Metaverse is what VRML tech was aspiring to back then, but standard dial-up internet, early web browsers, and PCs could not deliver immersive realtime 3D. It was obviously decades ahead of its time. I recall needing to install web browser plugin (I tried a few), then the VRML scene file takes a while to download (dial-up) and then draws an ugly 3D scene in the browser. Then the mouse navigation was horrible. No collision detection of course so you could easily fly through the floor, end up upside down, walk through objects, etc. No sound. No chat. No multi-user. At least it had level of detail optimization so processing wasn't on distant details. Then you'd click on a link in the scene and it would either load a different 3D scene, or jump you back out to a plain old 2D web page in the web browser. And of course you'd be looking at this on a plain old 17-inch CRT screen (no VR headset). I see my Oculus collecting dust and I feel VR tech has improved by a lot, but still, meh.
I used VRML for my thesis work where I was visualizing an energy surface in a 6 dimensional space and understanding the bifurcations where it would get holes, start to wrap around the space, break into separate pieces, etc.
I had all sorts of complaints around what VRML couldn’t do at that time, particularly how you’d inevitably get your back turned to what you were supposed to look at, have a hard time turning around, and the people developing the world don’t care.
Looking back with insight from ‘the metaverse’ I see the problem as a lack of storytelling or the facilities for storytelling.
The idea that you’re going to bum around in some virtual world and indulge your narcissism in parallel to how you indulge your narcissism in the real world still appeals to those who want to subject us to ‘experiences’ even if it doesn’t for end users.
I started studying theme park design a few months back because I was interested in seducing people (which you could win at 100% of the time if you had 100% control of the environment.) The metaverse fad came up and it gave me a good mental model of what’s missing in the metaverse…. Storytelling!
Many people in 2022 are inclined to accept you can have fiction without storytelling because we’re so used to fiction that is driven by characters and setting (say Star Wars or My Little Pony Friendship is Magic). Somebody even pointed out to be that those Victorian novels I couldn’t stand in high school were part of this trend.
Some point people will realize that ‘the line is going up’ (NFTs) isn’t a good enough story but until VR designers adopt storytelling ideas from theme parks people will be snoozing.
Videogames call this "environmental storytelling" and it's a really solid way of constructing a narrative in such spaces. The reason why the current or prior generations of "metaverse" technologies don't do this is because they're not trying to be a narrative work. They're trying to be "HTTP for 3D worlds" - in other words, hoping someone else will come in and build the narrative on top of their platform so they can charge the creators a fee to publish their own work.
Trying to be "HTTP for 3D world", yet they're not really protocols, but more something like geocities or MySpace.
If I was going to use the metaverse, I'd want to have a button "New world" that would essentially create a whole new world similar to decentraland, where I could choose the size of this world.
None of the metaverse platforms allow you to create your own world, your own 3d website. Instead they try to cram you into their world, which is made to be pretty small on purpose to keep "land" prices high.
VRML never had facilites to define meaningful interactions comparable to what a real video game engine like the Unreal Engine can do and I think the current "metaverse" platforms also lack that.
A run-of-the-mill game like Sword Art Online: Fatal Bullet has meaningful interactions with NPC characters that are NPC characters in the game. Mario and Luigi: Dream Team has NPC crowds that shower you with admiration.
Capital One (Progressive Insurance, AT&T, ...) establishes an emotional connection with me through actors who plays characters on television commercials, operating themed stores, etc.
They aren't going to move to the metaverse until they can give an experience at that level.
Single player video games succeed at this.
Fiction (Sword Art Online, Ready Player One, The Matrix, Disneyland) tells us clearly what the metaverse is: you share the space with players and NPCs.
The will has to be there but the technology isn't ready yet.
So... that leads into another conceptual objection to "metaverse".
NPC characters are almost always a handful of specific text lines, triggers, and flags cobbled together into something that's "interactable" only within the limited confines of that specific game. The NPC will not work outside of that specific game scenario, and often can be broken within that context.
Furthermore, a huge chunk of the effort to make a good single-player game is specifically the scenario and NPC design, which as mentioned above only works in the context of the other. None of this cost is being accounted for in any of the plans people have for "the metaverse". At best, there's handwaving about running a platform where players sell each other paid mods for an existing game. This is not an adequate system for funding the creation of worlds and items, IMO.
The people pushing for metaverse want something that isn't a videogame, but is wearing the skin of a videogame.
You should have a look at the emerging field of Immersive Analytics [1] which is re-imagining Data Visualization to make use of the new 3D capabilities of hardware and software that did not exist back in the VRML days
I wouldn't judge all VRML-enabled software the same, as they were not all terrible. For example, back in the mid-to-late 90s (and for several years in the 00's) there was a free (client) product called OnLive! Traveler (later DigitalSpace Traveler) that utilized VRML 1.0 with a few additional, custom VRML node types.
It was multi-user, it had a wide variety of customizable avatars that could express emotion and featured lip synching to the user's mic audio, it had 3D spatial user and environmental audio, and it all worked really well over dialup (even with 28.8kbps) even on first generation Pentium PCs. Movement was done with "FPS"-style keys (cursors, ALT for strafing, etc.). MTV would host regular live events in-world and there were a number of other large companies that were involved as well.
