What do you actually want from VR?

The sentiment currently prevailing seems to be that VR/AR is finally happening and that this time it works (whatever that means). I, for one, am giddy with anticipation at finally getting to try it out and, bar wide scale scathing reviews of it at launch, will be looking to buy a Morpheus soon after release (I don't own a PC for gaming so it is the most logical option).

However, something Dan said on the latest bombcast got me thinking... He said that he did not want the VR helmet to just replace the right analog stick. This sentiment has been echoed before by lots of others, with Jeff especially seeming to be of the mindset that he wants games to be tailor made for a VR experience. I.E. Make the games specifically with engagement in VR in mind.

Now I definitely understand this view and would of course love it if developers really thought about how best to use VR to make an experience unlike anything else, but the actual truth is that I would still be more than happy with the helmet simply just being a replacement for the right stick, as it were. This might be down to the fact that I am still yet to try a helmet and therefore am yet to become disillusioned by it, but the idea in my head of simply being fully immersed in these digital worlds fascinates me. I think that very immersion would be enough to change the game bottom end up in itself.

Say for example Bioshock Infinite. Personally I found the gameplay in that game fairly disappointing. The constant movement back and forth between explore scenario to battle scenario to explore scenario to battle scenario etc. got tired quickly for me and eventually forced me to give up some 4/5s of the way through. But one thing I loved about the game was that world. A world that simply could not be created with such clarity of vision in any other medium. For me, if I had the chance to go back and explore that world in VR then I think I could look past its failings as a game.

I understand that control input it something that would need to be looked at if VR is really going to become more than just a fad, but again I think I would be happy (in the short term at least) simply holding my DS4 and using my head to look around. I know this probably makes me seem like I lack a bit of imagination, but the truth is I don't know how comfortable I'm going to be making actual physical gestures like with the Oculus controller while I'm basically cut off from the real world. I know that with time these things will probably be worked out, but for now I see little reason to be worried about whether current control input is going to be sufficient to do VR justice.

But this is just me... Perhaps I'm giving VR as a medium in itself too much respect. Maybe in order for it really to take off it is going to require these tailor made experiences which certain people are asking for. Until I try it, I just won't know. But what do you guys think? What are the experiences you want from it? Would you be happy with simply playing your favourite FPS in VR, or do you want something designed specifically with the tech in mind? I'd be happy to hear any first hand experiences with the tech (whichever company) you may have also!

First and foremost I want VR headsets as an expansion to my experience in racing games, flight games, space games and such. I can imagine VR becoming the default for those kinds of games, at least for the people that are fully invested in them.

When it comes to the more abstract stuff... I'll probably have to try a VR device to make myself a picture of what I might want from it.

For something very specific, I want VR46: The Valentino Rossi Experience. You take this guy:

The GOAT

Make a AAA motorcycle racing game and then combine that with a modern, high quality, full tilt version of this

Motorcycle thing

and a VR headset.

This thing writes itself!

I want to date an anime.

@LunarJetman:

Yeah, surely those are genres that fit perfectly into the VR repertoire as is. None of them would require any form of control more complicated than what you already have at your disposal. I don't even drive a car in real life, but I can really see the attraction of going in on helmet cam while wearing a VR helmet. And no doubt the Elite stuff will be awesome too. But again, I think it just goes to show that those kind of experiences are, for all intents and purposes, already there and working.

@n7:

I think you have a glorious future ahead of you then!

I want haptic feedback.

I want to try it out while I'm waiting between flights at an airport, or on a cruise ship.

@n7: You know whats up.

I am not all that interested in the whole VR thing (honestly, the sensory deprivation idea scares me), but I'll tell you what I don't want them to do; which is try to cram VR functionality into every new game, regardless of whether it actually benefits from it.

Please don't get me wrong, I think it's pretty cool tech, and there are certainly games which would work really well with it, but I hope future devs and publishers see that it's a situational thing, and not something that magically enhances every game.

Also, the way I understand VR tech (which is limited, granted) is that it effectively renders a game twice, once for each eye. So on a more positive note, if they're optimizing games to run steady and stable on two displays at once, surely they can get the regular single-screen version to at least run at a halfway decent resolution and framerate, not?

So to answer the original question, I guess I want VR to ensure that games run well in non-VR :-)

@colony024:

I do get the whole sensory deprivation thing for sure... It does leave you massively vulnerable... But I guess that eventually the tech will become ever more like AR in a way that allows you to circumvent this issue (many years into the future)...

