"Greetings all and welcome to the Quantise launch party for Camorra and the ProTNT. I'm sure you're all itching to begin, but for the appeasement of our legal department", Lucy's rolling eyes inclined her head in the direction of a trio of people seated beneath the large screen behind her. "and the satiation of the world at large," she spread her arms wide to encompass the microphones and cameras arrayed across the rostrum before her, "I'd like to take five minutes to give an overview of what you'll be experiencing."
She brought her hand down on the podium in front of her and a film began to play showcasing a player's point of view within a forest, cel-shaded though realistic; dust in the fading sun, leaves in the wind, the sights and sounds of a relaxing summer night bled into the room as the perspective explored the area, focusing on the bark and moss of trees, turning over rocks to reveal the animated insects below, and skimming stones across the water, each ripple and splash perfectly life-like, though slightly cartoonish in appearance.
"When Quantise released the original ProTN four years ago it was a breakthrough not just in gaming but technology as a whole. Simulation training was taken to a whole new level, medical and military procedures became safer, and our shareholders all had to contract extensions for their wallets." Polite laughter rippled across the room.
"Even after release, we never stopped working. I never stopped working. Fully aware of the dangers and the potential for brain damage, I spent many hours reading the comments and feedback of our products, from the ProTN itself to the software we released; and of course that of our competitors seeking to share our first steps into this brave new world, some even taking those exact same steps, which I’m sure at least one of the trio behind me swiftly helped discourage, as we should all be seeking to tread new ground, rather than repeat the same traditional routines." Her eyes shone as she stood straighter, turning to face different parts of the audience as she continued. "One of the major concerns people had was the effects on the mind of creating absolute realism in a fictional world. As such with Camorra we've opted to create an immersive, hyper-realistic world, but in an obviously cartoon style. Pop culture has been full of the dangers of virtual reality, immersion issues and the direct engagement of the brain for decades now - since long before many of us here were even born."
Lucy looked out beyond the pack of reporters to the few hundred people seated to one side of the hall. "So the game will measure your suprachiasmatic nucleus, your pineal gland, and melatonin levels, all the bits of the brain that let your body know when you should be sleeping, and you will be prompted to disconnect when you become tired. If you succumb to sleep whilst playing, you will be logged out and the the game shut-down. Passing out in this way removes you from the game, or rather from any non-event rewards the game offers. Even whilst asleep - which is the default state for your character on any logout, they will still exist in the game world, so security is important as it'll be dangerous for your avatar to pass out in a forest. Back in the real world however, we're confident we're safe. We're certified as safe. But as with every moment in this blessed existence you call life there is always a risk, so for participation in this upcoming beta test a disclaimer will have to be signed-"
There was a genteel cough from behind her as a short, slender man in a double-breasted suit brought two fingers to his lips and cleared his throat. "My mistake. There are many disclaimers and waivers to sign. Thank you Legal. But this is not new ground, not new technology. We're merely applying the same tricks in a few new ways - all approved as safe over the course of our closed-testing and patent approval processes."
"As you can see," Lucy half-turned and gestured at the screen behind her where the viewpoint had been swimming in the lake and now began to sink to the bottom, "safety in extreme situations is paramount." The screen began to slowly tint red and fade back to the regular colouration. "There are no panic inducing sounds, no strobe lights, just a warning of the danger towards your avatar. And should the worst happen ..." The screen tinted red and kept going until the screen became a solid scarlet that swiftly shifted hue to a flat orange colour. "... there is no gruesome demise, no stressful rendition of death - just a flat screen that will transition to the game menus. And the player involved felt no harmful effects from their drowning - a slight pressure on the chest, slight limitation to their inhalations. Again, all repeatedly tested and verified as medically safe. This counts the same for the more violent ends - lava is hot to touch but still cooler than a lit match, being shot or stabbed is similar to a particularly vigorous flick on the forehead - and as a little secret, one of the deaths is actually calibrated to exactly match what it feels like to have me pinching your cheeks. I'll let you figure out which for yourselves. Which cheeks I mean." She winked towards the cameras.
"These levels of redundancy are built into the hardware of the system." Her face hardened slightly as she stood straighter. "We've all seen the horrific videos of people who took it upon themselves to try and overclock our system and the extremely stupid if inventive ways in which they bypassed our safeguards. With the ProTNT we offered a reward to anyone who could produce similar results, even offering up our own development labs for use to tweak it. The most that happened is someone shorted out one of the new machines by knocking their drink onto a stripped powerpack. We took notes and are now considering how the ProTNT+ can be -", she gasped and brought her hands to her mouth eyes wide before turning to the trio seated behind her. "Oh no! Sorry guys. I guess I let that one slip." Another polite cresting of laughter came from the crowd. "In seriousness, even if you are stupid enough to remove all the protections we've put in place and run this draped across your naked body in a shower, the worst you'll get is an electric shock typical to having live wires in water."
