General VR discussion thread

[Kaido]

I guess I didn't explain it well. Most people are saying they like Raw Data's way of doing it because it is less jarring than normal teleportation.

I haven't tried it yet. I have a backlog of VR games I haven't messed with yet.

Yeah, I just meant separately, it didn't bother me at all. I thought teleportation in ANY game would be jarring but it works somehow! :thumbsup:

 

[blurredvision]

My Rift finally arrived yesterday morning at work and damn was it a long day to wait. Like I said in an earlier post, I remember reading about and longing for VR back in the 90's when one of the major PC gaming magazines featured it. The article in that magazine had a list of 5 or 6 headsets that were supposedly in development but I guess technology at the time just didn't allow for it. If you had told me then that I'd have to wait 20 years to get VR, my level of emotion would have been in the gutter.

So anyway, here's my thoughts on the Rift, in no particular order. A couple of things to note before I start. I am running an i5 3570k CPU (one generation behind the Oculus recommendation) and a GTX 1070. My previous experience with VR boils down to demoing a co-worker's DK1 headset well over a year ago, where I rode a short roller coaster for about 45 seconds. That's it. I've never touched a Vive or done any cell phone VR.

• The packaging is very nice, if not a bit much. It actually feels so quality that it seems superfluous, as if they spent way too much on it. A big soft rubberized box is great but as soon as I take the stuff out of it the first time, I'm putting it in a corner and not touching it again. It does seem almost impossible that this gets damaged in shipment, though, so I guess that's a plus.
• The Rift headset is much smaller and lighter than I anticipated. I also like that there's one cable coming out and that's it, it's not messy looking. Very clean lines and minimized all around.
• Setup was very straight-forward and easy, I give Oculus high marks for this. They obviously put a lot of effort into initial presentation with the packaging and then the setup.
• My head is bigger than average so I haven't found a good fit yet. The ear pieces are just long enough to work for me and while they feel like they sit too high on my ears, the audio sounds fine.
• I liked the initial demo reel they put you through immediately after initial setup of the headset/sensor, Oculus had no qualms about freaking people out a little bit. The scene with the t-rex walking up to you and staring you down was somewhat uncomfortable, I noticed myself leaning back in my seat when it got close.
• I am super impressed with the tracking. I looked for and could not find any lag whatsoever. When I moved my head, the image moved 1:1. Any latency is imperceptible, which it kind of has to be for this to work, but still impressive.
• I had read a lot about the "screendoor" effect and it's definitely there, but I just don't notice it during gameplay. It's very apparent during mostly/all black loading screens and it makes text somewhat harder to read if it's small.
• The audio through the built-in headphones are actually pretty damn good. Surround effects are very convincing in all directions. In one of the Dreamdeck demos, you're in a submarine after a big rattle, one of the pipes break and starts spewing steam. This happens above and behind, and I was able to look directly at the source of the sound based on what I heard. I'm sure it's not the best surround sound you can get but it worked way better than I expected.
• The field of view on this thing is fine. As I read reviews and impressions in anticipation of receiving the Rift, I saw some people complain about the small FOV but it wasn't never a consideration for me. I played with the Rift for 3 hours last night and didn't even consider the FOV until this morning when I saw somebody mention it on another forum. I had forgot it was even an "issue" for some people.
• Lucky's Tale is really good and was a smart pack-in freebie. It's a fun platformer and handles perfectly, the camera is even fairly smart and doesn't hinder. As others have said before, it does kind of remind me of the same feeling I had playing Mario 64 for the first time. Something completely fresh and new. What's weird is that as I look back on my time with LT last night, my mind's eye shows me inside the game, which is a weird feeling when I think about games. I think LT is a lot of fun and I plan on finishing it. I really hope to see more stuff like this.
• I checked out all of the Oculus short stories and they're fun for one viewing, but that's about it. "Lost" is easily the best one. Every one of them starts extremely slow, though. On each one, I specifically remember thinking "get on with it already". Abe VR, while not Oculus-produced, was a bit jarring when I looked down and saw that I had breasts.
• I also have Eve Valkyrie, which looked like it will be fun. However, I had some sensor issues (see below for more detail) that didn't let me fully enjoy this. The controls with the Xbox conroller are super sensitive so I was horrible, it will take some getting used to. Being launched out of that tunnel is likely to never get old, it's too cool. I may look into picking up a cheap HOTAS but not sure I want to make that investment for this game. Maybe I'll pick up Elite Dangerous on a sale at some point and check it out, too.

