Ghost in the Shell: Virtual Reality Diver VR 360 Video Review
Just when I think I’ve exhausted every single animated incarnation of Ghost in the Shell (GitS), my online detective work finds yet another thing. Virtual Reality Diver is a 2015 VR “experience” that’s set in the Arise/The NewMovie universe, with a story by prolific writer Junichi Fujisaku, who’s written episodes of Stand Alone Complex (SAC) and Arise, plus SAC novels, the Arise manga, and the GitS: 1.75 The Human Algorithm manga. If you want a random GitS thing written, Fujisaku’s your guy.
Although I did buy a secondhand PSVR headset a few years ago, my experience of VR outside of a few sessions of Beat Saber, Rez Infinite, and Tetris Effect is limited. (There was that one weird Fate/Grand Order thing where Mash dances suggestively for you, but that one made me feel slightly grubby, so let’s not talk about it.) My eldest son, however, seems to have bought right into the whole VR revolution, and has owned multiple headsets — he keeps buying them broken online, before fixing them up, and selling them on. He’s kept a high end Pimax model for himself, so I was able to get him to set me up with it via Steam VR so I could experience this… “experience”.
Released around the time of The New Movie, it’s apparently set in 2025, which I’m not really sure matches Arise’s timeline. It doesn’t matter, I suppose, though it does namedrop the Fire Starter virus, a central plot conceit throughout Arise and The New Movie. Although Virtual Reality Diver was released for smartphone use on the Google Play Store (and possibly on Apple’s App Store?), it no longer seems to be listed. I also read rumours that it was supposed to have been released on PSVR too, but I can’t find it on PSN. I’ve also tried looking on the Oculus/Meta, Vive, and Steam storefronts, and none of them have it any more, which suggests it’s probably been deleted. At one point this may have been a Gear VR exclusive, and that system is no longer supported.
I found Virtual Reality Diver via YouTube, where it’s uploaded in low quality, but you can use your mouse for full 360 degree functionality. It’s clunky, but it gives you an idea of what to expect. The video uploader provides a link to his MEGA account, where he’s made the full-quality, 1.13gb mp4 file available for download. Thanks, YouTube user akaicat, you’re a life-saver. Now, for my son’s headset, the video isn’t immediately usable unless you want to watch it merely in “cinema” mode. To effectively use the full 360 degrees interactivity, you need an app like Skybox VR Video Player, though a recent version of VLC may work. After fiddling around with a few settings, it works extremely well via Pimax headset and Steam VR, using Skybox.
As expected, Ghost in the Shell translates extremely well to 360 degrees VR video — so well, in fact that the weightless cyberspace environment during the opening minutes left me feeling really quite vertiginous — not exactly to the point of motion sickness, but it was a novel experience! All interactivity in this is limited merely to your field of vision. Otherwise it plays like a normal video, or perhaps a little like a fairground ride? We watch Major Motoko Kusanagi’s body rebuilt from scratch, starting as a brain case with a spinal cord, as each successive anatomical component is slotted into place like a complex three-dimensional jigsaw, all while she narrates to us. It’s very cool, and meticulously animated.
Kusanagi is summoned to join a mission to prevent a terrorist from bombing an international meeting including politicians from the Republic of Kuzan. Suddenly we find ourselves in one of Section 9’s flying tiltrotor vehicles, talking with Batou and one of Arise’s sentient red Logicoma mechs. The Logicoma in particular looks great, very hefty, though you need to turn your field of vision all the way around to see it. Kusanagi and Batou then jump out of the craft and fall to the city below, in what’s an exhilarating, if faintly terrifying experience. They then embark on a fight against an enormous mech, with the point of view swinging wildly around, but not so badly as to cause disorientation. It’s all so incredibly cool to watch, as if you’re stuck right there in the middle of the action.
Kusanagi then hacks the mech, and then we’re launched back into cyberspace with all of the expected GitS visual cues — it looks so good. Reality shifts and moulds, buildings fall out of the sky, or we fall towards the ground, it kind of depends on your viewpoint… We find ourselves in a dingy, looping passageway as Kusanagi chases a girl’s digital apparition. This segment is very reminiscent of Silent Hill PT, with its recursive logic maze. Kusanagi is confronted by her terrorist quarry, as he first converses her via the medium of spooky dolls. The red leather-clad Arise version of Kusanagi never looked as good as she does here, even in sometimes extreme closeup. Her voice actress Elizabeth Maxwell does a good job, as does Batou’s Christopher Sabat.
The action then shifts to a fantasy setting with ruined buildings, water, and myriad vibrant cherry blossom trees shedding their pink blossoms like snow — the visuals are incredibly striking. The terrorist and Kusanagi engage in cyber-warfare, and scenes switch between virtual world hacking, and the ongoing, extremely explosive fight against the terrorist’s mech. Kusanagi’s body is blown to smithereens, while she confronts the terrorist regarding his false Fire Starter-implanted memories, before annihilating his ghost. It’s incredible to see GitS’ longstanding Inter Gate online hacking visual design architecture used in what’s about as close to its intended setting as is currently technologically possible in our world. I’m glad I can experience such incredible visual spectacle without having to jack my brain directly into the internet.
Although this is only a very short, 15 minute presentation, clearly a vast amount of work went into its production. I’d definitely recommend checking it out. The YouTube link above doesn’t quite do justice to the full experience, but not everyone is going to have a high end VR headset just lying around. Go check it out, if you can. There is a far-inferior VR video related to the 2017 Scarlett Johansson movie, but it looks really janky and cheap in comparison. You can watch it at the YouTube link below, then forget it exists.
I am almost running out of Ghost in the Shell things to write about now. I’ve still got to formally review both Shirow manga volumes 1.5: Human Error Processor, and 2: Man-Machine Interface, so they’re finally next on my itinerary. I may decide to review the console games if I can get my emulators to play ball (Duckstation has really started to chug lately, I probably either need to micromanage some settings, or get a new laptop…) Thanks for reading, I’ll be back again soon!
Ghost in the Shell: Virtual Reality Diver
Director: Hiroaki Higashi
Writer: Junichi Fujisaku
Character designer: Kazuchika Kise
Music: Hideaki Takahashi
Based on: The manga Ghost in the Shell by Masamune Shirow
Studio: Production I.G
Release: 2015 (Japanese), 13th July 2018 (English)
Language: English dub
Runtime: 15 minutes
