First time in VR. Holy Mary, Mother of God.

[scadh]

After 600 hours in standard ED on a 32" monitor, I returned to the game today after a 6 month layoff to try it out with the new Oculus Quest 2 my son got for Christmas yesterday. It was unlike any gaming experience I've ever had in 40 years of gaming. Jaw-dropping and indescribable. To call it a "night and day difference" is an insult to the sun. It's not even the same game.

The first thing you notice (more like, it jumps up and down screaming and smacks you in the face) is how big things are. Your ship is huge. HUGE. Walking around a Krait Mk II in the hangar makes you feel like a mouse. Can't imagine what a Beluga or Type 9 would look like. Stations are massive and intimidating to approach from space. Even before leaving the hangar, the scale of things is awe-inspiring. The landing bay floor that looks just a couple feet below the bottom of the canopy in 2D is WAY down there in 3D. It's like looking down from a 4th floor window. The contacts on your radar positively leap off the screen. Ships that fly by make you nervous when they get close. Combat literally made my heart pound, it felt 10 times as frantic. I literally just flew into and out of Jameson Memorial on auto-pilot like 8 times just to look around. Simply awestruck. I really wanted to head for a planetary ring system and do some mining, I think it would look incredible ...

... but then I started to get nauseous. Not "about to vomit" level, but enough that it was clear I could handle it for maybe 30 minutes tops before having to take a break.

So a question for VR veterans, not only of this game but VR games in general. Does that get better as I get used to it? Do I get "sea legs", for lack of a better term? If it does, I think I am going to get a Quest 2 of my own. After having played for maybe 20 minutes, I launched it in 2D on my own computer and it felt flat and tiny and boring. I truly feel like even just a very short time in VR might have ruined it for me in standard. It's now legitimately hard to imagine playing it any other way. I WANT to play in VR, but a half-hour at a time isn't going to cut it. I don't want to drop $300 only to make myself sick constantly!

Is there hope for the mild nausea to go away as I acclimate to VR? Or should I just start taking Dramamine?

 

[CMDR Harada]

A lot of the nausea is caused by the headset/video settings. Frame rates also greatly affect how you feel. I'd see if you could adjust them.

As far as your first experience, CONGRATS ! It is truly a different game in VR. And you're right, even the 'small' ships are big.

A RES site is very cool to try. Try a convoy dispersal signal, and do barrel rolls around the ships gathered there ( incredibly awesome ).

 

[BinakAlgo]

I don't know, I had just a slight discomfort when I started to play with VR in Elite and other games. I had a little more trouble adjusting to turning in Skyrim VR and the worst thing I had was headaches if I was getting below 30-45 fps as I was using a gtx 970 (the bare minimum for VR), as soon as I got a gtx 1660 and squeezed a little OC from my CPU I stopped having problems. I would recommend stopping using it as soon as you feel bad, that's what I did, walk a little, drink some water, and get back. I don't think that taking Dramamine is a good long time solution.

BTW, get a Lakon ship (best cockpits in my opinion) and try to land on a planet on the dark side of it. The first time I did on a T-6 I was half scared and half excited, that was an experience.

 

[gorankar]

Some people do build a resistance to the nausea. As Harada typed, adjusting settings can help with that. Keeping a stable framrate is important for VR, so maybe lower settings a bit and see what happens.

Oh yeah, the sense of scale that is almost totally absent in the normal game really smacks you in the face the moment you try it in VR. You actually "feel" the size of ships. A Type 10 actually feels like it's 135 meters long, 119 wide, and 40M, or 7-8 stories tall.

 

[jojon]

Does that get better as I get used to it? Do I get "sea legs", for lack of a better term?

I don't believe I am making a bad assumption, when I say that most (but by no means all) people do.

The important thing to keep in mind, is to take a break immediately, at the first hint of nausea, like you had the sense to do -- trying to "push through", the ill only masses up and then hits you like a brick, and repeated bad experiences could even conceivably cause your unconscious to learn to associate VR with sickness, to the point you don't even need to put the headset on to feel bad... and here Ludwig van never did anything to anybody. :7

 

[Terekhov]

"Dad - Can I have my Quest back please?" "Just a few minutes Son, I'm mining - just need another 40t of Painite and I'll be done...."

