VRML never had facilites to define meaningful interactions comparable to what a real video game engine like the Unreal Engine can do and I think the current "metaverse" platforms also lack that.
A run-of-the-mill game like Sword Art Online: Fatal Bullet has meaningful interactions with NPC characters that are NPC characters in the game. Mario and Luigi: Dream Team has NPC crowds that shower you with admiration.
Capital One (Progressive Insurance, AT&T, ...) establishes an emotional connection with me through actors who plays characters on television commercials, operating themed stores, etc.
They aren't going to move to the metaverse until they can give an experience at that level.
Single player video games succeed at this.
Fiction (Sword Art Online, Ready Player One, The Matrix, Disneyland) tells us clearly what the metaverse is: you share the space with players and NPCs.
The will has to be there but the technology isn't ready yet.
So... that leads into another conceptual objection to "metaverse".
NPC characters are almost always a handful of specific text lines, triggers, and flags cobbled together into something that's "interactable" only within the limited confines of that specific game. The NPC will not work outside of that specific game scenario, and often can be broken within that context.
Furthermore, a huge chunk of the effort to make a good single-player game is specifically the scenario and NPC design, which as mentioned above only works in the context of the other. None of this cost is being accounted for in any of the plans people have for "the metaverse". At best, there's handwaving about running a platform where players sell each other paid mods for an existing game. This is not an adequate system for funding the creation of worlds and items, IMO.
The people pushing for metaverse want something that isn't a videogame, but is wearing the skin of a videogame.
A run-of-the-mill game like Sword Art Online: Fatal Bullet has meaningful interactions with NPC characters that are NPC characters in the game. Mario and Luigi: Dream Team has NPC crowds that shower you with admiration.
Capital One (Progressive Insurance, AT&T, ...) establishes an emotional connection with me through actors who plays characters on television commercials, operating themed stores, etc.
They aren't going to move to the metaverse until they can give an experience at that level.
Single player video games succeed at this.
Fiction (Sword Art Online, Ready Player One, The Matrix, Disneyland) tells us clearly what the metaverse is: you share the space with players and NPCs.
The will has to be there but the technology isn't ready yet.