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Top Comment of Last Week goes to "JohnC", who offered this rejoinder to the idea that
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, basically arguing that they're real enough already:SL is of course a real experience, too real in fact, because apart from the mental trick of transferring consciousness into the scene on the screen, same as one does with a book, or when watching a movie, you are really just sitting in a room staring at a monitor, book or TV screen. Surely the dreamed of goal of a true Virtual world is a far deeper whole body experience than that. An experience that convinces the mind that the virtual world is no less real than actual reality. The whole point of virtual reality I thought was that it is not real, it just convinces the mind and bodily senses that it is.
And we're already reaching that point with existing technology:
SL only offers a visual experience. However, I clearly remember being fully mentally immersed in that experience at times almost to the exclusion of the real world around me for hours on end. But only in my mind, somewhere I was always aware of still being in my seat in my room, more like a daydream. If this mental trick is to be the definition of a virtual reality experience, then we are already there.
This is clearly not what those who bang on about VR are taking about. As far as the current headsets are far from ideal, I would admit they are a complete different experience to the flat visual experience of SL on a PC screen, and possibly a big step further down the path to virtual reality. When people eulogize about VR after spending time in a headset, it is because it really is something more than the passive experience we are used to. But it's just still only a visual thing. But I am happy to go with whatever we got right now. Just drives me nuts hearing people talk like we are all going to jack into the Matrix in the next year or so.
I'd say this sounds right, and also points to a limitation of the market for VR hardware: Most people who play them already feel immersed by PC-powered virtual worlds like SL or WoW or Minecraft or even (to stretch the definition) League of Legends and Call of Duty and so on -- they are totally engrossed, they lose awareness of their real surroundings, and the passing of real world time. And it's unclear how many of them want to become even more engrossed, even more lost in the experience. If like me, you accept that "Good enough and convenient is better than great but inconvenient" is a rule of thumb of technology adoption that is usually true, then maybe we're already in VR's golden age.
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