Very well written there, it was worth the time taken to read it through (twice in parts!)
Great advice given
VR usage across the user base.
- Thread starter Fibblesnork
- Start date
Great advice given
No, as HMD is used to track where you are looking in the Theatre itself and it would be eeeally disconcerting if the image moved alongside imho.
But the terrain upgrades and planetary landings are paid content, why should they release it to us for free? As for the software, Steam VR also has it, called Desktop Theater mode, you can launch pretty much any game in this and it will be like being in a cinema. There's dedicated 3rd party software like BigScreen too.
... and it will just become another Scam Citizen
See how that turned out ;-)Headtrackers work by creating a virtual axis/joystick device. As long as they allow it to work alongside the mouse, you will be fine. So you shouldn't theoretically lose tracking in the ship, but what will happen "on foot" is anyone's guess. Also X4 dropped support (or rather: didn't implement it, like Odyssey VR), so there's that. You are however much more safe than us VR users which may be getting the shaft.
I think the original Braben's (and cROBBERts) visions are great. Living breathing universe. Where you live and thrive as a commander, not are a ship or a srv. The devil is in the details. I see enormous potential in Space Legs, and don't automagically associate it with first person shooter gameplay. If it's the only association frontier sees, then poo poo to them. If however they use it for missions like Scam Citizen gives a taste of (EVA to derelict to find clues, explore a base, repair a comms satelite etc.), then it could be glorious. Also having a familiar size and depth cues on the screen one will be finally appreciate the scale of the Elite universe and ships too. Because now without VR you have completely no idea how big is for example a farragut. You can read the tech data... but your brain won't visualise it for you. And to see a planet hundreds of km below the coriolis station for the first time. To hover over a planetary ring and feel so abysmally tiny. It's unbelivable. And loss of it all is what we are lamenting.
FTFYA good analogy for the philosophy would be that it is fine to throw VR users under a bus as it would enable 75% people to get on because it had to stop
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Thanks! Now I'm off to Onward with a friend, those insurgents won't snipe themselves!Very well written there, it was worth the time taken to read it through (twice in parts!)
Great advice given
I don’t think I’ve seen anyone suggesting that and certainly not many, so don’t know where you are getting that from?
Most of us just want them to say they are definitely going to add VR not some ambitious ‘not at release’ which most of us take mean it probably will never happen. Even more just want them to include atmospheres and graphics improvements from Odessy into Horizons VR, at least in the interim. What’s selfish or entitled about that exactly?
How would it be any different from using a headtracker with a normal monitor?
You would still be looking at a static screen (albeit in virtual space) displaying your headtracked view - though I think now it wouldn’t be possible because, as you say, the HMD is tracking where you are looking so it can maintain the screen position - so there would need to be a way of taking that data and extracting just the info needed for the game. I suppose as an alternative I could mount a tracker onto the RiftS headband and have the webcam in a relevant position...but then I’d probably eventually end up looking like:
That is surely true - once installed, SteamVR and OculusVR both run a plentiful collection of background services and applications. And only they know what telemetry they gather - but they could certainly track and report what EXEs were using the VR APIs. The best analysis I could find is here: https://www.windowscentral.com/vr-and-your-privacy-how-are-these-companies-treating-your-data . But I doubt that this telemetry data would make it into Steam/Oculus's published 'leaderboards' (which relate to purchases from their respective app stores); they might sell the telemetry data to third parties of course, but I can't see why Frontier would want to buy it (being as it wouldn't tell them anything more than their own data already tells them).
Bottom line: I still think that only Frontier really have the full picture of how many VR users there are in Elite: Dangerous. I don't think you can rely on published statistics from Steam to tell you anything very much, because they won't give the whole picture.
what is certain is that with the quest link, and facebook horizon, and alyx etc... more and more people are VR enthusiasts. And that VR titles are still in the minority for the moment.
and that for all these users, and newcomers, they have a strong chance to want to test elite.
So not making odyssee compatible with VR by taking into account current and not future users can be a huge mistake;
odyssee VR would have made a strong buzz in 2021 with a huge influx of new players, tired of alyx or beat saber.
some will tell me it's a pro studio, they know what they're doing. A lot of people said the same thing in 2010 when Microsoft said that smartphones were a fashion phenomenon that wasn't worth the investment.
I say that when in doubt, the only leitmotiv is to always go towards innovation. the risk of standing still or falling back is greater.
and that for all these users, and newcomers, they have a strong chance to want to test elite.