Welcome to the VR club. - It really is something, isn't it!. I have a Rift S at the moment.

Both Combat and mining accentuate what VR can do. For me, VR heightens my situational awareness in combat, and in mining, I'm pirouetting around rocks checking for fissures in a way that I simply cannot achieve in pancake mode.

I'm fortunate enough not to be affected by VR sickness, but a couple of tips might be to ensure that you have the IPD of the headset is set correctly for you, so that your brain does not get confusing scale information. As a couple of posts above have said Frame rate is also very important. Ideally you want to be setting detail settings to achieve 80-90 fps - depending on your GPU that may bean lowering game detail settings considerably.

 

[scadh]

My son's computer is a Ryzen 5 3400G, SSD, 16gb DDR4, GeForce GTX 1650 Super. So not exactly a technological leap into the future, but not half bad either. The Quest 2 defaults to 72 fps, but has a couple other options (possibly still in beta) for up to 90 fps. I think he has graphic settings in ED maxed out. Is there a way to see what fps he's actually getting? For what it's worth, he played for hours yesterday and today and reported no symptoms. But he's 15 and I'm 50. Most games more intense than turn-based strategy are too much for me. Half-Life Alyx is in his future, but not mine.

I knew VR would make a big difference, but I was unprepared for just HOW much. It was so immersive in the cockpit that every time I took my hands of the HOTUS, I reached out to where they appeared in-game even though I knew it was really right in front of me. It's eerie how fast it begins to feel real.

 

[Terekhov]

Oh another thing is Nvidia drivers - the current ones induce a stuttering in VR, that could I suppose be jarring, and be upsetting you. Try regressing to version 446.14 (the newest version that does not have the bug - Note to others - this version does NOT support the new 3000 GPUs).

I can't advise on how to monitor frame rate in the Quest, but speculatively manually lowering the game settings may prove or disprove a point.

 

[Katie Byrne]

VR is something you build a tolerance for with experience - like you at first i could only do short stints. but after a little time with it I could go longer - Now I can stay comfortable for 5 hour fights against thargoid interceptors no problem

 

[Schmack]

After 600 hours in standard ED on a 32" monitor, I returned to the game today after a 6 month layoff to try it out with the new Oculus Quest 2 my son got for Christmas yesterday. It was unlike any gaming experience I've ever had in 40 years of gaming. Jaw-dropping and indescribable. To call it a "night and day difference" is an insult to the sun. It's not even the same game.

The first thing you notice (more like, it jumps up and down screaming and smacks you in the face) is how big things are. Your ship is huge. HUGE. Walking around a Krait Mk II in the hangar makes you feel like a mouse. Can't imagine what a Beluga or Type 9 would look like. Stations are massive and intimidating to approach from space. Even before leaving the hangar, the scale of things is awe-inspiring. The landing bay floor that looks just a couple feet below the bottom of the canopy in 2D is WAY down there in 3D. It's like looking down from a 4th floor window. The contacts on your radar positively leap off the screen. Ships that fly by make you nervous when they get close. Combat literally made my heart pound, it felt 10 times as frantic. I literally just flew into and out of Jameson Memorial on auto-pilot like 8 times just to look around. Simply awestruck. I really wanted to head for a planetary ring system and do some mining, I think it would look incredible ...

... but then I started to get nauseous. Not "about to vomit" level, but enough that it was clear I could handle it for maybe 30 minutes tops before having to take a break.

So a question for VR veterans, not only of this game but VR games in general. Does that get better as I get used to it? Do I get "sea legs", for lack of a better term? If it does, I think I am going to get a Quest 2 of my own. After having played for maybe 20 minutes, I launched it in 2D on my own computer and it felt flat and tiny and boring. I truly feel like even just a very short time in VR might have ruined it for me in standard. It's now legitimately hard to imagine playing it any other way. I WANT to play in VR, but a half-hour at a time isn't going to cut it. I don't want to drop $300 only to make myself sick constantly!

