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I Spent Hundreds of Hours Working in VR

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Re: I Spent Hundreds of Hours Working in VR

#131

Post by fuzzy2 »

randomhodler84 wrote: post #80

I wanted to love VR. I dreamed of having a headset when I was younger and kickedstarted the oculus rift. I imagined a million worlds that would be within virtual reach. It would be the coolest! VR has been nothing but a complete disappointment to me. Motion Sickness, headaches, sweaty headsets and detachment. Never played a VR game that wasn’t better without it, somewhat like 3D movies. I have my doubts this will eve…

One thing that just occurred to me: Maybe the headset was not correctly positioned in front of your eyes or the interpupillary distance was not set up correctly. If these are not perfect (but good enough) you can still get depth perception and immersion but the fatigue will increase a lot.

Also, the headset must basically be “glued to your face”, so it does not sway when moving the head. A high-performance PC is also very important, every FPS drop will induce nausea.

I can play HL Alyx for hours on end but still get dizzy when I become dehydrated or hungry. I only have first-hand experience with an HTC Vive (1st gen) though, which uses room-scale laser tracking. I also only ever played room-scale.

Re: I Spent Hundreds of Hours Working in VR

#132

Post by drusepth »

BaconPackets wrote: post #6

This is such a strange article. It doesn't present anything or explain how a VR workstation can actually work. Has anyone actually worked this way? I spent about an hour with a Vive headset and it was the most obnoxious experience I ever had. The lack of feedback, the requirements of a large room free of obstacle, the awful screen door effect, the poor precision from the dual wands. Overall, I was exhausted after jus…

I've worked 8+ hour days in VR for weeks/months at a time over the years on an original Vive. There are a ton of benefits over traditional monitors (physical space, infinite monitors, text/output scaling, more interesting work environments, isolation from distractions, etc), but there are also some sizable drawbacks too (resolution, battery life, mad thirst, being unaware of your surroundings, etc). I imagine a lot of those tradeoffs have improved in newer headsets, but I definitely enjoy working in VR over just sitting in an office 90% of the time. FWIW I sit, use the wireless adapter, and just touch-type on a real keyboard though; I definitely don't try to type with wands on virtual keyboards!

Re: I Spent Hundreds of Hours Working in VR

#133

Post by dale_glass »

randomhodler84 wrote: post #121
dale_glass wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, in that case you've got to make adjustments to your setup (wrong IPD maybe?), or you could just be unlucky and get sick far too easily. Consumer VR of course involves a disconnect between what you feel and what you see, and that makes people sick when it gets bad enough, but most people can enjoy at least some VR experiences. By my account, I've managed to spend days of real time within Subnautica exclusively i…

“Far too easily?” You Sir are being rude, and I feel like you are trying to justify your VR experiences to yourself. However If you enjoy it, that’s all that matters.

Well, I apologize if it came off as rude, wasn't the intention.

I was just trying to say that different people have different amounts of tolerance for VR, and it could just be that your isn't that high for whatever reason. Nothing wrong with that, but that it doesn't work for you specifically doesn't really mean much for VR as a technology.

Re: I Spent Hundreds of Hours Working in VR

#134

Post by noduerme »

4monthsaway wrote: post #128

It's such an exciting new wave of technology, I just wish it wasn't being spearheaded by Facebook. On the other hand, I can't wait to see how they further corrupt humanity with yet another tool in their pocket

I second this. Huge Neal Stephenson fan. I remember trying VR with a huge bulky headset in the Air and Space Museum in DC when I was 8 year old, back in the 80s. I bought an Oculus Rift when it first came out and really fell in love with it. But I am vehemently, violently anti-Facebook and social media in general, and refuse to have an account. To be locked out of the Rift for awhile just because of that... what a terrible play on their part. They're basically a trash/spam organization focused on spreading fear and conspiracy garbage among demented old people like my 80-year-old father, who should just be left alone, not manipulated into a state of rage and hysteria every day by his news feed. Zuckerberg is the world's biggest POS, and I say this as a similarly aged son of a Jewish lawyer, as opposed to a POS dentist. Zuck's not even a fucking dentist. And he has less than no right to try to claim the Metaverse.

Apple, at least, is smart enough not to try to claim the technology. But I'm sure in the next few years they'll try to wall off their own garden in VR/AR.

Neal's whole idea in Snow Crash, although it wasn't explicitly stated, was that the heavy processing was happening client-side, so different clients saw different things (a vague semi-transparent blob on a cheap headset would be delicately curling smoke rings on an expensive one) and it was easily degradable based on connection speed, and the protocol was essentially open source, and infrastructure was distributed enough that there were no vertical monopolies operating in that space unlike the rest of Snow Crash where pretty much everything from the franchise restaurant to the police force protecting it were vertically organized. So any attempt to vertically create a metaverse within a particular stack or corporate ecosystem is likely bound to fail, and VR as a popular technology will track with that until someone builds a portal-to-portals. I'd put my money on a new startup if it ever were to happen, because they could at least build something platform agnostic.

