
User succumbs to a seizure in virtual reality while other players can only watch - atomicnumber1
https://www.theverge.com/2018/1/19/16911408/vr-chat-virtual-reality-seizure
======
randomdrake
VRChat was released last year and has been picking up momentum all over the
place. If you have not had the chance to see what it's like, it's worth at
least checking out as an observer.

The worlds and experiences are reminiscent of Stephenson's Snow Crash or
Cline's Ready Player One in so many ways. It's eery, fascinating, and
altogether odd.

Add on top of this that spectators, sometimes in the thousands, watch these
virtual experiences live on Twitch.tv, and you have a very "we're in the
future" feeling.

You can check out plenty of live streams of people experiencing this on
Twitch.tv now:

[https://www.twitch.tv/directory/game/VRChat](https://www.twitch.tv/directory/game/VRChat)

~~~
FLUX-YOU
>The worlds and experiences are reminiscent of Stephenson's Snow Crash or
Cline's Ready Player One in so many ways. It's eery, fascinating, and
altogether odd.

It looks more like VR Idiocracy to me. Especially if you check out twitch and
see donation stuff and stream overlays. It's just a platform for vomiting
memes. [https://imgur.com/ZkJq1cr](https://imgur.com/ZkJq1cr)

On the other hand, if it were super-serious-Deus-Ex-plotting-the-control-of-
the-proletariat-VR-Chat, I don't think I could take that seriously either (and
would be quickly overrun with Uganda knuckles anyway).

~~~
randomdrake
There's more to it than simply what you see at first glance. Snow Crash and
Ready Player One described the _experience_ at length. The freedom of
expression, of identity of who or what you could be. The ways that people
talk, interact, explore, and represent themselves in the virtual realities of
those books is more than just "how it looks." Some concrete examples are
pulling up virtual windows to access resources from "outside" the reality, or
the multitude of sizes and shapes that people represent themselves with.

The descriptions of what earlier versions of the virtual realities in Snow
Crash or Ready Player One were, line up with the basics that VRChat
encompasses.

Those are some of the things I was addressing when I said it was reminiscent.

------
btown
> Rogue Shadow VR says he caught up with the player afterwards on Steam, and
> that he is doing better now.

Since one of the definitions of "succumb" is "die from the effect of a disease
or injury," this title is more than a little clickbaity! Mods, can you
potentially edit to "User has seizure..."?

~~~
chesimov
I also associate succumb with die for some reason, although I'm not sure why.
Maybe in the newspapers if they say 'x succumbed to their injuries' it would
imply that?

~~~
berberous
If you succumb to cancer or another often fatal disease - "fail to resist" it
-- that clearly has to mean death. If you succumb to a cold -- failing to
resist it just means you are stuck in bed with a bad cold. So I think it's
probably because you are used to hearing it used with more serious illnesses,
and in your mind a seizure is closer to cancer than a cold.

~~~
Buttes13
You can absolutely die from a seizure. Very appropriate language IMHO.

------
United857
Misleading headline -- the person managed to survive and didn't "succumb"
(die)

~~~
JshWright
Just because "succumb" is euphemistically used to refer to death doesn't mean
it's the only meaning. Perhaps "Users suffers a seizure..." would have been a
better phrasing though.

~~~
CodeWriter23
Not for driving clicks.

------
chrisper
What is it with twitch and other game streamers all having crazy colored hair?
What am I missing?

------
amelius
Could the VR have triggered the seizure?

That's one aspect I would have expected in the article.

~~~
sergers
I think it definitely could have, but it's very hard to determine the trigger
for a seizure.

It could not be related to any triggers too (audio/visual).

It can only be identified by review of the person who it happened to... The
rest of us are just speculating, and no point in that :)

Systems, including VR, should have an option to disable/slowdown fast paced
color switching on a end-user level of they are known to be susceptible to
seizures with visual triggers

------
tlrobinson
There’s a “Black Mirror” episode in there somewhere...

