One of the initial descriptions of the past in the novel Ready Player One stuck out to me. The passage reads as if you're listening to someone that doesn't breathe when they speak. Wade seems anxious describing his limited knowledge as a child, and how much he was missing out on. He describes the libraries within OASIS and what they taught him. I would be terrified to know how ignorant I was raised. So, to adapt it to VR, I would first place the player in the position of a young Wade.
The player begins in a nondescript version of Wade's childhood home. The player can wander around, pick up objects and the interface will tell the player what the objects are. But beyond that, the player is clueless. There is a strange white vignette on cast on the scene and almost a blurring effect as the player moves deeper into Wade's house. This should make the player feel confused, doubtful, and worried. But there's nothing they can do about it. This is to make the player feel what Wade felt.
Other types of media have spoken about a kind of OASIS. Soma is a terrifying game that revolves around something called the ARK. It is a system where the user "uploads" their self into a digital paradise. But forever. In the game, it is considered the last step of life. It is used on dying people or people who wish to escape the physical world. What the player slowly realizes throughout the game, is that this is a copy of them. It is not you. You cannot upload your being, as you exist now, into the ARK. That is why you must upload a copy. Once this happens, you don't know what happens to your copy, and your copy doesn't know what happens to you in the physical place. This game has been on my mind since VR became a dinner discussion topic. It explores a facet of humanity that is still very unknown to us today: consciousness. Soma is really an interesting game at it reminds me of OASIS.
Another piece is a music video by the artist Lorn. It is called Anvil. Anvil also discusses a similar paradise, but it is more motivated by the aspect of social media. From the music video, we can assume people upload themselves to escape and become one with their Twitter feed. This seems to express that this "digital afterlife" is actually you, unlike the ARK in Soma, you are not copied into a "cloud."
The player begins in a nondescript version of Wade's childhood home. The player can wander around, pick up objects and the interface will tell the player what the objects are. But beyond that, the player is clueless. There is a strange white vignette on cast on the scene and almost a blurring effect as the player moves deeper into Wade's house. This should make the player feel confused, doubtful, and worried. But there's nothing they can do about it. This is to make the player feel what Wade felt.
Other types of media have spoken about a kind of OASIS. Soma is a terrifying game that revolves around something called the ARK. It is a system where the user "uploads" their self into a digital paradise. But forever. In the game, it is considered the last step of life. It is used on dying people or people who wish to escape the physical world. What the player slowly realizes throughout the game, is that this is a copy of them. It is not you. You cannot upload your being, as you exist now, into the ARK. That is why you must upload a copy. Once this happens, you don't know what happens to your copy, and your copy doesn't know what happens to you in the physical place. This game has been on my mind since VR became a dinner discussion topic. It explores a facet of humanity that is still very unknown to us today: consciousness. Soma is really an interesting game at it reminds me of OASIS.
Another piece is a music video by the artist Lorn. It is called Anvil. Anvil also discusses a similar paradise, but it is more motivated by the aspect of social media. From the music video, we can assume people upload themselves to escape and become one with their Twitter feed. This seems to express that this "digital afterlife" is actually you, unlike the ARK in Soma, you are not copied into a "cloud."
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