More interestingly, do you think that the time where the concept of a physical screen being obsolete is on the horizon? You would have to imagine that holographic technology is also going to rapidly improve and when it does surely it's only a matter of time before screens (at least in situations where they are simply displaying an image) become unnecessary...

Elite: Dangerous, yo.

experiences that are maybe an hour long, maybe one-off thrill rides, maybe a five or ten hour episodic campaign thing, but to me it seems too uncomfortable a set-up to accommodate the kind of time-sinks we're used to - faffing in menus, dressing your character, reading text, i think the headset will be too draining for a lot of that stuff, and when it comes to that 'oh god i need to relax' game we'll be back to the gamepad and screen like always.

I have yet to experience VR (had a few chances to) but I know I don't want. If you're playing any fast paced action game or shooter that simply replaces right stick with neck movement, I feel that's going to get uncomfortable pretty quickly.

What i want from it is the reaction people seem to get from horror games, i'm not personally capable from seeing games on a monitor as anything more than a craft but the instillation you get from VR your brain can't help but to see it as "real". You don't just see it as real, you feel it as real. I ...experienced, played (?) a, "game" called The Chair on an Oculus Rift DK2 and beyond the sense of everything, "being right there" the two most memorable things i remember from it was flinching from a butterfly that felt like it was coming at my face, and later feeling an actual physical adrenaline rush as the VR world simulated falling from a sky scraper.

The, ,"only the right stick" analog (see what i did there?!) is fine for an experience like that; The equivalent of the, "it's a small world" ride at Disneyland. But if you want to interact with that world then you're going to need an input that makes those interaction less of an abstraction and more of an intuition and i think that's what Oculus is going for with their input devices.

This is also the second thing i want from VR, beyond the headset, i want more of a focus on creating GOOD motion controls. I believe if you can nail motion controls you create on input device that is versatile enough that the software developers themselves have more freedom in creating diverse interactions rather then being confined to an input standard. It's the difference, i believe, between mobile games of the, "key input" era, awkwardly trying to inform the user of it's functionality, and the "blank slate" era where software designers have more control of the interfaces.

I want VR to help flesh out systems that games like L.A. Noire started to implement. Examining a room by actually picking things up and rotating them around.

Other than that I'm not sure, I'm hoping to get pleasantly surprised although I think Hololens is a lot more exciting than VR glasses.

@kmfrob:

Regular monitors disappearing completely? Sure, it might happen one day, but I think that's still a way off. Gaming aside, i just don't see all the people using computers + monitors for professional purposes suddenly switching to headsets and whatnot. Yeah there are areas where it would work great; I'm thinking medical applications, architectural pre-visualisation, 3d modelling to name but a few, but for a lot of "regular" business/office related stuff, it doesn't really add any benefits; word processing, spreadsheets, doing calculations, writing code, etc. don't need to be in 3D or AR.

You are probably right about it going into some AR instead of VR direction though; as cool as the mental image may be, I just can't imagine an office full of clunky full-goggle-wearing future-clerks being a thing haha. But I think the tech first needs to be fully standardised, tried and tested, and mass-produced to the point where it becomes cost-effective and ubiquitous enough, before the professional (office) world will adopt it at large. Also, note that the initial investment of replacing current setups, and outfitting all your employees with this stuff could be prohibitive for a lot of companies. And to top it off, I'd also imagine the strain on one's eyes when wearing a screen up close to your eyes all day long might be a problem for some.

So yeah, I'm sure old tech will be phased out in favour of new tech, but not quite at such a speed that I expect to be doing my work monitor-free anytime soon.

Having said that though, when it comes to recreational purposes, I am genuinely curious to see which way it'll go. Even though I really don't have the urge to play games in VR myself, I do love technology and engineering in general, and it's wonderful to see there are people out there actively working towards having a portable holodeck on the tip of one's nose.

Come to think of it, I am kind of fed up with trains though, so when are we getting a transporter beam?

@colony024:

In terms of use in offices I was thinking maybe more along the lines of holographic technology. In other words the image of a screen is projected into 3D space (think R2-D2 projection in an incredibly high definition), therefore keeping the obvious functionality of a screen while eliminating the cumbersome stationary aspect of it.

Or alternatively, as something perhaps more feasibly close by, foldable/bendable type screens that can be compressed into small sizes and expanded/contracted as needed. I think there's already a fair few companies working on prototypes of this kind of technology using graphene, but I'm not sure how successful they have been with this. They have certainly shown graphene's potential to be folded and molded anyway...

I think ultimately the move will be away from goggles. If not the holo-deck then I'm sure it will eventually be in the form of contact-lens-esque devices or straight up implants. I seriously doubt that in 100 years time we will still be wearing big clunky headsets...

