El 4: Oculus Rift Meets the iPhone for 'Neuromancer' Inspired Game

The groundbreaking science fiction novel Neuromancer has inspired a new experiment that pairs the iPhone with the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset to offer a unique new gaming experience.

Created by Greg Borenstein, the experimental game is called Case and Molly, after two of the main characters in the novel. Mirroring the concepts imagined in the 1984 book, two players coordinate their movements between virtual reality and a real location.

"I think it's so cool that the Oculus Rift could make it possible to see, in real-time, any place in the world in 3D," says Borenstein. "Unfortunately, there's no stereo camera on the market that is both affordable and capable of simple real time streaming…"

To come up with a similar dynamic in reality, Borenstein used two iPhones taped together to serve as a kind of 3D camera and streamed that live video into an Oculus Rift headset.

Although the performance of the experimental game appears to be laggy in the video (see below), it nevertheless shows the potential of taking a common device like the iPhone and marrying it with a bleeding-edge gaming tool like the Oculus Rift to explore never-before-possible scenarios.

However, when Neuromancer author William Gibson caught wind of the game, he took to Twitter on Saturday asking questions about what appeared to be an unauthorized project. Gibson wrote:

Would whoever is making that Neuromancer game for Oculus Rift please get in touch with me? I knew nothing of it until yesterday.

— William Gibson (@GreatDismal) October 5, 2013

Thankfully, for all involved, what seemed like a potential legal firestorm turned out to be nothing more than a misunderstanding. The game is not for sale and was only created as an experiment for Borenstein's Science Fiction to Science Fabrication class.

Borenstein, an artist in the Playful Systems Group at the MIT Media Lab, responded to Gibson directly on Twitter, writing, "I made the game to explore the particulars of the digital/embodied cyberspace/meat collaboration you describe in Neuromancer… Sorry to startle."

When we asked Borenstein about the brief mix-up, he said, "I'd never use Gibson's IP in a commercial project without permission under any circumstances. I've been a fan of Gibson's writing since high school and it's played a huge role in shaping my work."

And while the game is non-commercial, those interested in giving the experimental game a try can do so by downloading the code made available by Borenstein on GitHub.

As for any notions of one day possibly seeing the game as a commercial property, Borenstein says, "I think the game would have to change significantly in order to even make sense as a commercial project... Rather than a product on a commercial games platform, I think it would make sense at a Big Games festivals like Come Out and Play or other 'meat space' gatherings or events."

1. Virtual Avatars

"By 2020 retail virtual avatars – on screens and in holographic projection – will start to become popular.

Their A.I. will be powered by realtime analysis of affinity data for product recommendations and neural network enhanced sales closing strategies.

Similarly, service desks in hotels, shops, banks and other retail destinations will disappear.

They will be replaced by nomadic staff equipped with in-ear devices that provide them real-time insights into your preferences, based on your NFC emissions."

Mike Walsh, Futurist

Image courtesy of Scott Wilcoxson
2. Intelligence in Anything

"The models I develop explore what it will feel like to be a human in the year 2020. We use these models to then go and build the technology needed to bring this vision about. I'm part designer, part engineer – so I'm really pragmatic.

The models I build are based on a mix of social and computer science, statistical data and my constant travels around the world talking to people about the future. The folks in my lab say that I'm futurehunting.

One thing I'm super excited about also gives the deep geeks I know goosebumps. As we approach 2020 the size of computing moves to zero. If you look at the size of computational power of the past few decades it's been getting smaller and smaller, from mainframe computers in the '70s, to desktops in the '80s, up through smartphones and tables.

The size of the meaningful computational power keeps getting smaller and smaller. So, as we approach 2020 the size of the intelligent gets closer to zero in size, nearly invisible. This means we can put intelligence in anything.

We no longer have to ask ourselves can we get this device to work, can we make this smartphone smaller; in 2020 we can ask ourselves what we want to do. We can put computational power in anything. Everything can become a computer that's as smart as your smartphone or tablet. That's awesome!

That means that as we get to 2020, we will be living in an environment where we are surrounded by computational intelligence. In 2020 it's up to us what we want to do. How do we want to make the lives of people all over the world better by infusing our lives with intelligence?"

