This produces a preliminary formal framework for discussing VR player experience as significantly structured by patiency (cf. Effecting a novel approach inspired by systematic review, the present study's observations and inferences regarding players' subjective experience of IVEs are presented alongside relevant findings from the research literature sampled. A purposive sample comprising video, photographic, and written documentation of IVEs (n = 124) from historical clinical VR and telepresence research is interrogated through the lens of cognitive media theory. The present paper describes and discusses findings from a qualitative content analysis of immersive virtual environments (IVEs) experienced via head-mounted display-based VR systems akin to those now commercially available. This paper asks-and reports on-what common features of digital games are liable to be experienced as stressors (that is, as beyond optimally affective or intense) when the player perceives her avatar–self egocentrically as a 'life-sized', spatially present, and potentially vulnerable entity within the gameworld. But what are the implications of this for player experience? It is well-documented that VR can induce illusions of non-mediation of spatial presence of embodiment in avatars. It is already a truism that consumer virtual reality (VR) systems offer sensorially immersive first-person experiences that differ markedly from those begat by traditional screen displays. Patiency-both a design strategy and a force or dynamic akin to agency-is thus framed as an indispensable way of guiding the VR participant that surpasses ‘mere’ spectacle. Participants may be most amenable to designers’ attempts at guidance when ‘hot’, affect-laden cognition leads them to engage with aspects of a virtual environment pre-reflectively. Immersion, construed as a fragile state of enthrallment, is argued as easily engendered by leveraging self-reflexive concerns at the nexus of attention and emotion. I extrude working definitions of presence and immersion, suggesting that the latter, attention, affect or emotion, agency, and patiency are all deeply entangled. The thesis works towards an account of how patiency can be used to guide the participant by first addressing some formal considerations (what is a VR experience? how do they ‘position’ the participant relative to the action? how do they convey stories or otherwise represent events?) before exploring VR experiences’ psychological functions. Consider vertigo, ‘butterflies’, startles, or the weird feeling of having one’s personal space invaded by lifelike virtual agents. Sensations of patiency in VR can be just as engrossing as exercises of agency. Looking to develop this line of thinking, the present thesis asks, ‘how can the participant be guided in VR experiences?’ and argues that while agency is indeed important, a neglected, corresponding phenomenon is agency’s opposite number: Patiency-the embodied feeling of being acted upon. It’s said that immersion is best induced by offering the participant opportunities to perform virtual actions and shape a story’s course. Analyses of VR experiences have historically privileged narrative, immersion, and agency. Between the extremes of ‘film-like’ and ‘game-like’ software applications lies ‘VR experiences’: A diverse grouping that spans narrative and non-narrative artworks and entertainment. Virtual reality (VR) is a burgeoning expressive medium.
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