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.