I recently purchased the Oculus Quest 2 to experience ED in VR. I’ve been playing ED for a long time but when I first loaded the game and reached the Main Menu, I was knocked to the floor and came over all emotional. There was my Phantom sitting in the dock in all its glory. You must understand, I’ve seen this screen 1000's of times and never taken much notice of it, but in VR, I spent 5 mins just looking around the hanger and at the ship. The sense of scale VR gives you is astounding. I’ve grown so used to 2D, I don't realise how big the ships are in ED but with VR I felt very small and insignificant.
I logged in and just sat there in my ship just in utter awe at how detailed the ships internals are: the various patterns on metal surfaces, wires poking out here and there, wear and tear details on the floor and some surfaces, dirt on the windows and elsewhere (I feel conned into buying this ship now, it was sold as new ;P). The cockpit/flight deck is huge too and I had a sudden urge to walk around but I don’t have the space in my room to do that atm. In 2D, I’ve done the usual things and accessed the various camera viewpoints, of course, but man, VR gives a whole new perspective. I looked out the window and could see the nacelles of the phantom jutting out in front (I’m sure they have another name) giving a sense of depth and height .. And even weight. They look so small on flat screens. The dashboard holograms pop out in greater detail too and the radar is much, much easier to interpret.
I took off and flew around my fleet carrier. Due to the speeds of ships in ED, you can be forgiven thinking that FCs are small as you boost over and away from them so quickly (wow, these ships can move and are very responsive considering their size). And although even in VR this perspective still occurs, I deliberately flew close to and flew slowly around the FC, and wow, these FCs are huge. I know this of course but I’ve never had this sense of scale before. The level of detail on the ships is astounding too. Of course, I’ve flown around my FC before, but not like this.
VR has essentially given me a new lease and freedom to a familiar game; with many previously experienced aspects to experience a new.
I’ve done various things now in VR: landed on a planet/moon and boosted close to the surface (so much more fun in VR), rode around in my SRV, flew around various stations, and done NPC PvP. And not once have I experienced motion sickness like some others have.
Despite all this, VR isn't perfect. It doesn't give you the same resolution your monitor provides - you have to put up with some blurring, some fringing, lens flares from the lenses on the VR headset, lower resolution with some things (particularly distant objects) etc but all this is nothing in comparison to the immersion VR provides. Your brain slowly learns to ignore these things as you seek out more exciting depths you have never experienced before. I wish i dove into VR a long time ago but, later is better than never i suppose.
I realise Odyssey is not VR supported with some things, particularly space legs, but at least all current VR content will crossover to Odyssey, and that’s good enough for me and I can’t wait to see the level of detail Odyssey will provide in VR. Yep, I’m a convert and would recommend VR to everyone!
While I liked ED VR up to a point for many of the reasons you cite above, in the end I just need my third party apps too much to make ED playable in VR...
This still makes me laugh!
