As we age, we often find that our most precious and beloved hobbies get superseded by the next generation. Take video games; if you grew up playing gaming systems like the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), and the Sega Genesis, you might see yourself as a good gamer. You probably feel like you are a good, natural gamer – and you no doubt taught adults some lessons as a kid, right?
Well, as time goes on, your kids will do the same thing to you. Tricks and techniques that you used to master will soon become child's play to the next generation. You’ll start to notice that your once vaunted skills are soon replaced by a hungry, ambitious youth. But did you ever expect that you might one day see yourself getting beat at a video game by a monkey? Well, thanks to Elon Musk, that might become real.
Musk, the man behind Space-X and Tesla, has become a pretty big deal in the last few years. The South African has been involved in all manner of zany experiments and product releases. His latest move, though, might be among the most satisfying-yet-scary inventions in recent time. The Neuralink is coming along at a rate of knots, and it now has the capacity to allow a monkey to play video games simply by using its mind.
Thanks to the Neuralink, Musk was able to show a monkey was able to play video games using its mind alone. By allowing us to control our computers with our thoughts alone, Neuralink is a proper sci-fi piece of hardware that could change how we interact with computers instantly. Indeed, they’ve already got a Neuralink working within a pig, called Gertrude, who was able to show neural activity on-screen.
What does this mean?
Well, for one, you might start seeing monkeys on ranked gaming match-ups in decades to come. Joking aside, Musk did say that they’ve already got a monkey using the wireless implant and was capable of “playing video games using his mind”.
The aim at the moment, in terms of testing video gaming in monkeys, is to get two monkeys facing off in a game of Pong. Saying that would be “pretty cool” – quite the understatement – Musk also addressed worries about the endangerment of the animals' welfare. However, Musk said that the monkey looked “totally normal and happy”, and that there was no visible sign of where the implant was placed.
So, if you ever start getting smashed on FIFA 28 and you hear a monkey hooting and hollering at you down the headset, now you know why.