Virtual Reality
Re: Virtual Reality
The Design of the Portal Locomotion - https://medium.com/neat-corp/the-design ... .katkx1ca3
Re: Virtual Reality
The Comeback of the Immersive Sim - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbyTOAlhRHk
The video includes a quote from Marc LeBlanc who said that Looking Glass approached VR from a software angle. But as Warren Spector mentioned in the Twitch stream in the System Shock thread, even as far back as System Shock, they were running the games on VR headsets.
There's a lot more that can be said about this fascinating branch of gaming. We've barely even begun to see its full potential.
The video includes a quote from Marc LeBlanc who said that Looking Glass approached VR from a software angle. But as Warren Spector mentioned in the Twitch stream in the System Shock thread, even as far back as System Shock, they were running the games on VR headsets.
There's a lot more that can be said about this fascinating branch of gaming. We've barely even begun to see its full potential.
Re: Virtual Reality
Playstation VR Worlds offers some interesting examples of VR. Now if you thought that the havoc Gordon Freeman inflicted upon his friends by detached players was bad, the equivalent situation in a VR, motion-controlled game is even worse. In the decade since, it's a problem that developers have largely ignored, as an incorrigible player is effectively dead and may as well not exist as far as the game is concerned. All the in-game characters see is his phantom. But therein lied the brilliance of Deus Ex. Rather than ignoring the players who pushed against the bounds of the simulation, it would bend and resist before springing back into place. Never breaking. It's unfortunate that this design is so scarce today.
But with a new generation of VR explorers pushing the simulation limits again, I wonder how long it will be before studios start applying this design to VR headset games. It seems practically essential that the two be joined.
I bring it up because The London Heist is so dreadfully narrative-heavy, and all I want to do is see what's possible for me to do in this world. It's not much, unfortunately. NPCs act as if they've got you spellbound, when in reality there's nothing in the world less interesting than what these gangsters are going on about. And they're far too easily exposed as animatronic. It's very much in line with what Looking Glass discovered with Ultima Underworld. NPC interaction is the weakest link (so for all the hatred Summer Lesson gets online, NPC interaction games like it are still critical steps toward the future).
Which is why you then have experiences like Ocean Descent, which remove NPC interaction altogether. You don't even have any hands (an interesting design decision perhaps intended to keep players from trying to punch the shark)! And yet, despite this drastically reduced interaction, it's more compelling than The London Heist (unless you just really love shooting guns). The advantage is that in your underwater cage, you're immersed in wonder all around you. And what else do you want to do? Shoot the fish? Talk to the operator? It's amusement park design, yes, but the kind that makes the Jaws ride at Universal Studios look pathetic in comparison.
But with a new generation of VR explorers pushing the simulation limits again, I wonder how long it will be before studios start applying this design to VR headset games. It seems practically essential that the two be joined.
I bring it up because The London Heist is so dreadfully narrative-heavy, and all I want to do is see what's possible for me to do in this world. It's not much, unfortunately. NPCs act as if they've got you spellbound, when in reality there's nothing in the world less interesting than what these gangsters are going on about. And they're far too easily exposed as animatronic. It's very much in line with what Looking Glass discovered with Ultima Underworld. NPC interaction is the weakest link (so for all the hatred Summer Lesson gets online, NPC interaction games like it are still critical steps toward the future).
Which is why you then have experiences like Ocean Descent, which remove NPC interaction altogether. You don't even have any hands (an interesting design decision perhaps intended to keep players from trying to punch the shark)! And yet, despite this drastically reduced interaction, it's more compelling than The London Heist (unless you just really love shooting guns). The advantage is that in your underwater cage, you're immersed in wonder all around you. And what else do you want to do? Shoot the fish? Talk to the operator? It's amusement park design, yes, but the kind that makes the Jaws ride at Universal Studios look pathetic in comparison.
Re: Virtual Reality
https://uploadvr.com/skyrim-vr-makes-el ... eel-fresh/
Still, VR developers could do with a little more madness.
http://disq.us/p/1o56w3nDavid Jagneaux wrote: While a lot of people would argue that a game needs to be built from the ground up for VR in order to truly excel, Skyrim VR defies that logic
It wasn't made for virtual reality headsets, sure, however, its genre has always been VR RPG, tracing its roots all the way back to Ultima Underworld, whose immediate successor, System Shock, actually did run in a VR headset. If anything about Skyrim VR seems to defy logic, it's because our confusion of genres and ignorance of history make it impossible to understand. When developers talk about the madness of porting to VR, they tend not to be talking about VR RPGs. Rather they mean an FPS. Or a Nintendo title or something.MrLonghair wrote: Skyrim felt stale in 2011 to me, but Skyrim VR puts the VR in VR and feels like it was made for the format.
Still, VR developers could do with a little more madness.