Guide To The Metaverse
The Sandbox
- 2D Virtual World
- Decentralised
- PC/Mac
Horizon Worlds
- 3D Virtual Reality
- Centralised
- Oculus Headset
A Social VR Platform featuring entertainment, music and events, owned by Meta (formerly Facebook), users create communities and worlds. Horizon is an umbrella name for Meta’s Metaverses that include Venues and Workplace. The platform has hosted a series of star studied free events.
Somnium Space
- 2D/3D Virtual Reality
- Decentralised
- PC/Mac/Smartphone/Oculus, HTC Vive, HP, Valve, Windows Mixed Reality Headset
Somnium space is a social virtual reality Metaverse platform where you can create and explore lands and games with customisable avatars. The open-source platform has its own economy built on the Ethereum Blockchain. Users can trade Land and NFTs and sell advertising.
Decentraland
- 2D/3D Virtual Reality
- Decentralised
- PC/Mac No Native Headset for VR
The first social Metaverse owned by its users. Decentraland introduced decentralised ownership of Land within its platform, an early adopter of Web 3.0 ideology. Home to a number of Brands and provides events and shows. Hosted last year’s Metaverse Fashion Week.
Fortnite
- 2D/3D Virtual Reality
- Centralised
- PC/Mac/Smartphone/ No Native Headset for VR
Fortnite comprises three game modes – Battle Royale, where 100 players fight to be the last. Save the World, a survival game where four players cooperate in fighting off zombies and Creative, where players can create and play in other users’ worlds. Fortnite’s Metaverse Concerts attract up to 45 million viewers.
VRChat
- 2D/3D Virtual Reality
- Centralised
- PC/Oculus, HTC Vive, Windows Mixed Reality Headsets
Operated by VRChat Inc. as a centralised platform, this social VR Metaverse allows users to create worlds to interact in. VRChat became a popular platform for YouTubers and Twitch streamers during the covid era. VRChat has attracted performance base artists and dancers due to its ability to create full-body 3D avatars.
AltspaceVR
- 2D/3D Virtual Reality
- Centralised
- PC/Mac/Oculus, HTC Vive and Windows Mixed Reality Headset
AltspaceVR is a social and events platform and has attracted many developers and artists, and there is a vast amount of user-generated worlds. Features niche communities and gatherings, comedy clubs, karaoke bars and churches, nightclubs, galleries and exhibitions. Now a part of Microsoft’s Mixed Reality division.
Roblox
- 2D/3D Virtual Reality
- Centralised
- PC/Mac/Smartphone/Oculus Rift and HTC Vive Headsets
Roblox is a voxel-graphic online multiplayer Metaverse game targeted at a younger audience. Roblox boasts a user base of over 160 million, over half of which are children. Within Roblox, you can create worlds, play in other users’ creations, and buy and sell through a centralised currency Robux. Operated centrally through the Roblox Corporation, Roblox is host to many brands and celebrities.
Second Life
- 2D/3D Virtual Reality
- Centralised
- PC/Mac No Native Headset for VR
Second Life was an early forerunner to today’s decentralised Metaverse Platforms. Founder Philip Rosedale is now back with Linden Lab and Second Life is a full Metaverse Game. Users can play, work and have fun and trade. Second Life even has its own centralised currency.
Latest Metaverse Headlines
It divided the technology industry leaders, became one of the fastest growing sectors, and trends as a buzzword of the year. But what is the Metaverse?
The Metaverse is the fusion of computer-enhanced environments within perceived reality. Often utilising various methods of extended reality, the Metaverse is an immersive, virtually enhanced environment populated by computer-generated graphics. The Metaverse has come to incorporate Web 3.0 ideas for decentralised ownership within metanomics (the metaverse economy). The Metaverse, we believe, is the next evolution of the internet.
History and Origins of The Metaverse
The term originated in Snow Crash, a dystopian science fiction classic by Neal Stephenson in 1992, to describe the virtual world people travelled in using avatars. Ready Player One, by Ernest Cline, introduced us to the concept of a virtual reality Metaverse, brought to the screen in 2018 by Steven Spielberg. But today’s Metaverse is far from such science fiction worlds. In many ways, the Metaverse is at its birth and consists of siloed platforms. The Metaverse will indeed arrive with interoperability when you can seamlessly navigate Metaverses across various platforms.
Virtual worlds date back as far as 1978, Multi-User Dungeon or MUD ( MUD1 to distinguish it from its replacement) developed by Roy Trubshaw and Richard Bartle at the University of Essex. Initially a TELNET game, MUD was the first game to feature talking avatars and a multi-player digital world. Often described as the forerunner to today’s Metaverse, Second Life from Phil Rosedale’s and Linden Lab’s featured a graphical virtual world, customisable avatars, and its own currency. Decentraland, the first decentralised Metaverse, came along in 2017. Utilising blockchain technology allowed actual ownership of digital assets.
The Metaverse currently spans gaming platforms such as Fortnite and Roblox and centralised owned platforms such as Horizon Worlds and AltspaceVR. Mixed Reality platforms such as Microsoft Mesh and decentralised Metaverses such as The Sandbox, Decentraland and Cryptovoxels. You can enter the Metaverse via mobile and desktop devices and with extended reality headsets. The headsets transform you into virtual and mixed reality worlds that are highly immersive.
Metanomics and the Metaverse Economy
Already the Metaverse has an economy where you can buy NFTs for digital assets supported by Blockchain. Enthusiasts claim in the future, we will learn, work, shop, socialise and be entertained through the Metaverse, that this disruptive technology will impact every aspect of our lives and introduce a fusion of technology and reality. But not everyone agrees. Whilst Microsoft and Meta (formerly Facebook) have made multi-billion dollar investments into the Metaverse, some Tech Leaders have been less than impressed.
Technology Leaders Split
Recently former CEO of Google Eric Schmidt described the Metaverse as a “confusing marketplace with no clear definition of the concept and how it will affect people’s lives”. Elon Musk recently remarked, “Sure you can put a TV on your nose. I’m not sure that makes you ‘in the metaverse.” And PlayStation inventor Ken Kutaragi “can’t see the point“. The Metaverse, in many ways, mirrors the development of the world wide web with pioneers building a new technological world and pushing the boundaries with each product. The Metaverse is yet to be defined, it is not here yet, but the foundations are being built.