Escapism Part Two: Virtual Reality

My name was Alyx Vance and I was awesome.

Jul 17, 2023

Hello friends!

I’m sorry for the irregular posting. Chronic fatigue has no schedule, other than the one I try to force it into to accommodate my phased return to work. The monster and I are still battling it out, but I think I’m mostly winning now.

Here’s part two of my series on Escapism. If you missed part one or the introduction, click the links below to check them out and get up to speed on this little foray into the pros and cons of different modes of escapism.

Escapism Introduction: humans are expert escape artists

Escapism Part One: social media… the pot noodle of escapism

Virtual Reality

Back in March, when I visited my brother in High Wycombe, I got to spend an hour as the daughter of a resistance leader, fighting against the rule of the alien Combine empire. I was a skilled hacker, proficient in firearms and extremely athletic, capable of defending myself in hand-to-hand combat, and able to climb walls, scramble over rooftops and jump great distances. My name was Alyx Vance and I was awesome.

I’d like to be Alyx again. In fact, I’d like to be her 100% of the time, minus having to fight an alien empire—because that’s just exhausting and there are only so many jump-scares I can handle in 24 hours. Unfortunately, High Wycombe is like a three hour drive away (especially when you keep misinterpreting the satnav and have to take a detour around the M25), so I won’t get to be Alyx again any time soon. Which I’m pretty sad about, to be honest, because being Alyx was some of the best escapism I’ve ever indulged in.

I’m spoiled of course, because if you’re going to plunge yourself into the full Virtual Reality experience, you can’t get better than Half-Life: Alyx. I’m not a gamer, but I’ve been told by people who are gamers, that Half-Life: Alyx sets the bar extremely high for the VR experience, partly because of the level of detail that has gone into realising the dystopian environment you inhabit as a player, but also because of the level of interaction you can have with that environment. Every set is packed with furniture, equipment and objects you can interact with as if it’s a real space—and, if you’re using a VR headset and controllers, you can do so organically, as if you’re really there. I only played the first chapter, but I had immense fun peering over balconies, checking over my shoulder and craning my neck upwards to watch a Strider passing alarmingly close. I opened doors, turned radio nobs, picked up books to read their blurbs, used pens to write on windows and threw tea cups against walls to watch them smash in spectacular 3D… just because I could. Actually, quite a lot of things got thrown out of windows and against walls on my journey through the first chapter, because who knew how fun it is to pick up virtual objects and throw them with all your very real arm strength against a virtual wall? And, honestly, I just couldn’t pass up the opportunity to do in a virtual reality what I could never get away with in the real world. Turns out I have a destructive side that likes to smash things. Kinda like the Hulk.

I’m also, apparently, much more impulsive in the virtual world. My brother was quite impressed by how enthusiastically I went ahead and pressed a flashing red button, without any qualms about whether it was a good idea or not, and without really caring either way. I mean, as much as my senses and my brain were telling me everything was real, my sense of adventure was having a field day doing whatever the heck it wanted without fear of serious consequences. I was Alyx and Alyx was invincible… which is just as well, since advancing through the game still relied on my very real inability to follow simple instructions and remember how to use the controllers. Many a time I found myself standing with my virtual nose against a virtual wall and unable to physically get out of it because I’d managed to walk my real body into a corner. Luckily, I had three other people present who could physically manoeuvre me out of my predicament and calm me down when my brain had some trust issues over believing there was solid ground beneath my real feet whilst my virtual body stepped off momentarily into thin air. It was very exciting. And confusing. And alarming.

I loved it so much.

I also spent about ten minutes trying to figure out the anti-gravity gloves. Honestly, if my brother’s partner hadn’t managed to explain the process in an idiot-proof way, I would probably still be in the backyard of a derelict building, in a city on post-apocalyptic Earth, right now, trying to catch barrels, bottles and boxes with one hand. But when I finally cracked it— successfully managing to pick up the weapon I was finally allowed to have, chucking the extra ammo in my backpack and jumping aboard a train to head into chapter two—I felt there was nothing I couldn’t do.

As I said, for a first experience with a VR headset, I pretty spoilt to get to play Half-Life: Alyx. It’s an experience I highly recommend if you’re confident that your brain can cope with that kind of immersive situation.

Now, once again, I’m not a gamer, so I can only offer the perspective of a newbie—or ‘noob’ as real gamers would call me—on the world of virtual reality.

First of all, just to clarify, not all types of virtual reality require a headset and are fully immersive. There also exists non-immersive VR and semi-immersive VR.

Non-immersive is your average video game that requires only a screen and a console. Here the physical world and the virtual world remain entirely separate. Whilst you’re engaging with the virtual world through the screen, using the controls, you also remain aware and in control of the physical world.

Semi-immersive VR is where you’re given the impression of being in a virtual world, for example in a flight simulator, through a screen and 3D images, but otherwise you remain connected to the real, physical world around you (e.g. the ‘cockpit’ of the simulator).

Fully-immersive VR takes over all your senses, essentially cutting you off from the physical world, and requiring you to interact fully with the virtual environment. Trust me, it’s scary, and also kinda awesome, how easily your brain can get locked into a virtual world this way.

Anyway… be it non-immersive or fully immersive, virtual reality is a form of escapism, right? It’s basically the closest we can physically get to opening a portal to another universe and declaring ‘I’m off to be someone else, somewhere more exciting, so long suckers!’.

