Video Games You Wish Existed

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

If Meta had actively wanted to kill off that whole approach and to ensure it didn't become mainstream they honestly couldn't have done a much better job than by making it look like trash, making it look really hard to do (it isn't), blowing tens of billions (literally! $47 billion!!!) on it, and completely failing to achieve or advance anything, in fact ending up far behind, say Second Life circa 2008 or say, VRChat, both of which were cobbled together on on a budget more than 10000x (literally) lower.

What's weird to me is that they haven't made a use case that isn't already covered by Zoom.

I have played in online worlds since the late 1990s, but other than very specific use cases (telemedicine, for instance), I haven't seen any compelling reason to do more with it in the decades since. And I say that as someone who blew some pandemic checks on VR headsets for my kids at the height of lockdown.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I want augmented reality, heads up display glasses more than any piece of technology I can think of and I absolutely do not want to get them from Meta.

I do think we will get wearable AR glasses -- or something similar -- for mainstream consumers in the next 10 years. But Meta absolutely doesn't have a compelling case for their vision of how that might work.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I do think we will get wearable AR glasses -- or something similar -- for mainstream consumers in the next 10 years. But Meta absolutely doesn't have a compelling case for their vision of how that might work.

They're also going to face serious social pushback if used in public unless they solve the "HI I AM RECORDING YOUR FACE RIGHT NOW HI YES FACE RECORDING AND NOW I AM RECORDING LOOKING YOU UP AND DOWN I AM RECORDING YOUR CHILD DO NOT BE ALARMED I AM RECORDING YOUR PHONE SCREEN I AM RECORDING YOUR CLEAVAGE I AM RECORDING YOUR ASS" etc. factor which Google Glass had. People called them "Glassholes" for a reason, and it absolutely stuck.

Like, to function most usefully, AR glasses kind of need forward-facing always-on cameras, but that's like walking around with your cellphone up and pointed at every single stranger you go past, people will at best think you're complete and utter wanker. At best. At worst you're going to get hit or tripped (probably not from the front, admittedly!), and certainly a middle ground of "No you cannot come into our store/bar/restaurant/train station/etc. wearing those, sir!" or "Eww, creep" will be common.

The most straightforward solution would be simply not have cameras in them and make them link to your cellphone and use its camera, so it would be obvious if you were pointing the camera at something, but that reduces their utility. Other potential solutions are hardwiring them so they can't record (doesn't really reduce utility, there's no legitimate usage for them recording which a phone can't do and less covertly) or making them light up like the fourth of July if they're recording, but you'd have to make the public believe those weren't easily subverted (autoblurring everyone's faces would also help, ironically there are videogames which simulate bodycams which already do this, mostly as a trick to save processing power).

What anyone making this really would want to avoid is their wearers essentially becoming the "gargoyles" from Snowcrash, which could very easily happen without care!