Discovering Space 2 on Oculus Rift

cherbert · Apr 18, 2016

If you haven't got got this - its an incredible experience.

I don't like to be ciritcal of Elite Dangerous but there are a number of observations I had while playing this...

The stars and milky way backdrop were very nice and space seemed to have much better depth to it that in Elite Dangerous.

The chair and body of your avatar is proper scale! I know fdev have been on here before claiming there is nothing wrong with their scaling but this is a £10 one man demo and he got it right!

An amazing effect which was crazy for feeling presense.. when its cold (normally after a gate jump) your avatar breaths cold air. You can't help but think its coming from your own mouth!

Nice little easter egg in orbit around Jupiter... I'm sure there are more.

Super intuitive controls.

In summary - this has been one of the most amazing VR experiences I have had yet. I thought Elite Dangerous had nailed it but this demo has made me think there are improvements FDEV can make. If any of the devs are reading this please buy this early access demo and give it a go!

[video=youtube;ZR0ssYy4xto]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZR0ssYy4xto[/video]

Thacyoon · Apr 18, 2016

Agree, I just got it and it is really good

TFW Primus · Apr 18, 2016

Does it support HOTAS?

Thacyoon · Apr 18, 2016

TFW Primus said:
Does it support HOTAS?

no, I would say. Throttle axis is missing. However, if you can accept mapping thrust + and - to two buttons, it is ok. Don't run any TARGET scripts, and remap in game. You can map roll/pitch to joystick and yaw/thrust to buttons on the throttle. It supports HOTAS "light". I have TM-W HOTAS, and I am ok with this since it is an exploration sim experience. But it should support full HOTAS with proper throttle axis. All flight/space/sims should fully support HOTAS setups.

nepo · Apr 18, 2016

where did you get it, or is it space1 ?

Quote, Tom Rudderham,March 29,2016
"There’s no release date for Discovering Space 2, but Simon is hoping to release it for both the DK2 and CV1 headsets later this summer. In addition, a beta release for select gamer’s will be ready towards the end of April."

siphi · Apr 19, 2016

nepo said:
where did you get it, or is it space1 ?

Quote, Tom Rudderham,March 29,2016
"There’s no release date for Discovering Space 2, but Simon is hoping to release it for both the DK2 and CV1 headsets later this summer. In addition, a beta release for select gamer’s will be ready towards the end of April."

Hi Guys,

Discovering Space 2 is available now from http://theriftarcade.com/downloads/product/discoveringspace2/ . Although this is still beta, it is a fairly complete experience, and well work the £10. There is always more stuff to add, and currently I am following up a few bug fixes, HOTAS support and general additions to the experience. A new beta should be out in the next day or so.

Feedback and requests always welcome.

-Simon

Gabberkooij · Apr 19, 2016

Is this only for VR? Or is it also interesting to 2D monitors? I;m waiting for my Rift, but it will be June/July before it arrives...

- Martijn

siphi · Apr 19, 2016

Gabberkooij said:
Is this only for VR? Or is it also interesting to 2D monitors? I;m waiting for my Rift, but it will be June/July before it arrives...

- Martijn

It does work without a headset, but it really isn't suited for 2d, so I wouldn't recommend it. The joy of the experience is from being immersed. I haven't put anything in there for mouse-look etc, so it is pretty 2d and lacking the immersion.

I appreciate and understand the pain of waiting. I am also still waiting for my CV1 and won't get it until May/June. Thankfully I have a DK2 and it works VERY well with that. If you can get your hands on a DK2, I would definitely recommend it.

vic · Apr 19, 2016

siphi said:
It does work without a headset, but it really isn't suited for 2d, so I wouldn't recommend it. The joy of the experience is from being immersed. I haven't put anything in there for mouse-look etc, so it is pretty 2d and lacking the immersion.

I appreciate and understand the pain of waiting. I am also still waiting for my CV1 and won't get it until May/June. Thankfully I have a DK2 and it works VERY well with that. If you can get your hands on a DK2, I would definitely recommend it.

Do you get the black smearing when you move your head in Space2 with your DK2 like we get in ED?

siphi · Apr 19, 2016

vic said:
Do you get the black smearing when you move your head in Space2 with your DK2 like we get in ED?

Not so much, as this has been tuned out by adjusting the deep-black level. There are a few places where it occurs (in dark corners of the cockpit), but as far as the main sky is concerned ... no. The slight down-side is that the black's aren't deep black, they are 2% grey, but you soon see past that.

This ultimately is a limitation of the hardware which you simply work around. There other aspects of the hardware which completely make up for any of these limitations.

I am expecting to have to retune the black / contrast again with the CV1, and to be honest I'll probably set it as a user tune-able preference.

vic · Apr 20, 2016

siphi said:
Not so much, as this has been tuned out by adjusting the deep-black level. There are a few places where it occurs (in dark corners of the cockpit), but as far as the main sky is concerned ... no. The slight down-side is that the black's aren't deep black, they are 2% grey, but you soon see past that.

This ultimately is a limitation of the hardware which you simply work around. There other aspects of the hardware which completely make up for any of these limitations.

I am expecting to have to retune the black / contrast again with the CV1, and to be honest I'll probably set it as a user tune-able preference.