After about 3 hours of playing it last night, I started to get a headache, so I stopped. It wasn't a straight 3 hours but the majority of that was spent with it on my head. I didn't get nausea or light headed at all, so that's a good start.

So I did have some sensor issues. They began after my first short session of getting the Rift setup and going through some demos. I put the headset down for a few minutes and after putting it back on and going into the Home VR interface, it kept re-centering my screen and jumping me around every few seconds even though I wasn't moving my head. After about 2 minutes of this and me getting very annoyed, I heard my computer making the USB connect/disconnect sounds, as if I was unplugging something and plugging it back in. I took the headset off and saw a couple of notifications about the sensor being disconnected and then reconnected, and it eventually stayed connected and everything worked again.

This happened a couple more times throughout the night, and it seemed to only start right after I put the headset back on after putting it down for a few minutes. It completely ruined my initial Eve Valkyrie experience because it was pointing me in all kinds of directions in my ship. I started googling and found many others having the same issue. Somebody recommended turning off power management to the sensor, which I did and then rebooted. I didn't have the problem again after that but I didn't play much after that either. Others suggested that the sensor was pretty picky about what USB ports it liked, so hopefully it's not an issue with that. I'm hoping I won't see it happen again.

So I've got my fingers crossed for no more sensor issues but other than that, I'm glad I bought this thing. I do look forward to the touch controllers later this year, as that should enable all kinds of awesome stuff at that point.

 

[Kaido]

My Rift finally arrived yesterday

Congrats! I am interested to see how the Rift's touch controllers compare to the Vive's. VR is one of the only things I'm really excited about in the computer world right now, and it's fun because we're right on the verge of it getting big...despite the high cost, I'm really enjoying all of the games & experiences coming out & I'm anxious to see what the future holds for the platform!

Probably my one complaint with the Vive is that my current housing situation has no rooms big enough to do a proper room setup. I had to fake out the roomscale stuff to get it to let me past the setup wizard lol. I want to say that an omni treadmill would solve that issue, but with games like Raw Data, I move around & duck & stuff way too much to be confined in something like a Virtuix with a seatbelt (that game is a good workout!).

 

[Canbacon]

• The packaging is very nice, if not a bit much. It actually feels so quality that it seems superfluous, as if they spent way too much on it. A big soft rubberized box is great but as soon as I take the stuff out of it the first time, I'm putting it in a corner and not touching it again. It does seem almost impossible that this gets damaged in shipment, though, so I guess that's a plus.
• My head is bigger than average so I haven't found a good fit yet. The ear pieces are just long enough to work for me and while they feel like they sit too high on my ears, the audio sounds fine.
• I liked the initial demo reel they put you through immediately after initial setup of the headset/sensor, Oculus had no qualms about freaking people out a little bit. The scene with the t-rex walking up to you and staring you down was somewhat uncomfortable, I noticed myself leaning back in my seat when it got close.

If you aren't already doing so, try putting the back strap (triangle part) at or just under your occipital bone. That should really keep the rift in place without needing to have the straps set really tight. Also, the earphones will have more travel since the side straps will be lower on your head.

I would really recommend "The Climb", "Project Cars", and "Virtual Desktop". The Climb is really great at making a sense of anticipation and urgency for the climbing mechanics. Project cars is a great visual display if you have the hardware to run it. Virtual Desktop is what it is, it creates your desktop view in the VR space so you can launch games/view websites/videos without taking the headset off. I believe if you get them in the Oculus Home store, it will use the Oculus SDK features like Asynchronous Time Warp, where the Steam versions do not.

 

[Canbacon]

Congrats! I am interested to see how the Rift's touch controllers compare to the Vive's. VR is one of the only things I'm really excited about in the computer world right now, and it's fun because we're right on the verge of it getting big...despite the high cost, I'm really enjoying all of the games & experiences coming out & I'm anxious to see what the future holds for the platform!

Probably my one complaint with the Vive is that my current housing situation has no rooms big enough to do a proper room setup. I had to fake out the roomscale stuff to get it to let me past the setup wizard lol. I want to say that an omni treadmill would solve that issue, but with games like Raw Data, I move around & duck & stuff way too much to be confined in something like a Virtuix with a seatbelt (that game is a good workout!).

