As we continue to explore the Cyberia Universe, we will look at some of the ideas pitched by employees at Give Me Head Productions HQ. They understood that such a project required coherent, multilayered immersion. To their credit, they were on track for achieving at least this much (if they had a thousand years to produce the thing).

They mapped out six unique districts within Cyberia and tried to enrich them with as much detail as possible. An example of this enrichment is the creation of “megacorps.” Several of the team were assigned the task of developing what we now recognise as multinational corporations except even more evil. A bit like if Coca-Cola was manufactured by Satan himself. These megacorps were also more digital and more tech-orientated.

One of the earliest megacorps the team came up with was Viv Bastard.

V-Spex by Viv Bastard

We found some handwritten notes which were for a megacorp meeting:

Marty reckons that the goggles of the distant future will not only allow metropunks to know what time it is on either the 24-hour clock or the 12-hour clock depending on their preferences, but also what the weather forecast is looking like as early as the next day. How epically cosmic is that?!

When I was thinking about it last night while trying to get a new high score on After Burner, I wondered if they might even find a way of being able to play video games by fiddling with a plastic knob and using your pupils to control the joystick.

The question is: where does this possibility end? The answer is: it only ends with the limits of our imagination. I’m getting total granola vibes with this project, dude!

-Orson

The team was clearly flabbergasted at the thought of such a radical technology and so they came up with V-Spex by Viv Bastard.

These glasses apparently have a zoom function and can detect “nervous vibrations” (a warning of potential enemies). They can also send messages to other wearers, log in to the digital black market where they have instant access to illegal weapons, stolen credit and high stakes gambling facilities. Another cool feature is tuning into live broadcasts at the Screamer Arena and making bids for terrible artwork at the Swank Gallery.

But the real hallmark of a megacorp wasn’t just being a huge corporation selling digital tat; they were primarily involved in unethical business practices. For example the team proposed that Viv Bastard also tracked their consumers’ spending habits and stole their private information. They then used it for stealth marketing as well as selling it to other megacorps so they can exploit the lowlife chumps for all they’re worth.

Orson was fascinated with the idea of the glasses being capable of manipulating wearers. It appears that he came up with the idea of hypnotic cartoons which, instead of having subtle product placement, demanded that the wearer bought this or that product immediately. Because the wearer was fully hypnotised, there was zero resistance to aggressive marketing campaigns.

To be fair to those guys, it was a fairly accurate prediction of tomorrow’s tech. However, the Give Me Head team had a habit of exploring an idea, getting overly excited about it, and then, a few days later, presumably on a cocaine comedown, they’d realise that the idea was either too stupid or too expensive. They’d scrap it and start over. And over. And over.

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