The handheld gaming market is currently dominated by the likes of Steam Deck and Nintendo Switch. Playtron wants to shake up this marketplace with its unique take on a gaming handheld device that unifies different game studios under one umbrella. Developed in collaboration with Mytsen Labs (one of Playtron’s seed investors), the Web3 capable gaming handheld dubbed SuiPlay 0x1 will be available in 2025 for a rumored $500.
The gaming titles compatible with the handheld will be available for purchase via the blockchain and tie some titles to Mysten’s Sui cryptocurrency. Mysten is also promising crypto-incentives and rewards as long as you keep playing and buying more games.
For now, the handheld renders look too sleek to be true. The D-pad is even flatter than the one on the Game Boy Advance SP, which was super-flat by necessity due to the console’s clamshell design. The startup is aspiring to create an Android of PC gaming, something that Steam Deck did. If the Web3 games on the PlaytronOS won’t do well, then the Steam and Epic Games Store availability on the platform will come to the rescue.
All said and done, the company is still to reveal any specs details. All they leaked was the promise of the handheld to be based on Advanced Micro Devices technology and currently, there are system-on-chip vendors interested in this unique offering. According to Playtrom CEO, Kirt McMaster, they are looking for manufacturing partners and a follow-up announcement will come in three months. You can look forward to the pre-order window once the specs are cleared up.
The open gaming handheld will offer multiple game stores, right from Sui Web3 games to the popular Epic Games Store. Every single game available will appear in a single launcher and work with a single operating system. The good news for developers is that the Playtron software will integrate stores with a program called Playtrom Select, so that small publishers can also launch their games directly on the launcher.
It doesn’t have to be all fun and games in the Metaverse, especially when its best use cases are the ones that need a different reality the most.
Thanks to a few companies that have large marketing machines, the word “Metaverse” has become muddled in hype and controversy. While the current use of the coined word might be new to our ears, the technologies that empower it have been around for quite some time now. And they aren’t always used for games or entertainment, even if that is what everyone thinks these days. In fact, one of the most frequent early adopters of these technologies come from the medical field, which continuously tests new equipment, theories, and digital experiences to help improve lives. So while mainstream media, carmakers, and social networks continue to shine the light on new ways to experience different worlds, the Metaverse, its concepts, and its applications are already sneaking their way into medical and scientific institutions, ready to take healthcare to the next, augmented reality level.
Telepresence Training and Consultation
If you ask somebody about the Metaverse today, they will either look at you as if you were a crazy person because they have no idea what it means, or they will look at you as if you were a crazy person for glorifying games and virtual worlds like Second Life. Thanks to how it has been portrayed, especially by Meta, formerly Facebook, that has become the stigma that the term and the concept will carry for the next few years. At its most basic, however, the so-called Metaverse is really nothing but a combination of AI, AR, VR, blockchain, and related technologies that try to bind the digital and the physical world together into a more coherent whole. Sometimes, even something as simple as a virtual video call is already Metaverse-worthy, with or without the goggles.
This kind of visual communication can be critical not just in keeping people socially close while physically apart but also in keeping the world turning even when locked indoors. The recent COVID-19 pandemic has forced many people to resort to video calls for work and even for doctor’s appointments. Telemedicine became a thing in the past two years, but things aren’t going to stop there. With the help of VR and AR applications, medical personnel and healthcare workers can extend their reach, even when the real thing isn’t in front of them.
No, this isn’t the frightening scenario of performing surgeries remotely (we’ll get to that later) but the simple case of training personnel or even informing patients through virtual channels. Although nothing really beats the real thing, there are some pieces of information, like learning how to operate machinery, that don’t really need in-person training most of the time. And if diagrams and charts are effective in educating patients about various diseases and medical conditions, imagine how a more interactive and lifelike demonstration in the Metaverse can be more effective.
The phrase might conjure up horrific images, particularly of scenes from iconic horror films in the 80s, but digital twins are less frightening or even less dramatic than they sound. In essence, a digital twin is pretty much an exact replica of a physical thing, in this case, a person, based on real-world data. This replica can undergo hundreds of simulated changes in just minutes or even seconds that would normally take hundreds of years in real-time.
In this application, machine learning and AI take center stage over AR and VR, determining the possible results based on changing factors. To put it bluntly, a digital twin could be used as a virtual guinea pig, testing different medications and doses, different procedures, and different treatment options to see which ones will have the best possible outcome for a patient. All of these can happen in a matter of seconds, perhaps even while in the middle of an operation.
