As a very long time hopeful in VR technology, I have been awaiting not-so-patiently for the technology to come out. With that being said, I do feel that we are on a threshold for this technology.
Now, I have a few other interests other than VR
![Surprised :o](./images/smilies/icon_e_surprised.gif)
- I want to design a survival horror game for VR
- A self-served research project (which this thread will go in to)
- Just because I want to play around with it
Note: Speaking of "playing around", does anyone have the weight specifications for the Rift casing? I might know of an opportunity for weight reduction; but I would need to get the specs and talk to my previous employers.
So.. enough of the introductions. Let us begin to play the advocate.
![Twisted Evil :twisted:](./images/smilies/icon_twisted.gif)
As we all know, we get information about the world around us by several different senses. For humans, sight is a primary sense of how we percieve our world. You often hear of people that are blind, however, their other senses take up the slack for them. The miracles of the brain, right?
With virtual reality, the stuff that we can do now, not 20 years down the road, we can at least put artificial information in two of our senses. Optical and auditorial.
As it is now, with 2d displays and audio, we hear of cases where people lose themselves in games / movies / online. We call these people addicts. But everyone is addicted to something, right?
Now enter virtual reality. The entertainment industry as we know it changes, and evolves around this technology. Instead of merely watching, you can now be apart of the entertainment. You can now go inside of the game you play. You can now become something you're not. This will have an almost universal appeal to people, no matter what form of entertainment they enjoy.
The last I have heard about experimentation from the effects of VR was back in the late '90's. If we look at the research that has been done, you can see tha it ties into what people are interested in at the time. The last time, it was the Matrix. Before that, The Lawnmower Man. This is public research; whether or not the military has done research into the effects of VR.. well, maybe Palmer can answer that one for us (or not :p).
Let's take an average, hard-core gamer. Like me for example.
I get my brand new rift, "YAY!".. I grab something to eat, down a couple bottles of water, and then I hop into the game, say, Doom 3, on Friday.
Sunday, I come out of the game. For two days, my world has been revolving around demons trying to kill me, and me killing them. Fun times, right? Except, now my brain expects to see things that are not there. I start to react as if I was still in the game. There is a popular term for this that would apply. Post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. It may be for a short time (a few seconds after I come out), to a long term (several days). Who knows? There is no "standard" for how each of us will react.
Even then, people will become addicted to the VR space. We often hear stories of obsessive gamers that literally "forget" to eat / drink / sleep, and end up dying while being immersed in just a 2d enviroment. Imagine the implications if people could truly go into the game.
This will have a global impact, as the technology evolves. Businesses start to become virtual only. Worlds start being developed. We would rather be in VR than the RL. On a good note, global warming may slow down
![Wink ;)](./images/smilies/icon_e_wink.gif)
I could go on, but rather than make this a huge thesis of a post, I'll finish up, and give the reason why this is in the R&D section. My particular research project is to test my PTSD theory, as this is probably the extent that my talents to could contribute to the development of VR/AR.
For 48 hours, I'll step into game. After the 48 hours, I'll come out. During this time, I'll have a webcam recording my reactions during this time. I'll also be running Fraps for game footage recording. No outside interference, nothing to draw me back into RL.
Any thoughts for this project? Has it been done already? Recommendations? Discussion is now open.