BraLoD said:
I don't think the tech will come remotely close to that in our lifetime, possibly ever, tho, lol. |
Sometimes it already comes close, just not in a way you're thinking.
I'm reading Recursion atm which is basically about enhancing / reliving memories, and VR can do that as well. The first time I played 80s mix tape side B in Synthriders it transported me back to the 1980's. The music, the movement/dance patterns, the light show, it all worked perfectly together to trigger tons of memories. It was so overwhelming I was sobbing by the 3rd song.
RE8 Village ironically also triggered memories from going on holiday as a kid in France. We stayed in an old country house like the ones in Village one holiday. The environment feels so real it brought those memories back.
On PSVR1 Astrobot Rescue Mission made me feel like a kid, discovering Mario again. Subside tested my claustrophobia by crawling through caves under water, holding your virtual breath. (And automatically do it for real lol)
Skyrim started feeling like a real place in VR, I could just lay down and stare up in the sky, comfy in an alternate world.
The presence of realistic rendered VR characters already feels very real with the personal bubble feeling and the power of virtual characters looking you in the eyes.
There are many such moments in VR you never get on a screen.
But unfortunately the current trend is cheap mobile games and frankly most new releases do not come close to spaces and characters feeling real. Low res textures, low poly count, simple lighting are a bigger hurdle than the headset imo. In that regards PSVR2 is 2 steps forward in technology, 1 step backward in software. PSVR1 had more, more detailed games with more realistic characters and environments. PSVR2 still basically only has RE8, CotM and GT7 for realism feeling. Subside does a good job as well yet visible LOD changes kinda break immersion there a bit.
The big hurdle atm is not the tech, it's the low user base and thus low budget for games. And thus more risk averse, less experimental games. Due to the extreme blow up (like watching gameplay as Digital Foundry compares screenshots, 300% zoomed in) you need a lot more detail to sell the illusion on a 2K per eye headset. What looks decent on you tube, looks like a ps3 game in the headset.
So for best immersion feeling you need a beefy PC that can run realistic games. PSVR2 could run those as well, but no budget to port them. So PCVR mods are the only option for now.
(Stylistic games work as well, but the lighting and physics need to be realistic to sell those to your mind. Moss really feels like you're interacting with a diorama in front of you)
As for neuro feedback for VR, never say not in my lifetime. See how fast the world changed with the internet. Now we have AI becoming more powerful. Can it help in mapping the human mind and nervous system, probably. Hijacking the human nervous system has already been a topic since the 17th century when electric stimulation became possible. Mind machine interfaces are the next big break through, and we'll probably still see that in our life time.
https://cumming.ucalgary.ca/research/pediatric-bci/bci-program/what-bci
https://neuralink.com/
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