Virtual reality is totally impossible

[davidn]

I've been trying to get back into writing music recently, but I've found myself with an increased vulnerability to wandering aimlessly around Youtube instead. For better or worse, this has allowed me to dredge up more programmes that I only half-remember from watching CBBC and CITV in the 90s - one of which was called Virtually Impossible.

I remembered it as one of a spate of computery programmes that sprang up at about the time Reboot was popular - this one was an ambitious game show that attempted to combine live action with a virtual 3D world, which just sounds like a faintly dangerous idea until you're informed that it was meant to be the replacement for Knightmare, at which point it becomes all the more rage-inducing. Anyway, I started the video to see how my memories lined up, and the AAAAGH THAT FISH HAS A HUMAN NOSE

How the hell did I not notice this when I was twelve? The presenter, then, is Codsby, who I can now only describe as a sort of fish thing from hell who lives within a Lawnmower Man nightmarescape. Quite apart from the unsightly foreign appendage plonked on to the front of his piscean face, the contorted expressions generated by the crude 3D model doing its best to translate the mouth movements of a facial waldo make it seem like he's in constant agony, and combined with the voice like an autotuned Muppet, I'm surprised that I slept the night after first encountering him (or any night for the next ten years or so).

Anyway, once the cyberpod or whatever they're playing it up as arrives, the programme opens with some rather strained introductions which the nightmare-fish smiles through as naturally as Gordon Brown, and - because this is a 90s computer programme - spouts the legally mandated quantity of gobbledegook about interfacing oneself with the mainframe and surfing through digispace and other such twatterdom. The players - rather inadvisably referred to as "joystick jockeys" - strap one of their number into a device that wouldn't look out of place as the hub of a tortured bio-computer from Doctor Who, and (though with the amount of pain I've just described it feels like the programme should be just about over by now) the first game begins.

The first game is called Tetris Towers, which I'm surprised they got away with - and it's a flat-shaded 3D environment that looks like one of the more coherent environments put together with 3D Construction Kit. A countdown starts, sirens blare, and the player leaps into the game at a rate of about one picometre per hour, stumbling around and getting caught by stairs that aren't really there. They then spend a while muddling around being unable to turn around on a platform and once it was announced that there were just eleven pieces left to collect, I felt compelled to skip ahead.

Next, the boredom continues with a driving game, mostly controlled through more conventional means with the cybernaut (or whatever she's called) reduced to being superimposed on a video background and having to wave her arms a bit. As part of the programme's penchant for unnecessarily overcomplicating things, the pit stop involves turning on the ability to shoot with a button placed conveniently at the other end of the space station, and then picking up some discarded rings while some polygonal insects mope about. They then go into a game that's remarkably like the first except it's too dark to see anything, and the last game is a free-flying shooter in which I never had any idea what was going on at all, so further commentary from me would be pointless. After flying around aimlessly for a while, they do quite well, but lose. Hooray.

Really, this wasn't exactly a bad effort with the technology of the time - the trouble was that the technology of the time was just inherently rubbish. The walking games in particular make for exceptionally boring television, the equivalent of watching someone trying to get through Doom with a blindfold on and one hand tied behind their back with the soundtrack replaced with a Jeffrey Archer audio book. It's eerily as if the entire concept behind the programme was "Like Knightmare, except a bit worse" - the guidance style of gameplay is very similar, except transplanted into an environment which tries to make you believe it's fast-paced but lends itself to the speed of an asthmatic snail. Even without the foreknowledge that the look of the games would age terribly, there's not a lot you can get excited about when a programme amounts to half an hour of watching other people play games badly. Yes, I know. But at least I don't have a human-nosed fish shouting over my shoulder.

The whole idea of "virtual reality" was rather sadly pushed on to us at least ten years too early for it to be executed in any way that could approach the outskirts of "any good". Instead, the idea of immersive 3D worlds is forever going to be associated with these efforts, and in more general terms, the image of someone in a 90s mullet with a bulky proto-Star Trek helmet across their eyes. And a Powerglove on each hand.

Comments

[rakarr.livejournal.com]

Virtually Impossible actually looks sort of appealing in a retro-virtual-reality sense, back when super-advanced computing was imagined to involve a combination of huge amounts of condescension and one of the following: A) Incredibly simple polygons, B) stupid amounts of pixelation or C) real life with the occasional wave of static. I rather liked the introduction when the nose-fish disappeared.

But... how annoying, having three obnoxious, impatient people scream in your ear. That's what ruined that section for me, rather than the slow movement - although I suppose that contributed. But given the inherent slowness of being led while blindfolded, they could have spiced it up with some actual tension.

I always find myself a tad confused by these game shows that work in a storyline and setting with the intent of immersion... only those production values are spent on making the storyline and immersion for the viewers rather than the players, who must be aware of the script and are certainly aware of the superimposed CG (except when blindfolded). It seems like it should be the other way around, if anything... although I suppose the important part is the ratings, not the experience of the player.

[rakarr.livejournal.com]

To elaborate further... it may be unique to Virtually Impossible, but it looks like the participants are not even allowed to be part of the story. The greetings are perfunctory with no room for elaboration, and they just have to sit quietly and be taunted during the story sequences/game explanations. There's no opportunity for them to leave their mark at all - except in that awful haggling section halfway through that... race... thing.