If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.
A throat was cleared behind her.
"In my unqualified and non-binding opinion." She exhaled heavily. "To my mind, the greatest improvement here is the transition from helmet to what in effect are a series of surgical sticky notes. Synaptic sequencing will no longer be required to trigger the ProTN to load the designated software, now we can directly jump into the neural network as soon as the pads are attached and the two triggers on the heart monitor are depressed. This may sound scarier in brief, but I assure you the breakthrough is significant and a major step forward in both diagnostic treatment, rehabilitation therapy and comfort during gaming - I'm willing to bet that a lot of you have suffered through what to our own distress has become known as ProTNeck-ache by not following our suggestions to only use the device whilst in a fully horizontal position. Though I’m sure a lot of you are also aware of the enjoyment of another type of stiffness that has risen up from use in that position. Cheeks were certainly experiencing more than a pinching there for me." Lucy smirked, pretending to ignore the beleaguered reactions of those behind her and the catcalls in the crowd.
She turned her attention back to the cameras focused on her. "You all should know enough of what the media says about me to know that I'm an addict. Above all else I seek the perfect world. I'm no philanthropist - all that money I donate aside. It's great, I love that I can do it, but my aim has never been to help people, that's just a happy, ecstatically ebullient accident. But I have always craved that ultimate game. That potential to immerse myself in a world of my own design." Her hands clenched into fists briefly. "Some have called it a god complex. I'm certainly blessed to have had the breaks I've had, to work with the people I have, to be able to have created something like this. And to have improved it even further." She smiled and looked across the filled seats before her.
"Camorra is the first fully immersive virtual reality game to feature no character NPCs - each and every person, or rather personality, you encounter will be handled by a real live human specially trained and educated in that role. Or they're fellow gamers. Or a mix of the two. It doesn't really matter. Just like in this world, the population of Camorra are people. They're given free-reign to act and respond however they'd like, because even after training, we all know that people can ignore it. Virtual verisimilitude. And yes, I'm aware of the multiple meanings. It's one of the scant examples of my personal puns left over in this speech."
She smiled again and clapped her hands, smirking at the jerking awake of some of the crowd as the sound echoed loudly, seeming to emit from the corners of the hall.
"Now, onto why you're here. Whether through sponsorship deals, competition winning, blackmail or nepotism, all three hundred of our lucky testers to the side here have been selected to be a part of our closed beta. They will each be gifted a ProTNT. Please, accept the factory settings. Don't do anything stupid with it. If you do, you’ll likely disqualify yourself from being able to boot the free, finished, copy of Camorra that will be sent to you in time for when the public servers go up. Your characters and any material gains made before the release date will of course be wiped. Cosmetic awards will be given for those who reach certain benchmarks, or top certain hidden tables. Short of staying on the character creation screen for the next month I'm pretty certain all of you will qualify for your own unique rewards in some way, and I'm not even certain that we don't have something for character creation - our scripting team includes some pretty stellar faces as you know, and even a few we kept masked. Explore. Try everything. And should any serious bugs be found due to your actions, no matter how slight the contribution, or should your actions particularly impress us, some serious rewards will-"
Hem-hem.
"-may be given. This is up to and including cold hard currency, digital or printed, in game or real life, and even jobs working for us if we're especially impressed by what you do."
She leaned forward, seeming to sink into the podium.
"As that's brought us back to jobs, of course the amount of manpower Camorra to staff has required does yield a few problems - we're aware that hiring all these actors has made table service and getting coffee in this city a bit of a challenge over the last few months, so just a few more words and then let's take a break and you can hit the buffet over at the back of the room." She waved her hand vaguely out towards the rear of the hall.
"As I said, at my heart, I've always been an addict over an altruist. A gamer over a generous soul. Someone seeking something more than the grind of everyday life in the real world, favouring the grind in-game. This has led me to seek to escape from this world and after three decades of life on Earth I've finally managed that." Lucy lifted up her hand in front of her and turned it palm down, slowly bringing it back towards her nose. Into her face. Through her head.
"I did say we conquered the uncanny valley. I have now travelled through that valley and crafted my perfect world on the other side. And I invite you all to come and find me upon the game's public release. I offer up digital immortality to the first seven to beat the game."
She disappeared, and her last words echoed out from the corners of the room.
"I'll be waiting."