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Ever since computers have been around, man has strived to make it play games...
Games are used for our entertainment, and like most forms of entertainment are escapism. Escaping the realities of life and entering a gaming world where the rules are different. But with the advances in technology going in such big leaps now, how long will it be before we can keep our lives playing games and our reality seperate?
One thing which brought this to my attention was an interview in PCGamer, the September 1999 issue (with the Tiberian Sun front cover) which was with Richard Garriot AKA Lord British. He is the creator of the Ultima universe. He believes that with Ultima Online a whole online world has been created. In the interview he talks about such things as having adverts in the virtual world, and allowing real businesses to set up in the virtual world, so, for example, in the online virtual world you could nip intp a Special Reserve store, and buy a game, and it would actually order the game for you, and Special Reserve would send the game to your doorstep. And all this within an online videogame...
Another thing with Ultima Online, and other MMORPGs (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games) is that people are spending so much of their free time on these virtual worlds, simply because these online existences are more fun than reality. People are even spending real money buying gold (Ultima Onlines currency) off of other players. One person bought some virtual property on Ultima Online from Ebay for $5000 in REAL money! Is escapism to this degree right? If we are so pre-occupied with our virtual representations will we lose sight of who we are in reality, or our goals in reality?
Another thing in this interview was the fact that Richard Garriot wanted to really blur the boundries of reality in a quite scary way. As well as having messages (presumably in the form of phone texts, e-mail, and pagers) telling you when your virtual assets are under attack, he has much bigger ideas. One of these stemmed from some goggles which you wear when sleeping. They watch your eye movements, and know when you are dreaming, and once a dream has finished. When a dream is over they blink an LED into your eyes to wake you so you can remember your dreams. But what happens if you start to dream that the LED is waking you? It would take you some time to figure out if you really were awake, or still dreaming. Garriot had the idea of hooking these goggles up to a PC, so you play a game, and while you are asleep the PC communicates with you while dreaming, and if in the videogame your character is in, say, Russia, it would make you dream about receiving mail or E-mail from Moscow.
You may think this is ingenious, but however you look at it, you could begin to question what is real anymore, and if an individual finds their online existence better than their real existence, all they need is a PC and internet connection, and they can disappear from 'reality'.
Another example is Eternal Darkness by Silicon Knights, due for release on GameCube. It has a sanity metre, so the more and more unbelievable things your character sees, the more they lose grip on reality, and you may be fighting enemies, only to find they were not real, and just in your head, or you may check your inventory to find all your equipment gone, but it is just you losing your grip. This isn't as drastic as the stuff above, but could be developed further from here to incorporate some of the online ideas. Another thing that could be utilised is the sensor used on one of the N64 Tetris titles which measured whether you were panicking, and would increase the tempo if you were. Just imagine playing something like Eternal Darkness, or Resident Evil, and the more nervous or anxious you got, the more your character became paranoid, and began to imagine noises behind you, or shadows moving in strange ways. This would undoubtedly create an awesome game environment, but would it connect us with the game too far?
Can the real reality begin to take the back seat while we indulge ourselves in 'realities' which, at the end of the day, only exist on our TV screens and monitors, while others who aren't as well off as us must suffer in their real lives. Games have always been a target for those looking for a scapegoat, but if reality and virtual worlds are blurred to this extent could games really start to breed people who have no grasp of what is real, and what isn't and become increasingly psychotic?
Your thoughts and comments on this topic please, and thanks for reading, or just checking out the topic then thinking "no way I'm reading that, it's too long!"
Games are used for our entertainment, and like most forms of entertainment are escapism. Escaping the realities of life and entering a gaming world where the rules are different. But with the advances in technology going in such big leaps now, how long will it be before we can keep our lives playing games and our reality seperate?
One thing which brought this to my attention was an interview in PCGamer, the September 1999 issue (with the Tiberian Sun front cover) which was with Richard Garriot AKA Lord British. He is the creator of the Ultima universe. He believes that with Ultima Online a whole online world has been created. In the interview he talks about such things as having adverts in the virtual world, and allowing real businesses to set up in the virtual world, so, for example, in the online virtual world you could nip intp a Special Reserve store, and buy a game, and it would actually order the game for you, and Special Reserve would send the game to your doorstep. And all this within an online videogame...
Another thing with Ultima Online, and other MMORPGs (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games) is that people are spending so much of their free time on these virtual worlds, simply because these online existences are more fun than reality. People are even spending real money buying gold (Ultima Onlines currency) off of other players. One person bought some virtual property on Ultima Online from Ebay for $5000 in REAL money! Is escapism to this degree right? If we are so pre-occupied with our virtual representations will we lose sight of who we are in reality, or our goals in reality?