What I have tried myself is that the touch controllers fell really natural in the hands and are really light. I really like them over the Vive wands.

Also, Oculus has released an update a week ago that allows for more cameras to be added for better tracking in a larger scale.

 

[blurredvision]

If you aren't already doing so, try putting the back strap (triangle part) at or just under your occipital bone. That should really keep the rift in place without needing to have the straps set really tight. Also, the earphones will have more travel since the side straps will be lower on your head.

I would really recommend "The Climb", "Project Cars", and "Virtual Desktop". The Climb is really great at making a sense of anticipation and urgency for the climbing mechanics. Project cars is a great visual display if you have the hardware to run it. Virtual Desktop is what it is, it creates your desktop view in the VR space so you can launch games/view websites/videos without taking the headset off. I believe if you get them in the Oculus Home store, it will use the Oculus SDK features like Asynchronous Time Warp, where the Steam versions do not.

I'll give the fit more of a go tonight, as I was in too much of a hurry to get playing last night. Thanks for the tip.

I saw that Virtual Desktop was $15 on Steam, so I opted to try out the BigScreen Beta instead. Worked well, I just wish one of these would given the option to add more screens, regardless of whether or not I had a monitor for them. I'm of the understanding that Virtual Desktop doesn't provide this option either.

How does The Climb work with the controller? I would think it would lose some luster without proper Touch support, but I'm sure that would be added later.

I had thought about Project Cars but I'm fairly down on sim racers these days. I would love a great arcade racer.

 

[Canbacon]

I'll give the fit more of a go tonight, as I was in too much of a hurry to get playing last night. Thanks for the tip.

I saw that Virtual Desktop was $15 on Steam, so I opted to try out the BigScreen Beta instead. Worked well, I just wish one of these would given the option to add more screens, regardless of whether or not I had a monitor for them. I'm of the understanding that Virtual Desktop doesn't provide this option either.

How does The Climb work with the controller? I would think it would lose some luster without proper Touch support, but I'm sure that would be added later.

I had thought about Project Cars but I'm fairly down on sim racers these days. I would love a great arcade racer.

Yea, Virtual Desktop only displays screens that are being displayed by Windows. I wonder if the developer will add support to the multiple desktops views that you can have in Win10.

The Climb uses the triggers for the climbing actions you need to use. Yes, it definitely is not as immersive with out the Touch controllers, but everything else will suck you in.

If you don't want super sim based driving, DIRT just released last week on Oculus Home. The DIRT line of rally games are sudo-sim levels of realism.

I really do wish that Oculus puts in a timed demo system into Home. It would really make the big purchases a lot easier to justify if we could try out the setup/nausea factor before we are locked in.

 

[Kaido]

What I have tried myself is that the touch controllers fell really natural in the hands and are really light. I really like them over the Vive wands.

Also, Oculus has released an update a week ago that allows for more cameras to be added for better tracking in a larger scale.

My only real complaint about the Vive controllers is the side buttons, because they are awkward to reach & hold. For example, in Raw Data, they have a tap & hold mode for holding stuff like guns & ammo - it's cool because then it feels like you have to hold onto the weapon, but the button placement on the side buttons is so weird that it's not comfortable to hold; I went back to sticky holds, which doesn't feel as natural, but is easier with the controllers.

Although I do like the Vive controllers in general...very lightweight, amazingly accurate tracking, and aside from the side buttons, the layout is actually very good...triggers, touchpad, menu button, etc. They work fantastic in NVIDIA's Funhouse & especially in Tilt Brush.

 

[Aikouka]

I saw that Virtual Desktop was $15 on Steam, so I opted to try out the BigScreen Beta instead. Worked well, I just wish one of these would given the option to add more screens, regardless of whether or not I had a monitor for them. I'm of the understanding that Virtual Desktop doesn't provide this option either.

You can buy a screen-faking dongle off Amazon for about $15-25 (e.g. fit-Headless). The only bad part is that it also adds an invisible screen to normal Windows use... unless you unplug it whenever you're using the normal desktop. I use one of these to combat a bug in Windows 8 and higher that makes your desktop turn black whenever you remote in while all monitors are deemed inactive (only an issue with HDMI and DisplayPort, not DVI).

