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A Third of Valve Is Now Working on VR

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Re: A Third of Valve Is Now Working on VR

#121

Post by burkaman »

AJ007 wrote: post #112
burkaman wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's clearly not ready for anything like the adoption levels of consoles, but people who own VR products definitely use them. It's too expensive, too low resolution, and too clunky to conquer the world yet, but it's an excellent first generation. What you're describing sounds more like AR to me. Everyone I know who bought Google Glass showed it off to their friends and then never used it again. I know AR has…

The interesting thing is consoles aren't even the "big" market for games, mobile is. VR could hop past the console market size pretty quickly - though I suspect general media consumption may surpass the game use. (Gaming may win from a $ standpoint.) Magic Leap is certainly promising, and a more plausible iteration of mass AR than Google Glass. The final form factor on that isn't clear. I had the Dk1 and Dk2, and the…

Well I would call DK1 and 2 more of the 0th generation. The Vive is good enough for regular use, and from what I hear the released Rift is too.

Motion sickness I think will become less of a problem as developers get better, and people just get used to VR. You don't have to be superhuman to have no problem with the current headsets.

And yes, for entertainment, people want fully immersive media. Not for all applications, but it has high appeal for games and other pure entertainment.

> I don't have time for the game stuff.

Well, ok. I guess an xbox would end up in your closet too, then.

Re: A Third of Valve Is Now Working on VR

#122

Post by intrasight »

sergiosgc wrote: post #113
intrasight wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As was the case with early personal computers - until some "killer apps" arrived. For businesses, the killer app was Lotus 1-2-3 and/or WordPerfect. Rest assured that some clever young things are actively working on the killer apps for VR headsets. I assume there will be at least one, and I assume that it won't be a FPS game.

I see two avenues for great VR games: 1) Cockpit based games. Flying a plane, or spaceship, in VR is immensely better than on a screen. I get nauseous in car racing games but, my friends who do not, rate them as best simulated driving experience ever. 2) Room scale games. Here, I have no idea wich ones. It is a complete green field in terms of gaming. There are some great concepts, like Fantastic Contraption or the "…

I totally agree about "room scale games". Has add-on benefits of getting out of the house and getting some exercise. Here's my idea (shh - don't tell anyone). Buy an abandoned roller skating rink and transform it into a VR game space. Of course this assume that some other entity will create one or more compelling games to be played in your space.

Re: A Third of Valve Is Now Working on VR

#124

Post by loudmax »

partiallypro wrote: post #94

In all of my experiencing of the new VR products, I am firmly in the position that it's not ready for public consumption yet and won't be for quite some time. The only real reason it's being pushed hard is because people have a fear of missing out. Meanwhile, if I were a company I'd be focusing on AR, because at least there you can push for enterprise customers which won't need the full immersion yet that a general c…

John Carmack had an interesting take on AR. His feeling is that AR is a more difficult problem to solve, and for artificial objects to blend nicely with reality you'll probably need to redraw the entire field of vision anyway. By this reasoning, VR is a necessary first step along the way to the development of AR.

Re: A Third of Valve Is Now Working on VR

#125

Post by abelhabel »

flatline wrote: post #116
partiallypro wrote: post #94

In all of my experiencing of the new VR products, I am firmly in the position that it's not ready for public consumption yet and won't be for quite some time. The only real reason it's being pushed hard is because people have a fear of missing out. Meanwhile, if I were a company I'd be focusing on AR, because at least there you can push for enterprise customers which won't need the full immersion yet that a general c…

VR fundamentally conflicts with how the eyes focus, and it will never be solved with the current technology. For some people it's not a big problem, but a sizeable portion of the population will be unable to use VR at all or for any extended period without ending up with eye strain, headaches, nausea, and/or a general sense of malaise. It will always be something of a niche technology IMO - very cool, but of limited…

In addition to this I think an inherent problem with occulus rift and similar technology is that as humans in the real world our vision is connected with our body. When we move our head, focus and so on we also use the rest of our body. A visual experience is not just visual but a full sensory experience with visual focus. Occulus rift, then, for example, only works with your eyes and so gives you a disconnected experience.

The VR technology tries to eliminate any real world point of reference which makes us use reference points inside the VR which, I believe, is one reason the experience for us gets disconnected.

