Ready Player One: A VR Experience

The user stands in an extremely dim, almost pitch black, room. Slowly the user’s eyes adjust to the darkness (light in the scene will be brought up slightly; just enough for the user to be able to see). The user is in an apartment. It is small and basically cubed shaped (ten meters by ten meters), with only one window that seems to have been painted over completely black. The door behind the user is a heavy-duty armor-plated door that is firmly shut and locked.

The user can explore the space, although there is not much to explore. The kitchen area on side of the room is sparse. Exploring the cabinets, drawers, and fridge will reveal only a few microwave meals and frozen dinners. There are no actual cooking utensils aside from the microwave. A clock on the microwave reads 7:18 PM.

There is also a bathroom unit that the user can look at. It is essentially a shower, a toilet, and a mirror, so it is also, not much to look at. If the user looks in the mirror, they will discover that they have the appearance of Max Headroom, a ‘virtual’ talk show host and the interface that Wade set up to be his system agent software. Near by the bathroom, there is a flat-screen monitor mounted on the wall. The monitor is off, but there is faint glowing arrow above it, indicating that the user must interact with it to start the interactive scene.

The main space is dominated by expensive VR equipment. There is a state of the art haptic chair, currently oriented into a bed, near the center of the room. There is a pale, bald figure, sleeping soundly in it. The rest of the set up is equally as state of the art and impressive and feels out of place in such a sparse, sad living space. There is a custom OASIS console by the chair and what is essentially a high-tech treadmill underneath the chair. In the corner of the room there is a smell-tower, and on the other side there is a spare haptic suit along with visor and gloves.

After the user has explored, they must go interact with the monitor, after which they will be placed in the monitor, looking out on the apartment. After a few moments of silence, the dark quietness is interrupted by the computer system integrated into the apartment blasting “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go” by Wham from the impressive sound system.

COMPUTER:

Jitterbug.

Jitterbug.

Jitterbug.

Jitterbug.

You put the boom-boom into my heart

You send my soul sky high when your lovin’ starts

Jitterbug into my brain

Goes a bang-bang-bang ‘til my feet do the same

But something’s bugging you

Something ain’t right….

The figure in the haptic chair rouses, groaning.

WADE: [shouting] I’m up!

The haptic chair reorients from a bed to a chair and the lights in the apartment slowly come on. The figure, Wade, is now sitting position. He looks groggy and grouchy.

If the user says nothing, text will appear in their view telling them to interact with Wade. Wade will not move from the chair until the user greets him.

USER: G-g-good morning Wade! Rise and sh-sh-shine!

All dialogue said by the user is filtered to sound like Max Headroom and given an electronic stutter and distortion.

Wade will move from his chair to the bathroom module. The user can switch to any view where there is a screen in the apartment to follow Wade.

WADE: Good morning Max.

USER: I think you mean good evening Rumpelstiltskin. It’s 7:18 PM, OASIS Sta-sta-standard Time, Wednesday December thirtieth.

The rest of the scene in Wade’s apartment until he logs in to the OASIS is carried out in this way. The user receives prompts of what dialogue to say, and Wade will not continue his progression if some things aren’t said. The user can deviate a little bit from script and ask Wade personal questions, some of which he will answer, and some of which are too touchy and he will threaten to delete the user. All questions serve to build Wade’s character more for the user if they are jumping in to this scene with no prior knowledge of the story. The user can also tease and insult Wade and he will respond accordingly. Once Wade finishes his work out and logs on to the OASIS, the scene ends and goes to the next scene.