In reading Hamlet on the Holodeck, I found it hard to categorize which of the four principal properties of digital environments best suited VR. I think there are two audiences here for VR; the creators and the participants. I make this distinction because I think some elements of digital environments simply apply more to the fabricators’ experiences than to the participants and vice versa.
What do I mean by this? Well, I want to start by saying that I thought procedural was the least fitting for VR. While there is a sense of “procedural” within VR, as there are rules and structures that guide the worlds inside VR, I do not think they apply as much to the audience as the do to the creators. The creators can see the rules and algorithms in the making of VR, but I think in most cases they reach a level of complexity that it becomes hard for the user to understand these patterns. In the reading example of Eliza, her pattern was basic enough for the users to understand and even become frustrated at due to unintentional humor. I do not believe the audience of an open world in VR would begin to understand the series of rules unless the creators themselves wish for the audience to understand.
The most fitting aspect of the four digital rules I found was participatory and spatial. I say this because from personal experience, I found VR games/worlds with the utmost basic layout to still have effective narratives through the user participation. And in the case of VR being focused on more spatial than participatory, it simply becomes a complex type of “film” in which the audience are merely viewers. I think combining these two aspects are what bring the success and wonder of VR.