Going the Distance

With gaming there are various means of pushing the realm of reality. Tabletop gaming most of all establishes a sense of space and time while there being no prior imagery. The mind creates and fills in the blanks for the environment after the overall area is given. The smell of the trashcans or the sound of the passing people is all something that the mind creates in order to establish the game as a reality. In this the players take their pre-established characters and interact in the world within the confines of the world. Rules, Statistics, and points are all what allow the players to work and interact within boundaries of the world.

This leads to a state of virtual reality without the use of an interactive unit or board. The game's creator calls the shots and puts this all to work for the players and in this we can see what happens when our minds are the storytellers and not something pre-scripted by a developer. The player shapes the world and bends the boundaries of what is before them without losing the grip of what is and isn't in the world. This sort of mental gaming could be influential in the games to come when we develop more and more bits of technology. Having computer programs interact and fulfill our need for a truly "open" world setting may be in the cards at some point.