It does seem like the eventual destination of any civilization to plug themselves into a simulation. Seeing that the universe expands at the speed of light, with our current understanding of physics and tech, we just simply wouldn’t be able to expand as quickly as the universe did. So, we’d always be trapped in this bubble and unable to reach any further.

Why bother with all that trouble when you can be essentially gods in your own virtual reality simulation? You can have any life that you could possibly want in there if it was advanced enough.

This was my exact thought as well. There’s really no reason why sufficiently advanced computers couldn’t eventually simulate anything and everything. I’m going to go a bit off-topic but there’s a theory about the simulation in The Matrix operating from a different set of laws from the real world. Hence the reason why humans can actually work as human batteries very efficiently compared to other forms of energy.

So, there’s the possibility that if we are in a simulation then the “real world” might be operating by a different set of laws and physics to what we know in here. If that’s the case then I really don’t know where the limit actually is or how we could tell from inside here.