Another thing in this interview was the fact that Richard Garriot wanted to really blur the boundries of reality in a quite scary way. As well as having messages (presumably in the form of phone texts, e-mail, and pagers) telling you when your virtual assets are under attack, he has much bigger ideas. One of these stemmed from some goggles which you wear when sleeping. They watch your eye movements, and know when you are dreaming, and once a dream has finished. When a dream is over they blink an LED into your eyes to wake you so you can remember your dreams. But what happens if you start to dream that the LED is waking you? It would take you some time to figure out if you really were awake, or still dreaming. Garriot had the idea of hooking these goggles up to a PC, so you play a game, and while you are asleep the PC communicates with you while dreaming, and if in the videogame your character is in, say, Russia, it would make you dream about receiving mail or E-mail from Moscow.
You may think this is ingenious, but however you look at it, you could begin to question what is real anymore, and if an individual finds their online existence better than their real existence, all they need is a PC and internet connection, and they can disappear from 'reality'.
Another example is Eternal Darkness by Silicon Knights, due for release on GameCube. It has a sanity metre, so the more and more unbelievable things your character sees, the more they lose grip on reality, and you may be fighting enemies, only to find they were not real, and just in your head, or you may check your inventory to find all your equipment gone, but it is just you losing your grip. This isn't as drastic as the stuff above, but could be developed further from here to incorporate some of the online ideas. Another thing that could be utilised is the sensor used on one of the N64 Tetris titles which measured whether you were panicking, and would increase the tempo if you were. Just imagine playing something like Eternal Darkness, or Resident Evil, and the more nervous or anxious you got, the more your character became paranoid, and began to imagine noises behind you, or shadows moving in strange ways. This would undoubtedly create an awesome game environment, but would it connect us with the game too far?
Can the real reality begin to take the back seat while we indulge ourselves in 'realities' which, at the end of the day, only exist on our TV screens and monitors, while others who aren't as well off as us must suffer in their real lives. Games have always been a target for those looking for a scapegoat, but if reality and virtual worlds are blurred to this extent could games really start to breed people who have no grasp of what is real, and what isn't and become increasingly psychotic?
Your thoughts and comments on this topic please, and thanks for reading, or just checking out the topic then thinking "no way I'm reading that, it's too long!"
Ever since computers have been around, man has strived to make it play games...
Games are used for our entertainment, and like most forms of entertainment are escapism. Escaping the realities of life and entering a gaming world where the rules are different. But with the advances in technology going in such big leaps now, how long will it be before we can keep our lives playing games and our reality seperate?
One thing which brought this to my attention was an interview in PCGamer, the September 1999 issue (with the Tiberian Sun front cover) which was with Richard Garriot AKA Lord British. He is the creator of the Ultima universe. He believes that with Ultima Online a whole online world has been created. In the interview he talks about such things as having adverts in the virtual world, and allowing real businesses to set up in the virtual world, so, for example, in the online virtual world you could nip intp a Special Reserve store, and buy a game, and it would actually order the game for you, and Special Reserve would send the game to your doorstep. And all this within an online videogame...
Another thing with Ultima Online, and other MMORPGs (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games) is that people are spending so much of their free time on these virtual worlds, simply because these online existences are more fun than reality. People are even spending real money buying gold (Ultima Onlines currency) off of other players. One person bought some virtual property on Ultima Online from Ebay for $5000 in REAL money! Is escapism to this degree right? If we are so pre-occupied with our virtual representations will we lose sight of who we are in reality, or our goals in reality?
Another thing in this interview was the fact that Richard Garriot wanted to really blur the boundries of reality in a quite scary way. As well as having messages (presumably in the form of phone texts, e-mail, and pagers) telling you when your virtual assets are under attack, he has much bigger ideas. One of these stemmed from some goggles which you wear when sleeping. They watch your eye movements, and know when you are dreaming, and once a dream has finished. When a dream is over they blink an LED into your eyes to wake you so you can remember your dreams. But what happens if you start to dream that the LED is waking you? It would take you some time to figure out if you really were awake, or still dreaming. Garriot had the idea of hooking these goggles up to a PC, so you play a game, and while you are asleep the PC communicates with you while dreaming, and if in the videogame your character is in, say, Russia, it would make you dream about receiving mail or E-mail from Moscow.
You may think this is ingenious, but however you look at it, you could begin to question what is real anymore, and if an individual finds their online existence better than their real existence, all they need is a PC and internet connection, and they can disappear from 'reality'.
