Meta’s Horizon World is a free virtual reality online gaming and social media application. Though it is free you need an Oculus Quest VR headset developed by Meta to access the VR environment.
Difference between conventional Social Media Platforms and Meta’s Horizon World –
Instead of a profile picture, you have to create your avatar or an animated version of yourself, you can customize the avatar or the image through several elements such as body type, skin tone, face shape, nose, mouth, facial hair, clothing, and accessories, etc., you have to use the pair of controllers or the joysticks of the headset Quest 2 to edit the avatar.
Things to do in Meta’s Horizon World –
It is a place where you can meet up with your friends and make new ones in the virtual world. Needless to say, your friends must have their own account or virtual space in Horizon World, like any general social media channel. Some spaces or worlds are for socializing and others are for gaming, which are all created by other people in the virtual space.
A headset is used to see in the virtual world and controllers are for accessing and managing your activities in the virtual world of Metaverse. In simple words the headset is the monitor and the controllers are the mouse respectively in this regard.
It offers a camera to take pictures with your friends and share them.
Hangout, Play and Explore –
In Explore you can say thanks to people or users for being helpful. You can visit their profiles and share your thank you message in turn, they will get a fun special effect as a reward to show off, and it is like giving reviews and ratings to the profiles.
Personal space area –
It is similar to your profile or virtual world on the Horizon World. You can create your personal word through the create mode and can add different elements through several customized tools like paint, and color. You can also import an element, which you have created in advance for the concerned virtual space of yours.
Like in any other social media platform you can even visit other worlds created by the users and can explore other activities near your personal space similar to viewing other posts on social media.
You can duplicate the elements you are creating and even send the unwanted pieces of designs to the trash can. Needless to say, you need to get used to the entire process of managing the controllers.
How much time is required to master Meta’s Horizon World?
At least 6 months of regular practice is needed to get acquainted with the controllers of Quest2. However, the time may vary depending on your adaptability and cognitive capabilities.
One can play several types of games on Horizon Worlds such as – getting yourself out of detention by finding the key with a slew of activities, fighting supernatural entities by creating a team by including your friends, and even competing with your friend in a boxing game. The options are endless and above all you can create your own game and let other users enjoy it.
You can enjoy a glass of beer and hang out with other friends or users in a British pub, and you can communicate with them through verbal interaction rather than text, which is the biggest takeaway, compared to conventional social media networks. It will give you a personalized experience compared to a live session or video conferencing.
You can even high-five your friends, which integrates a touch of reality into the entire system.
Apart from your friend, you can even communicate with the avatars of the programmers and chatbot, which have been given a makeover of the avatars to get relevant information.
If you are a religious person you can visit virtual churches with worship songs playing in the background and with an attendant to request to you to explore the place. While browsing around the holy place, you can bump into the host of the church and plan an event with his consent. You can get insightful pieces of information about the programmer and the graphics artist who have created the virtual space, while verbally interacting with the host himself.
It must be seen that the entire process doesn’t run in a per-written programming language, in contrast, it allows the visitors to have a live interaction while in a programmed virtual world in live mode. The best part you can enjoy and experience the entire virtual space together unlike video conferences where you can only have a one-sided view through the screen. You can ask direct questions to the concerned person and since the communication is taking place verbally clarity is comparatively better. However, one has to have a good grasp of English to communicate with the other users.
Risks of Meta’s Horizon World –
1. Horizon World has policies for teen users. However, it becomes ineffective if someone places wrong information related to their age.
2. Since the VR space is comparatively more intimate with respect to the interaction, it may lead to a more visceral experience if someone faces harassment in the virtual space, such as if someone brings his avatar closer to someone else avatar despite repeated denial of the person that may lead to harassment of greater proportion.
3. VR can throw additional challenges regarding data security as it deals with data such as retina scans, face geometry, voiceprints, and finger impressions.
4. Since the Horizon Worlds are user-generated, some sections and their content may be inappropriate for some users under a certain age limit.
5. The closed members-only sections or spaces are not been scrutinized by the Meta engineers and may contain illicit content that may be suitable only for the 18+ members so, it is up to the members to exercise caution while exploring those sections.
There may be several concerns; however, Meta has several policies in place to mitigate the issues such as Meta VR parent supervision tools, Family Guide to Parental Controls, Meta’s VR privacy policy, etc. Moreover, Meta doesn’t allow immersive advertising to limit the misuse of data manipulation by any unwanted entity.
In a nutshell, Meta’s Horizon World is the thing of the future and we can hope with more cost-cutting it will drive the Gen next to explore the limitless space of Virtual Reality (VR) with fun and pleasure. It has the potential to emulate real-life situations and may be used for virtual field training and risk analysis for both medical and defense purposes.