Digital twins can be used on more than just humans, of course. The same kind of high-speed trial and error can be applied to developing medicine, analyzing viruses, studying animals and plants, and anything else that can be solved with some simulations. Of course, looking at all these data as just figures and text would be boring and even painful, so 3D models can go a long way in visualizing and understanding the results of these simulations. Bonus points if you can view them in the Metaverse, too!
Designer: Philips
AR Surgery
Thanks to Hollywood, many people probably imagine surgery in the world of AR and the Metaverse as involving doctors doing procedures miles or even countries away from the patient. While that could have life-saving benefits, we don’t really need to go that far yet to reap the benefits of the technology in the operating room. Simply being able to see more information than what’s physically in front of us goes a long way in improving our knowledge and understanding, which is really the heart of augmented reality, without the hype and sensationalism.
Doctors require a lot of imagination when working on patients, and not in the flights of fantasy kind of way. They might not have a clear view of what they’re operating on, or they have to work with microscopic materials that would be impossible to see with the naked eye. Although these professionals have been working like these for decades, that doesn’t mean things have to stay that way, especially if technology can help ease the burden.
AR-assisted surgeries have already been performed with much success, but you often don’t hear about those in contrast to news about this or that new Metaverse platform. Being able to see where to drill inside a bone or where to put a screw can make procedures faster and safer. Of course, you’ll need better AR glasses to make that happen because the current consumer models we have just won’t cut it on the operating table, pun intended.
Not everything about the Metaverse has to be visible, or at least not in its real forms. Of course, the Metaverse can be reduced down to 1s and 0s, just like any computer program, but most people that experience it will be focused on digital artifacts like VR objects. One of the “non-visible” technologies that are being associated with the Metaverse is blockchain, and despite misconceptions, it actually has the potential to protect virtual people and data, including medical records.
Blockchain has gotten a lot of flak because of its association with controversial applications like cryptocurrencies and, more recently, NFTs. Like any other tool, however, it is really agnostic. Blockchains are more concerned about keeping a record of transactions joined together by cryptography in a chain. Each node in a blockchain network contains a copy of that chain and is updated with new transactions all the time. The decentralized and cryptographic nature of blockchains makes them almost perfect for protecting data, such as sensitive medical records.
Of course, that’s the ideal scenario, but blockchains are so new to the hearing and minds of anyone outside the computing industry that its applications to things like financial and medical records are still blowing people’s, especially legislators’, minds. Given the highly sensitive nature of medical data, this might take a while before a stable and trustworthy blockchain system is accepted and put in place.
The Metaverse being about having fun and games isn’t necessarily a bad thing, especially when done in moderation. In fact, playing games isn’t a bad thing, despite the connotations and prejudices surrounding even just the word. People have learned long ago that games, or specifically gameful activities, can be beneficial to learning and adapting to new things. It can even help people cope with trauma or stress.
Gamification, or the application of game thinking and game mechanics to non-game activities, has been around for years now. From leaderboards to levels to high scores, these small things can give a sense of accomplishment that reinforces the new knowledge that we just gained. And since the very same technologies that are used to make games also make the Metaverse, the intersection of gamification and the Metaverse is pretty much in the bag.
NASA, for example, has enlisted a game developer that specializes in using games to train people, particularly doctors, in diagnosing and treating different conditions. The idea is to train astronauts to have enough medical knowledge in an emergency, in case it’s the onboard doctor that needs treatment. These educational tools have all the hallmarks of typical mobile games, except it trains you with serious, life-saving skills rather than just mashing the screen to get kills.
The Metaverse might sound new, but it’s actually built on old technology. AR and VR have been around for decades, but it’s only now that they’re becoming more commercially available. Blockchain technologies are finally becoming more comprehensible even to lawmakers. The psychology of games has been lurking in plain sight in productivity tools and educational materials. You just never considered them to be formal games.
The hype around the Metaverse might have many people rolling their eyes, but all that focus has some benefits. It puts a spotlight on what the Metaverse can actually do, even separate from all the social and entertainment aspects. It brings to light how these technologies have actually been working in the background in different fields, including medicine, and how the Metaverse can be used not only to improve lives but also to save them.
As if cryptocurrencies weren’t confusing enough, here’s something that mixes it up with NFTs and the Metaverse, too.
