I'm talking Sword Art Online Level virtual reality, where you can't tell that it isn't real. The Elder Scrolls series may not last that long, but how far away do you think we are from full immersion VR?

how far are away are we from legitimate Full-Dive technology? I highly doubt i'll see it in my lifetime.. aside from the technological aspect, there would numerous safety, psychological, and moral issues that would have to be overcome..

Yeah... we can do some really basic things in terms of neural interface. Move a circle to intersect with a bigger circle. Simple visual interaction with a mental control. And even that isn't really that simple, and definitely nowhere near consumer-ready. I'd be surprised if we see anything close to a full sensory virtual experience within the next century, and that's assuming we don't encounter any major ethical and legal hangups (which we will, look at the Internet).

Functional visual VR is probably going to be within the realm of common practice within a few years, depending on how the headsets next year catch on. More expansive virtual experiences could follow, but it depends somewhat on where housing designs go. If they get smaller, we aren't likely to see full-body VR control outside of public forums.

We're talking something that would need to hijack most of your nervous system to function. With modern technology, that would probably be best accomplished by severing your spinal cord and interfacing with it directly. But something along the lines of what we see in The Matrix? I'd be amazed if we had it within the next 50 years. 100 to 150 or even longer seems much more likely. The non-invasive system seen in SAO? A few decades longer than that at the least.

It's not entirely a matter of detecting electronic brain activity; It's also a matter of translating it to something meaningful. Every person's brain is similar, but unique. This means that if I were to think the word 'carrot' while being scanned by an fMRI, a certain section of my brain would be lit up, but if you were to do the same, a similar but distinctly different portion of your brain would be lit. Designing a system that can determine that blob A and blob B mean the same thing would difficult, but we can already do this to an extent. Google actually uses something like that for image recognition software used in image search. What's harder is getting it to pick out individual thoughts simultaneously. When you're in combat, you would be thinking about a ton of things (How much HP do I have? How much HP does my enemy have? What are their weaknesses? Parry, parry! Wasn't there another one over there? Did I leave the oven on?) and the system needs to image your brain, identify every individual thought, determine what thoughts are relevant, and have your game avatar respond just as fluidly and rapidly as your real body, without error. And that's just starter problems.

What about keeping your body immobilized? Does the device inhibit motor function? If so, how do you safely log out and remove the device? What if there's a system crash? You've probably seen a computer hang on shutdown, what happens if the VR system does that? How do you ensure that it doesn't stop vital organs, such as the lungs? Maybe the device doesn't inhibit motor function and instead the player self-administers a paralytic. How do you ensure that nobody overdoses, especially considering that the vast majority of the players probably aren't qualified to use paralytics?

To what extent does the player remain aware of their physical body? Do they retain all sensation? That would probably be safe, but would ruin immersion and could easily induce panic attacks. Do they lose surface sensation and retain deeper things, such as hunger pangs, while touch is a game mechanic? Do you remove all physical sensation entirely so that you can impose hunger pangs as a way to tell them to feed their character? That would produce phenomenal immersion, but the players could easily starve to death.

Do you project images directly into their brain or do you have the player view a screen? If they're using a screen, issues with paralytics and sensation come into play again. The player needs to be able to feel their eyes so they know when to blink and the relevant muscles can't be paralyzed accidentally. If there's a problem with either of these, they risk permanent eye damage, up to and including blindness. If you're projecting, you need to be able to transmit complex images in a manner that accounts for every player's unique brain. Additionally, the projection needs to not interfere with the brain imaging system.

Of all these problems, only the first could be considered to have even been started on, and that requires a supercomputer or a large and powerful server hooked up to a (rather bulky) fMRI.

the biggest issue I see with a Full-dive technology is both medical and psychological ..


if we are virtually experiencing the world as if it was reality with all senses intact (which is what I am pretty sure the OP is referring to, as he mentioned Sword Art Online), this could cause actual harm to the human body.. for example, if we are feeling the pain of say a daedric battle axe to the gut, our brain would think as if its actually happening which could cause major medical issues. first of all, it could potentially set the player into an immediate state of shock (which is life threatening)..

in the case of minor injuries, the human body reacts to such things in some cases by altering blood flow (as an example). if your experiencing this in a full-dive scenario, your mind would potentially think you were actually hurt in that way, and respond accordingly. but since you were not actually hurt physically, this could cause potential bodily harm..


the human body reacts highly by signals the brain sends out in response to external stimuli (aka, your senses).. in a full-dive scenario, where we are sensing everything within the virtual world while our body is in a stationary coma-like state, this could cause a lot of issues..

also, because of how the human mind works, an hour long battle against an overpowered boss (using Skyrim as an example, say tackling Miraak at very low level.. or using CoD as an example, being rofl-stomped by a team far more skilled and equiped than yours) could potentially inflict a state of PTSD (Post traumatic Stress Disorder) upon the player.. sure, we may consciously know "its just a game", but unconsciously because we experienced it in a full-dive scenario with all senses intact our mind would have quite a bit of trouble properly distinguishing it from reality, which could potentially inflict PTSD..




maybe this would be a better discussion for the General forums?