But in terms of the very near future then you're right about how it could be useful for engineering and teaching type applications (AR anyway). I think it's all pretty cool myself.

@kmfrob said:

For things like presentations, demonstrations, or working on location, sure (see me rhymin'). But thing is though, that for a lot (if not most) of office related work, I think there's often actually very little need for displays to be portable or even 3D. Even if you need to show work to colleagues, your boss or clients or something, it's probably more efficient to simply send the relevant data to their own pc/tablet/hololens/whatever, than it is to physically go over to them with your portable display device. And if you're just working alone at your desk, what's the benefit of it being a projection instead of a physical screen? Being able to see your text from a different angle? Sounds like needlessly complicating things to me.

Until these potential holographic projection devices become affordable (as in, at the very least equal to a simple common monitor) while also having a quality which at the very least matches current monitors, I don't think we'll see them in common use anytime soon. I am currently thinking of how many businesses in my own town are still using old hardware (and some cases old-ass obsolete OSs), simply because those still work for their purposes, and replacing it all for the sake of progress is simply not cost-efficient.

Again, in certain areas I think this tech will be massively valuable. But your question was if I thought old fashioned displays becoming wholly obsolete is "on the horizon", which I don't think it is just yet. Just because it's technically achievable doesn't mean it will automatically replace current setups just like that. I know it sounds rather cynical, but money makes the world go 'round, and new tech is simply expensive.

That said, I have no doubt that certain more specialised and niche companies will adopt this, and help to work out all the kinks from the cable so to speak, before it becomes a mainstream thing; Much like how certain car-tech which was developed and advanced in the world of F1 racing has made its way into consumer cars over time.

@colony024:

But could you not just have easily said the same thing about the telephone or PC in general 30 years ago? How much business nowadays (call centre work excepted) is performed at a desk phone? I'm sure some use survives through habit, but I doubt its out of necessity. Same with the idea of moving from a desktop to a laptop... The portable screen is surely just the next logical step on from that?

Say for example you want to do work while outdoors or in some public space? Sure you can use a laptop/tablet/phone etc. but these are things that take up space and weight, whereas portable screens (if taking the moldable route I mentioned before) or holoscreen type technology would in most aspects circumvent this...

But sure you're right, this isn't technology that's coming right round the corner. But I do envisage that it will become common-place within the next 50 to 100 years (if we haven't killed ourselves off already)...

What I want is to go back to some old fav games with VR support and feel really immersed and enjoy those games on a whole different level I want my mind blown.I want to fly a plane in GTA5 in fps mode with freebird playing on the radio flying past sky scrappers looking out the windows in awe.Now what I don't want is motion sickness and for VR to cause dry eyes I already have chronic dry eyes and headaches almost everyday. I don't want VR to make it worst.Other then that I want just really great games and some cool movie theater experiences there are so many possibilities with it that's what I'm really looking forward to seeing all the games and demos ect.

You know what I want.

I predict a very short lived fad much like its first foray in the 90s and the similar periodic surge of 3D movies and television. At best, it might find a small niche in hardcore video gaming circles, but I really don't see the general public rushing to pick the things up.

That said, gimme a brand new Space Harrier or Sin and Punishment game from the protag's perspective. Holy fuck that would be awesome!!

@kmfrob:

Yup, agreed. Your phrasing led me to think you meant we'll see this happening in the foreseeable future, but if you're thinking in that sort of timeframe, sure.

The pedantic in me though, has to disagree at least a little with your analogy of jumping from using a phone to using a pc. Obviously the jump to using computers offered a lot more than solely interface convenience. It allowed (and created) all sorts of services, tasks and possibilities which beforehand simply were not attainable. Going from a physical screen to a projected, portable one isn't nearly as radical a shift. Certain specialised applications aside, a holo-display doesn't allow the average office worker to do anything he or she couldn't do before. Instead it mostly offers convenience and/or effiency. A good thing for sure, but not nearly as big an impact as the introduction of the computer itself.

All of this talk of AR and holo-tech has steared quite a ways from the original subject though, that being VR as applied to gaming. And in that regard, I am curious to see if the cumbersome nature of the tech as it stands, will appeal to the mainstream consumer. I just don't see Joe Blow putting on headgear and possibly separate headphones each time he feels like a round of his favourite timewaster. My guess is that for gaming it will go the way of racing wheels, flightsticks, fightsticks and the like, in that VR will be mostly used by dedicated fans of certain genres (simulators of various kinds fit nicely), who are willing to invest in specialised hardware for their hobby. As for the rest (and likely majority) of the gaming audience out there, I think they'd sooner buy a nice big new TV than a VR headset (or multiple depending on your household/setup).

