Reactive Grip is an interesting technology by Tactical Haptics which lets you feel feelback from games in the palm of your hands. The company plans to take their prototype to Kickstarter to raise money for production versions of their controller. They say that motion component of the controller will support Sixense STEM and other trackers.
The Sixense STEM Kickstarter had a very successful end this past weekend, reeling in over $600,000 in funding. In addition to teasing some collaboration with NASA and Project Holodeck, Sixense says that STEM pre-orders will be available through their official store in the near future.
Rising like a prototypical phoenix from the ashes of a discarded Valve project comes CastAR. The worlds first projected AR and VR system has arrived at Kickstarter and is nearly fully funded after just two days.
HL2VR is a mod for Half-Life 2 which adds Razer Hydra support and a bunch of other tweaks, it turns Half-Life 2 into one of the best virtual reality experiences available today. The latest version of HL2VR adds new features and is easier than ever to use.
Robert Yang, creator of Nostrum, a VR Flight game inspired by a viewing of Porco Rosso takes time out of his busy Teaching schedule to answer our questions on his experiences coding for the VR Jam competition.
To say the range themes and styles exhibited in the first ever VR Jam, a call to arms by Oculus Rift manufactorer Oculus VR and IndieCade to develop great VR content in under three weeks, would be a laughable understatement. As I’ve commented before, the sheer breadth of originality on show was eye-popping with almost every finalist offering a completely unique approach to the competition’s minimal brief.
A seasoned modder, Robert Yang received renown with his “Radiator” series of Half Life 2 Mods, non-violent musings on the difficult relationship between two men. Not your average fair then.
Nostrum is another good example of this VR Jam uniqueness. Placing 2nd in the ‘Indiecade Selected Develpers’ group, it’s creator Yang came up with the idea after a viewing of the classic Miyazaki Anime Porco Rosso. After that, his original idea – that of a Lion Simulator (yes really) was shelved in favour of an aeronautical theme instead.
As yet, Nostrum has yet to be released to the public or press – as such I can’t comment on the game itself, but I can include one of the videos released as a milestone midway through the development cycle:
We asked Robert if he’d be good enough to answer a few of our questions on the project and what the future plans are for it.
Road to VR: Tell us a bit about yourself
Robert: I teach video game development in New York City, at Parsons the New School for Design and at NYU Game Center.
Road to VR: Would you call yourself a VR Enthusiast? What got you hooked?
Robert: I wouldn’t call myself a VR enthusiast, no. A lot of VR things make me sick after 10-15 minutes, it often feels like a burden.
Road to VR: What attracted you to the VR Jam contest?
Robert: I was part of the “selected developers” group. Indiecade e-mailed me and it sounded like fun so I said okay.
Road to VR: What was your inspiration for Nostrum? Was there a ‘Eureka!’ moment?
Robert: I was working on a lion simulator for the first week, but I wasn’t sure which direction my prototyping was heading. Then I watched Porco Rosso and realized that a flight simulator was a lot more feasible to do in the time frame, and all the VR flight sims flooding into the space are focusing too much on maneuvering and not much about actually looking around.
Road to VR: How did you approach the project? What processes did you use to prepare and plan?
Robert: First I prototyped basic movement and camera control. Just moving around, in a space, should feel alright and be interesting enough on its own. Then I gradually layered on other systems — world generation, cloud generation, enemy AI, and a simple quest system.
Road to VR: How many people were involved in the project?
Robert: Just me.
Road to VR: What was it like developing a full game in such a compressed time window? How did you survive it?
Robert: I’ve done quite a few jams, so I generally do a good job of scoping my jam games to be pretty small and doable. A general guideline is to take an initial time estimate and multiply that number by 3.
Road to VR: What VR specific challenges did you come across and how did you solve them?
Robert: I chose a very simplified flight control model that does not let you do loops, but it auto-levels the plane. I think rolling the horizon would’ve caused too much VR sickness.
Road to VR: Now that you’ve won the VR Jam, are you planning a full commercial release for Nostrum? If so, when can we expect to see it?
Robert: Maybe in a few months, yeah.
Road to VR: If you had to pick a favourite VR Jam entrant other than yours, what would it be and why?
Robert: Lau’s Virtual Internet Hacker is brilliant. At this phase of VR, half of the appeal is in the performance art.
Road to VR: Is there any advice you’d like to give other developers thinking about working with the Oculus Rift?
Robert: Remember that the Rift is not just a display, it is also a controller.
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Thanks to Robert for sparing the time to answer our questions. You can find his Website and Blog here, and we hope to offer some hands-on thoughts for Nostrum once we get hold of some code.
I’m heading to Toulouse, France to meet the InfinitEye team and try out their latest prototype. What would you like to know about it and what would you ask the team?
Earlier this week I was fortunate enough to get my hands not only on YEI Technology’s existing 3-space tracking system, but I was also the first to see the true PrioVR virtual reality motion capture prototype.
A new head mounted display by a company called Avegant uses 2 million micromirrors in a virtual retinal display to draw images directly onto the retina. The company says this replicates the way we see in real life and lends itself to much more realistic images.
Oculus Bridge is a free package to get Oculus Rift head tracking data into the browser. With support for Mac OSX and Windows, Oculus Bridge opens the door for Rift integration with web-based applications.
