Becoming Real

Becoming Real

Michael Hagerty— GhostRayder , to his fans—reviewed video games and made game videos for a living. He was intimately familiar with virtual worlds. They were his everyday bread and butter. He was quite certain he understood very clearly the lines of demarcation between game and reality, between what was physical, and what was virtual. What was real, and what was not. Then one day, not long after he reviewed a newly released VR open-world adventure game, a mystery source sent him a modified version of the game, and asked him to go back in and try it again. Michael would soon find out, amid a high-stakes game of hide-and-seek with shady multinational corporations and shadowy government agencies, that the question of real or virtual, human or not, was far more nuanced and less clear-cut than he had ever believed possible. •••••• Sean Fenian’s Becoming Real is an exploration of the natures of humanity and reality. Or perhaps it’s a commentary on some of the blind spots of video game design. Or perhaps it’s an SF postmodern love story with a twist. Or perhaps, it’s all of these things… and more. Becoming Real may be about Michael Hagerty… but it's not really about Michael Hagerty. •••••• This book is © 2025, Sean Fenian and Fenian House Publishing. Published by Fenian House Publishing