Trials of a VRMMO Healer

Introduction - A Brief History of VRMMOs

The dream of all gamers since the history of video games began was a truly immersive experience--one that felt so real that you couldn't distinguish it from reality. While early Massively Multiplayer Roleplaying Games — MMORPGs — offered a crude but compelling glimpse of what was possible, it would be decades before the first Virtual Reality systems would truly emerge. The key was a combination of hypnagogic induction and deep semantic engines. The first technology allowed us to replace external inputs such as displays, speakers, and controllers, with devices that would interface directly with our brains, placing us into a sort of lucid dream that allowed us to retain consciousness while it fed us sensory data. This, however, was not enough. Early hypnagogic devices were novelties that were primarily used as sleep aids. While we could simulate environments, they were never truly convincing. At the smallest and largest scales, they simply didn't convince us they were real. The breakthrough development occured when these devices were combined with deep semantic engines, powerful pieces of software and hardware that helped to overcome the biggest problem with VR — that of information.

A truly realistic, massive world required a, well, massive amount of information in order to convince our brains that it is real. That's why the visual, auditory and haptic devices of the past were so limited. Even using procedural techniques, creating entire worlds was out of the question. The processing power and memory needed would have made the entire enterprise unprofitable. It turned out the trick was not to feed brains all the information needed, but to feed them just enough that our brains could fill in the blanks. We know what cats look like, so the semantic engine could say, "This is a cat, it's very furry" or something similar, and our brains would take over from there. It only needed to describe the specifics instead of every minute detail. And what if someone had never seen a cat? The engine could pull data from other players and distribute it as needed. This also meant that designers could literally dream up complex and detailed settings, allowing worlds that were both carefully crafted and yet freed enough resources for complex AI routines. The engines even made realtime universal translation of languages possible by being able to directly transfer ideas and meaning from one party to another.

VR systems became popular learning tools, but experiments in using them to inject knowledge into our brains fell short — the dreamlike nature meant that long-term retention was bad. But moment-to-moment, cohesive experiences? Those worked great.

Eternity Online was not the first VRMMO but it was the one I had been waiting for. I remembered playing MMO (not the VR kind) after I had finished high school, and while I missed the old days, I just didn't have the time these days to play such an involved game. The fact that I was sick of dating and my friends all had kids might have also had some small part in rekindling my old hobby. Eternity's world took place in three times realtime, so a few hours in real life would equal triple that in-game. This was a rather useful feature for those of us with limited play time. It also boasted a flexible skill system that let you create a character that would play in a totally unique way.

I figured this was as good a time as any to get started. I splurged and spent my tax refund on the hardware and on a Friday night, after I had eaten dinner, I logged in for the first time.