Back in December of last year, after seeing few compelling consumer augmented reality applications, I wrote a short article about one that I would actually use, an AR piano trainer. I’m thrilled today to see that something very similar has popped up, and can’t wait to get my hands on it!
VR Jam winner Lau Korsgaard talks to Road to VR about KnapNok Games‘ Virtual Internet Hacker, a VR fueled homage to the 90s hacker movie.
Sixense’s successful STEM Kickstarter has been running for a few weeks now, but for the first time they’re showing the true power of their VR tracking system with full 5 point tracking. The results are, quite frankly, awesome.
Kevin Williams reports from EuroGamer Expo 2013 with Oculus Rifts abound!
Editor’s Note: Less than 7 months ago, I went to GDC 2013 to meet with a small contingent of VR believers — among them, Oculus VR Inc, Sixense, and Fourth Dimension Displays. Last week was the massive EuroGamer Expo 2013. Kevin Williams brings us a report from the show floor and shows the incredibly rapid grassroots spread of VR development, evident by widespread usage and interest in the Oculus Rift developer kit at EuroGamer Expo 2013.
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What proved to be London’s largest gathering of Virtual Reality (VR) entertainment technology, EuroGamer Expo 2013 also proved to be a vast mecca to the consumer game environment, but also became a clarion call towards the level of interest that has been generated in VR by the public.
This year’s EuroGamer Expo 2013 (EGX) proved a sold-out event over its three days, offering a mixture of elements found at Game Developers Conference, E3, and IndieCade, all in one location – housed in London’s famous Earls Court exhibition facility. Regarding the VR scene, the venue proved a melting pot of the latest hardware. Vying alongside the first UK public showing of the Microsoft Xbox One and Sony Playstation 4, VR was able to hold its own and give the consoles a run for their money.
Oculus VR
The Californian company made the long trek to the UK event and brought more than eight of their latest Oculus Rift HD prototype head-sets. This was the third time that the European scene had the chance to see the higher resolution and performance HMD – a prototype of one of the panel sections by the company. Representatives of Oculus VR were admittedly stretched thin to have to support so many shows, but felt it important to work with the consumer games scene to promote the best message regarding the public interest for the platform.
This was my first time in the HD version of the system, and I was impressed by the quality of image and the elimination of the ‘screen door effect’, but to hear that this was an intermediate step towards next years’ consumer HMD release increased faith in the start-ups drive towards a successful consumer launch. The queue to experience the HD version of the system snaked round the company’s booth for the duration of the Expo – a testament to the interest and fervor that has been generated by the company and their hardware.
Virgin Media
The Virgin Media booth at EuroGamer Expo 2013 was a mix of indie games and new releases, built off of the launch of their Virgin Media Game Space (pop-up arcade) facility covered previously on Road to VR. Virgin Media as a main sponsor of EuroGamer Expo 2013 and had a prominent space; they made the most of it, including an Oculus Rift demonstration on their booth (entitled “Get Your Head in the Game”). The company had two systems running the skydiving experience seen at their pop-up space – and saw long queues at their booth to try out the experience.
Virtuix
The virtual mobility system developers came to EuroGamer Expo 2013 with an example of the Virtuix Omni for selected visitors to try out. It was amazing to see the interest from those walking the vast Earls Court floor homing in to see the latest VR technology. The system presented under the tag line “Step Into The Adventure”.
RePlay
The organizers of the popular Northern RePlay retro gaming event presented a great booth that looked back at the history of video gaming, and in a nod to the future the company had a independent developer running a Oculus Rift rig with an indie demonstration of his own design – great to see the independent development community working the Rift.
Design Media Kensington
One of the many universities that have courses in video game development – the Kensington course came to EuroGamer Expo with news of their development and showed some examples of their course work – this included a Oculus Rift running another independent demonstrations.
NFTS Games
In the game courses and employment area of the Expo another two Oculus Rift’s were spotted running some example demonstrations.
Bossa Studios
The popular Surgeon Simulator 2013 was presented on the EuroGame Expo 2013 show floor, and along with the normal PC version, the studio brought a Oculus Rift version of the amateur surgery game emulator – though the tracking was a bit off when visiting the booth, there was the customary long lines to have their turn on the game.
Independents
In the Indie game area, the games Dream and Montague’s Mount (recently Steam ‘Greenlit’) were both demonstrated with Oculus Rift examples – seeming to illustrate a pattern where the credibility of some of the new PC content from independent developers is being seen as Rift suitable!
Finally, the event proved a crowded and exuberant gathering of the latest games, consoles and aspirations in the consumer game medium – the VR contingent proving that this latest application of immersive entertainment has captured the imagination. We now have to wait what the next phase of interest will be once the first foray of these platforms are officially released.
For more information about EuroGamer Expo 2013 visit:
http://www.eurogamerexpo.com/whats-on/overview
About the Author – Kevin Williams has an extensive background in in the development and sales of the latest amusement and attraction applications. The UK born specialist in the pay-to-play scene; is well-known through his consultancy, KWP and as a prolific writer and commentator (The Stinger Report) on the emergence of the new entertainment market. Kevin is also the founder of the association and Conference (DNA Association/DNA Conference) that focuses on the digital Out-of Home interactive entertainment sector. Kevin can be reached at – kwp@thestingerreport.com – http://www.thestingerreport.com (both free to subscribe services).
Today begins the crowd-funding campaign for Powergrid, a virtual reality club and gallery created by developer Astrogun and intended for Oculus Rift users.
