The experiment uses cortical rat neurons, because of their affordability and because they can learn well enough for these purposes (you too can order a million frozen rat neurons online, what a world). Yes, you could use human neurons to the same end, and no doubt someone watching this video will be off to order some imminently, but they’re expensive and almost seem overkill because playing Doom can be stripped-down to relatively simple yes / no patterns.

Is this real life?