Published on 23/12/2020 – Updated on 30/12/2025
Story Territories Rituals Metaverse Logbooks
“The Soulignac Brothers” is the story of two brothers having fun in-games. A creative collective exploring new territories in cyberspace, in search of new rituals to overcome distance and experiment the potential of the metaverse. Part of the Virtual Tourism Project, a series of photos and videos dedicated to the work of game designers, developers, and a way to keep memory of our excursions in cyberspace.
Story | The Soulignac Brothers
Reconnecting despite the pandemic – Gamification of the family time
In December 2020, in the midst of a global pandemic and severe travel restrictions, my brother Thibaut and I were living 10,000 km apart. He was in Paris, while I was in Saigon (Vietnam). We began to wonder how we might see each other for the holidays despite these constraints. In previous years, I would usually travel physically for the holidays, by plane, thereby generating an excessive and unreasonable amount of carbon emissions. We could also have chosen to connect through voice or video calls. However, as my brother and I share the same passion for video games and new technologies, and had previously collaborated on the GTA 4 Episode of the Virtual Tourism Series, comparing Los Angeles and Los Santos, we ultimately decided to simply meet in our favorite video game: Red Dead Redemption 2.
New territories
Exploring virtual worlds – The shifting boundaries of cyberspace
Until then, the Virtual Tourism Project, dedicated to the contemplative way of gaming, had been a very solitary project; in 2020, it became a family matter, a collaborative project between brothers sharing the same passion for video games and new technologies. The objective was simple: to reunite despite the travel restrictions, to talk, to have fun, and to try to preserve a tangible memory of that moment. This simple idea gradually evolved into a video project, in the spirit of “Machinima,” which can now naturally be found on our YouTube channel.
Cyberspace – A new continent in progress of mapping
Cyberspace is a new continent whose maps are still being drawn up; The Soulignac Brothers is therefore a constantly evolving project. Multiple expeditions that will be recounted in our logbooks, shaped during our different travels in cyberspace. Our progress on this new continent is slow, as we are primarily concerned with reality. Despite our passion for art and new technologies, exploring the real world, understanding it and meeting people IRL remains a top priority for us.
The fictional pact – Shifting and mental travel
Our brains, the result of a long evolutionary process, react emotionally and physiologically in similar ways to real and simulated experiences. Video games, like literature and cinema, exploit this ability to immerse ourselves in alternative realities. The fictional pact or «shifting» within the reality shifters community, allowing us to believe, at least temporarily, in these worlds. This capacity for immersion and mental travel, through meditation techniques of hypnotic trance and self-hypnosis, intensifies our experience of shared stories.
Traveling despite the restrictions – The power of inner journeys
Managing to meet up in virtual and inner worlds despite the restrictions has been beneficial for our mental health. A form of shifting also occurs when you lose yourself in digital limbos with people you know. This is even more intense with the people you love. We experienced it and it did us a world of good. It reduces feelings of distance and loneliness by reinforcing the sense of presence, which is essential to any human relationship. Read more about The shifting territories of mental travel.
New rituals
Augmented video calls – The future of long-distance relationships
Through this modest video experiment, we also aim to explore how new rituals are emerging from virtual worlds. Sometimes as a direct response to real-world disruptions, sometimes not. My brother and I had a lot of fun playing and exploring, but mostly we talked for hours. Not just about what was happening in the game, but also about what was happening in our real lives. Two brothers having a long augmented video conversation, plain and simple. A conversation that turned into a three-day creative collaboration, carried out remotely between Paris in France and Saigon in Vietnam. The result of this social experiment is a short video souvenir of the two of us, which faithfully reflects the pleasure we have in discussing and creating together.
Rituals of emancipation – Pleasure, joy and public interest
After those first digital vacation experience with my brother, we realized that there were many ways to spend time with loved ones, including in cyberspace. These are truly fascinating times: despite the mobility constraints of the 2020-2021 period and future restrictions linked to the increasing scarcity of fossil fuels, we are fortunate to have the arts and technologies capable of creating immersive virtual worlds, enabling us to simulate a new decorum for our cyber-meetings. It’s up to us to make these new places our own, inventing new rituals based on pleasure, joy and public interest.
Metaverse
The true potential of video games – The metaverse as it should be
The metaverse is often presented today as the future of social networks and continues to fuel debate among experts. However, for us, The Soulignac Brothers, in our humble gut feeling of geeks, the metaverse is already here and all online gamers are already there, especially the youth. The existence of the metaverse dates back at least to the emergence of the first online video games, when people started to interact for fun in cyberspace. But it was probably with the development of realistic interactive real-time 3D simulations that the metaverse began to take its ideal form.
Digital naturalism – The conditions for enjoyment
For a balanced person to willingly spend hours in a virtual world, the experience must be immersive, stunning, deeply inspiring, and preferably without strapping on a clunky virtual reality headset. In this category of production, Red Dead Redemption 2 stands as a masterclass in naturalistic design, widely regarded as one of the most beautiful and realistic interactive simulations ever created. It’s the kind of world you can lose yourself in, especially when the journey is about reconnecting with the people you care about.
Red Dead Redemption 2 – Total Recall and San Junipero
With Red Dead Redemption 2, a spectacular and deeply engaging online simulation, the mainstream public, and especially older audiences, can finally discover and experience the true potential of video games: a glimpse of what the metaverse could bring to human interaction. In this virtual world, the allure is instant; our brains are wired to respond to such beauty, much like the characters and viewers in Paul Verhoeven’s Total Recall (inspired by Philip K. Dick’s We Can Remember It for You Wholesale), or more recently, in Charlie Brooker’s visionary Black Mirror episode, San Junipero.
The Soulignac Brothers – Experimenting the metaverse
My brother and I didn’t just “play a video game”, we travelled together in a completely fictional, naturalistic and neo-realistic simulation developed by a visionary studio Rockstar Games. This outstanding virtual space – Red Dead Redemption 2, generates real and lasting emotions. It’s a new theme park, where the risk of accidents is zero and memories can be documented and shared ad infinitum. Wouldn’t this be the ideal place to spend time and chat with loved ones when face-to-face meetings aren’t possible? And finally, isn’t this the metaverse as it should be?
Other logbooks
- Logbook | Virtual Tourism in the USA
- Logbook | Virtual Tourism in Uncharted Territories
- Logbook | Virtual Tourism in Detroit
- Logbook | Virtual Tourism in Russia
- Logbook | Virtual Tourism in Night City
© 2020-2025 The Soulignac Brothers | Virtual Tourism in the USA – Red Dead Redemption 2. Creative walks and videography in video games. © Rockstar Games (game designer). © Thibaut & François Soulignac (in-game videographers). Technique: video capture on PlayStation 4 Pro, in December 2020. Virtual Tourism Project is a series of photos et videos dedicated to the work of game designers, developers, and a way to keep memory of our excursions in virtual worlds. “The Soulignac Brothers” is the logbook of a creative collective exploring new territories in cyberspace, in search of new rituals to overcome distance and experiment the potentials of the metaverse. Discover The Soulignac Brothers on YouTube.