 

[Kaido]

You can buy a screen-faking dongle off Amazon for about $15-25 (e.g. fit-Headless). The only bad part is that it also adds an invisible screen to normal Windows use... unless you unplug it whenever you're using the normal desktop. I use one of these to combat a bug in Windows 8 and higher that makes your desktop turn black whenever you remote in while all monitors are deemed inactive (only an issue with HDMI and DisplayPort, not DVI).

I hope they can figure it out for multiple remote desktops. Or else use something like DisplayFusion, which can split a regular monitor into virtual monitors (zoned displays), on a virtual 4K (or great) resolution monitor. Something like an NVIDIA GRID card could be promising as well...

 

[ImpulsE69]

Yea, Virtual Desktop only displays screens that are being displayed by Windows. I wonder if the developer will add support to the multiple desktops views that you can have in Win10.

The Climb uses the triggers for the climbing actions you need to use. Yes, it definitely is not as immersive with out the Touch controllers, but everything else will suck you in.

If you don't want super sim based driving, DIRT just released last week on Oculus Home. The DIRT line of rally games are sudo-sim levels of realism.

I really do wish that Oculus puts in a timed demo system into Home. It would really make the big purchases a lot easier to justify if we could try out the setup/nausea factor before we are locked in.

They can, but no one is doing it. Hard to give demos when the length of your thing is anything from 5 minutes to 3hours.

The ones that do are on Steam.

 

[funks]

Anybody got some sort of jittery tracking issues with the rift? I'm about 7 feet away from the sensor and when I look at the menu's ( eq. Project cars ). Looks as if I'm moving my head forward / backward an inch or two. I wonder if the rift just can't track as well as the Vive the farther you are from the sensor.

Looks like Dirt Rally launched from Steam also works with the Rift now, it's odd that it gives me the VR head ache a lot faster than Project cars.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

 

[ImpulsE69]

I wonder if the rift just can't track as well as the Vive the farther you are from the sensor.

It can't. Ideally you are supposed to be about 3 feet from it, but it is good up to 5-6 feet, you might be getting a bit out of its optimum range. I have heard if you mount it facing down from above it gets better range, but I haven't tried it.

 

[ViRGE]

I didn't have the problem again after that but I didn't play much after that either. Others suggested that the sensor was pretty picky about what USB ports it liked, so hopefully it's not an issue with that. I'm hoping I won't see it happen again.

So I've got my fingers crossed for no more sensor issues but other than that, I'm glad I bought this thing. I do look forward to the touch controllers later this year, as that should enable all kinds of awesome stuff at that point.

I've heard the same thing. For what it's worth I ended up buying Oculus's recommended USB 3.0 card since my board didn't have any native Intel 3.0 ports, and it has been problem-free. So if you're plugging into third party controllers, that may be an/the issue.

 

[blurredvision]

I've heard the same thing. For what it's worth I ended up buying Oculus's recommended USB 3.0 card since my board didn't have any native Intel 3.0 ports, and it has been problem-free. So if you're plugging into third party controllers, that may be an/the issue.

I'm using the USB 3.0 ports on my motherboard, but it's a 3-year old motherboard so maybe they're aging. Nonetheless, I'll be playing some more tonight so we'll see if it happens again.

If you aren't already doing so, try putting the back strap (triangle part) at or just under your occipital bone. That should really keep the rift in place without needing to have the straps set really tight. Also, the earphones will have more travel since the side straps will be lower on your head.

This did it. I simply didn't follow the instructions during the setup when it said to completely loosen the top strap. Once I loosened it all the way and put the triangle part on the back of my skull, the fit was immediately better and the ear pieces fit right over my ear. I'm set with the fit.

 

[Mutilator]

FYI my 6mm VRcovers came today - they shipped yesterday from Savannah, GA not from Thailand like I was expecting. Not gonna complain about 1 day shipping.

 

[blurredvision]

So my fit is now good. I haven't had the sensor issues again yet since I turned off power management of the sensor in the device manager. However, this afternoon my remote isn't behaving right. The middle-click is intermittently working. It will stop working completely and won't work again until what seems the HMD goes into standby and then I put it back on. All the while, every other button on the remote works fine.

Something else to keep an eye on.

EDIT: Turns out I'm a complete sucker for these living diorama scenes. Examples are the satellite view in Farlands or the level selector screen in Lucky's Tale. Everything single time I'm at these screens, I spend way too much time leaning in and looking around. So awesome.

