This actual anime VR high school where you'll be able to get proper qualifications is the first metaverse-based project that makes any kind of sense to me

GamesVRThis actual anime VR high school where you’ll be able to get proper qualifications is the first metaverse-based project that makes any kind of sense to meWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.

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(Image credit: Aominext / PR Times)

Look, we’ve all been dunking on the whole ‘metaverse’ concept for a while now. As Phil Iwaniuk wrote for us back in February of last year, anyone who has played video games knows that themetaverse’s promised digital wonderlandhas existed since the days of the CRT monitor.

It comes from the companyAominext, which develops distinctly anime-styled metaverse spaces that slough off the disturbing, soulless avatars we’re used to from Zuckerberg and his crew—revealing the cute anime avatars underneath, like a VTuber butterfly cracking open its uncanny chrysalis.

(Image credit: Aominext / PR Times)

An anime student raises her hand in Aominext’s metaverse project, a VR school in japan where you can get actual diplomas.

I want to be sceptical, but this genuinely does feel like the first metaverse-focused project I’ve seen that makes absolute sense to me. While it might be easy to point fingers and laugh at a bunch of VTuber-looking kids gathered around a school table, correspondence learning has existed for years. While it became more common during the Covid-19 pandemic, it’s always been a thing, and it’s always been kinda socially isolating.

As the press release points out, correspondence schools often use programs like Slack or Zoom calls, which don’t replicate the feeling of being in an actual classroom. If you’re an adult with other stuff going on that’s not so bad, but they’re certainly no replacement for a young mind desperate to actually make friends and socialise.

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Obviously, VR isn’t a one-to-one replacement of that, but I think we can agree that it’s definitely a step up. Marrying the concept of a correspondence school with a VRChat-style space that lets you customise an anime avatar—which is something kids might actuallylike? It feels like a natural fit. Conceptually this whole thing rules, especially since the press release promises it’ll loan the equipment to students free of charge.

Whether it’ll work at all in practice is another thing entirely—but I’m rooting for this funky little experiment, especially if it helps remote students feel a little less isolated. The fact that you’ll be able to earn an officially-recognised diploma while donning an anime avatar is the kind of futurism I’m here for.

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