Best premise/Most immersion

I was thinking about this today….

It's so hot here in our office - that I've been feeling drowsy and not at all up to working as much as I should.

But not drowsy in a bad way, quite the contrary. Almost like a dreamy sensation and I've been contemplating something that was always very important to me.

The concept of "setting/atmosphere" in games. Games that present an environment that truly makes you FEEL something. That makes you feel like you really are in another place, and mostly a place that you know you would never get to visit in real life.

Some games are superb at setting up something like that.

I've been rather down on Bioshock, for instance, but I have to say something good about it. The PREMISE - as in the setup, the way the game introduces its world, and most of all: the beginning of that game is FANTASTIC.

I can't remember any other game that managed to intrigue me to that extent, and that truly created a level of immersion for the first couple of hours - at that level.

Being thrown into the water, and almost drowning - and seeing that tower/lighthouse-thingy in the middle of the ocean, completely set apart from the rest of the world. That was simply alluring in the extreme.

Stepping inside and experiencing the art deco architecture and strange broken down underwater city has to count as one of the most immersive gaming experiences of my life.

Other games have come close, and some of those have actually managed to live up to their premise. I'm thinking of System Shock (naturally), BioForge, Gothic, Risen - and others.

But, I have to say that Bioshock has THE most intriguing premise I can think of.

So that would be my number one.

Have you experienced something like that? What games have done this for you?

I agree on Bioshock and system shock2

My #1 immersion.

The start of Deus Ex.
Standing on a pier with the Manhattan skyline visible in the night combined with superb music.

C

It's so hot here in our office - that I've been feeling drowsy and not at all up to working as much as I should.

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HA I knew you were lazy

the beginning of that game is FANTASTIC.

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I agree completely with this. While many other games have had fantastic openings ( like final fantasy 7,8 for example ) they had it through FMV's and not through playing which is a huge difference.....

Although I haven't made time to play it yet, Dead Space supposedly has tremendous "atmosphere" to it.

I have to agree with you, though, that Bioshock (particularly the opening, although I thought it did a fairly good job maintaining) was the gold standard for atmosphere. The game itself was decent at best from a mechanics standpoint, but the overall experience of the game was tremendous.

Well. S.T.A.L.K.E.R.

The combination of the highly realistic wheather, post-apocalyptic wasteland (which actually is real), spooky anomalies and the best dark/light effects I've seen.

I have never played Bioshock, but I probably should.

For me, I'd have to say it was Ultima VII followed by Baldur's Gate. I haven't played as many games as others on this site for sure, so I do tend to keep going back to those two. For U7, starting at the murder scene just grabbed me much more than any game I had played before. Previously, you kind of wandered around until you found something. The world was so 'real', with everything movable, usable, etc. and everyone having their own lives. I started to really care about the people I was interacting with and my companions.

BG took that to the next level, IMO. I really got emotionally attached to my party, particularly in the sequel.

The game, which achieved the kind of immersiveness you describe for the start of Bioshock, is Max Payne. If you ignore the genre and only think about the way the world and the story in it is presented, Max Payne surely invented a new level there including the "cutscenes", which were comic book pages, the lore shown in television and the dream scenes.

Games like F.E.A.R. and Bioshock borrowed heavily from the Max Payne ideas.

The game that immersed me most in its world and story would have to be Planescape Torment.
From the moment i woke up in the mortuary with morte i was completly hooked.
Its only letdowns were the somewhat akward gameplay and slightly less then baldurs gate's level of grafix but the sheer genius of its writing more then made up for that.

Immersiveness and premise are not the same thing. The first may help to better get across the latter. I thought DA:Origins has great origin premises without the immersiveness.

I agree Bioshock, SS2, and Liberty Island of Deus Ex are great for general atmospheric immersiveness. I also think The Witcher and Morrowind are very immersive, but especially Morrowind. STALKER, I agree, is good for atmosphere.

