Current Events > Dated characters and concepts that still exist in modern media

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MisterPengy posted...

Do you think in 100, 200, 800 years people will still be carrying around phones? With cameras on them and everything?

I wonder if we'll ever grow out of needing to have a camera on us at all times.

This is an interesting topic because a lot of potential successors in the desktop > laptop > smartphone timeline haven't really panned out. VR isn't widely adopted, wearables aren't considered a must-have and spatial computing (Vision Pro) is having a really rough launch plus its only sensible applications are for enterprise and media production situations.

Something would hypothetically have to be introduced that adds something new to the day-to-day computing and media consumption experience while also being considered more convenient and superior than pulling your phone out.

MisterPengy posted...

Do you think in 100, 200, 800 years people will still be carrying around phones? With cameras on them and everything?

Probably. The response to being able to make tech smaller isn't usually to make it smaller but to make it do more things.

We could have removable storage the size of a fingernail if we wanted to but it turns out that when we do that people lose them.

So even if we can fit everything your existing phone does on a single chip only a few mm wide, I expect the extra space would get packed with something else.

Yeah Mass Effect is a good one. Again it's clearly designed around what the mid 2000s would look like in the future. Everyone uses glowing orange desktop computers for emails.

I played Dead Space and it's sort of similar. Everyone uses video chat. Outside of that everyone leaves their work on a data or audio log with the odd person who records themselves via a hologram that can only be watched in the room they recorded it in. Nothing about the technology is actually convenient lol

Punished_Blinx posted...

Yeah Mass Effect is a good one. Again it's clearly designed around what the mid 2000s would look like in the future. Everyone uses glowing orange desktop computers for emails.

Tbh I always kind of got the feeling that's what ME was going for, like it was more a depiction of futurism rather than trying for any sort of realism. Like a lot of stuff felt like it was paying homage to the sci-fi of decades past

Ivynn posted...

Cyberpunk is based on an 80s TTRPG so it uses a lot of imagery of the future that the 80s expected.

I realize that. This topic is about dated concepts. Someone explained the cords as simply being more reliable.

DipDipDiver posted...

Tbh I always kind of got the feeling that's what ME was going for, like it was more a depiction of futurism rather than trying for any sort of realism. Like a lot of stuff felt like it was paying homage to the sci-fi of decades past

That's the funny thing about sci-fi at the moment.

Either it is an old property based on the idea of the future decades ago. So can't update that due to what's established.

Or it's inspired by those old properties and it's still overall based on those old ideas.

Even Starfield which is a new sci-fi property is the same. Nobody calls or sends a message ever.

I get it though. It's still pretty hard to depict this stuff in modern settings never mind for stuff set in outer space.

Black Mirror does have its entire concept based around it but even that's just a per episode thing. Would be interesting to see an actual universe take in stuff from some of those ideas that are a bit more modern.

Punished_Blinx posted...

Black Mirror does have its entire concept based around it but even that's just a per episode thing. Would be interesting to see an actual universe take in stuff from some of those ideas that are a bit more modern.

I wouldn't be surprised if Black Mirror's transition to horror is because of the writer(s) simply not being able to keep up with how fast everything is changing. Episodes are either too outdated or too oddly prophetic to the point where it can't come off as speculative sci-fi anymore.

The record scratch sound effect held on way after it was common for people to own and use record players.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQrCNnSnsiM

Ah yeah stuff like that is a good example too.

I have never seen an anvil in real life. I just know them from Looney Tunes. I'm guessing those animators included them back in the day to reference their own childhoods.

Aren't many of those voices and lines in Looney tunes are impersonations and references to slang that would be long forgotten? At least I don't think there's anyone out there calling people mac and doc anymore without impersonating Bugs Bunny.

Crimsoness posted...

The way anime treats lesbians half of the time being super sexual aggressive toward their straight friends

Honestly the pervert whose main idea of getting female attention is violating their personal space is just sad to look at now.

A lot of the classic perverts are good characters in spite of being one, which just means the trait itself holds them back a lot of the time.

UnsteadyOwl posted...

The record scratch sound effect held on way after it was common for people to own and use record players.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQrCNnSnsiM

I guess, similar to this, we have an entire generation of people now who only know the floppy disk as the save icon and have no idea it was an actual thing people used.

UnsteadyOwl posted...

The record scratch sound effect held on way after it was common for people to own and use record players.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQrCNnSnsiM

Speaking of dated sound effects, Pac-Man music/sound effects whenever a video game is off screen.

Tyranthraxus posted...

A ton of modern vampire shit in general has aged extremely badly. Twilight is arguably one of the ones that makes the most sense. Stuff from the Anne Rice/White Wolf era really stretches suspension of disbelief with the omnipresent surveillance we have today. If I was going to run another vampire RPG it would have to be set in the 80s.

I always enjoyed Brian Lumley versions of vampires. Part cold war spy era, a somewhat superheroish protagonist and vampires that are not pretty at all and do some "intresting" things to their victims

Punished_Blinx posted...

Ah yeah stuff like that is a good example too.

I have never seen an anvil in real life. I just know them from Looney Tunes. I'm guessing those animators included them back in the day to reference their own childhoods.

Aren't many of those voices and lines in Looney tunes are impersonations and references to slang that would be long forgotten? At least I don't think there's anyone out there calling people mac and doc anymore without impersonating Bugs Bunny.

Even the whole carrot-eating thing is Bugs-specific, not a rabbit thing. Rabbits generally eat leafy greens. It was supposed to be a reference to an old actor IIRC.

MorganTJ posted...

Even the whole carrot-eating thing is Bugs-specific, not a rabbit thing. Rabbits generally eat leafy greens. It was supposed to be a reference to an old actor IIRC.

The carrot eating was a reference to a scene in It Happened One Night where Clark Gable's character eats a carrot while talking.