion implies
learning to swim, to do the things that the
new environment makes possible… the
enjoyment of immersion as a participatory
activity”
Murray, J.H. Hamlet on the Holodeck, New York: Free Press (1997)

16. Looking at the Terms
Agency Can be thought of in terms of Interactivity
Transformation Can be thought of in terms of Identification
Suspension of
Immersion Can be thought of in terms of
disbelief

17. Looking at the Terms
Agency AESTHETICS OF CONTROL
Transformation
(interactivity) (identification)
These terms are interlinked

18. “If we could someday make holographic adventures
as compelling as Lucy Davenport, would the
power of such a vividly realized fantasy world
destroy our grip on the actual world?”
Murray, J.H. Hamlet on the Holodeck, New York: Free Press (1997)

19. “Will the increasingly alluring narratives spun out for us by the
new digital technologies be as benign and responsible as a
nineteenth-century novel or as dangerous and debilitating
as a hallucinogenic drug?”
Murray, J.H. Hamlet on the Holodeck, New York: Free Press (1997)

20. “Do we believe that kissing a hologram (or engaging
in cybersex) is an act of infidelity to a flash-and-
blood partner?”
Murray, J.H. Hamlet on the Holodeck, New York: Free Press (1997)
Virtually Jenna Ver 2.0, PC Download, 2008, http://www.virtuallyjenna.com/

21. 3 other areas of understanding
Immersion Engagement Presence
McMahan, A. The Video Game Theory Reader - Immersion, Engagement and
Presence – a method for analyzing 3-D Video Games, New York: Routeldge
(2003)

22. Immersion
“Hotshot digital cinematography doesn’t make a
digital story immersive. What makes it
immersive is a world where no territory is off-
limits, anything you see is fair game, and all
your actions have consequences”
Provenzo, E. Video Kids: Making Sense of Nintendo Cambridge,MA: Harvard
University Press (1991)

23. Immersion
“Immersion means the player is caught up in the
world of the game’s story (the diegetic level),
but it also refers to the player’s love of the
game and the strategy that goes into it (the
nondiegetic level)”
McMahan, A. The Video Game Theory Reader - Immersion, Engagement and
Presence – a method for analyzing 3-D Video Games, New York: Routeldge
(2003)

24. Immersion
“Three conditions create a sense of immersion in a
virtual reality or 3-D computer game: (1) the user’s
expectations of the game or environment must
match the environment’s conventions fairly closely;
(2) the user’s actions must have a non-trivial impact
on the environment; and (3) the conventions of the
world must be consistent, even if they don’t match
those of ‘meatspace’.”
McMahan, A. The Video Game Theory Reader - Immersion, Engagement and
Presence – a method for analyzing 3-D Video Games, New York: Routeldge
(2003)

25. Engagement
“…narrative is not a key component of most games.
Instead, many users appreciate games at a
nondiegetic level–at the level of gaining points,
devising a winning (or at least a spectacular) strategy,
and showing off their prowess to other players
during the game and afterward, during the replay.”
McMahan, A. The Video Game Theory Reader - Immersion, Engagement and
Presence – a method for analyzing 3-D Video Games, New York: Routeldge
(2003)

26. Presence
“we experience what is made of information as being
material”
Ryan, M.L. Narrative as Virtual Reality: Immersion and Interactivity in
Literature and Electronic Media, Baltimore MD: The John Hopkins
University Press (2001)

27. Presence/Telepresence
Telepresence is the communication mediated with
technology, giving a sense that you are present in another
location
Paul Sermon – Telematic Dreaming 1992 Britney on her phone in her car