Personally though, I am quite interested to see what developers will come up with in terms of games designed specifically for VR. I mean first person shooters, racing, etc. might all work nicely in VR, but those are existing genres. I can't imagine what this would be though. If I did I'd sell the idea to some studio haha. But what I want to see is game design, and mechanics which are new and unique to VR only; a game where the core mechanic requires it to be in VR, and that would not be possible without it. Even if it fails commercially, I'd like to see it inspire creative minds to explore new ways to entertain the lot of us.

I believe just about everyone is in agreement that VR is best suited for cockpit experiences, since that makes the most sense to our brain in terms of movement and our current controllers. In order to prevent simulation sickness we need to have something that is static on the screen, because while we see movement, we don't feel it - and having that static element, which would usually be a dashboard helps ground the player as being inside a moving thing instead of being the actual thing that's moving.

I know that some have experimented with creating a similar sensation by making the player character's nose visible (as it is in real life in the corner of your eyes), but I still think we're not quite there yet when it comes to making regular first person shooter/walking games make sense in VR, as you'll get a disconnect between what you feel your own body is doing and what you're seeing the player character's body is doing. We do have the technology to make that work (Kinect/Move could make your movements map well enough to what you see in-game), but I'm not so sure that's something a lot of people will have in their homes - both because of the requirements of floor space, and the requirements for actual physical activity.

All I really want out of VR is vehicle simulation games of different kinds, so that's alright with me.

Personally I think it is PC VR or nothing, for me. That's where you are going to get the truly cool VR experiences, even if they are just short demos. THE console space is going to be flooded, at least initially, with crappy console-like games that do just what Jeff and Rykert are saying they don't want. You'll get crap like, "Killzone VR, Unfinished Swan VR, and God of War VR". I'm not saying those won't be neat, but it's not what people really want.

THe introduction of VR is a resetting of the landscape that can only be likened to the jump from sprites to polygons. This means that we will see a resetting of games to more primal entries in the landscape. We're going to see, and have already seen, Tetris clones, breakout clones, pac man clones, etc. This is exactly what we saw in the PS1 generation when games like Cyber Sled were just 3d versions of Atari Combat.

I want VR for racing sims and pretty much nothing else. I can't see the added value beyond any cockpit-based experience. (yet..?)

I want weird shit from Japan and I'm going to get weird shit for Japan because I will buy Sony Morpheus. There's already Danganronpa for it.

@bananasfoster:

Yeah, but you see that's the thing for me, I would really love an Unfinished Swan in VR. I appreciate what you're saying, but for me the experience is the immersion, not the genre/game changing potential. As @fisk0 said there are clearly display problems to resolve, but I'm confident this is something that can be moved past fairly smoothly as more developers get involved.

@colony024:

Sure, I get that for most people, but I think I will be more likely to buy a Morpheus when it comes out than I will but a new 50" + TV... There's no doubt that the whole headset set-up is a major put off for some people (more so for the disconnection from reality than discomfort I think), but I am going into this genuinely optimistic that my mind is going to be blown. I'm not even somebody prone to boarding the hype machine, but really with this I am well and truly on board. Anyway it's clearly the infancy of the tech so I guess all we can do is wait and see how it develops over the next generation or two.

What I want out of VR is Elite: Dangerous/Steel Battalion or other simulations(not just combat, racing would be fun also). Im not very interested in cramming VR into every game or messing around with random VR "experiences". I guess I just want the next step forward from using multiple monitors with sim games.

I think Unfinished Swan VR would be cool, too. My point is that's it's just a recycled retread of a game that was designed for a controller. That's what I think Sony will do more than actually develop for the Morpheus. They will dip a toe in like they did with Move.

I think the PC is where you will get apps like some guy saying "hey, I made a VR roller coaster. It's not long, it's not compliated, but it's free and it's cool." or "Hey, here is a VR replication of the Louvre with jpg reproductions of classic art on the walls."

Digital might change the game, but the most frustrating thing about Sony is that they make all these cool tech demoes to show off their console slike the PS2 and PS3 and then they do NOTHING with them.

I think I don't know what I want exactly, but in general something like the "Haptic Adaptive Feedback" of scifi, and VR/AR goggles. We're not that far from a useful gestural and voice interface, but that's what I need for VR to be more than a cool way to view existing tech.

For it not to become a debilitating addiction that pushes people further away from reality.