Is there hope for the mild nausea to go away as I acclimate to VR? Or should I just start taking Dramamine?

your post could have been written by me, it sounds a lot like my experience. I like to get a small ship like iEagle and just fly around the exterior of stations, it's amazing how well you can navigate through the structure in VR. But I also get nauseous after about 30m in the game. The 2nd problem I have with at least my Oculus Rift is that text on screen is too pixelated so even if the starfield looks ok, the text on the HUD does not. Maybe with the newer Oculus that's no longer an issue. Also it gets too warm on my face after awhile.

But you realize quickly that you cannot possibly describe it and do any justice, a person has to experience it.

 

[Arioch]

Welcome to the “real” version of Elite

In addition to the other good advice given above, having a fan blowing on your face can help with nausea.

Short sessions should acclimatise you within a few days, but be wary of certain in-game movements in your early sessions - autopilot is one (you don’t control the motion, so it can upset your perception a bit), SRV is another - try the SRV comfort options but only try short sessions with it. The SRV tutorial is good for this as you can nope out of it without consequence, plus it literally drops you off a cliff at the start

 

[Chazzie]

After 600 hours in standard ED on a 32" monitor, I returned to the game today after a 6 month layoff to try it out with the new Oculus Quest 2 my son got for Christmas yesterday. It was unlike any gaming experience I've ever had in 40 years of gaming. Jaw-dropping and indescribable. To call it a "night and day difference" is an insult to the sun. It's not even the same game.

The first thing you notice (more like, it jumps up and down screaming and smacks you in the face) is how big things are. Your ship is huge. HUGE. Walking around a Krait Mk II in the hangar makes you feel like a mouse. Can't imagine what a Beluga or Type 9 would look like. Stations are massive and intimidating to approach from space. Even before leaving the hangar, the scale of things is awe-inspiring. The landing bay floor that looks just a couple feet below the bottom of the canopy in 2D is WAY down there in 3D. It's like looking down from a 4th floor window. The contacts on your radar positively leap off the screen. Ships that fly by make you nervous when they get close. Combat literally made my heart pound, it felt 10 times as frantic. I literally just flew into and out of Jameson Memorial on auto-pilot like 8 times just to look around. Simply awestruck. I really wanted to head for a planetary ring system and do some mining, I think it would look incredible ...

... but then I started to get nauseous. Not "about to vomit" level, but enough that it was clear I could handle it for maybe 30 minutes tops before having to take a break.

So a question for VR veterans, not only of this game but VR games in general. Does that get better as I get used to it? Do I get "sea legs", for lack of a better term? If it does, I think I am going to get a Quest 2 of my own. After having played for maybe 20 minutes, I launched it in 2D on my own computer and it felt flat and tiny and boring. I truly feel like even just a very short time in VR might have ruined it for me in standard. It's now legitimately hard to imagine playing it any other way. I WANT to play in VR, but a half-hour at a time isn't going to cut it. I don't want to drop $300 only to make myself sick constantly!

Is there hope for the mild nausea to go away as I acclimate to VR? Or should I just start taking Dramamine?

..and that is pretty much why the VR community had a meltdown when FDev said that Odyssey did not support VR, It’s a amazing experience isn’t it?

I personally don’t own a VR headset - but my brother in law does, he brought it all around to try - and just wow. Ironically though it’s the lack of full VR support for Odyssey that stopped me buying my own Oculus Rift 2. I’ll wait for the full experience!

To answer a question though I did find the nauseous feeling to lessen the more I used it - I did find the SRV hell though.

 

[AkenBosch]

@scadh - Aside from all the good advices that have been given so far, another small but possibly relevant detail to your experience:

I literally just flew into and out of Jameson Memorial on auto-pilot like 8 times just to look around.

Movements outside of your control and your inner ear really don't go along well in such situation, it's the same reason why many people get car sick when they are passengers but not (or not as much) while driving themselves. If you are the one doing the piloting, your brain already expects what kind of input your eyes or ears are going to receive and somehow compensates, lessening the nauseous feeling. But being carried around while the ship rotates to align with an already rotating outside world, that may get pretty intense for people suffering sea or car sickness. Especially in those Lakon bubble canopies. Mismatches between peripheral vision and sense of equilibrium are what causes most of the discomfort, that's why some apps like Google Earth VR default to a "comfort mode" that blanks out everything but a central spot of vision while moving around.

