The Wondrous World of Immersive Sims

Welcome to my world, insect.

What is an Immersive Sim? Well, it has nothing to do with The Sims or any other Maxis title. It is not even a genre, really - it is a school of game design.
The term is heavily associated with the developer Looking Glass and its successor, Ion Storm Austin. Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss, released in 1992, was groundbreaking in many ways. First-person RPGs were not new at the time but it was one of the first to utilize a full 3D environment with many immersive qualities such as dynamic lighting or the ability to make popcorn by combining corn with a source of fire. Later on Looking Glass would develop System Shock, Thief and (in the form of Ion Storm Austin) Deus Ex. The influence of these games cannot be overstated and its ripples can still be observed in modern gaming. Bioshock, Skyrim or Dishonored would arguably not exist without them. In recent years indie games have emerge that resemble Immersive Sims in many ways: Amnesia, Dear Esther or Gone Home. Laughed off by some as "walking simulators" they certainly do have the Avatar somewhere in their family tree, however distant.