> I find the suggestion that videogames don't need to suspect disbelief, but films do, very strange. True, the distinction may seem strange to some, and it's n

> I find the suggestion that videogames don't need to suspect disbelief, but films do, very strange. True, the distinction may seem strange to some, and it's not always a clear distinction. Here's how I'd describe it in more detail (just my opinion of course): In film, we see a person depicted on the screen with certain characteristics that convey emotion (just as we do with a group of lines comprising a stick figure with similar emotion), but we are forced to activate parts of our brain that span the gap between what we see (which obviously isn't reality) and what that character might feel in his/her universe. To some degree that same experience happens in video games, but I would argue that instead of seeing the emotions and trying to understand them, we (as players) are the person feeling the emotion. In one, we are witnessing events happen to someone else (and exercising empathy), whereas in the other, we are experiencing the events first-hand (even in a 3rd person view, we're playing as if we are the character in view). A first-hand experience feels most believable when it's actually realistic (hence the need for high frame rates), but a simple stick figure can feel "believable" if we're engaged and sharing the emotion we believe it to be feeling. As a side note, maybe that's why I personally prefer classic (8-bit era) video games over modern 3D video games :)