Another example is Eternal Darkness by Silicon Knights, due for release on GameCube. It has a sanity metre, so the more and more unbelievable things your character sees, the more they lose grip on reality, and you may be fighting enemies, only to find they were not real, and just in your head, or you may check your inventory to find all your equipment gone, but it is just you losing your grip. This isn't as drastic as the stuff above, but could be developed further from here to incorporate some of the online ideas. Another thing that could be utilised is the sensor used on one of the N64 Tetris titles which measured whether you were panicking, and would increase the tempo if you were. Just imagine playing something like Eternal Darkness, or Resident Evil, and the more nervous or anxious you got, the more your character became paranoid, and began to imagine noises behind you, or shadows moving in strange ways. This would undoubtedly create an awesome game environment, but would it connect us with the game too far?
Can the real reality begin to take the back seat while we indulge ourselves in 'realities' which, at the end of the day, only exist on our TV screens and monitors, while others who aren't as well off as us must suffer in their real lives. Games have always been a target for those looking for a scapegoat, but if reality and virtual worlds are blurred to this extent could games really start to breed people who have no grasp of what is real, and what isn't and become increasingly psychotic?
Your thoughts and comments on this topic please, and thanks for reading, or just checking out the topic then thinking "no way I'm reading that, it's too long!"
Games are used for our entertainment, and like most forms of entertainment are escapism. Escaping the realities of life and entering a gaming world where the rules are different. But with the advances in technology going in such big leaps now, how long will it be before we can keep our lives playing games and our reality seperate?
One thing which brought this to my attention was an interview in PCGamer, the September 1999 issue (with the Tiberian Sun front cover) which was with Richard Garriot AKA Lord British. He is the creator of the Ultima universe. He believes that with Ultima Online a whole online world has been created. In the interview he talks about such things as having adverts in the virtual world, and allowing real businesses to set up in the virtual world, so, for example, in the online virtual world you could nip intp a Special Reserve store, and buy a game, and it would actually order the game for you, and Special Reserve would send the game to your doorstep. And all this within an online videogame...
Another thing with Ultima Online, and other MMORPGs (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games) is that people are spending so much of their free time on these virtual worlds, simply because these online existences are more fun than reality. People are even spending real money buying gold (Ultima Onlines currency) off of other players. One person bought some virtual property on Ultima Online from Ebay for $5000 in REAL money! Is escapism to this degree right? If we are so pre-occupied with our virtual representations will we lose sight of who we are in reality, or our goals in reality?
Another thing in this interview was the fact that Richard Garriot wanted to really blur the boundries of reality in a quite scary way. As well as having messages (presumably in the form of phone texts, e-mail, and pagers) telling you when your virtual assets are under attack, he has much bigger ideas. One of these stemmed from some goggles which you wear when sleeping. They watch your eye movements, and know when you are dreaming, and once a dream has finished. When a dream is over they blink an LED into your eyes to wake you so you can remember your dreams. But what happens if you start to dream that the LED is waking you? It would take you some time to figure out if you really were awake, or still dreaming. Garriot had the idea of hooking these goggles up to a PC, so you play a game, and while you are asleep the PC communicates with you while dreaming, and if in the videogame your character is in, say, Russia, it would make you dream about receiving mail or E-mail from Moscow.
You may think this is ingenious, but however you look at it, you could begin to question what is real anymore, and if an individual finds their online existence better than their real existence, all they need is a PC and internet connection, and they can disappear from 'reality'.
Another example is Eternal Darkness by Silicon Knights, due for release on GameCube. It has a sanity metre, so the more and more unbelievable things your character sees, the more they lose grip on reality, and you may be fighting enemies, only to find they were not real, and just in your head, or you may check your inventory to find all your equipment gone, but it is just you losing your grip. This isn't as drastic as the stuff above, but could be developed further from here to incorporate some of the online ideas. Another thing that could be utilised is the sensor used on one of the N64 Tetris titles which measured whether you were panicking, and would increase the tempo if you were. Just imagine playing something like Eternal Darkness, or Resident Evil, and the more nervous or anxious you got, the more your character became paranoid, and began to imagine noises behind you, or shadows moving in strange ways. This would undoubtedly create an awesome game environment, but would it connect us with the game too far?
Can the real reality begin to take the back seat while we indulge ourselves in 'realities' which, at the end of the day, only exist on our TV screens and monitors, while others who aren't as well off as us must suffer in their real lives. Games have always been a target for those looking for a scapegoat, but if reality and virtual worlds are blurred to this extent could games really start to breed people who have no grasp of what is real, and what isn't and become increasingly psychotic?