 

[Bantha]

Welcome... to the real world!

This game is spectacular in VR isn’t it!

You do get used to it over time. I started out feeling a little nauseous after 15 mins, but now I’m perfectly fine with it, and can go for as long as the rest of me can tolerate it - wearing a hot sweaty mask on your face with a bright screen 2cm from your eye balls, sat in the same position for however long - these things bring their own challenges.

Other games are much worse for sickness than ED though - Onward VR for example, which I love to play. But when you use your thumb stick to walk your character along - that can be tough.

Oh, by the way, as has been eluded to above, for some reason, whilst I am perfectly fine now in the ship’s cockpit, the SRV still makes me feel a little sickly after a while...

 

[Dragsham]

I've never played in pancake mode. I can see it on my monitor when I start the game in vr but that's about it.
Nausea legs develop over time.
I'm glad you were blown away Op.
We all were and continue to be.
Hats off to fdev on this one.
And yes the vr Community here in elite are all very passionate about this game. Welcome to the club.
Just wait till you manually land on your own carrier.
Or 1st trip planetside... try to pick a spot to land in daylight...it'll blow you away

 

[Rat Catcher]

Steal the HMD from him again and take a drive around Guardian or Thargoid sites, although I'd recommend that you fly and land in pancake so as to maximise the 'window' of play while you get your 'VR Legs'... You may be surprised just how 'immersed' you can get in these alien ruins.

I think playing Lone Echo early on in my VR days made me immune to any kind of motion sickness... You are doing things the right way - cut loose as soon as discomfort hits, the time between starting to play and its onset should start to lengthen!

 

[[VR] Deggial]

Welcome to the cult!
Yea, ED is a completely different (and stunningly beautiful) beast in VR.
I believe, you can relate to the Odyssey-related disappointment, when the (initial?) drop of VR was announced.

Regarding your question: Yes, it is very possible to get used to it.
But give it time!
I can not emphasize the following quote enough:

The important thing to keep in mind, is to take a break immediately, at the first hint of nausea, like you had the sense to do -- trying to "push through", the ill only masses up and then hits you like a brick, and repeated bad experiences could even conceivably cause your unconscious to learn to associate VR with sickness, to the point you don't even need to put the headset on to feel bad... and here Ludwig van never did anything to anybody. :7

A hundred times YES!
I made this mistake while driving in the SRV (especially in bumpy terrain).
The consequence was, that I associated planet surfaces with nausea so much, that even flying over it in my ship made me feel sick. (I still could do all normal space flying just fine.)
Fortunately, after a long “un-learning” period, I came over it.
( By the way: make sure to remove the cockpit-shaking for SRVs in the setup menu, when driving in VR!)

What does help generally, is ginger!
Get yourself some ginger root and brew a nice tea out of it (delicious with some honey).
Or buy candied ginger.

With enough patience, it’s very likely you will get completely used to VR and be able to fully enjoy its awesomeness.

 

[Helvellyn]

At first I couldn't manage long in VR. The slight turning of the hyperspace tunnel made me feel a little queasy. Turning on the launch pad did. Combat did. But that's all gone and now I can carry on for hours. I recently tried turning the SRV settings back to the default and that made me feel bad in a very short time though, but with the level horizon option and blackout in spins option SRVs are mostly fine too (bouncing around over really rough terrain can be a little offputting).

Those are just my personal experiences though, it seems that different people can react very differently (e.g. I don't seem all that affected by frame rates, unless they get to slideshow level, but it matters a lot for others). The best advice I can think of is to take it easy but don't quit, and to experiment with settings.

 

[Helvellyn]

Oh, another suggestion, just for the sense of presence rather than getting used to VR - take a spin in a Sidewinder or Eagle, something with a small, cramped cockpit instead of a huge bridge.

 

[lordzaz]

Can I ask about the control methods while using the Quest 2 ?

I use HOTAS and keyboard for flight nav and mouse for menus etc, would that still be possible or do you have to use VR controls only ?

Asking because my lad wants to buy one and I'm tempted to split the cost so I can play Elite