Week 11: Cyberpunk

The “punk” genres have become a huge part of sci-fi today. They definitely feature some of my favorite themes such as virtual reality, androids/cyborgs/robots, and advanced technologies in different eras, I am even designing my own spin off of “beauty and the beast” set in a diesel punk 1920’s setting. Currently there are up to 20 different derivatives of the cyberpunk genre and it continues to grow.  

When it comes to cyberpunk and the thought of virtual reality taking over our lives, all I can think of is how not so far away this future is for all of us. The Oculus Rift is a virtual head mounted display that works, I’ve tested it myself, and although it is still being developed, it only has a year or two until it is completed. Virtual reality will have its advantages to the world not only for gaming; it could be used for social, military, and even medical purposes.

But will the Oculus Rift cause more problems than solutions? I like to think about one of my favorite anime series called .hack. In this franchise, virtual reality exists and players interact with each other through The World, a massive multiplayer online game. The common occurrence that happens in the series is when artificial intelligent programs cause players to fall into a comatose state while playing the game. While I don’t see this to be a reality in the future, I do see people’s vision being affected by the displays. After trying the Oculus Rift myself I can see how addictive gaming will be and how altered my sense of sight will become.

 In the .hack//movie, set further after devices like the Oculus Rift, virtual reality is seen through what is equivalent to the Google Glasses and the game is controlled through a handheld console like the PSP. Basically, you could go outside, sit at a park bench, pop on your glasses and play your virtual reality game. Until this future, gamers like me are going to become couch potato’s that may never see the light of day again. For this week I read the short story, Johnny Mnemonic, which brought forth the concept of having a computer system implanted into our heads. After Oculus Rift, this may just be the next big thing.