The Metaverse might be the big buzzword right now, thanks to many companies like Meta, formerly Facebook, trying to push their vision to the masses, but there was a time not too long ago when there was a different tech craze gripping the world. Cryptocurrencies, especially Bitcoin, hit mainstream media hard to the point that even lawmakers were starting to scramble and struggle to make sense of it all. Non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, a cousin of these blockchain-based digital entities, also took the world by storm, particularly in art and design circles where this new kind of ownership still remains a bit controversial. Almost cooking up a perfect storm, a designer and artist duo are bringing all these together into an NFT that almost makes cryptocurrencies a bit more approachable or at least more visible.
Although they are always associated with money, cryptocurrencies are difficult for most people to grasp, particularly because these aren’t exactly represented as anything but incomprehensible numbers and letters. When people think of money, they will at least think of figures separated by commas or dots. Most will even think of paper bills and coins to make the connection to something familiar that has been around, even going back to the ancient Greeks. Cryptocurrencies have thrown all preconceived notions out the window, but NFTs and the Metaverse present an opportunity to turn things around a bit.
An NFT is a form of blockchain, but unlike cryptocurrencies, each one is non-interchangeable. That means it can be sold and traded, like digital equivalents of physical goods, but they’re often associated more with supposedly rare digital artworks that sell for thousands to millions of real-world dollars. NFTs don’t always have to be artwork, though, and can actually be used for anything that has a digital representation, including, in this case, NFT coins.
Minted was conceptualized as an answer to the question of what Ether, the currency for the Ethereum platform, would look like if it were an actual coin. Just like an NFT, however, a Minted coin is going to be a one-of-a-kind digital artifact, though they would have fixed Ether values. The coins will be available in Ether denominations of 0.1, 0.2, 0.5, 1.0, 2.0, and 5. Each coin, however, will be “handcrafted” and unique, so they still retain the unique value, even if they just look like digital coins. And, of course, these will only be circulated via Ethereum since that’s the only place where Ether will have any value.
Of course, Minted doesn’t exactly make “crypto,” as they are called, suddenly more approachable and more understandable. They do, at least, give them a more visible form that could help lead towards a better comprehension of these newfangled technologies and concepts. It is also an attempt to beat governments to the punch in creating NFTs that will be associated with blockchain currencies. After all, if cryptocurrencies are designed to decentralize the distribution of assets, it would be ironic if a single entity like a government would co-opt that to become the new centralized bottleneck of these new systems.
If you are diving into NFTs and the digital media that comes along with them, you might as well have something that proudly displays that piece of NFT art you just bought.
If you thought cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum were already controversial, try throwing the word “NFT” around and see the debates explode like a long-dormant volcano. While discussions for and against the use of NFTs in the digital art industry continue to rage, there are already people that have accepted them as part of the future, especially with the Metaverse being pushed by companies and media. When that day comes, you’ll probably want a way to show off those NFT purchases, and this holographic cube definitely fits the theme.
Although NFTs can be used for anything digital, the biggest conversations revolve around their use in digital art. For some people, NFT-purchased art or videos have become something like a bragging right, not that different from the feeling you get when owning a piece from the great Masters of the trade. You can’t hang an NFT on a wall, of course, but the Holocube gives you a way to display these digital artworks in a way that matches the almost futuristic nature of NFTs.
Nothing says “the future” like holograms, and the Holocube makes it even more futuristic by having the hologram displayed inside a glass cube that rises from the box when activated. LEDs in the eight corners light up to add to this futuristic motif, though it doesn’t seem to be configurable to match the art being displayed. The idea behind the concept is to allow NFT owners to upload their purchases from their phones and have as many of these on display at home or in the office.
It’s definitely a visually interesting way to proudly proclaim being an NFT owner, though it might not work for all kinds of digital art or videos. Then again, holograms might have sufficiently advanced by then as well, presuming NFTs are still a thing. As forward-looking as these decentralized digital ledgers might be, NFTs, in particular, are also heavily criticized for their impact on the environment, making at least the current implementation controversial from a sustainability perspective. That said, there is also the possibility of blockchains like NFTs and bitcoin to advance in a way that retains their advantages while also reducing their carbon footprint.
The online casino industry is not the only one that is benefiting from the advent of blockchain technology. The world at large inducing new casinos, have been benefitting from the coming of this tech advancement. A lot of things have improved on the internet after the coming of blockchain technology. Various entrepreneurs are investigating ways to use blockchain to disrupt and change conventional business strategies. Many market leaders have already realized profitable results, such as increased transparency, enhanced security, improved traceability, increased transaction efficiency and speed, and cost savings. Transparent Business Transactions With the use of blockchain technology, transaction records…
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