2024 feels like 2022 (or 2023) again, as Futureverse teams up with novelist Ernest Cline and Warner Bros. Discovery to try to create a “Ready Player One”-inspired, AI-powered virtual universe that could consume For billions of dollars, the virtual universe will likely only achieve a fraction of what Fortnite is already capable of.
The worst entertainment-related news of 2024 so far (the competition is already fierce) comes to an end today, January 4th, with the Futureverse announcing a partnership with Ready Player One creator and director Ernest Cline for the 2018 Dan Farah, the producer of 2016’s Funniest Films, launched Readyverse Studios with Steven Spielberg to do his best with this rancid source material.
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The entire press release reads like a fever dream, filled with common buzzwords and concepts that everyone but C-suite executives and aspiring tech bros have been toying with for two years. With Meta abandoning its embarrassing Metaverse plans early last year, and Warner Bros. Discovery going bankrupt and burying nearly-finished movies in a bid to make a quick buck, one has to wonder what the long-term goals are (besides deceiving other executives and investors) here.
With big brands and well-known IPs approaching their natural breaking point, the existence of large virtual “universes” like RPO seems inevitable, but online video games have been doing everything every virtual universe promises to do for some time. Epic Games seems to be on the “right” track of creating an entertainment hub with social elements that’s fun to play and live in (and has the backing of a major company).
Thankfully, no one who has actually spent the last 20 years playing video games will be fooled by this nonsense, if tech startups and entertainment companies continue the push to siphon money from unsuspecting internet users.
Readyverse Studios have put together a barebones website to let everyone know how non-serious they are with all this, and if you need a laugh you can check it out here .
