It’s hard enough when a VR game just asks you to fly a spaceship around in a big circle without hitting an asteroid. Once you’ve popped your goggles on to play The Assembly, you’re asked to decide whether you’d kill one person to save 100.
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If a first-person utilitarian parable set in an underground scientific facility sounds like something you could do with a Rift on your face, well, The Assembly is out today on Steam. If that sounds like too much to think about at once, you can always play it the old-fashioned way.
The non-VR edition will set you back $19.99 /€19.99 / £14.99, with full-fat 3D priced at $29.99 / €24.99 / £19.99. You can always upgrade from one to the other later on. UK developers nDreams reckon The Assembly is an ideal introduction to virtual reality and have included a range of control schemes to suit all levels of experience.
In-game you take on two roles: that of unwilling Assembly newcomer Madeleine, and well-established company man Caleb, who is just beginning to question the experiments going on around him.
The story tackles the real-world difficulty of making moral decisions about tech that develops faster than legislature. It’s an intriguing subject, whether you’re pondering it in VR or not. Think you’d be into it?