Written by Cassie, 2021 Cohort
The lights are on, the music starts, a blue-skinned virtual person is in the centre of the stage. She is dressed in a metallic costume and starts singing in a low and magnetic voice. She looks so confident! The whole scene is psychedelic, you would think you were watching the sister version of the movie “Avatar”. This, however, comes from Fox’s most recent singing talent show, Alter Ego.
What is the picture of a group of virtual people going to a talent show?
The word “Alter Ego” comes from the Latin word meaning “another self”. Alter Ego is the world’s first virtual idol singing competition talent show that started in September 2021 on Fox TV, in the United States.
In the spotlight, colourful skin avatars sing on stage. They all have their own artistic names and flamboyant shapes. In fact, this is not a complete avatar, because real singers are backstage wearing motion-capture suits and their performances are captured and mapped to these avatars which are performing on stage for the judges and studio audience.
In the performance process, the virtual character’s form of expression is much richer than that of real people, they can have many stunning effects. Some netizens even commented: “This feels like Black Mirror”.
Why did the ratings plummet for this cool meta-universe variety show?
Although the show, which claims to break the boundary between reality and virtual, is very innovative, it has not received the praise that most people thought it would. On IMDB, many studio audiences complained about the lack of interactivity of the avatars. Although the show’s performance was presented in a real-time rendering, in reality, the studio audience and judges were still unable to see the avatars directly but had to watch them on a large screen. In this way, Alter Ego is an emotional-friendly based talent show, that claims to let socially phobic people also have the opportunity to show their talents. But in the end, it has a layer of incongruity, a sense of less sincere emotion.
The meta-universe world is coming, and the virtual characters have entered a new chapter. From Alter Ego’s point of view, virtual idols do not seem really ready to really break down virtual and real boundaries. The next step for virtual characters may also require more caution.
Resources:
https://www.realitytitbit.com/whats-on/how-does-alter-ego-work