 

[Kaido]

I played two games briefly over the weekend:

1. Final Approach: ($25) This is basically Flight Control for iOS, but in 3D VR instead of 2D. The idea is that you draw a flight path for airplanes to land. If you draw the turns too sharp, they can crash. More & more airplanes show up, so you have to manage the traffic pattern so they don't run into each other. VR takes it to the next level by adding stuff like engine fires, helicopters that need to relocate crates, etc. If you ever flew toy airplanes around as a kid, this is that imagination game brought to life, really fun!

You can also zoom in on the map to do things like use an air horn to scare birds off the runway & use a firehose to put out engine fires on airplanes. Plus the narrator is snarky & makes fun of you when you crash airplanes & blow stuff up, which adds to the fun. I played one other level where there's a bunch of aircraft carriers being attacked by UFO's - they shoot at your jets & beam people off the flight deck, so you have to have your jets chase & shoot them, guide choppers in with ammunition supplies, and zoom down to the deck to fire the guns at the flying saucers.

As with everything in VR, it's a pricey game but it's really, really cool to play. Plus you can squat down & look at the intricate detail of each little model on the runway, which is just nuts. It gets pretty crazy when you have a half a dozen airplanes all trying to land, another few wanting to take off, a chopper with an engine fire, and birds on the runway needing to be scared off

http://store.steampowered.com/app/380670/

2. Audioshield: ($20) This is basically 3D Guitar Hero, but instead of playing an instrument, you have shields to punch musical notes. It reminds me a lot of the last fight scene in the final Matrix movie with the flying squid robots. It's actually really fun & a great workout! If you like rhythm games, this is a must:

http://store.steampowered.com/app/412740/

As it turns out, VR cardio is actually a legit way to exercise. One Vive owner did some testing; there's a summary here:

http://uploadvr.com/best-htc-vive-games-excercise/

More details here:

https://www.facebook.com/notes/aaro...paring-heart-rate-per-minute/1066866030056285

He measured BPM & calories burned per hour using VR games with & without weights:

Audioshield w/o weights – 96.75 bpm – 413 calories/hr
Audioshield w weights 118.2 bpm – 610 calories/hr
Hover Junkers w/o weights – 105 bpm – 487 calories/hr
Holopoint w/o weights – 168 bpm – 764 calories/hr
Thrill of the Fight w weights – 144 bpm – 851 calories/hr
Spell Fighter w/o weights – 86 bpm – 314 calories/hr
Orc Hunter w/o weights – 105 bpm – 500 calories/hr
Quiver Aplha w/o weights – 87 bpm – 322 calories/hr

In more detail:

To put that into perspective, the common consensus in the fitness community is that running a mile burns between 100-150 calories on average. This means that by some estimates playing Audioshield for an hour, even without weights, is equivalent to running about four miles in terms of burned calories.

The clear winner in this experiment is clearly Thrill of The Fight. This VR boxing experience burned a whopping 851 calories in an hour and rocketed Stanton’s heart rate up to 144 bpm. Again, to add some perspective, a well trained sprinter’s maximum heart rate is around 168 beats per minute and they will usually hit 90 percent of that when going all out.

He used a weighted vest:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B015EUKKIW

As well as ankle & wrist weights:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00V1WGGQS

Just based on Audioshield, it seems that wearing weights can add a couple hundred extra calories to the total burned per hour, as well as raise your BPM by about 20. I've started using my Training Mask (air intake-limiting device) with my VirZoom bike & it really wipes you out quick haha. This is pretty fun...I like the concept of "Augmented Exercise" :thumbsup:

 

[Kaido]

Tried out a couple more games:

1. Hover Junkers: ($35) I only really got to play the shooting range demo. This game is a bit more on the cartoony side than hyper-realistic. Also, the bigger the room, the better. The guns are surprisingly crappy in terms of accuracy, which I'd imagine would make multi-player fun because you're not going to get perfect shots every time unless you get a gun that only shoots like one bullet at a time. I tried jumping into a full game but it was too confusing to get started without going through a tutorial. I've been a bit short on free time at home, so I jumped into another game so I could get a taste of something new, but will revisit this one over the weekend.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/380220/

