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The truth behind Thirteenth Floor

The Thirteen Floor is an overall fun watch, but not spectacular. For anyone who has seen more than three episodes of Star Trek involving the holodeck, the confusion of reality vs. simulation is completely familiar territory, and thus not very exciting. I was sure from the beginning that one of two possibilities would be the ‘twist’ in the story. In fact, the outcome was not exactly one of the two I suspected, so that was a nice surprise. However, it fit broadly into the same category as one of them so it wasn’t a big surprise. The characters in the movie are all flat and undeveloped; the ending is expected way before it happens; and the plot fairly think. Still, the movie scratched my sci-fi itch.

What really intrigued me however was the movie’s relevance to the trend in video games. Video games are becoming more and more a simulated reality in which we interact in ways similar to real life. There are 2 main reasons for this increase in reality. The first is the increase in the visual reality of our games. The second and third both increase the reality of the game by increasing the interaction with characters. The second way this is done is with increases in artificial intelligence so that computer driven characters seem more real. The second and currently most important is that games are increasingly being played over the Internet so that characters can play with other people. Every major video game system out now has, or plans to have, online gaming capabilities.

The end result of this increase in reality and interactive-ness is that increasingly people are substituting the virtual for reality. There are now several very large online games being played now in which a person assumes the persona of a character and lives in the simulated world as that character. Just like in the movie, the game is always running, never ending. When a person stops playing, the game goes on and other character continue to grow and change. Just like in the movie, relationships can and do become real within the game. Just like in the movie, virtual relationships can become real, and real relationships can become virtual. Some people have taken their real life relationships into the game, each developing a character. Others have found real life relationships in people they met first in the game, although this is probably still rare. Just like in the movie, addiction to the game can become overwhelming and damage real life relationships when the person begins spending more and more time in the game. The players of one of the most popular games, called Everquest, sometime call it “Evercrack”, an inference that the game is as addictive as the drug crack-cocaine for some people.

As technology progresses, and more and more people become comfortable with technology and virtual world, these issues will only become more relevant. I was with this perspective that I really enjoyed watching the Thirteenth Floor.

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