The Metaverse is meant to be the future, so the world is buzzing with excitement. Funnily enough, however, the notoriety of the catchphrase “futuristic” has led to it old Footage of digital worlds is exploding on social media, largely driven by the fact that no one really understands what the heck the metaverse actually is. And because the average person doesn’t know what the metaverse is, shots of shoddy, lifeless digital universes that look worse than Roblox can pass as unreleased cutting-edge technology.
At the end of January, for example, a re-upload of a Facebook/meta trailer from 2019 went viral on Twitterwhich showcases an awkward social virtual reality app called horizon worlds. Everyone thought it was a new announcement from Facebook, but it wasn’t. Somehow, this metaverse fakeout has happened more than once in the last year!
But back to the viral ad: it tries painting horizon as this open and free place where people could happily do anything and everything while surrounded by friends around the world. The happy-go-lucky mood was over the good place The tweet noted, except that of course the TV show has a nefarious twist that makes the whole thing even weirder. The footage felt very artificial and made a lot of people feel uncomfortable online. Everyone portrayed in the ad was a floating torso with endless smiles, sexless and toothless.
But was the actual experience as repulsive and sterile as the ad made it out to be? I decided to jump in and see for myself. First launched in closed beta last year, horizon worlds is a free social app that was made available to everyone last month. I spent a few hours hanging out with other people in his oddly gloomy worlds, playing bad games and talking about random things. It was a strange experience, but I think many will share it as they take their first steps into the internet nightmare digital metaverse.
After creating an avatar and being put through a short but informative tutorial, I was thrown in horizon Main Hangout Hub. I got on around 1am so wasn’t sure how many people would even be there. Besides, how many people really wanted to hang out in Facebook’s Pseudo-Matrix? The answer was: many people. Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised considering how good the Oculus Quest fared this holiday season.
When I arrived I saw a few groups of people hanging out in different parts of the area. I ran to the next group, which also had a Facebook community guide. These are users who help coordinate events within the app and introduce new players horizon, while also helping with technical issues. The app uses proximity chat so I could overhear their conversation as I got closer. It was weird.
“…so that’s how he fell. It was hard. He broke his leg. And he was in a coma for a few weeks,” one person said.
“Oh my god,” was the community guide’s reaction to the story.
“Yes, he finally woke up. It’s a miracle he’s even here and playing with us,” the storyteller finished his story before apparently the subject of his story answered.
“I could have died,” then he started laughing.
I charged into their group and was silent until the guide waved and asked how I was doing. I explained that I was fine and also asked how the person fell since I missed that part. But before I could hear the story, two more people walked in and the conversation changed as people introduced themselves and joked about their floating avatars having no legs.
I spent time walking around to the different niches of people in this hub. One person asked me if I knew how to create something using the game’s creation tools. I explained that I just started playing and thanks to the power of VR I watched them react physically sad. It seemed that no one could help them build their palace.
Another group had people talking about ghosts. Apparently a player had logged in earlier and left after saying they heard a ghost. Since then, the group had continued to exchange ghost stories. At one point I assume a kid ran up to us and did it “Sheeesshhh” memes and then ran back to a large tree that can be climbed using teleport controls. After a moment of silence and giggles, the group turned back to the ghost stories.
After some people left I went back to the community guide. She was very nice and had just helped someone fix an issue with their headset audio. I asked a few general questions, like why the Hangout area was still decorated with Christmas decorations in January. She laughed.
“People keep asking me about it and I don’t know!” She seemed a bit frustrated by this, so I excused myself and asked if she was getting paid Facebook or Meta for their services. At this point she seemed a little hesitant to talk to me any further and when I asked her how long she usually spends in sessions, welcoming players and helping them with technical issues, she explained that she loved the community and got started to switch to different groups of people. It felt weird chasing her, so I didn’t.
But it seems clear that Facebook has community guides to watch over players horizon worlds, which might explain why the general mood was mostly relaxed. I only heard a few players swear or make nasty jokes and no one said any insults. Even as numerous players came and went, the general vibe felt less toxic than I expected given how awful Facebook is. Maybe just talking to people and being with them is enough to keep most assholes at bay? Or maybe the ever-watchful eye of community guides is key?
At one point, a player I’d talked to on and off for the hour I’d been at the center asked me to come and play a zombie game with him and a friend. I joined him with a simple wave of my hand and we played what might be one of the worst zombie shooters I’ve ever seen. It featured enemies barely animated, looking plucked from evil Roblox Game. The guns also felt terrible with no feedback when firing. Apparently this is a popular community creation. But still, no offense to the person who created it, but it wasn’t great. The fact that it was completely free, easy to play, and didn’t contain too much gore or violence probably explained why so many younger people were playing it when I joined. However, I dropped out after less than ten minutes because I simply have better things to do than playing a bad zombie game with 14-year-olds. Not much better, but still.
Before I left, I started asking people why they were here. Some admitted they didn’t have any games to play, so this was a free option to check out. Others had met some people they liked here and took advantage of this to hang out and chill with them during the ongoing pandemic. As I mentioned VRchat, another social VR app with higher quality graphics, legs and the realization that sex is real, some didn’t seem to know it existed. Others had tried it or looked it up online and weren’t thrilled with how “wild” it looked, which is funny considering many denounce the Facebook equivalent as being too tame.
The most surprising answer was that some people liked Facebook, Instagram and Messenger so much that it just made sense for them to use them horizon worlds also. Her friends just hung out here and so did she. I’m surrounded by people who hate Facebook, the company and all the shit they’ve done, so it was weird to see people still using Meta’s various apps every day. A reminder of how big the world is beyond your Twitter group and your Slack mates I guess.
At the end of my time with horizon worlds, I got around to it. I still think Facebook (or Meta or whatever new name they’re changing next to avoid bad press) is the worst company I can imagine owning and controlling popular VR technology and software, let alone for the future of all technologies that could be superimposed on the whole of the world. horizon isn’t quite as awful as the adverts suggest, but it’s still a hollow corporate shell that has more in common with an office than a playground or any other sort of social space a person would want to hang out. It’s definitely no VRchat or Hobby room. And for some, that empty vibe won’t matter: Based on what I’ve seen during my time at Horizon, a lot of people seem very excited to be hanging out in Mark Zuckerberg’s underperforming version The Matrix.
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