Brian David Johnson, Futurist, Intel

Image courtesy of Steve R
3. The Cloud to Become the Norm

"My prediction is that the term 'cloud' will have disappeared from the phrase 'cloud computing' by 2020, because the majority of computing will simply assumed to be done in the cloud.

As a result of this transition, the market capitalization of major networking firms will be slashed to less than one-third of their 2012 levels, and 50% of all of today's IT vendors will be out of business by the decade's end."

Jack Uldrich, Futurist

Image courtesy of Florian Rieder
4. Connecting the Cloud With the Crowd

"By 2020 everything will have moved into the cloud: content, media, health records, education. Connecting the cloud with the crowd will become a huge business.

Related to this, access will replace ownership in almost all forms of media. Future media 'consumers' will simply have music, films, TV shows, games, etc. in the cloud, paid 'with attention,' i.e., advertising and data mining (Facebook cloud), subscription (Apple new iTV), and bundles (i.e., with mobile operators).

Most importantly, many consumers will not pay for 'content' per se, but for all the added values around the content, such as curation, packaging, design, social connections, interfaces, apps, etc.

Finally, all media that is not social and mobile will shrink; all that combines with their current models will prosper."

Gerd Leonhard, Futurist

Image courtesy of Kerstin Kollmann
5. Virtual Hospitals Thanks to Bio-Connectivity

"By 2020, if not before, most industries – health care, agriculture, financial – will have found that they have been transformed by the velocity of Moore's law. Mobility, wireless, pervasive connectivity – everywhere we look, we see that the big trend for the next eight years is that technology will drive the pace of innovation in every single industry.

Credit cards will be replaced by smartphone transactions systems; auto insurance will be forever changed through GPS-based monitoring devices that reward good driving performance; hospitals will become virtual through the extension of bio-connectivity, involving remote medical monitoring and management.

The big trend is that as tech comes to change industries, change in those industries will occur faster than ever before. The winners will have been those who understand this reality, and adjust their innovation engine to keep up with this new speed of change."

Jim Carroll, Futurist, Trends & Innovation Expert

Image courtesy of Friendly Joe
6. Ultra-Intelligent Electronic Agents

"By 2020, 'ultra-intelligent electronic agents' will be our primary interface with both people and devices connected to the online world.

Think of it as a mobile concierge that looks human, but is actually an avatar with a personality.

It will have a supercomputer brain in the cloud, and will be available to you on any connected device, with the ability to learn more about how to help you as you use it.

Daniel Burrus, Technology Futurist

Image courtesy of oerendhard
7. New Image and Video Analysis Algorithms and Tools

"By 2020 predicting the future will be commonplace for the average person – futurists could be out of a job.

We are amassing unprecedented amounts of data – a zettabyte alone this year. This data is social and public (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, blogs, etc.). Billions of devices (25-50 billion by 2020) will contribute exponentially to this avalanche of data.

By some estimates, 90% of all the content is rich media (video, photos). Facebook is home to [roughly] 140 billion photos (4% of all pictures ever taken by people*). By 2015, Cisco Visual Networking Index predicts 1 million video minutes will traverse the Internet every second.

Vast amounts of knowledge is sequestered within this rich media.

New image and video analysis algorithms and tools will unlock this rich source of data, creating unprecedented insight. Cloud based tools will allow anyone to mine this data and perform what-if analysis, even using it to predict the future.

We are seeing the early signals of this now. For example, Twitter is already being used to predict financial markets, and social media can predict unemployment."

Dave Evans, Cisco Chief Futurist

*Source: Nokia Connects

Image courtesy of Jeff Minarik
8. Improved Call Sound Quality

"Quality voice service on wireless devices will become an option, if not standard. Improved handsets and the increased bandwidth afforded by 4G and 4G advanced will make this possible. It may be a carrier-provided service, or an application riding on the Internet, or a combination of the two.

Younger generations will hear something that theretofore only older generations remember: the sound of a pin dropping."

Dr. John H. Vanston, Consultant and Author

Image courtesy of S58y
9. Digital Jewelry

Finally, Dr. Ian Pearson gave us his brief prediction: "By 2020, many people will be unwilling to admit to still using a smartphone."

We asked Dr Pearson what he thought they'd rather be using instead. His reply:

"Digital jewelry and video visors."

Dr. Ian Pearson, Futurologist

Image courtesy of Exhibit-M