It's time to talk about space hands.

[amadeus1171]

Forget about space legs for now. Let's talk about space hands.

How many in the VR community would like to strap a controller to the back of their hands and interact inside the cockpit? Or when the Vive Knuckles or gloves are released, be able to push buttons with your fingers? How about seeing your hands move, or have others see your head move?

I, for one, would love to see this!

Some have argued that they'd rather the controls be on the hotas, because having to take your hands off the hotas to press a button may be the difference between winning and rebuy. I say taking your hands of the hotas to open your cargo scoop is not going to get you killed. lol

VR buttons can be for non-time critical events, such as lowing your landing gear, turning on your lights, or even opening and browsing the various panels.

And if the gloves are sensitive enough, and can properly detect pressure, we could even have virtual buttons on the VR hotas; providing FD models the stick after our RL hotas.

Frontier D, please give VR some love. All the shoe box owners would love you for it!

 

[CylonSurfer]

Its already been spoken about to death in this very sub forum if I'm honest. As much as I love motion controls in VR, Elite isn't a VR only title and to be frank has much bigger problems to address than adding motion control support for an extremely small percentage of users that would actually use it for more than 10 minutes.

Swapping between two control types would be cumbersome and annoying, your HOTAS would be in the way preventing you from using certain panels or buttons. All in all as good as it sounds in your head it wouldn't be in practice.

VR needs some love, you are correct there. Motion controls - not so much.

 

[Lowe1978]

Funny you should mention this. I saw the 'back up your controls' threads and social media posts so was having a poke about the configuration stuff the other day and came across a folder with Oculus Touch controls in. I wonder if proper Touch support is on the way?

 

[CylonSurfer]

Funny you should mention this. I saw the 'back up your controls' threads and social media posts so was having a poke about the configuration stuff the other day and came across a folder with Oculus Touch controls in. I wonder if proper Touch support is on the way?

I'm pretty sure that is just the stuff so you can bind touch as joystick ala no motion support. There has been a preset for sometime.

 

[VR andysonofbob]

In the future would you have holographic joysticks?

I think until we have a neuro-link interface to our ship, we will need some form of tactile connection to the ship.

Unless there is a glove interface, where I can still freely manipulate the joysticks, 'space hands' would be too restrictive for me!

 

[Hadarmil]

Only way I see this working is maybe Leap motion style tracking, but that is even more niche. Or someone develops a haptic glove with tracking( glove, not controller - I need my HOTAS!).

Oh, and you need more than a dozen people who use it.

 

[ebbrell]

I would be cool if you could touch the side panel with a glove. And buttons or even use an on screen keyboard which we can see.
Then we would to bind less voice attack buttons

 

[shadragon]

How many in the VR community would like to strap a controller to the back of their hands and interact inside the cockpit?

A HOTAS is a much better option. To use what you suggest would require huge modifications to the cockpit design and HUD. Probably not going to happen soon, if at all.

 

[Robot1167]

Leap Motion...

Leap Motion is a great and relatively inexpensive addition to VR. FlyInside already has incorporated Leap Motion in their VR software to make Microsoft Flight Simulator as well as X-Plane usable with hand gestures and full hand mapping so you can hit buttons with the tip of a finger. Yes, I have used it.

You would not use Leap motion hand tracking for a HOTAS. But you could use both together using Leap Motion for navigating your Panels and moving and selecting the Galaxy map.

Leap Motion has a sensor that tracks your hands so there is no need for a glove or anything in your hand to work. If the developer coding was there, it would be very useful and a great addition to the game.

I have already send some emails to Frontier, FlyInside and Leap Motion today inquiring about it's addition into ED.

Got a response and redirection from Frontier already saying, "I would love to see Leap Motion support included in Elite Dangerous."


--Robot1167

 

[Alec Turner]

At the very least I would LOVE to be able to manipulate the galaxy map with my hands! I also think (and this is obiously WAY off in the future), that if/when we can move around our ships and/or space stations, FD could learn a lot from the zero-g movement model so brilliantly demonstrated by Lone Echo.

