by Video games have served as a form of entertainment and a hobby for many people since their creation with games like “Pong” and “Space Race”. As video game technology has developed, the games are getting closer and closer to a real world experience, up to the point of virtual reality today. There have been many representations of a world where gaming takes over the real world, such as in the book The Three Body Problem or in the movie Ready Player One. I personally think that in just a few years time gaming will develop so much that there will be a completely other worldly experience through games.
As games and gaming consoles progressed from the first games of “Pong” to the virtual reality games, there have been many different steps along the way. Companies like Sony and Microsoft have been in a battle for many years with their competing consoles, Xbox and Playstation, and this battle forces the companies to try and make more realistic graphics. Visuals on games have progressed from very pixelated and grainy to the point where there are HD and even 4K gaming experiences. Although gaming on consoles is much more popular than any VR set, I believe that console gaming will begin to fade out of the mainstream when virtual reality prices decline.
There are a few reasons why virtual reality is not a hugely popular form of gaming. The major contributor is the cost. For most virtual gaming headsets and systems, you need around $800 for that equipment, as well as around $1000 to buy or build a PC that can run the VR games. In addition to the cost, the experience is much more tiring than sitting on a chair or couch and playing on an Xbox or Playstation. Virtual reality uses sensors and controllers to create a full-body experience, which some people don’t want when they are playing relaxing video games. This is understandable, but I believe sometime in the near future virtual reality will develop so that people can come home, pop on a headset, and be taken to a place where they can meet with friends, watch a movie, or play in a band. Virtual reality is trending to a place similar to Ready Player One where these people had a whole new life in the gaming world.
Ready Player One is a very entertaining movie which is basically set in the virtual gaming world. It poses many serious questions such as how government regulation would work in a virtual world and if you can get a real human experience in this world. Although I don’t think a fully virtual world would be beneficial to society, it does seem that gaming will trend in this direction. In the novel The Three Body Problem written by Chinese author Liu Cixin, the characters play a virtual game in a v-suit. This suit allows the person to feel hot and cold depending on the environment they are in, which is something that would be very interesting in a VR setting. Keeping in mind this book was written in 2004 is very important because it was predictable back then. As the virtual gaming industry progresses, it seems more and more likely to be a popular hobby, taking over from TV and movies.