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Virtual Reality is on its death bed
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Remember Nintendo's Virtual Boy?
Remember the days when games used to be a one way experience? At that time you had to sit in front of a TV/Computer screen and interact with a virtual world with a game controller or keyboard and mouse. Weren't those the good old days? The purely virtual reality that we know and love may have its days numbered.
A recent visit with Henry Tirri, Senior Vice President and Head of Nokia Research Center (NRC), at NRC in Palo Alto, CA seemed to allude to the dwindling future for virtual reality games. Our meeting started off with the usual pleasantries, but quickly turned towards what Nokia planned to do with what it and many other firms have been working on, Augmented and Mixed realities. Let me pause to explain what these realities are before I continue.
Augmented Reality (AR) - The best example I was given of this is to imagine using your phone camera to view an area like Union Square in San Francisco. Say you want to view what the buildings looked like before the last earthquake. AR would be the phone drawing information from the internet to overlay the past look of the buildings in real-time. It's best to think of Augmented Reality as being an one way street and the virtual world adds to your real world.
AR Video Example - NVIDIA Tegra game named ARhrrrr (Zombie game utilizing skittles)
Mixed Reality (MR) - This is essentially data being shared and updated back and forth between the virtual space and the real world. People may not realize that MR has been woven into some of our daily interactions with certain sites. Aspects of Google Maps use it. Satellite imagery and real-time traffic data update a an otherwise virtual look at directions. Data from the real world is interwoven into the directions and is updated back and forth.
MR Video Example - MR Interface CeBIT 2006
Now that those have been explained, I can move on to what Nokia is planning to do. Nokia wants to take these realities a step further than they have gone so far. This would be involving 3D manipulation using a multi-view codec they developed at NRC. Nokia has been tinkering with a tablet like device that would use a 3D display that would not carry the traditional eye strain associated with most current 3D solutions. This is possible because the user doesn't have to wear special glasses to view the 3D imagery. This would not only apply to releasing immersive games with us directly impacting the 3D world, but could also apply to social elements like a mixed reality treasure hunt involving several players that each have a piece of a map and need to come within close proximity of one another to assemble said map and continue.
One of the potential problems associated with this is answering "How much is too much?". How much can you have in an AR or MR visual field before the user becomes overloaded by the sensory input. How many explosions, sparks, people, animals, zombies, naked ladies, creatures from unknown galaxy X, or even advertisements can you put in front of a gamer or other user before they go nuts? Nokia will be looking for answers like this while this technology progresses. Even so, the promise of new and exciting games is on the horizon for sure.
It is safe to say that the standard virtual reality we game in is either on its death bed slowly walking towards the light or one broken hip away from said bed. Children years from now will wonder why we used those archaic controllers and screens and we will just have to sit and reminisce about the good old days when 2D was enough.
For more info: E-mail Nic at technic.amoroso@gmail.com
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