41 Comments

Well, the WEF's Yuval Harari says it'll likely be a combination of drugs and video games that will be used to placate the "useless people" once the utopian dream of owning nothing, having no privacy, and nonetheless being happy is realized. I guess the powers that be will turn their attention to developing newer and better narcotics and video games once they get done dismantling everything in our civilization that they can't fully control. Looking forward to your followup pieces on this subject!

On a different note, old school arcades were a different variety of, rather than a replacement for, in-person socializing. I guess they're not what Harari has in mind, though, for all us "useless people."

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This is sounding more and more like Guantanamo Bay on acid. What you're describing is effectively the Matrix, which I feel is the goal of the transhumanist bio-digital convergence, or at least part of their goal.

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This is a lovely vision of the gaming future. I mean, it's a nightmare for game developers, graphic artists, voice actors and so on. But it'll be boon for indie game creators.

I will say that the full immersive Matrix/Cyberpunk tech isn't there yet. I have multiple friends who've worked with VR and the hardware is just too uncomfortable to wear for long, and the altered perception makes a lot of people react poorly (vertigo, nausea, etc). Those might get fixed given enough time and money. Of course, they've been promising fixes for that since the 80's....

Me, I'm mostly still playing older (and indie) titles. Turn-based strategy or puzzle games that aren't as dependant on twitch reflexes or dealing with annoying players online. Heck, I still play Master of Orion 1, which is the gold standard for gaming AI, for me.

But, as I'm sure you're aware, if they do fix the hardware + meatsuit interface issue, things are going to dystopia fast. And the Amish will inherit the Earth. Which is fine, I guess.

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Feb 17, 2023Liked by Mark Bisone

Gee Mark, your imagination is on fire here, in the best possible way. An astonishing and vivid and probably accurate vision of a possible future. Dream or nightmare? Well that's a different question.

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founding

And then you die...and you never lived....?

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This is a good argument for why we're probably already in such a simulation.

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Feb 16, 2023Liked by Mark Bisone

An innocuous vision of Really Terrible Orchestra makes rounds in my mind 😇

🗨 truly to appreciate skill, you must appreciate the absence of it.

Best wishes for copy editor to get well soon, in time for part two 🙂

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Great read. Took me back to the arcades, and then forward to the nightmare, extending what we have already seen with deep fakes, dali, and chat gpt to games.....

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The Soup Pot reads like Choronzon and it’s underlying technology not unlike that of the actual Demiurge.

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Feb 20, 2023Liked by Mark Bisone

It reads to me like a marketing spiel from someone who wants you to invest in their "guaranteed profit" scheme of "the future of gaming". What happens when someone finds the magic words that will bluescreen the game's AI like ChatGPT?

(Which reminds me of the trolls in game chat who type things like, "Press Alt-F4 to activate your character's dance animation!")

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Feb 17, 2023Liked by Mark Bisone

Wow

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Shades of The Matrix and Tad Williams’ OtherWorld! I’m assuming this is what Zuckerberg is busy scheming away on with his META?

I do enjoy a good immersive RPG game (I’ve played Mass Effect, BioHazard and The Elder Scrolls, to name a few) so I can see how on the surface this landscape you painted of what is basically a new and improved gaming world sounds fun. That’s the trap mechanism.

Can’t wait to read the shop drop part in your next installment!

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deletedFeb 16, 2023·edited Feb 17, 2023Liked by Mark Bisone
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