Whilst I was in High Wycombe, I also got to watch my brother play Hogwarts Legacy, which was much less exciting than playing Half-Life: Alyx with the VR headset, but no less fascinating. In this game, you get to be a student at Hogwarts, explore the wizarding world, and go on quests to level up your character. Since I’m neither a gamer nor a Potterhead (shocking confession here: I have neither read nor watched Harry Potter, please don’t revoke my UK citizenship), I had no idea what was going on, despite my brother’s commentary. It might have just been due to my chronic fatigue haze, but I found it quite soothing to watch my big bro navigate his way through Hogsmeade and the Forbidden Forest, collecting magical flora and fauna whilst periodically ambushing poachers and slaughtering Dugbogs. He seemed quite happy pottering about (pun FULLY intended) the Hogwarts world, not really doing much else but what he’d been doing since he’d started the game a week or so before. For him this was chill-out time. A break from the stress of adulting. A way to escape expectations and deadlines and houseguests.

Even though I’m just a noob and a muggle, I can kind of see the appeal. And, if I could afford gaming as an obsession, I’d probably also find myself running to it as a means to escape the real world for an evening, or seven, a week. Fortunately, being a penniless, mugglesome noob, I don’t have to worry about going through the same intervention I did with myself for social media. No need for a complete ban here. I can enjoy being beaten at Mario Kart by my eight-year-old nephew without worrying that I’m turning into a classic example of the Hypodermic Needle theory1 or that I might become a Hikikomori2.

Of course, if someone were to set me up with a gaming console, an endless supply of video games and the fanciest VR gear on the market, it would be a different story. I know my weaknesses.

So, is virtual reality a good or bad form of escapism?

Virtual Insanity?

I must admit that whenever I come across the term Virtual Reality I reflexively play Jamiroquai’s 1996 hit Virtual Insanity in my head. You remember that extremely catchy specimen of funk and acid jazz, right?

*sings* FUTURES. MADE OF. ViRtUaL InSaNiTy…

It’s a song that expresses concern over our obsession with new technology and the digital world, written at a time before Google was even founded and when anyone lucky enough to own a brick-like desktop computer spent most of their time in front of it waiting for the dial up connection to work. Did you know that if you’re feeling nostalgic for the iconic garbled sound of pain that dial up connection used to make, you can revisit your trauma by listening to clips of it on Youtube? Thanks for that, Youtube.

Anyway. Virtual Reality. Is it Virtual Insanity?

There tend to be two camps of reaction when it comes to new technology. There are the believers: those people who can’t wait for someone to invent a means to transfer the human consciousness into a synthetic body so they can live the rest of their lives as immortal cyborgs. And then the sceptics: people who have been experiencing an existential crisis over the impending destruction of human identity since the invention of the electronic calculator.

I tend to swing between the two:

This invention is amazing! Where can I get one?

Humans are horrible and we’re definitely going to find a way to make life worse with this new tool we’ve invented.

As with social media, there have been tons of theories, articles and research published on the negative impact of gaming on humans—particularly young humans who’ve been reared in windowless basements, under the blue light of a bank of 65” computer screens, and fed intravenously on a diet of online game marketing since leaving the womb. Those ones are in big trouble. Probably.

Of course too much time spent in the virtual world will have a negative impact on a person’s mental health, social skills and ability to function in the real world. Just like social media, gaming’s interactive nature provides users with a certain level of freedom, control and empowerment that the real world doesn’t provide. And, let’s admit it: it’s fun to be someone else for a while, whether that’s a Formula 1 driver, a solider, a wizard, or a football manager. It’s also fun to try your hand at things you wouldn’t ordinarily get to do… things like killing zombies, running a kingdom, flying a spaceship, building a city, and committing grand theft auto. Virtual reality offers its users everything they can’t get in the real world with a heavy dose of dopamine on the side. And, again, just like social media, it’s designed to be addictive.

Gaming addiction is actually a recognised mental health issue. In the UK, the NHS treats hundreds of children and their family members a year at their National Centre for Gaming Disorders, because it’s recognised that addiction to virtual reality ruins the lives of individuals and families, and there are people out there who need professional support to overcome their addiction.

That’s not to say that gaming and virtual reality are inherently evil. There’s a good side and a bad side. On the one hand, gaming can be incredibly social and a vital way to find connection and community for those who face obstacles engaging socially in the ‘real’ world. On the other hand, gaming can also cause isolation and there are plenty of online gaming communities out there that are extremely toxic. At the end of the day, it always comes down to one thing: everything in moderation.

As a little aside: although we tend to primarily associate virtual reality with the entertainment industry, it actually has many, many more uses in the modern world: design, education & training, medical treatment, tourism, fitness & wellbeing, retail & fashion, news & journalism… it’s quite fun to stick the term ‘virtual reality’ into your preferred web browser and discover the clever, inventive and exciting ways that VR is being used these days.

Personally, I think virtual reality is a pretty cool form of escapism. I love that it’s so interactive. You’re using your brain and your hand-eye co-ordination (and your whole body if you’re on a VR headset), and you can play alone or socially, depending on your preference. I’d personally choose it over social media any day, perhaps because there’s less confusion over what is real and what is not. At the end of the day, I am not Alyx, but I can enjoy living her dystopian life for an hour or two and then go back to my real life without any ambiguity over where one ends and the other beings.

So, the verdict on VR?

Let’s be all join the resistance to liberate Earth from her alien overlords… but only at weekends and maybe for an hour before bed after a really, really boring day in the real world.

Also… how did I manage to go this entire post without once referencing The Matrix?

See you next time, friends, for the third and final part in this series: Escapism & Fiction.

How about you? Are you a gamer or a noob? Have you had much experience with fully-immersive VR? What’s the most fun you’ve had with VR? What do you think the biggest dangers are of VR as a form of escapism?

I’d love to hear your thoughts so click the comment button below to join in the conversation.

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Life at 23.5 Degrees

Escapism Part Two: Virtual Reality

My name was Alyx Vance and I was awesome.

Virtual Reality

Virtual Insanity?

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