Ok but something i don't understand: are you saying you are able to adjust contrast? how?

siphi · Apr 20, 2016

No, at the moment I hardcode the contrast and brightness in the game build. I am saying that in a future build, I would probably have this as a user setting to cope with quirks of different headset hardware (ie. the CV1 might need a different setting to DK2).

vic · Apr 20, 2016

siphi said:
No, at the moment I hardcode the contrast and brightness in the game build. I am saying that in a future build, I would probably have this as a user setting to cope with quirks of different headset hardware (ie. the CV1 might need a different setting to DK2).

Oh really?? Can you share with us how we can modify the hardcode for contrast/brightness or is it too complicated? Right now I'm not even playing ED anymore becuase of how awful smearing is with the DK2 (it is not subtle at all).

Mosait · Apr 20, 2016

I tried Discovering Space 2 and Ocean Rift last night (on dk2), and thoroughly enjoyed both. Every time I try these apps/games I have to stop myself from waking up my daughter to show her how cool this is. I envy her for what she gets to grow up with and see in technology.

siphi · Apr 20, 2016

vic said:
Oh really?? Can you share with us how we can modify the hardcode for contrast/brightness or is it too complicated? Right now I'm not even playing ED anymore becuase of how awful smearing is with the DK2 (it is not subtle at all).

No, sorry, I mean it is hardcoded into the game. You can't modify it. I have pre-set the brightness in DS2 in order to combat the smearing. For this to be fixed in ED, Frontier would need to modify then scene rendering in order to stop it - it's easy for a dev to do, but you need to do it at code level.

For future builds of DS2, I will give the user an option to change it, but it will only be applicable to DS2 ... it won't affect anything else, sorry !

VR andysonofbob · Apr 23, 2016

-nvm-

[VR] Scifikomori · Apr 23, 2016

Awesome!

DK2 user here, I just bought this. Not sure where those 2 last hours went

Great stuff, awesome immersion!

Nice little details too! I loved the self-shadow from the VR head and upper body movements, including mirrored head movement (something I've suggested for ED as well). Also loved the blue-shift with relativistic speeds, as well as the abberation effect of wider FOV.

For me, the pilot seemed a bit big though, just saying. But otherwise the scale felt alright.

The controls menu are too sensitive when rebinding joystick or controller axis though, I barely thought about moving the HOTAS and it registered

I'd suggest a more generous deadzone while rebinding.

Also, the problem with the red color is very apparent, especially in the beginning hangar launch with the red and green guide lines. This also goes for texts in-game btw. The red appear closer or pop out more than other colors, especially blue. This also goes for ordinary 2D monitors to some extent, and all other VR stuff, so it's not just this game. I've only seen one other person mention this (not that I've searched a lot), I find that a bit odd. I guess this is something that would have to be addressed for VR generally at some time. Maybe a new adjustment setting, eye chromatic aberration, or something, to realign 3D color depths, at least to some degree (effect seems much more prevalent than on 2D screens for me).

Oh, and Mars sunsets are actually blue-ish

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_347.html
But the visuals are gorgeous anyway.

Anyway, great demo/game, loved the little spaceship and flying around the solar system.

stripealipe · Apr 23, 2016

Thanks to the dev for chiming in on this thread. It's always cool to hear what goes on behind the scenes and i've been looking at this for a few days now. Def gonna now go and buy into this experience and support your project, seeing as you not only do some very nice coding, but you also sound pretty smart in your implementation

siphi · Apr 25, 2016

Thacyoon said:
no, I would say. Throttle axis is missing. However, if you can accept mapping thrust + and - to two buttons, it is ok. Don't run any TARGET scripts, and remap in game. You can map roll/pitch to joystick and yaw/thrust to buttons on the throttle. It supports HOTAS "light". I have TM-W HOTAS, and I am ok with this since it is just an exploration experience. But it should support full HOTAS with proper throttle axis. All flight space/sims should fully support HOTAS setups.

I have released a new beta over the weekend which fully supports HOTAS setups (as best as I can determine). Many thanks to Thacyoon for helping me get this working. With this new build, you should be able to either keep your controllers separate, and remap in-game, or create a single virtual controller and remap in game (recommended). There are two modes of throttle type supported 1) game controller "trigger" type, and 2) HOTAS "absolute position" type.

This is available from http://theriftarcade.com/downloads/product/discoveringspace2/

If anyone tries this and has problems with their control setup, please let me know - either through this forum, or via email or a direct message.

Thanks

-Simon.

Thacyoon · Apr 26, 2016

siphi said:
I have released a new beta over the weekend which fully supports HOTAS setups (as best as I can determine). Many thanks to Thacyoon for helping me get this working. With this new build, you should be able to either keep your controllers separate, and remap in-game, or create a single virtual controller and remap in game (recommended). There are two modes of throttle type supported 1) game controller "trigger" type, and 2) HOTAS "absolute position" type.

This is available from http://theriftarcade.com/downloads/product/discoveringspace2/

If anyone tries this and has problems with their control setup, please let me know - either through this forum, or via email or a direct message.

Thanks

-Simon.

No problem Simon, happy to assist you with this space flight sim 'gem'. Really folks, it is wonderful to just cruise around in our solar system - visiting planets/moons, and flying down to the surface (seamlessly) to all planets/moons. AND, now it can be configured in full HOTAS style!

I have a Thrustmaster Warthog Throttle/Joystick (HOTAS), and it just....works

Excellent Simon, congratulations, and keep up the good work!

Regards,
Thacyoon

EDIT: There is NO 'black smearing' in DS2 - we can actually configure the 'black' level (numbers) our self in the config file [yesnod]