2. Pool Nation VR: ($20) Saw a video of this & it looked pretty cool, even though I'm not a big fan of pool IRL. For starters, I'll complain about the graphics...after being spoiled by NVIDIA's Funhouse, I was a bit disappointed that the graphics were more on the cartoony side than the ultra-realistic side. They have Sim's-style people chilling around the pool hall, which kind of detracts from the visuals because the rest of the stuff looks better, but I guess it's better than playing in an empty hall. That's really my only complaint tho, with Funhouse being out I kind of expect everything else to look equally as awesome

The pool physics are great & they have some noob helpers like a laser dot for aiming & stuff. The stick aiming system is surprisingly good & easy to pick up right away. You can also throw darts (again, with Funhouse, the graphics & physics are just the next level) & do stuff like break glass bottles. I don't know if this is really worth $20, if you like pool & don't have a pool table then definitely, because the physics are really good on the table & the sounds are good, but I'd like to see them amp up the quality of the graphics just a wee bit (not that they're bad, again, just spoiled by NVIDIA!)

http://store.steampowered.com/app/269170/

I moved my VR setup into another room, what a pain lol...ATX tower, monitor, keyboard, mouse, etc. Quick recap, I got lucky & had a friend who is traveling & was able to borrow their GTX980 Ti setup for the next few months, which gives me some time to save up for an upcoming GTX1070 laptop. Definitely looking forward to a more compact setup for mobility! Anyway, I took a chunk of my PC budget & finally ordered the Subpac, as well as a pair of the 3-pound wrist weights for Audioshield & boxing in the Thrill of the Fight for some added calorie-burning. Augmented Exercise FTW! Definitely looking forward to firing up the subwoofer vest with Audioshield & also seeing how it fares with stuff like Lord of Tanks on the VirZoom. Along with my training mask, I am going to look like a complete tool on my VR bike

 

[Kaido]

Tried 2 more games:

1. Holopoint: ($15) Must-have VR game imo. REALLY fun. It's basically an archery game that gets harder as you progress. One of the best workouts I've had...really glad I ordered a waterproof cover as this will make you work up a sweat! It starts out with simple target boxes, then the boxes shoot at you when you hit them, so you have to duck. The music is excellent. You really start jumping around like crazy as they add more elements!

http://store.steampowered.com/app/457960/

2. The Lab: (free) A bunch of mini sampler games from the makers of Portal. My favorite was the archery one (shooting arrows is surprisingly fun in VR!), it was a lot of fun! The human body one with the skeleton was actually really cool too, it's exactly how a hologram would look if they ever invented one, I wish it was more immersive! It was fun poking my head through a ribcage & seeing the body in basically full-scale. I wish they had taught biology & physiology class with VR, it would have made it so much more fun! It'd be amazing to apply this technology to doctor visits too. Oh & the magic hut was pretty cool, make sure to stick it out until the end!

http://store.steampowered.com/app/450390/

I've blown a pretty good chunk of my laptop budget on accessories & games. So far, I would say that the best investments have been the VirZoom bike (makes exercise fun) & Holopoint (REALLY fun, especially once you get into it & start going up in levels, & also good exercise!). I'm also really enjoying TiltBrush, which was included free with the Vive (I definitely would buy it separately if I had to), but I come from an artsy background & can doodle for hours, so if you're a sketcher you should absolutely try that out ASAP!

I still have a ton of games on my list to try. I am patiently awaiting for an awesomely immersive story-game experience like Half-Life. I think Raw Data is going to get there eventually (it's in the Early Access phase right now). I enjoyed Adventure Time on my GearVR quite a bit, one of the best demos of VR for controller gaming imo, but sadly it was only a few short levels. Extremely well-done though. I think VR is going to bring some really killer gaming experiences in the future.

I am curious about VR movement. Teleportation works perfectly because it doesn't make you sick, but I'd really like some method of locomotion. Virtuix's omni-treadmill looks fantastic, but for stuff like Holopoint, I don't think it'd work because you need to squat, dodge, duck, etc. & you'd be stuck in a seatbelt inside of a ring on a stationary platform with the Virtuix. Although they even have legacy games like some of the old Star Wars ones working with WASD support & no sim-sickness:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybExYMIxwDM

Being critical of the platform, I can easily see how we could use a 4K & 8K boost. The quality of the graphics mask the pixels for the most part, unless you're looking for them, but it is a limiting factor in some cases. 4K VR will be a big step up, I think. I also notice the Fresnel lens rings at times, you have to make sure you're properly oriented with the headset. A redditor is working on a a calibration app that involves IPD:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Vive/comments/4g7ggi/ipd_and_vive_placement_test_app/