I hope we are far away enough so that we don't see this happening.

Yeah... in fact, .Hack, Sword Art Online and Ready Player One (the only 3 fictions i am familiar with that deal with this subject) all explore various theoretical negatives of this kind of escapist concept as core crises in the stories. Based on all the reasonable information we have right now, even TRYING this wouldn't be healthy... Medically, psychologically, or socially.

As it is, the simple visual VR that we have can cause rather serious nausea and disorientation... And that's with the other sense firmly grounding you in your chair. Can you imagine the disassociation if your body receives totally different neurological input than from your physical body? I mean, we have literal mental disorders that trigger that kind of delusional reaction, and this concept is about deliberately creating that environment? The entire concept is like selling schizophrenia in a box.

Just like the Ghosts in Ghost in the Shell, this isn't really something to look forward to, but a pessimistic and dangerous vision of the future.

I think that's up to the Mods... we're still partially talking about control schemes for TES, i guess...

huh.. I didn't even really think of the social aspects to much.. but the three parts I've bolded brought up to mind Tsukasa from .HACK..

because if a person games to escape reality, but then for them that game essentially becomes a new reality indistinguishable from the first, its going to end up causing alot of issues for the person mentally..

My god that kind of technology is at least a few decades ahead, maybe we'll see it when the 90s generation is in their like 40-60s but it's a very long way and this is assuming our technological advancement keeps going this strong.

I agree. It is quite a ways away, yet. We are still learning things about our brains and nervous system. Without that knowledge, VR at that level is far away. I doubt I'll see it. I'd be surprised if my 27 year old son sees it in his lifetime.

It's fun to think about, though

I agree with most of the points mentioned in this thread. There are all kinds of psychopathology that could become horribly worsened from this kind of technology. There would also be all kinds of liabilities that would need to be discerned. If someone is inadvertently stricken with PTSD, would the company be liable? Would any parties that were involved in the PTSD-inducing experience be liable? If it's possible for these kinds of complications to arise from this technology, would it be ethical for businesses or researchers (i.e. Institutional Review Boards) to invest in the necessary research and development to make these kinds of things a reality?

In regards to possibilities for this kind of technology, however skeptical I may be regarding it, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/ray-kurzweil-nanobots-brain-godlike_560555a0e4b0af3706dbe1e2

Of course, even if his (often correct) predictions came true, all of these issues plus many more would have to be considered before anything were to be attempted, so I'd place it probably sometime after 2100.

Although, if I'm not too far off the topic of PTSD, there's a lot of http://ict.usc.edu/pubs/VR%20PTSD%20Exposure%20Therapy%20Results%20with%20Active%20Duty%20OIF%20OEF%20Combatants.pdf that shows that videogame simulations can actually effectively treat PTSD, especially if they're coupled with cognitive behavioral therapy.

I had to smile at this as the anime "Ghost in the Shell" takes place in 2030. Of course, they have some consciousness on the net by then

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Wanted to mention that they also have nanobots and deal with a disease called "Cyberbrain Sclerosis", or hardening of the brain where implants are connected. The first TV series deals with medicine for this disease: A vaccine versus micromachines

now, I certainly could see a valuable place in society for some of that tech we see in GitS, although I don't think just anyone should have access to it.. an example, Multiple Sclerosis is a terrible disease that makes a persons life unbearably difficult.. but if we were able to properly transmit someones consciousness into a "cyberbrain" and a full Cybernetic body, while it wouldn't be cheap it could essentially "cure" a condition such as MS..

granted, there are a whole lot of issues such technology can bring about as well.. as seen in the major arc of the first SAC season with the whole laughing man incident, you would have the risk of being able to hack into another persons mind entirely, essentially making the person your puppet.. and there are so many reasons that would be dangerous..

Oh how i dream of true VR that you can use at home. We will probably be stuck with headsets for the next couple of decades, although considering the advancement from PS1 to PS4 over the last 20 years, now imagine in 20 years time the PSVR4/Oculus rift 4 vs todays PSVR and Oculus Rift.