Even on adult game shows the host will usually ask contestants a few questions about themselves, but not so here:
"I'm Laura."
"Laura. Hi. And you must be?"
"I'm Viv."
"Ah. Viv. And am I to understand you'll be the ranger for today?"
"Yep."
"Ah. A challenge awaits you all."

The kids just end up as bodies to fill a (highly-diminished) role, and perhaps that's why they're standing around looking either angry or bored - or, in one instance while being taunted, wearing a "This is so stupid" expression.

[davidn]

What impressed me most about the haggling section was how shamelessly it was crowbarred in, completely changing the genre of game they were playing - the earlier Knightmare was full of character interaction like that (though acted rather better in general, to my memory) and it seemed like a bad attempt to reintroduce that aspect of the programme.

The introduction really does deserve special mention for its amazing awkwardness and gaping pauses in between exchanges - I'm used to older (and, indeed, non-American) television being much calmer and slower paced, but this crosses the line down into grating in the other direction.

[kibet.livejournal.com]

Was that the eye-shield from the later series of Knightmare on her back?

That was terrible for several reasons.
1. Use of the term 'good guys' and 'bad guys'
2. The enemy telling them that she controls all the software, and not willing to give it to anyone, however if they get 40K points then she will give 10% of it to them. What the hell sort of plan is that???
3. Ok, so blindfolded in a fantasy session I can understand. Putting on a virtual head set would not transport your body into the game, it would allow you to see your movement in the game. What the hell is the point of putting on the virtual headset and not being able to see what is happening!
4. Interesting how the special effects of Knightmare looked far better than this show, so it is not all about dated graphics, it is all about the overuse of graphics.

I could go on, as this was strangely irritating to me at how badly done it was, and that is saying something.

[davidn]

You seem a very calm fellow normally, so getting you irritated really is something special :) I'm unclear on whether the 'player' can see what's around them or not, now - I had assumed that she had a view of what was going on, hence the headgear, but that would sort of defeat the point of having quite so many advisors to tell her what she was doing.

Knightmare went through a transformation over its lifetime, from really impressive painted scenes through photographs run through a computer (mostly to make them purple for some reason), and eventually into fully computer-generated environments - it's difficult to remember if you haven't seen it in fifteen years, but the difference between the first and eighth series is striking. (Even then, the ones in this programme are significantly worse than late Knightmare, probably because they had to move around and couldn't be pre-rendered.) It's what's referred to by TV Tropes as the "Polygon Ceiling" - 3D artwork tends to look a lot more awkward in retrospect and age very badly.

I also noticed the eye-shield resemblance, and they have it in the programme's symbol as well... apparently Tim Child really liked grafting eyes on to otherwise inanimate objects.

[kibet.livejournal.com]

I know I watched it less with the eye shield once it became a regular piece of equipment. If I remember correctly, it only came in a couple of times as some reward initially. Being able to use the eye shield to see took away the blindfold. I also remember goblins being used more frequently rather than loss of health for staying in a room for too long. Although, I think it has been closer to 20 years from when I last saw it. Actually looking at Wiki on Knightmare, I think I only ever saw seasons 1-5, as I can not remember the knight being the health card.

She must have not been able to see, as you would be able to see when a platform is down or up. Although the fact she had to turn using the joy stick suggests there was at least a limited view. I think the three speakers had different views as they did refer to someone having a different angle.

[davidn]

Yes, mostly the shield was a handy way to transport a team out of a room quickly without having to line themselves up with a door - it used to just be used with fairly obvious video sequences where the players had no influence at all, but later on they started allowing the player to see for short periods of time (and I've no idea how that would have worked, in reality, seeing as it was all computer-generated).

The health meter changed from the iconic face/skull in series 1-5, to a walking knight that gradually fell apart to reveal a skeleton in series 6-7... then for the last series they replaced that with a cake(!) with slices gradually disappearing. Their trouble is that they went soft ;) (and I never thought I'd say that about a programme in which there was quite a decent chance of being killed).

[kibet.livejournal.com]

I actually had a flash of memory when you mentioned about the walking knight. I could not remember evr seeing the knight when it was mentioned. Then when you mentioned walking knight, I did imagine something which I am sure was right. I don't remember the Pie but then it was likely I would have still been at school because I would have started high school by that time.

[kjorteo]

What's that? Sketchy interactive videogame game shows? OKAY

[davidn]

It's telling that Nick Arcade, despite being around three or four years earlier, managed the idea of transplanting someone into a game rather better - or at least didn't try to base an entire programme around the idea, as I remember from what you've shown me before that most of it was more of a Gamesmaster-type competition. Perhaps the greatest problem with Virtually Impossible was that it wasn't really aware of its limits.

I didn't even feel that the performance in that "worst ever" video was all that bad an effort, especially after witnessing the above confused mess. (At least they weren't standing around for three minutes unable to find the button grid on the wall right in front of their nose.)

[kjorteo]

Oh, I found a more thoughtfully-assembled compilation of the most egregious Crystal Maze moments, though most of them are just people being appallingly bad at trivia questions and actual video games.

[lupineangel.livejournal.com]

THAT FREAKY DAMN FISH INVADED MY DREAMS LAST NIGHT

I BLAME YOU FOR THIS D:<

NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNnnnnnnnnnnnnnnNNNNNNnNNNNNnNNNNNNNnnn

D.F.

[davidn]

There aren't many more appropriate reactions to being confronted with this hellfish than the password that unlocked the gate to insanity in Ecco.

What was in the dream - did he have a sinister role in it, or just put you through a variety of increasingly boring games?