Road to VR

NASA-backed ‘Mars 2030’ Now Available – A Beautiful, Educational Trek That’s Rough Around the Edges

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Dominic Brennan

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Aug 8, 2017

The education-focused Mars 2030 launches today on SteamVR for the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift, soon to come to PSVR. With 40 square kilometers of explorable terrain, the experience successfully achieves its main objective: to make the user feel like they are on Mars. However, while its stunning canvas has great potential, its execution currently suffers from a lack of features, and a number of technical problems.

The Gift Economy Dynamics of ‘Anyland’ & Social VR Anecdotes

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Aug 7, 2017

Anyland is a social VR experience focusing on worldbuilding and avatar creation tools that allow you to create interactive experiences while in VR. They’ve also implemented an open sharing feature that makes it easy to collect objects from the world and share them with other people. Stephanie Mendoza is a VR developer and artist who has spent a lot of time creating worlds and exploring the gift economy dynamics within Anyland, and I had a chance to capture some of her stories and social experiments.

You Can Watch This Week’s ‘Dota 2’ International Championships With Friends in VR

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Aug 7, 2017

Beginning today through the 12th of August is one of the biggest E-sports events of the year, the 2017 International Dota 2 Championships. With a prize pool of more than $23 million, there’s a lot on the line. You can get an inside-the-game front row seat through the Dota 2 VR Hub.

Oculus’ New ‘Stereo Shading Reprojection’ Brings Big Performance Gains to Certain VR Scenes

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Aug 7, 2017

oculus stereo shading reprojection (2) — A finished frame rendered with SSR | Image courtesy Oculus

Oculus is calling its latest rendering tech ‘Stereo Shading Reprojection’, and says that for scenes which are heavy in pixel shading, the approach can save upwards of 20% on GPU performance. The company says the new VR rendering technique can be easily added to Unity-based projects, and that it “shouldn’t be hard to integrate with Unreal and other engines.”

Save 50% on ‘Battlezone’ During Weekend Steam Sale – Now Including HOTAS Support

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Aug 5, 2017

Looking to pick up one of Steam’s most polished VR titles? Battlezone (2016) is on sale for 50% of the usual asking price through August 7th.

Reflecting on AltspaceVR’s Technical Achievements & Social VR Lessons Learned

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Aug 4, 2017

AltspaceVR held its final official Good Bye gathering on Thursday, August 3rd after announcing last week that they had run out of money and their investors decided to not invest any more. News of the social VR platform’s closing rippled throughout the VR community over the past week, and some are wondering if it’s any type of bellwether about the overall health of the VR ecosystem. There have been a number of discussion threads on Oculus subreddit, Vive subreddit, and Twitter that had employees chiming in on imminent plans and the challenges of dealing with trolls and harassment in VR.

Valve Sends ‘Knuckles’ Controller Dev Kit to Revive Developer

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Aug 4, 2017

revive-dev-kunckles — Image courtesy CrossVR

Valve isn’t being shy about their support for Jules “LibreVR” Blok, the developer behind Revive, a hack which allows the Vive to play games from the Oculus store. Having patched SteamVR on more than one occasion to ensure Revive’s continued compatibility, the company has now sent Blok the Knuckles controller dev kit

New Fresnel Lens From Wearality is Thinner Than a Quarter

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Aug 4, 2017

Nearly two years ago, Wearality created a unique Fresnel lens for VR headsets offering a claimed 150 degree field of view. The company successfully funded a VR viewer featuring the lens called Wearality Sky through Kickstarter. The company recently revealed a new and improved lens, but this time around they intend to act as a supplier rather than directly selling a viewer to consumers.

VR Design Tool ‘Gravity Sketch’ Launches in Early Access

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Dominic Brennan

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Aug 4, 2017

VR-optimised 3D creation tool Gravity Sketch is now available on Steam Early Access. Developed by a group of design engineers at the Royal College of Art, the software is ‘for everyone’, but its feature set has particular relevance to creative professionals, and could become an invaluable tool for industrial design visualisation.

‘The Lost Bear’ Side-scrolling Platformer Coming Exclusively to PSVR This Month

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Dominic Brennan

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Aug 4, 2017

Odd Bug Studio’s debut title The Lost Bear arrives exclusively on PlayStation VR this month. Described as a “2D cinematic platformer”, the player controls Walnut, a young girl who sets out to save her teddy bear from the Toy Snatcher

VR-based Treatment for Vision Disorders Shows Positive Results in Peer-reviewed Study

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Aug 3, 2017

vivid vision lazy eye treatment (1) — Image courtesy Vivid Vision

Vivid Vision offers a virtual reality based treatment for lazy eye disorders. A new study published in the peer-reviewed BioMed Journal of Ophthalmology finds positive preliminary results which “indicate the potential for a new treatment for adulthood amblyopia.”

Co-op VR FPS ‘Killing Floor: Incursion’ Launches on August 16th, Save 10% on Pre-order

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Aug 3, 2017

Oculus exclusive Killing Floor: Incursion is due to launch on August 16th. The game is now available for pre-order on the Oculus store for $36, 10% off the $40 launch price.

Researchers Induce Artificial Movement Sensation in VR Using Four-Pole Galvanic Vestibular Stimulation

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Dominic Brennan

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Aug 3, 2017

four-pole-gvs — Image courtesy Dr. Aoyama et al

Shown as part of the Emerging Technologies installations at SIGGRAPH 2017 this week, the GVS RIDE experience demonstrates the effects of four-pole galvanic vestibular stimulation combined with a VR headset. The technology is pitched as a potential alternative to a motion platform, with its ability to “induce tri-directional acceleration” and “enhance virtual acceleration”.

Inception Raises $15 Million Series A Funding Led By EU Media Conglomerate RTL Group

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Dominic Brennan

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Aug 3, 2017

Inception — image courtesy Inception Inc.

Inception’s ambitions to become the ‘Netflix of VR’ have just received a major boost, with the Tel Aviv-based company closing a $15 million Series A funding round led by media and broadcast giant RTL Group. Launched in October 2016, the Inception app is accessible on leading mobile VR platforms, as well as the Rift and Vive, while PSVR support is ‘coming soon’.

‘Through You’ – Dance as Embodied Communication in VR & Pushing the Boundaries of Editing in VR

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Aug 3, 2017

Dance is all about bodies moving through space, and it’s something that shows the strength of the VR medium since there’s something that’s lost when it’s translated onto a 2D screen. Lily Baldwin observed how audience members heard the music differently through her expressions as a dancer touring with David Byrne, and she wanted to experiment with using dance a form of embodied communication within virtual reality.

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