That is pretty exciting, and by then people will know how to ultilise vr to the best of its limits and capabilities in terms of immersion and gameplay.

The next step is possibly public VR entertainment, such as the VOID (https://thevoid.com/#home) or omnidirectional treadmills such as cyberith and virtuix omni (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4UfZ_0yCBxM).

we have reached the point of diminishing returns as far as games go visually though

I'm talking mainly in terms of VR tech, not necessarily graphics, but resolution/ fps/ fov/ etc. To make the experience better, even if graphics stay the same.

Don't bet on it... The holy grail for VR companies currently is working eye tracking, and if they can achieve that at an affordable price there's good reason to hope for a quantum leap in visuals. Microsoft published a research paper on it a few years ago, and the projected speed-up compared to full screen rendering was about a factor of 5 for HD resolution and a relatively narrow field of view. At ~11K resolutions and a ~200 degrees FOV, which is what we'd be shooting for in VR, the speed up is literally in the hundreds. It's numbers which would take decades to reach if you'd be relying solely on Moore's law, which is basically what we have in the past.

A full vr experiance like soa? I dont think that would legal or at least there be some heavy laws on that espessially If it leaves the body in a vulnarable state like that.

Ben Bova wrote a sci-fi novel in 1969 called The Dueling Machine in which participants could resolve disputes by engaging in virtual reality duels that were supposed to be perfectly safe. Of course someone figured out how to use the machines to actually kill people by overriding a few of the program safeguards and killing their opponents in gruesome means so their brains overreact, actually killing them just from the psychological stress and hormones the brain was releasing in response to the situation.

I don't know when... But my response to the majority of posts expressing concern about the negatives is, I think there's a fairly simple solution. When it comes to the Non-Visual/Non-Auditory parts of VR, simply don't add in actual physical pain, some tactile touches sure, as well as some smells, but no smells that could be vomit inducing, and no tactile stuff that involves physical pain. As for how to "close a VR from inside it"- perhaps something similar to a Pipboy but it controls the logging in and out of the VR and your character/avatar simply wears some wrist device for immersions sake as well? A control panel worn on the wrist, and you open the panel with your other hand, then press a switch to exit the VR. Those I think would be two major answers to some questions I've seen here. If it crashes or whatever you can also press something on the VR panel on the wrist thing to escape.

What about pain? It doesn't need to be so realistic it includes pain. And I'm sure non-realistic smelling corpses will be more than fine, worth the immersion loss there. I'm sure most will agree with me, a NEARLY COMPLETELY REALISTIC THING, minus a few things related to extremely unpleasant non/visual/non auditory senses, would be ideal.

I don't want to feel myself be burned/frozen/stepping on a thorn or nail/getting hit with a hammer/hit with an explosive or whatever- I suppose if a "damaged" sensation is so important, then perhaps just something that shakes you a little bit. Not shake you violently- and not shake you hard enough to damage you, but enough that you can clearly feel it. A fairly gentle but mildly disorienting shake- like a rumble pack worn around the body basically. If for SOME REASON you HAD to have a non-visual/non-auditory way to be damaged "immersively"... Which personally isn't something I want anyways.

Trust me I'm totally fine with good old fashioned health bars, or the rapid beating heartbeat sound.

Nah man, when I get stabbed in the abdomen with a Forsworn sword laced with poison I wanna feel the burn. /s

Sarcastic or not, that's exactly the problem. When you're dealing with technology that basically hijacks the nervous system and generates false input, you're going to have 2 basic safety thresholds. One will be, for lack of a better term, mechanical, and one will be software.

The mechanical safety will simply be that anything not interfaced will be beyond the ability to interact with the simulation. If the system isn't designed to stimulate your olfactory system, you can't really hack it to make it interface with an unconnected part of the brain. The same goes for your ability to feel things like heat, pressure and pain. If the system doesn't interact with the brain to elicit those sensations, it would be very difficult to make it without changing the interface system it's self.

But if it IS designed to, even in a muted sense, it becomes a software safety. And those can be worked around. And there WILL be people who want the full sensory experience. And there WILL be people who want to force that experience on others.

As an example of why someone would want to break the safeties on the sensory stimulation software, consider both the rule of first adopters and the wide range of advlt mods for even the most low-tech games. Even if it's only designed to cause mild sensation, someone will want to change that and they will find a way. Also, no matter what reason the safeties were originally broken for, there will be people who, for example, try to hack the other players in multiplayer so they feel full sensation so the first guy has an edge because some people care more about winning than having fun or following basic morality.