We've all played countless games, we've all had thousands of adventures, played hundreds of roles and strolled around as many different worlds. We've all enjoyed visiting these places that were offered to us, and we sometimes went back for second helpings, or even thirds. But in a way these worlds all seemed static and rigid. We've all had an impact on stories, but somehow we still feel like we're tourists in a museum, don't we? You can look all you want, only don't touch!

Immersion: where does it come from?
Be it an online persistent world, or even a static single-player game, the world in which any CRPG is set in is often intricate and detailed. A few hours spent in Morrowind is enough to see how huge and detailed the universe around you is. The player is usually presented with a story, epic or very simple, and often times he is given choices as to how he will influence this story.

It has often been discussed how the story is absolutely critical to the immersion factor. It actually is very important, there's no denying that. But lately we've seen a few RPGs coming out in which the story sometimes took a backseat to the interaction with the game world, where open-ended gameplay is more important than plot. Morrowind is again a good example of this, but most MMORPGs also fall in that mold. In this design, you lose most of the immersion another game would gain with the involvement of the player in its story. Where then can a game regain this very important aspect of immersion?

Leaving a footprint in the snow
Most players play RPGs for one reason: to play a role, to matter in an imaginary world. If the game does not make you feel like you matter, then how can it possibly invite you to play on and on? You might enjoy the stunning visuals, the clever dialogues, the mysterious critters and the killer weapons, but these novelties will not keep a player's interest for very long past the initial trial phase. What then could a game do that might give proof to the player that he does matter, that he can affect other things than the story and sub-plots or how some NPCs react to him in the game world?

One aspect of games that has been grossly overlooked until now is the ability for someone to physically affect the world around him. Far too few games have ever allowed you to buy a house to live in by the side of some road near the big city. Too few of them have ever given you the ability to scorch a brick wall with a fireball spell, or break the head of a statue representing some nasty, self-righteous crime boss dwelling in the city which is under his control. These are not essential things to any story, but they would go a long way in making the player feel he actually belongs to the world.

Imagine such a world where you could leave a physical mark on your surroundings, take a snapshot and say: "This is where I cornered that slimy villain and got him with a perfectly aimed fireball. See that scorch mark on the cliff? That's where the first spell, the one that missed his head, hit the rock!". How about if you want to play that self-righteous crime-lord yourself and erect your very own statue in the center of the town you're controlling with a tight strangle-hold?

Open season on exaggerations
I can already hear those screaming: Bah! That's opening up a can of worms! People will start abusing of this and cast fireball spells on walls just to scorch all of them. True, very true. For MMORPGs there would have to be limitations and specific requirements set for those who would wish to leave their mark on a persistent world. Rigid sets of rules need to be outlined for that to work in any environment that has more than one player at the same time. But this gaming aspect in an MMORPG is a really delicate issue.

In a single-player game on the other hand, it suddenly becomes your own game, and I'm willing to bet most of us would start really role-playing these features after toying around with them for a little while. It's not like I'll be getting on anyone's nerves if I put statues of myself everywhere there's space for it.

Having the player physically interact with, and alter his surroundings, beyond just being able to pick up forks and plates or push chairs and tables around, would certainly go a long way to making a game more immersive. Two people could play a game and have two very different experiences, regardless of the story they're following. Why can't a miscast spell hit a particularly big rock on top of a cliff and make it fall down, forever changing the landscape? Why couldn't this landscape remain changed as it was even if I start a new character, continuing the legacy of this living, breathing world, creating and continuing a history of its own?

Design me a world and make it live!
In my mind, the effort done to make interactions with NPCs has all been fine until now, but it's still not enough as far as levels of immersion goes. We need more. We need a reason to continuously want to go back to this artificial world, and to wonder how we can influence it next. We need a way to express ourselves beyond going out of the game and using an editor to create whichever little trinket we wish to use. A living, breathing world is where things should evolve now.

I know, I'm asking for a lot… again! But I think that making the game world more interactive would make things even more interesting beyond the stories, and beyond the cookie-cutter NPCs we're too often presented with. As technology evolves, it will become more and more possible for developers to let us shape the world as we go along. Perhaps one day I may be able to take an axe and swing it at a tree to bring it down… FOREVER! Let us shape the world along with our adventure.