The Metaverse [initial thoughts]
As I write this, I’ve been working towards or been a part of the building of this new global frontier called the Metaverse for close to three years now.
I’ve worked on virtual world projects, VR experiences and games. I’ve been a part of the early NFT community as an artist, and a collector. Dabbled in smart contract development and invested in blockchain technology. I’ve worked on it commercially, as a part of a team, and at times on my own.
The more I think about this new paradigm the more it grips me. My entrance into the crypto and NFT space at the end of 2020 I think really opened my eyes to what was coming.
The potential of DAOs (Decentralized Autonomous Organizations) through proper governance and consensus, could have the means to replace some of the institutions and centralized forms of control we see today.
We will see player and community-driven micro-economies appear. Early versions of these exist - $WHALE and the play-to-earn game Axie Infinity ($AXS) are great case studies for how web3 will revolutionize the social-economical dynamics in the years to come.
Combining the potentials of these two together, you might expect the metaverse to be an open system. Ran entirely by communities with common and shared goals. If, of course, the first movers that onboard the mainstream are not walled systems from the likes of Facebook. Open decentralized worlds in VR and overlayed over normality through AR, with creator economies promoting incentivized engineering and creation, may well birth entirely new ways of living.
One thing I believe will occur is the realization and true potential of the gaming medium in the years to come. Already a behemoth of an industry overshadowing film and music, it is only getting bigger and more powerful. The Metaverse will be the gamification of reality, an extension of what we see in traditional gaming simulations today. Its roots and foundations are being built by the subcultures of the internet, gaming being a massive part of this. The creators of these new worlds will be level designers, game developers, and world builders.
It’s easy to see how much power resides in the gaming industry when you see the way things are heading. The very foundations of the metaverse will be developed with the tools used for game development. Game engines like Unreal, Unity and CryEngine are world creators. With incredible toolkits for environment design, character animation, AI and storytelling that will be used to develop experiences in VR and persistent visual spaces in AR. Bridging the gap between reality and immersive medium. Enhancement and experiential seclusion.
Saturation and interface improvement.
There are walls and indecision as of current, but they will eventually come. After all, it’s operating on outdated models that limit innovation and make player bases unhappy through DLC focus and corporate priorities. It’s a model begging for a shakeup. To give more control, ownership, and incentive to the player is the next step, and the shackles of venture capital funding will be eradicated by the simplicity of the economic freedom that DeFi presents, funding for innovation alas will be open to everyone.
The players will own their characters, skins and assets they would normally purchase separately, remaining in an uncontrollable walled database. Free to use in other applications, interoperable and of value to the wider metaverse ecosystem.
The Metaverse brings with it a chance to establish new ways of life and build a new system. It will revolutionize gaming, fashion, finance, and art (in many ways it already has). Give more power back to communities and people. Through DAOs it will realize true, open, and fair democratic processes.
It of course, like anything, comes with its own issues to confront. But these are challenges to embrace and I believe it can be done and done so in a brighter, collective orientated, and more considerate way.