Mobile Devices and the New Technological Era

Since the beginning of this century, portable eletronic devices have been modified the way we lived our lifes in a dramatic way. There were so many changes that we passed to communicate to each other, to organize our life and to do many tasks because of their existence that it's difficult to think in a world with all other things that we have without their.

It began with simple wireless talk devices, known as "brick cell phones", because of their big sizes. These devices evolved, reducing their sizes, year after year, until technology allowed developers to add new functions, as calculators, calendars, alarms and phone books.

I will not describe all changes that ocurred in each year, all of us know the end of the summary (and I don't know all story). In the last five years we have seen the popularization of smartphones and tablets devices. Many of us have a mobile with an iOS or an Android system in our home. What is the future of this and what this mean?

Now, there are more than one billion of activated Android devices and more than 700 millions of iOS': These are monstrous numbers. Day after day, there are more applications been developed, trying to make more easy everyday tasks of all types of lifestyles. You can find an application to help you for develop other applications, or for control your gym routine or even for you take care of your garden.

This evolution don't stopped in this smart devices (that already are more like a computer than a cell phone). In this year, 2013, we see the release of a new type of devices, a type of smartphone in a glasses: the Google Glass. You can do a number of tasks, like take photos, record videos or make calls, only with voice commands and seeing the screen in front of your eyes, without disturbing your vision.. And there are even more: Recent Apps for these crazy glasses allow you to take photos only blinking your eyes or finding a place following a arrow that appears to you.

We are each time nearer to incorporate mobile devices in our body. For example, contact lens that works like a screen is in development in labs currently. I don't know where this will stop, neither if this will stop one day, but we need to stop just for a moment to think what this represent to us. We can't develop things just because we can, we need a path, a target, because with all this advances and informations been increased every day, there is a chance for us to lose ourselves.

Console Generations and Video Game Evolution

 

   Video game consoles are not so young. The first generation of these machines (that revolutionized the world) were born in 1972, one year after the arcade machines. As well as all other technologies that innovated, the first generation demonstrated the their big potential, with primitive (but fun) games. Pong is from this generation. All of us know Pong: it's an eternal game.

   I'm not too old to have lived through that time, the first game that I've played in my life belonged to the fourth generation, with the Super Nintendo (SNES). There is no way to describe how big was this console to my life. Games like Super Mario, Donkey Kong and Super Bomberman dominated my days. I remember the problem that we had to complete those games where we can't save and continue later.

   Time has passed and other generations came. The fifth (1993-2006) with Playstation, the sixth (1998-2013) with Playstation 2 and Xbox, the seventh (2005-present) with Playstation 3, Xbox 360 and Wii and now the eighth (2012-present) with Playstation 4 and Xbox One. It's incredible how these video games have evolved in so little time. The images below are of race games of the first and eighth generations. I know, it's a big surprise to see in this way. Only thirty years between these two. Now, imagine how great will be the near future?

   There is a bad thing with all this crazy evolution: There is no time to enjoy all games, not even the top games of each generation. Yes, you can play the best games one time each, but you will not be appreciating like they need to be. Just think how many times you have played a single game in your childhood and today (I'm sure that this number is decreasing), and, in the same way, you should know more of an old game that a recent one.

   I don't know what is the solution to this, each of us that enjoy this form of art have a way to deal with this. Maybe playing just a few games, but enjoying them completely, or playing them all, and enjoying only the time you can spend in each one. There is still the question wether to explore or not the old generation of video games, because the past keeps a lot of the best works of all time.

Book: Ready Player One - Ernest Cline (2011)

Absolutely, it's a book that will be loved by almost all gamers, programmers and technology fans. Let me write a short summary of this work.

OASIS (Ontologically Anthropocentric Sensory Immersive Simulation) it's an alternate reality game that allow people to live a better (but fake, virtual) life. It's a utopic simulation in a dystopic world. The world is in an energy crisis. The population of the earth have low life quality, living in precarious places due to lack of space. One way or another, "living" in OASIS is an obvious choice to all.

James Donovan Halliday, creator of OASIS, left in the game, before he died, a series of clues to the biggest competition of all time. Three keys to be find and three gates to be opened, who complete this will gain all his fortune: 240 billions of dollars.

For me, the best thing in this book, in this world created by Ernest Cline, is the way that all players need to follow if they want to have a chance to win the prize. Halliday left the "Anorak's Almanac", a list of his favorite books, games, movies and other things. All of 80's, his favorite decade. The challenge is based on this. Several things of that time are described in detail. It's a new (old) world to discovery.

Well, he lived in a super technological era, owner of the biggest game in the history, but all he liked, and played, and lived, it's things of a previous generation. I guess that we can choose which generation we want to live, we don't need to know all new games, and movies, and whatever. We can watch a billion times the Star Wars movie, or play Super Mario World until we die. It's a thing to think.

Other thing that make me think about is the possibility to dealing with life as a RPG game (a adventure game) where you make choices, gain experience, up levels and buy better equipment, exploring a giant universe.