Oculus Rift General Discussion Thread

...and it's name is Oculus Rift. Well, not now. The consumer version won't be out for a little while. I've been watching youtube videos the past couple days (theres a ton of them)and I'm starting believe the hyperbole. This thing really seems to be legit. Almost across the board, people who experience this, come out of it wanting one asap. I can't wait to try one out.

The dev kits are out there now and theres a ton of indy developers creating content for it. I'm hopeful some of the big dogs get involved as well. There's already very positive feedback to mods for Skyrim, Team Fortress 2, Half Life 2, Portal series and others.

Here's some links to articles about it. I dont know how I never heard about this until a couple days ago, but now that I have, I'm very excited by the possibilities.

https://www.oculusvr.com/

https://www.pcgamer.com/tag/oculus-rift/

https://kotaku.com/tag/oculus-rift

Re: The future is now...

There's a bunch of great vids on youtube, but heres a couple funny ones.

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSzA6hWCcvo"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSzA6hWCcvo[/ame]

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ARHWmliUPY"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ARHWmliUPY[/ame]

These are people trying a few demos that are out there right now.

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This is an indy dev using it for the first time. I leave these kinds of videos.

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qqH_L8H-7s"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qqH_L8H-7s[/ame]

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[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJo12Hz_BVI"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJo12Hz_BVI[/ame]

This is a vid of some gaming press trying it out. This is a demo called the Citadel. It's an Unreal 3 tech demo in a fantasy type town. A bit longer, but still a very interesting watch.

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It looks very cool. But, if only they were able to implement that sort of stereoscopic 3D without the gnarly head attachment. That thing looks uncomfortable to wear for a few hours of gaming.

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Solidus said:

It looks very cool. But, if only they were able to implement that sort of stereoscopic 3D without the gnarly head attachment. That thing looks uncomfortable to wear for a few hours of gaming.

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Youre describing a holodeck. We're not quite there yet. The way I see it, this is the first real step into true virtual reality. From everything I hear, the dev kit is very light. The retail release should be lighter.

The dev kit was only $300, so the retail model may be even less.

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Plus the fact that John Carmack is their new CTO.

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Something Sexy said:

Plus the fact that John Carmack is their new CTO.

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A plus to be sure. He's still with Id, but his involvment has been what's made awareness of this device explode in the past year.

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snappahead said:

Youre describing a holodeck. We're not quite there yet. The way I see it, this is the first real step into true virtual reality. From everything I hear, the dev kit is very light. The retail release should be lighter.

The dev kit was only $300, so the retail model may be even less.

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Perhaps . It probably is light weight, but what concerns me the most are the side-effects of wearing enclosed virtual goggles, that rob you of your sight in relation to your natural surroundings. I remember back in the day, when people complained about how the Virtual Boy caused headaches and nausea. Personally, I never had that issue, but it might be even worse for some people with 3D goggles.

Devs might be giving it glowing reviews in the demonstrations, but until they start to play this for a few hours in stretch, no one will actually know the side-effects that are associated with this. Personally, I'm kind of skeptical.

Re: The future is now...

really interesting...definitely keeping an eye on this.

Wonder how long until the first lap dance game comes out.

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Solidus said:

Perhaps . It probably is light weight, but what concerns me the most are the side-effects of wearing enclosed virtual goggles, that rob you of your sight in relation to your natural surroundings. I remember back in the day, when people complained about how the Virtual Boy caused headaches and nausea. Personally, I never had that issue, but it might be even worse for some people with 3D goggles.

Devs might be giving it glowing reviews in the demonstrations, but until they start to play this for a few hours in stretch, no one will actually know the side-effects that are associated with this. Personally, I'm kind of skeptical.

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We should make a distinction right away that this is no Virtua Boy LOL. These kits were available to anyone while they lasted. Thats why you see vids of Joe Shmoe using one in his house. People have had these in hand for a few months now. I havent heard of any adverse issues so far. I imagine that some people have spent countless hours using it by now. There's a very popular mod for Mindcraft out. You can imagine the hours on a game like that.

I can tell youre skeptical and you should be. You can never tell for sure how something like this will effect you until you try it yourself. So far though, the worst reaction Ive seen was impressed but not blown away. Thats with the dev prototype though. Much lower rez than the retail version will have.

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Vader AL said:

really interesting...definitely keeping an eye on this.

Wonder how long until the first lap dance game comes out.

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Probably in development as we speak heh. I have seen a demo here they created an incredibly realistic model of a woman. It was like a statue though. No animation. You could walk around her and everything. It was pretty impressive. You could see veins and even little hair stubble under her arms. Much more creepy than sexy though LOL

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From what I read some people got very dizzy very quickly. They had to try it for like 30 minutes a day and gradually add more time to get used to it. I know the second I put that on I would puke.

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[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hS6vPqAcLg"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hS6vPqAcLg[/ame]

This one's funny. The roller coaster demo.

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Something Sexy said:

From what I read some people got very dizzy very quickly. They had to try it for like 30 minutes a day and gradually add more time to get used to it. I know the second I put that on I would puke.

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Yeah, its pretty disorienting for some people. You do acclimate over time though. I think it's the disconnect that you're brain thinks you're moving but youre not. I've heard a lot of people describe it like a strange feeling in their stomach.

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The last time I tried this thing I nearly got my @ss chewed off by a shark. #%^@ this thing!

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It's very light and the sensor is very quick so there's no delay from your head movements to what's happening on the screen.
There's two reasons you can get a bit dizzy, one is that the screen resolution is not so good so you kind of strain to see things. The other thing is that if you're moving in the game and not in the real world it really throws you off. You can get used to it, but some people get really dizzy and some don't. If you get car sick or seasick then you will probably get sick from this.

There's development to get some more direct correlation between your body in the real world and the virtual world which should help. Things like Kinect or some motion controllers can help.

I think there will be some cool stuff made, haven't spent much time making stuff with it because we've had other stuff to do. But I hope to make something in the future. I prefer UDK development which doesn't have much support so I'm waiting until they update their UDK support.

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Centurion said:

The last time I tried this thing I nearly got my @ss chewed off by a shark. #%^@ this thing!

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I see what you did there. My sides hurt.

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darthviper107 said:

It's very light and the sensor is very quick so there's no delay from your head movements to what's happening on the screen.
There's two reasons you can get a bit dizzy, one is that the screen resolution is not so good so you kind of strain to see things. The other thing is that if you're moving in the game and not in the real world it really throws you off. You can get used to it, but some people get really dizzy and some don't. If you get car sick or seasick then you will probably get sick from this.

There's development to get some more direct correlation between your body in the real world and the virtual world which should help. Things like Kinect or some motion controllers can help.

I think there will be some cool stuff made, haven't spent much time making stuff with it because we've had other stuff to do. But I hope to make something in the future. I prefer UDK development which doesn't have much support so I'm waiting until they update their UDK support.

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Yeah, thats about it. I've never had car sickness, but it's been ages since I was on a boat, so I dont know. I hope I can handle it. Maybe easing yourself into it with calm things will make things better. Get your "sea legs" with stuff like Dear Esther or the space demos.

The last paragraph was over my head.

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snappahead said:

I see what you did there. My sides hurt.

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Relax. It was a bad joke for sure.
In honesty, it's got a lot of potential where other devices before have failed, that is, if it is indeed light weight and the high definition images are able to converge accurately.

It's got a huge hurdle it must overcome, as mentioned before. The sense of motion from visual feedback and the lack of motion from tactile feedback is nausea inducing.

I'm excited to hear that Carmack is on board. Like I said, it's got potential.