Re: I Spent Hundreds of Hours Working in VR

#135

Post by idontwantthis »

dendriti wrote: post #86
blazespin wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah in the end, this may be the only killer app for VR. Replacing multiple monitors. Think about all the space multiple monitor desk environments takes up in the real, and how little space a VR replacement takes up via the virtual. The other cool thing is the separation between home and work. Once the headset is off, work is done. That separation is actually very important, and ironically it's actually the worst thi…

For now, and I think for the next several years at least, if you can afford to purchase and drive a headset which comfortably replaces multiple monitors, you likely already have the space and resources to use multiple monitors already. I spared no expense on a fully kitted-out home office and didn't spend anywhere near $100k USD.

It’s $420 for headset and 1 year subscription. You can’t buy 5 comparable monitors for that price. Or 3 like I use.

Re: I Spent Hundreds of Hours Working in VR

#136

Post by jcun4128 »

mojzu wrote: post #110
randomhodler84 wrote: post #80

I wanted to love VR. I dreamed of having a headset when I was younger and kickedstarted the oculus rift. I imagined a million worlds that would be within virtual reach. It would be the coolest! VR has been nothing but a complete disappointment to me. Motion Sickness, headaches, sweaty headsets and detachment. Never played a VR game that wasn’t better without it, somewhat like 3D movies. I have my doubts this will eve…

I've got the Index, there was definitely some acclimatisation required to dampen the motion sickness (especially for free movement) but for the most part I've had a great experience with it. Half-Life Alyx is an incredible game, although I would like to see more narrative/story driven games for VR. There are a lot of arcade games that are fun to pick up now and again (Beat Saber, Robo Recall), and shooters like Pavlo…

Yeah I had the same problem too at first. I could only play about an hour max before I had to stop. Got better over a few weeks then was able to play like 4-6 hrs straight one time.

Re: I Spent Hundreds of Hours Working in VR

#137

Post by Duralias »

> I have Facebook's Oculus strapped to my face

I know many people call their Quest 1 or 2's just "my Oculus", but I didn't expect a large site to do the same, really shows how dumb it was to scrap that name.

It is also a smidge funny that they used both Facebook and Oculus when "Meta" doesn't want you to use either anymore, in the context of VR.

Re: I Spent Hundreds of Hours Working in VR

#138

Post by haalia »

randomhodler84 wrote: post #99
dale_glass wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You've not played the right games, then. I mean, take Robo Recall, which is one of the first things that came out. Sure, you can do a shooting game without VR, but then you don't get the experience of tearing a robot apart with your own hands and punching another's head off with a torn off arm. Or Elite Dangerous is quite the experience in VR too. Less so than Robo Recall, but it works out extremely well if you have…

The tech works extremely well at making me feel sick. I enjoyed subnautica sans VR. ED is less interesting than Euro truck simulator. :-) I get the physical games like table tenis and beat saber, but how is this not a fad? The wii was cool at the time too. Nintendo didn’t retain the ideas in later hardware. VR chat is about as interesting as second life, and any metaverse that follows will follow the same path.

> The tech works extremely well at making me feel sick.

But you realize this is a you problem, right? Outside the handful of people who get motion sick with VR, the tech is rock solid. Everyone who tries an Index is blown away by how immersive the experience is.

> VR chat is about as interesting as second life, and any metaverse that follows will follow the same path.

You couldn't be more wrong. There's a reason Facebook rebranded to Meta, and Microsoft just purchased Activision with designs on their own metaverse. Big players are putting serious money behind this, and I like those odds.

Re: I Spent Hundreds of Hours Working in VR

#139

Post by darrenf »

fastball wrote: post #127
politician wrote: post #104

PSA: You can no longer buy a business-class Oculus Quest 2 from Facebook/Meta. Presumably while sales reworks the product line for Metaverse pricing. If you don’t want a Facebook account for your VR device, the only other option for Immersed looks like a Vive Focus 3.

I'm not sure what you mean by this.

It used to be possible to buy a Quest 2 without the requirement of a Facebook account, but that freedom came at a premium cost.

Re: I Spent Hundreds of Hours Working in VR

#140

Post by interstice »

randomhodler84 wrote: post #121
dale_glass wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, in that case you've got to make adjustments to your setup (wrong IPD maybe?), or you could just be unlucky and get sick far too easily. Consumer VR of course involves a disconnect between what you feel and what you see, and that makes people sick when it gets bad enough, but most people can enjoy at least some VR experiences. By my account, I've managed to spend days of real time within Subnautica exclusively i…

“Far too easily?” You Sir are being rude, and I feel like you are trying to justify your VR experiences to yourself. However If you enjoy it, that’s all that matters.

Perhaps could be phrased as “more easily than other users”? Dropping in as a quest 2 user to add anecdata of not feeling sick in most games or for extended periods of time. I’m not used to moving around smoothly using controllers though, flying a racing drone is kind of similar in being vaguely disturbing to begin with.

Quest 2 sales over the last few weeks would hint this might not be a fad, though.

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