It's such a subjective evaluation. I was plenty immersed in Elder Scrolls Daggerfall, despite constantly falling through the floor. I was plenty immersed with Cyberpunk 2077, despite minor car accidents rocketing me to the moon.
> frame rates vary so wildly a game
Which is a problem that DLSS helps solve, by improving FPS while minimizing the sacrifice to quality. I'm not sure what's the problem? If a few wonky shadows or other minor graphical glitches ruin the immersion for you, it sounds like you've set the bar too high and have unrealistic expectations.
I much prefer turning shadows off than have them do something crazy. Graphics don’t need to be awesome just consistent. Minecraft is in many ways worse than Daggerfall, but you quickly get used to the world. Skyrim is fine for a more realistic world even without mods, until a texture messes up and looks crazy. That’s the moment when you go from playing at game to looking at a screen.
IMO Cyberpunk would be strictly better off with fewer effects and worst textures in exchange for fewer glitches. Voluntarily selecting more glitches please aka DLSS is just a terrible trade off from my perspective.
Entertainment doesn’t need to be responsive. I can watch a movie at 24 FPS and it’s fine hell most YouTube videos are fine at 360p. First person games however need to be immersive to be entertaining rather than annoying.
> It’s great to get a billion FPS, but the reality is that outside of a few people most gamers just don’t notice the difference after a certain point.
You’re talking about something different. I’m saying a monitor set to 60 FPS is fine as long as the game is rock solid at 60 FPS. However, frame rates vary so wildly a game can easily average 120 FPS and suddenly then drop 4 frames which people notice.