Dead Space - it is OK for immersiveness. The gore gets old after a while, and I found the jarring sounds more irritating than immersive. But the vacuum areas are great for immersiveness, and though zero-g was not great because of the wonky consolized controls, it's the best zero-g I've played yet.

While waking up in a mortuary as an immortal amnisiac was a brilliant premise for a story i probably should not have skimmed through the original post.
As for atmospheric immersion id have to say system shock 2 is probably the best ive seen.
Of recent titles tho i found the oblivion mod Nehrim to be pretty impressive in that regard.
Only an hour in but the starting dungeon really does a great job of keeping you on your toes and seeming like it could collapse around you at any moment.
The realiance on a hand held torch does wonders for the atmosphere and while its in the back of my mind that im never in any real danger since its the starting area and all i still occationally jump at a snarling beast somewhere up ahead in the dark.

I had the most immersion probably with Thief 2 and occasional glimpses with Splinter Cell but System Shock (CD version) was probably the one that immersed me the most because of the perfectly timed 'conversations' with Shodan. SS2 gets an honorable mention but the first was way ahead of its time. For some reason Bioshock did not have the same effect for me probably because it was more shooter than sneaker to me.

I 'd say X-BTF , sucked into a wormhole , dead engines and suddenly a lizard proposed me a business deal .

Lots of good examples, and I've played all the games mentioned. Definitely strong contenders.

Oh, and I know that a premise and immersion are not the same things

I was just thinking of both, which is why I asked about them.

I enjoyed Bioshock and I could appreciate the story in it's sequel. It is uncommon for a game that the setting is remembered long after remembering the main character. Having read intellectual history I appreciated it's take on the ideologies presented which added even more depth to it.

One game that have'nt been mentioned yet was Condemned. I believe it is one of the creepiest games I have ever played. Sure it's atmosphere is not as strong as other mentioned titles, and the story is rather poor, but it definitely is atmospheric.

JemyM said:

One game that have'nt been mentioned yet was Condemned. I believe it is one of the creepiest games I have ever played. Sure it's atmosphere is not as strong as other mentioned titles, and the story is rather poor, but it definitely is atmospheric.

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True, it had a strong atmosphere.

If a bit "one-trick pony" - what with the constant dark "ruined building"-look, but it worked extremely well for what it was.

Sadly, I found the gameplay way too simplistic - but that's not what we're talking about, so…

Best premise/Most immersion:

For me:

Albion

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Contenders:

The Aielund saga

A Dance With Rogues Part 1 & Part 2

DArtagnan said:

Sadly, I found the gameplay way too simplistic - but that's not what we're talking about, so…

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First-person Double Dragons... Grab whatever tool you can get and get smacking. Interesting premise.

I do not consider 'game openings' as a main factor for immersion. I look at immersion as something that should last throughout the game and for that to happen the gameplay is also a factor. It has to be non-sucky and it has to not create a disconnect between the game's setting and story and the actual mechanics.

With that said, games that I remember keeping me immersed in their worlds were F.E.A.R., Deus Ex and Mass Effect.

Amnesia: The Dark Descent and Call of Cthulhu.

Call of Cthulhu for scaring the crap out of me and enjoying every minute of it. The scene where you are running from the villagers will forever be burned into my memory.

Amnesia is …..well it will suck you in from the very start. It truly freaked me out. Here's a review for it which pretty much sums up my opinion on this game.

For just a regular game The Quest for Glory series was the most immersive. Not because of the graphics, but because of the settings and character interactions. QFG 4 is the best out of that bunch (it also has Lovecraftian elements in it )

Albion is a close second. Loved that game from Blue Byte. Too bad they didn't make another.

I agree scavenhorde. Both on CoC and Amnesia.

I have played Frictional Games Penumbra series, and I can recommend those as well Those are extremely creepy.

Which reminds me that Scratches had a similar theme, although it uses a MYST-style interface rather than a first-person 3d engine. Being the first game developed in Argentina is also an interesting trivia.