The most common symptom of this is that you get nauseous. My guess is that the (sensory) disconnected experience makes us lose balance.

What would solve this problem, I think, is to make the VR work with the whole body. So wearing a suit with goggles and standing on a plate that moves as you move which gets translated to in-game movement.

Re: A Third of Valve Is Now Working on VR

#126

Post by whatever_dude »

dyeje wrote: post #119
whatever_dude wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree with that. I played (and finished) HL2 in VR and while it was more of a prototype (e.g. loading screens were static) it already proved modern(ish) FPS games are not the best application of VR. Too many kinks of the genre do not translate well, while other features of VR are left unexplored. For that matter, racing or space exploration games (where the protagonist is seated) translate way better. So I think…

I don't think it's fair to judge the potential of VR FPS games based on playing a game that's over a decade old and was in no way designed for VR.

But that's my point. It is still a good indication of what a modern FPS is, and of what HL3 would be. I don't see them changing the game radically to be a "native" VR title, which is what VR needs (and which may not even be what we call a FPS anymore).

Re: A Third of Valve Is Now Working on VR

#127

Post by dyeje »

whatever_dude wrote: post #126
dyeje wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's fair to judge the potential of VR FPS games based on playing a game that's over a decade old and was in no way designed for VR.

But that's my point. It is still a good indication of what a modern FPS is, and of what HL3 would be. I don't see them changing the game radically to be a "native" VR title, which is what VR needs (and which may not even be what we call a FPS anymore).

I agree, if HL3 is going to be one of the killer apps for VR then it will be radically different. I think Valve have the resources to pull it off, and I suppose we'll see what path they take.

Re: A Third of Valve Is Now Working on VR

#128

Post by augustt »

abelhabel wrote: post #125
flatline wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

VR fundamentally conflicts with how the eyes focus, and it will never be solved with the current technology. For some people it's not a big problem, but a sizeable portion of the population will be unable to use VR at all or for any extended period without ending up with eye strain, headaches, nausea, and/or a general sense of malaise. It will always be something of a niche technology IMO - very cool, but of limited…

In addition to this I think an inherent problem with occulus rift and similar technology is that as humans in the real world our vision is connected with our body. When we move our head, focus and so on we also use the rest of our body. A visual experience is not just visual but a full sensory experience with visual focus. Occulus rift, then, for example, only works with your eyes and so gives you a disconnected expe…

Vive has partially solved this problem with room scale - moving your goggles also moves your perspective in game.

Re: A Third of Valve Is Now Working on VR

#129

Post by zelias »

ungzd wrote: post #114
blastofpast wrote: post #110

I wish Valve was publicly traded so that I can invest.

Invest in Clash of Clans, not this nostalgic shooter company. New generation never played such quakey games. Even Valve already knows that Half-life and so on has commercial value comparable to Nethack and is building new click-to-pay free-to-play mobile-first responsive disruptive VR-first AI-first isomorphic madness. http://www.theverge.com/2016/6/21/11986712/tencent-supercell...

Valve would be a fantastic investment. Steam is essentially the app store for PC gamers -- which is an extremely dedicated (albeit smaller) userbase that consistently spends money buying and installing new games that come out on the platform (unlike actual mobile apps, installations of which are on the decline).

Re: A Third of Valve Is Now Working on VR

#130

Post by deelowe »

abelhabel wrote: post #125
flatline wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

VR fundamentally conflicts with how the eyes focus, and it will never be solved with the current technology. For some people it's not a big problem, but a sizeable portion of the population will be unable to use VR at all or for any extended period without ending up with eye strain, headaches, nausea, and/or a general sense of malaise. It will always be something of a niche technology IMO - very cool, but of limited…

In addition to this I think an inherent problem with occulus rift and similar technology is that as humans in the real world our vision is connected with our body. When we move our head, focus and so on we also use the rest of our body. A visual experience is not just visual but a full sensory experience with visual focus. Occulus rift, then, for example, only works with your eyes and so gives you a disconnected expe…

Actually, as the OP states, the issue is with focal distance.

The military has been using AR/VR in heads up displays for decades now and have had to work around these issues. When a user is forced to focus on a 2d projection of a 3d field, it creates all the issues people have with VR including: vertigo, nausea, eye strain, anxiety, and malaise. Motion exasperates the issue.

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