The Narrative Twist and the Immersion Problem

As is obvious from several of my past essays, I am interested not simply in how games are made both on a technical and narrative level, but also how we play them. Sometimes the ways we engage with games create new forms of entertainment that may not have been anticipated by the developers. Sometimes the ways we engage with games exhibit obsessions that lead to us having a bad time. And sometimes the ways we engage with games demonstrate a weird back-and-forth relationship between ourselves and media.

And in the vein of this last relationship, I wanted to look at narratives and writing. And in particular, the idea of a “twist.” The concept of the narrative twist is something we are all familiar with. Sometimes a story attempts to subvert the expectations of the audience by introducing a surprise at some point in the story. Occasionally these surprises are something the audience would struggle to predict, and sometimes they’re the kind of twist that you could foresee if you pay close attention.

Now the twist as a narrative tool is not an issue on its own. What we think counts as a “twist” and how prevalent it is can be debated, but I don’t want to focus on that topic. Instead, I want to focus on how the twist impacts our consumption of stories.

What I mean by this claim is that as we get used to the idea that a twist exists, we start to get obsessed with predicting the twist.

The attempt to predict twists is not necessarily a good or bad thing on its own, but I do want to dig down into the phenomenon as it relates to processing stories both in private and as part of a public performance such as streaming. Because our engagement with games impacts our enjoyment, sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse. And seeing how this tendency can impact our engagement, we might be able to examine our own behavior and ask whether it is something we wish to continue doing or not.

The Social Dynamics of Prediction

When we first encounter twists, they are a surprise. Hopefully, a pleasant surprise. To believe that the narrative is about to go in one direction only to head in another direction creates a sense of wonder and amazement. The twist is, at first, fun.

But as we become more aware of twists, there are a few potential forces that start to change that amazement.

The first is that as we gain experience with a trope, it becomes easier to understand and foresee. Eventually, the twist becomes something we expect. And being something we expect, we start to wonder what that twist must be. It becomes difficult not to try and guess what the twist is, because we anticipate a twist will occur.

The second is that by its very nature, a surprise is something that “gets” us. If a twist occurs in a narrative and we don’t foresee it, we have been to some extent fooled. That isn’t a bad thing…but we can still internalize that idea and respond to it. We begin to predict what will happen as a way of preventing the story from fooling us. We’ve been fooled before, but not this time.

We should also remark upon the ways in which games in particular can effectively “punish” us for not engaging in this behavior. Some games may feature branching storylines where a player’s choice can lead to radically different consequences – including a “bad” ending. And in some cases those different consequences may come as the result of the player trusting what the game tells them. Even if the player learns to be more wary of that particular game, they also take away to be wary of games and stories in general. Meaning that if one game tricked you and you want to avoid that in the future, you simply presume that all games are going to pull that same trick. At the very least if you do that, you’ll never get fooled again.

The third is that our ability to foretell how a story will go becomes a form of showmanship. If you’re watching a movie with a bunch of friends and can predict what will happen, then you appear smart – you can see the story before it happens. Of course, this could also make you annoying to watch the movie with. But the point is that how well we can predict things becomes a way of showing off our knowledge of stories and writing in a way that necessitates trying to get ahead of the narrative.

These forces have greater and lesser pulls depending on an individual. And the overall familiarity we have with different narratives will impact how good we are at making these predictions. The more we read, watch movies, play games, and so on, the easier it is to see certain twists coming. The more we understand about the forces that encourage and discourage certain writing practices – such as the need to make something commercially viable – the easier it is to note what can and can’t happen within certain stories.

In saying all of this, there’s nothing bad about this practice. Because we’re likely still having fun in this process. Trying to predict an upcoming twist becomes a sort of game on its own. Success or failure does not really mean anything within that game, as it is more about the attempt to predict what will happen.

Admittedly, it can get to the point for some people where the failure of a story to go as a player predicted can cause frustration. But this phenomenon is uncommon enough for us to ignore it for these purposes.

But while the practice isn’t bad, it does impact how we consume media. And that impact is worth looking into.

Prediction vs. Immersion

Part of being immersed in a game involves letting the information you are being given wash over you. To, in a way, not question it. Which sounds strange. And indeed, having talked about the value of talking to ourselves, the process seems counterintuitive – if talking through information helps us process it better, then why is talking suddenly something we want to avoid?

But narrative often relies on a series of shortcuts and amazing events that can, if poked at, undermine the story. If you’ve ever observed someone nitpick a story “unfairly” (however you would like to define that term), then that process takes away from the story’s ability to be a story. And yet, that same process occurs when the nitpicks are “fair.” It is stopping to examine every detail that prevents us from looking at the larger picture.

Now on its own, that doesn’t mean much. This process could be perfectly fine if what we valued in a game is its ability to tell a story that is perfect in its details. But one of the core things we often want out of games – and especially stories – is for them to be immersive. And immersion is as much about, or perhaps even more about, our own approach and engagement as it is the quality of the underlying content itself. If we want immersion, we need to be willing to be immersed in the first place.

And it is that effort to predict which takes us out of that state. The more we are in our heads about what could be happening, the less we are in the game.

And so as I mentioned the desire to predict upcoming plot twists conflicts with the desire to be immersed within a game’s narrative. If we succeed in guessing the upcoming twist, then the surprise has naturally been removed. If we fail in guessing, then we may wind up disappointed.

The tension, admittedly, does not have any clear solution. Some portion of our attempt to predict where a story is going is subconscious – once we engage in the process enough times, we basically can’t help ourselves. Perhaps we don’t mind losing a bit of immersion in order to retain our analytical capabilities. Perhaps we find the whole process fun.

But it is worth examining this behavior particularly within the context of performance. I’ve written before about how activities like streaming on Twitch or recording ourselves for YouTube impact the way we play and analyze a game. Knowing that there is an audience there pushes us towards particular behaviors that we think are “successful.”

And predicting narratives is certainly an aspect of this. While some portion of viewers enjoy witnessing “authentic” moments, a large chunk of content is based around the player providing commentary. And that forces the player to find something to fill the space. Sometimes that something can be simple sounds, but the more the player focuses on analysis at some level – how does the game feel, how well is the story landing, how good are the graphics, etc. – the easier it is to prevent dead air.

And so when the player encounters a story beat, they don’t want to just let that beat pass by. They need to comment on it. And that will naturally include “what do I think is going to happen next?” The process of performing, something which already removes the player from the experience of the game, pushes even further away from any real sense of immersion.

And that allows us to circle back to the social dynamics surrounding predictions: the more we start engaging in these predictions, the more we are basically performing. Perhaps for ourselves, perhaps for our friends or family, perhaps for some imagined observer. Whatever the case, we are continually training ourselves to see the plot itself as a guessing game, rather than as a story.

Concluding Remarks

We want a lot of things out of video games. And sometimes what we want is for them to create a feeling in us that we felt when we were much younger. A sense of wonder, excitement, surprise, or something similar.

But those feelings that we may be chasing are often tied to our capacities as kids. When we had much less experience, much more time, much more patience, and so on. As we keep playing games and experiencing stories, our expectations change. What might have fascinated us at age ten has less impact at age 15, and may have even less at age thirty.

Everything that surrounds games – video content, reviews, trailers, discussion boards, chats with friends, etc. – shapes our perception of those games and how we experience them. There is not really an escape. There is no going back. What is possible is asking ourselves how we approach all of these things, asking what the consequences of that approach is, and asking whether we are okay with those consequences.