funding and with an inability to deal with the ever-increasing prison population, rehabilitation programmes lack the necessary support and resources in order to function at its full potential. This might have something to do with the fact that prisoners aren’t treated like individuals. Partly due to the failure of such programmes as a consequence in the generalisation of offenders, partly in the total disregard for their personal characters, histories, skills and desires. At a time of a sorely needed reinvention, can rehabilitation become a process sustained between simulations, emerging multi-sensory technologies and the physical walls of the prison itself? Can aspects of open-world video games be deployed as new platforms, in which a third space is designed in order to accommodate for the prisoners of the future? This reinvention would turn the very infrastructure of the current prison model inside out; through examining and then later subverting the model’s existing mechanisms and frameworks, in can in turn accommodate the simulated rehabilitation of a criminal, 20 years from now. The prison can be considered as the purest manifestation of architecture and control. At its very essence, the prison cell is a room stripped and removed from any sign of comfort and familiarity.
The reinvention of the prison provides an alternative model of incarceration. Incorporating rehabilitation through the application of simulated realities and its associated technologies within the confines of the prison cell, the cell is no longer the embodiment of control – a fortress – instead it transforms into an interface, or a portal that transports the prisoner to other places beyond the prison. Filled with multi-sensory haptic technologies, the cell silently observes its users while sustaining the virtual spaces that they occupy. Omnidirectional treadmills are installed to enable movement, facilitating the prison cell’s expansion beyond the boundaries of its four walls. Its climate system manipulates temperature, weather and atmosphere. The cell brings together the technologies to work in tandem as a multisensorial machine, transforming the space to sustain and facilitate a multitude of simulated environments. Virtual reality therapeutics is a recognised strategy for psychological rehabilitation processes that utilises fully immersive and engaging simulations; the efficacy of which can be objectively measured through empirical data that the technology simultaneously obtains while operating simulations. This data can be analysed and used to identify
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