I was reflecting upon the differences between turn-based and real-time game worlds. In the summer I started this train of thought with "Is Love and War Turn-based?". There the claim was that the meaning to the pauses between turns was different than, say, the moments in a Real-Time Strategy (RTS) game, or to the half-hours in MMOG grinds. I also think the meaning of fear is different.
In July it was pointed out that "turns" can be segmented - which if taken to the limit and were time also sped up, might lead to confusion with real-time interaction:
...For example, a turn-based battle game such as Advanced Squad Leader can by its 1977 ruleset, have turns segmented into 8 phases each averaging 4 sub-phases. The purpose of segmentizing a turn into phases (e.g. "prep fire phase", "movement phase"...) is to balance play and to better simulate the real-time process... also help the player to organize the mass of detail into coherent action.
However it is rarely the case that one plays turn-based games to play as quickly as one can. Aside from exceptions such as speed chess, players like turn-based games because they want to be able to explore the moment of the world as it stands still.
One of my favorite computer games is X-COM (UFO Defender). A classic turn-based strategy game over a decade old. I still play it. The Gollop brothers who originally developed the XCOM games went on to create Laser Squad Nemesis (LSN), an innovative and modern take on the venerable Play-By-Email (PBEM) genre. I used to find the anticipation between turns in LSN riveting. Players make their move independently of the other, and only when both moves are submitted (very asynchronously) and reconciled on the server and returned can the consequences of one's actions be fully appraised...
One characteristic of my experience with this kind of play was how much anguish went into each turn. The planning, the 'what ifs...' Because there was the time and the imagination...
When I used to play LSN much of my effort went into planning and replanning 'covering fire' actions. In fact most of my turn was likely consumed with the detail of staging overwatches amongst my squaddies and the physics of grenades and suppressing fire for the anticipated but-rarely-materialized-'cept-the-last-deadly-one zerg rush. There are analogs with different genres of PBEM games. The point is that for each turn time stood still. Yes, there was the rest of the game, a full process to be tapped and of which you as a player are fully aware, but that moment, this turn was always the pivotal one.
True, with PBEM the intervals between turns is exaggerated in comparison to other turn-based experiences. This likely leads to a vascillation and lingering for many players. However I don't think that is the entire explanation. At least in the PvP cases (vs. turn-based XCom for example). What can build up in the lonely moments of turns are the products of reflection, whether they be a deep suspicion, a regret, a paranoia at times. Often there is a fear of the unknown, of what your opponent is doing in his moment, in his world when time stopped...
Sometimes pauses can be scary for reasons of the bogeymen that live there, and these are not the demons of the real-time universe.
