by Phoenix, HSM team writer

Virtual yoga.

As a concept, it takes one by surprise. Initially the mind can’t wrap itself around yoga that you don’t actually do. Everyone knows yoga is a very physical, and in the beginning demands extraordinary practice. So why would it be developed for a virtual world?

Well…why not? Do these LMOs have a niche in Home? These packs contain the most popular poses in the practice, and real application.  But what demographic are they aimed at?

Yoga is no different from the other sports-related activities available in Home. There is swimming in nearly every body of water represented in Home to date; there is now bike riding and running, Home has jet pack flying and has always had dancing, so why not yoga?  If you think about it as I do, then it makes perfectly good sense.

Think about Home: we enter Home via a television and gaming console. That part is real. We physically have to turn on both and continue to use the controller to move about once here. But that is the extent of our physical exertions, yes? Yet if someone asked what we are about in Home we could answer, I’m going dancing, or swimming or any number of activities. But do we? Did we?

Yes, is my response. I live life in a world where my every day is much the same as that of other people that play inside Home. Once you sit down, and pick up that controller that it is the extent of most of your physical movement, your hands do everything. But once inside Home you see yourself as doing everything your avatar, the “you” you created does.  For me yoga is no different in that aspect for any of us. This is because we are looking at ourselves doing these things, so when asked we say yes, I did that. Mind over body.

Let me explain it this way: the reason some of us are able to use Home in a way that has allowed it to become a real world for us is immersion.  Virtual worlds are suppose to be able to  not trick the mind into believing you are there, but to perhaps allow the mind to accept the vision, a new reality, that is being sent by the eyes, as real.  If the mind can accept the reality of what it sees we are able to actually feel as though we have done these activities in the world we see. Have you ever in Home thought you felt the wind, when you were in a space where the wind is visibly blowing? Even just for a second you imagined what that wind felt like on your skin, in your hair? You felt it: that was mind over body. The environment you were in was real enough to allow immersion to happen within your mind.

Have you ever in Home felt or experienced the presence or knowledge of someone you were with that defied understanding outside this virtual world?  There is a keener sense of being, for some in Home. Without seeing or hearing a friend in the real world you can sense when they are upset in this virtual world. In the same way we duck when being shot at in a game world or lean from side to side when the movement onscreen does so. Immersion is why yoga is a yes for me.  Speaking metaphysically, some experience feeling a rising in consciousness, a change in reality, just as you do in the practice of yoga. We find a reality beyond what is perceived. Home is a reality beyond what is perceptible to our physical body.

Once I turn on that television and PS3 console, I am able to run, dance, swim, race, ride a horse and bike, or just walk, if I chose to. Yoga is something I’ve always wanted to do. Meditation is something I’ve practiced for years; yoga seemed a natural progression. I have even done hand yoga, as it is a form of yoga I can do in the real world.  But, now full body yoga is available to me, Konami and Lockwood have created these poses for Home. I no longer have to watch other people do yoga. I can participate in this world of physical and mental meditation and attune myself to the blending of body and mind, in a way I have always wanted to do.

The answer to the questions are this: yoga poses are logical for Home as a vehicle towards immersion into a virtual world.  Yes, there is a niche for them here. The demographics they are aimed at, are the ones that have found they had to have them. It is the ones that see themselves using them. Finally, it is for those that can see themselves practicing yoga — in Home.

Share