I sometimes play with this thought as well, and I think we will see more of it as AI technologies allow for more realistic behavior of virtual agents. The reas

I sometimes play with this thought as well, and I think we will see more of it as AI technologies allow for more realistic behavior of virtual agents. The reason why I think having virtual agents instead of real players is important is because real players are not invested enough. They can always switch to a different reality whereas virtual agents are stuck and have to live with the consequences of their actions. That does change the dynamics a lot.