Your thoughts and comments on this topic please, and thanks for reading, or just checking out the topic then thinking "no way I'm reading that, it's too long!"
i can just say before i start :) Well Done! You should get a GAD!
I the ideas of Devoplers are expanding, Futher and futher...Into OUR lives...As u said in that you could buy a game and it come to your door-step. But this Don't stop them trying to Create something Totally Original. More and More ideas pop into their heads they Write into paper, let me take a trip down Memory lane..shall i? Virtal boy..1 thing i never seen before :) i was 3-7 years old when it came out hehe...anyway...i heard it was flop, it tired to Give you a step into Reality. But, Overall i think that Some reason, near total Realism will never appear in my life time.
I the ideas of Devoplers are expanding, Futher and futher...Into OUR lives...As u said in that you could buy a game and it come to your door-step. But this Don't stop them trying to Create something Totally Original. More and More ideas pop into their heads they Write into paper, let me take a trip down Memory lane..shall i? Virtal boy..1 thing i never seen before :) i was 3-7 years old when it came out hehe...anyway...i heard it was flop, it tired to Give you a step into Reality. But, Overall i think that Some reason, near total Realism will never appear in my life time.
yay! someone replied to one of my topics! Cheers Evil-Dark!
hope developers continue to be original, and blurring our reality doesn't turn us into psychos...
hope developers continue to be original, and blurring our reality doesn't turn us into psychos...
I think some people do take computer games too far, I mean buying property on an online computer game, that's not only stupid, it's quite scary that someone can get so engrossed in a game.
As for what you said about Resi Evil games monitoring you to see if you're nervous, I think that sounds like a damn good idea actually, it would definetly add a lot too the gaming experience.
As for what you said about Resi Evil games monitoring you to see if you're nervous, I think that sounds like a damn good idea actually, it would definetly add a lot too the gaming experience.
"But come to think of it. In USA, They Banned The light gun....Where's is the reality in it for them poor ppl? Banning something like light gun iz not to make them go much futher in the ture computer gaming reality"
==Ev][L~Dark==
==Ev][L~Dark==
Ev][L~Dark, do you mean all light guns in the USA are banned? That makes little sense, if that is what you mean.
"Listen kids, you can't buy light guns to shoot baddies on your games console, but go downtown and you can get a wide range of real firearms, because it is your constitutional right to own a gun, no matter how much of a psycho you really are, or how far you are willing to go to be a 'gangsta'"
No wonder there are shootings in schools over there...
"Listen kids, you can't buy light guns to shoot baddies on your games console, but go downtown and you can get a wide range of real firearms, because it is your constitutional right to own a gun, no matter how much of a psycho you really are, or how far you are willing to go to be a 'gangsta'"
No wonder there are shootings in schools over there...
Don't make me laugh... :D
I Think i was half Sleep when i wrote that
I Think i was half Sleep when i wrote that
I'm trying to drum up more support for my recent story so here goes:
Go to FOG chat and read my story 'Invasion of the Poke-It-Ons'. It is (at the moment) two episodes , but will be added to at least once a day with another episode for your reading pleasure, until the story is complete. Today I have posted two Episodes in the topic 'Invasion of the Poke-It-Ons (Story- All Star Cast)' So go read it and reply. You may even feature.
PS there is another topic that;s the same but Invasion is missing the last N, and it only has episode 1. Let that one die, and just post in the latest one with two Episodes. Cheers.
Sibs
Go to FOG chat and read my story 'Invasion of the Poke-It-Ons'. It is (at the moment) two episodes , but will be added to at least once a day with another episode for your reading pleasure, until the story is complete. Today I have posted two Episodes in the topic 'Invasion of the Poke-It-Ons (Story- All Star Cast)' So go read it and reply. You may even feature.
PS there is another topic that;s the same but Invasion is missing the last N, and it only has episode 1. Let that one die, and just post in the latest one with two Episodes. Cheers.
Sibs
POP!!!
This has been popped to the top, because there is an obscure (actually, maybe it's not so obscure...) referance to this topic in my Invasion of the Poke-It-Ons Story in FOG chat. so if you liked this topic then read that story, and see how it was implemented.
Thanks for reading!!!
This has been popped to the top, because there is an obscure (actually, maybe it's not so obscure...) referance to this topic in my Invasion of the Poke-It-Ons Story in FOG chat. so if you liked this topic then read that story, and see how it was implemented.
Thanks for reading!!!