3D glasses do not protect from UV rays.

This post is mainly about immersion. But to begin I would like to briefly add my two cents to what seems to be the main question that got everyone thinking last week. What is a gamer?

I have read a lot of talk about the amount of hours people spend playing videogames defining whether or not they actually are a gamer. However, to me, it's not about the amount of time you spend playing games. Yes, that does contribute, but most importantly I think that what makes a gamer is self-identification, as Kevin pointed out. It's not just the hours, but whether the person identifies with the entire subculture, if I may use that term. There is a lot of the time a whole new set of specialised vocabulary, dress and mindset involved that I would associate with being a gamer.

Moving on to the topic of immersion, one of the comments by Laurie N. taylor that interested me was, "In a video game, the attributes of the game do create the illusion that the player is indeed within the space of the diegesis, whereas this is primarily a figural notion- a conceit of narrative convention- in other modes of representation like film." Do you agree with this statement? I would disagree with the idea that only videogames can produce a form of situated immersion. One of the first films ever to be made was of a train coming towards you, and people in the theatre watching it actually screamed and tried to duck out of the way. It is a common phenomenon that when people watch a movie where the character is underwater or drowning, their reaction is to hold their breath as if they, as the character, were underwater, too. Indeed, the latest use of 3D cinema enhances the illusion of being in the media.

But, one may argue, what differentiates videogames from film is agency! When you play videogames, the character's involvement with that space becomes the player's involvement and you are able to change things and almost literally put yourself into their shoes. However, one must also ask how much agency there really is in games. You may change the route by which you get to the end, but the end will still be predetermined, even if it is one of eight possible endings. Just as in a film, the end will be unchangeable.

Therefore, it seems to me that the gap between immersion in videogames and film does exist, but it is not uniform across every game or film. I think films also require you to give something of yourself emotionally and can involve a deep identification with the characters that goes beyond mere 'narrative conceit'.