Overall, despite the horrifically high price (initial & ongoing lol), this is the most fun I've had with a tech product in ages. I don't recommend buying it now unless you're okay with (1) investing a large sum of money, (2) living with not everything being perfect, and (3) not having access to a truckload of extended content just yet. It's really good, but it's still definitely early-adopter stuff. Assuming PSVR doesn't screw things up by turning everyone off to VR (lots of negative reviews about the early-access hardware), then I think things will start to take off over the next couple of years.

I can see hardware investments being HUGE for the VR platform: airplane sims, car racing sims, bicycling (Virzoom station & there's talk of an upcoming recumbent model), omni-treadmills, rowers, and other stuff people haven't even thought of yet. I initially got it for gaming, but the primary use now is exercise...between VirZoom & Holopoint, every single cardio session has been FUN FUN FUN! I no longer loathe exercising lol. And I still have plenty of games to look forward to like Rec Room, Thrill of the Fight, etc.

I couldn't imagine using VR on a Rift with just a controller. I have that setup on my GearVR & it's a lot of fun, but the combination of Roomscale & VR controllers on the Vive just makes it sooooo much more immersive. The Rift will get a huge boost once they come out with their own VR controllers; hopefully game designers will make sure that all future games are both Rift & Vive-compatible.

It's fun having something to look forward to in tech again!

 

[Kaido]

Thiiiiiiiiiiiiiis would be fun in VR!

https://i.imgur.com/IOvxAPm.gifv

From Pillowcastle Games - "Museum of Simulation Technology":

http://www.pillowcastlegames.com/

Antichamber would be fun in VR as well:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0qMiPxVLVI

I wonder how many games they'll end up porting in combination with either omni-treadmills or additional control mechanisms to combat sim-sickness...

 

[Aikouka]

Keep in mind that you don't just have to play games through Steam. For example, I think the Budget Cuts demo is external to Steam, and if you want to play MineCraft in VR, that's external to Steam too.

 

[Michael]

My Vive arrived yesterday. I had a meeting in the uploadvr offices last week (for something else) and finally was able to try VR out. New video card should arrive today.

I actually am more interested in how it will change the standard computer desktop experience over time than I am games and such. I use three screens today and they take up a lot of desk space. I am hoping that VR will be able, eventually, to seemlessly replace them.

Michael

 

[Kaido]

Keep in mind that you don't just have to play games through Steam. For example, I think the Budget Cuts demo is external to Steam, and if you want to play MineCraft in VR, that's external to Steam too.

Oh nice! Budget Cuts is on my list this week, that looks awesome!

Really excited to get some AAA-quality games on this thing...I'd love to play like a chapter a day of Half-Life, you know?

 

[Kaido]

My Vive arrived yesterday. I had a meeting in the uploadvr offices last week (for something else) and finally was able to try VR out. New video card should arrive today.

I actually am more interested in how it will change the standard computer desktop experience over time than I am games and such. I use three screens today and they take up a lot of desk space. I am hoping that VR will be able, eventually, to seemlessly replace them.

Michael

I agree. There are a couple virtual desktop apps that I know of. Would love to see (1) multiple RDP windows, and (2) higher-res screens. Right now the Vive's resolution just isn't really there for spending a lot of time doing things like reading text on a virtual monitor, but it might be usable at the 4K level, and the devs said 8K will be where it's at. So, a few more years until it gets really good, but it's exciting to see the brink of it now!

Again I can't remember the name of the book series, maybe it was Clancy's Net Force Teen or something, but it had a really fun way of describing VR, because people would sit in a chair & plug their heads into the system to go into VR, so the graphics were uber high-quality. You'd show up in your homeroom & have things like an email message indicator floating above you to the right, with the number of messages listed & doing a little dance & light blink to get your attention, that you could reach up & grab to check messages. I've noticed some VR game's menu system are more intuitive than others.

I think eventually we'll probably have something like gloves with motors in them. The Vive's VR controllers work surprisingly well with the haptic feedback, and Leap Motion's controller is amazingly accurate with finger detection, so being able to integrate your hands into the mix would be super awesome! So many possibilities for this platform & for the future as the tech gets better!