 

[Ancipital]

At the very least I would LOVE to be able to manipulate the galaxy map with my hands! I also think (and this is obiously WAY off in the future), that if/when we can move around our ships and/or space stations, FD could learn a lot from the zero-g movement model so brilliantly demonstrated by Lone Echo.

Just as long as they don't also steal the "stupid corridor full of waggling lasers" idea too

 

[GeneralIdea1964]

Some great ideas folks.

I think the cockpit designs might need to change a bit, but I think this needs an overhaul anyway being by far one of the oldest bits of the whole game design.

So FD while you are at it, how about making switches and knobs on ship console actually work? You already have pilot's hands moving with throttle and flight control.

If I could flip a switch or press a button with a hand, it would be brilliant.

Only issue is would I have to have some controllers for my feet as well to operate rudder/yaw controls?

Thanks

 

[CMDR Rison]

I too would like to be able to lift my hands from my HOTAS and interact with the side menus.

Here's an example from Leap Motion back in the DK2 days.

 

[dogbite]

No doubt Leap Motion could work well enough with the coarse cockpits in ED. I don't think current accuracy would work well with my DCS bird. though. It is more likely a matter of whether or not it is a priority at the moment with installed base of users of VR let alone LM. As a HOTAS user, the glove would work the best from an immersion and accuracy standpoint.
FlyInside also added Touch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adcgNDGR4Jw may or may not seem clunky, but the one thing that the reviewer mention was the haptic feedback. That is why I like the glove solution over LM so you can get a sense that you've touched something like in the physical world.

 

[Captain N]

Main problem with Leap Motion is that it's something very few people own.

Every Vive has been sold with tracked hand controllers for more than 1.5 years now, and most Rift users probably have a pair of Touch controllers by now as well.

All the upcoming Microsoft MR headsets as well as Pimax are coming with their own versions of the controller.

We're looking at a future where a larger number of people own motion controllers than HOTAS. Come to think of it we might already be there, considering how niché flight simulators have always been.

There are actually some flight sim type games that use motion controllers to allow the user to control the craft with a virtual joystick. VTOL is probably the best known example, I haven't played it, but I have played Bullets and More which has helicopters which you can fly with a similar control scheme - and I was surprised how well it works. It's not as good as HOTAS but a perfectly viable alternative - and I dare say good enough for a game like ED. If mouse is good enough for some people then so is this.

 

[Robot1167]

Example of Leap in a cockpit in VR

Am Elite Dangerous Cockpit is laid out very simply. Which is a good thing. If they can get it working on the layout of "real" cockpits it could easily be done in ED. Example of someone using it for the first time below with FSX. Keep in mind this isn't even a VR program. It has been modified by FlyInside to make the transitions to VR and using Leap Motion. Note how he still uses a joystick etc. Hands are just for the odds and ends. I would suggest only using Leap for the menus, galaxy map, System Map and menus in Stations. After all after your death grip on the HOTAS from that last battle you might want to stretch your arms out.


https://youtu.be/yf-zLCmwsEk?t=1m30s

 

[shadow133]

I had a leap motion for a few days and returned it. Great idea, poor execution. The hand gestures in game is for developers and not implemented on Elite like pointed here before. So the only use is as a camera, in theory useful to see a keyboard, but on practice useless due to the camera definition (won’t be able to read keys or text files). But of course I see the potention, if implemented in to elite. A sleek glove would be ideal for vr cockpit, but like many said, there are bigger issues to solve first.

 

[Exigeous]

Its already been spoken about to death in this very sub forum if I'm honest. As much as I love motion controls in VR, Elite isn't a VR only title and to be frank has much bigger problems to address than adding motion control support for an extremely small percentage of users that would actually use it for more than 10 minutes.

Swapping between two control types would be cumbersome and annoying, your HOTAS would be in the way preventing you from using certain panels or buttons. All in all as good as it sounds in your head it wouldn't be in practice.

VR needs some love, you are correct there. Motion controls - not so much.

Seems like the first reply nailed it right outta the gate. Yet another thread, yet the same discussion. And it will still never happen.

Move along, nothing to see here.