So not making odyssee compatible with VR by taking into account current and not future users can be a huge mistake;
odyssee VR would have made a strong buzz in 2021 with a huge influx of new players, tired of alyx or beat saber.
some will tell me it's a pro studio, they know what they're doing. A lot of people said the same thing in 2010 when Microsoft said that smartphones were a fashion phenomenon that wasn't worth the investment.
I say that when in doubt, the only leitmotiv is to always go towards innovation. the risk of standing still or falling back is greater.
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![[VR] optimal_909](https://forums-cdn.zaonce.net/data/avatars/m/109/109067.jpg?1553781733){kind=avatar}
They have certainly crunched the numbers and came to an educated conclusion.
But they may have misjudged the situation from two angles:
- That some of the most dedicated players, many of the them driving force in the community created content play in VR i.e. those players may worth more than simply 'one player'. Possibly also responsible for the disproportionate pushback.
- Most importantly, that VR players would be ready to accept major compromises while still pay for the new content.
I will happily pay twice the NonVR amount to have VR Odyssey at release ... and I won't buy Odyssey at release without it. I don't care if others buy it and play it without VR ... it's just not something I am going to do. I brought ED when it originally was released and did not play it once until I got my first VR headset. I bought my headset expressly for ED. I have only ever played it in VR and will only ever play it in VR.
While I agree with the general sentiment of not buying Odyssey without VR I don't agree companies ransoming us with higher prices for VR releases. Either you put the VR work in, or you won't be seeing a penny from me. We VR players need to work together to bring VR prices down, not up for the whole market to be more competitive.
I used to have an Oculus Rift. Loved it, but the novelty wore off quickly. Went back to playing Elite on a screen just over a year ago and enjoyed it just as much.
I completely understand and appreciate your point. I do think currently however that as VR users we have to accept in the short term, that we need to offer incentive to devs to implement VR in some cases. Unfortunately for alot of devs, that's time and resources ... so money.
Even though I’ll be getting EDO as part of my KS pledge, I’d still be willing to pay extra for a VR version - the way I’d see it is like when I pay extra for a film on 3D Blu-ray as opposed to just getting the DVD.
I can see how other people wouldn’t be happy with the idea for Elite; I know it’s not really comparable to EDOs situation, but I paid full price for SkyrimVR on release compared to the couple-of-quid sale price the flatscreen version goes for, and I think it’s been worth every penny.
Great advice/info there Starlight o7Oof. Where to begin... First things first: if someone is new to VR, the VR owner should be responsible and not put the VRgin through something like Elite Dangerous or Onward (read: free locomotion, wild camera movements in 6 degrees of freedom). Or god forbid a roller coaster for kicks and giggles. I really wouldn't recommend Elite as first experience, unless you're stationary in the menu - in VR version you're standing in the hangar next to HUGE SRV and even more HUGE Eagle, and the hangar is VAST. But I digress. For first experience, something stationary is recommended, like a wave shooter or something. There's also individual biometrics at play, namely your head shape and interpupilary distance (IPD). If the headset has wrong IPD set, you will see blurry, double, ghosting, chromatic aberration, and it will greatly add to the nausea.
Headset should be adjusted properly, so that lenses center are as coaxial with your pupils as possible, hence the need for IPD regulation. Some cheapskate vendors try to weasel out of the IPD hardware slider as it drives up the cost (looking at you HP Reverb and Oculus Rift S). One should avoid models without IPD regulation unless his/her IPD is ~64mm.
Now regarding glasses, IDK what HMD did you try. There's sufficient room for glasses in Valve Index. There are also companies that offer VR prescription lens inserts for your hmd, like https://vidmovr.com/ or https://vr-lens-lab.com/ . That or you can use contact lenses if you are able.
Back to your first experience - getting nauseous on your first try, depending on the content used, is completely normal. You should stop immediately at first signs of sickness and take a break. Machine used to demo is also important, if it's potato pc and frames are not up to par, VRgin will "suffer". VRvet will only shrug and notice the choppy framerate.
As for your rig, it's not its fault. It's Elite engine being crappy in general. Also, VR is demanding, you need compromises on crappy engines. Again lots of factors could be contributing. Rift had "hidden supersampling" back in the day which kicked in at random moments when the drivers felt that they have overhead. SteamVR does this stupid, stupid auto resolution thingy which needs to be adjusted often per application basis, because it's overly optimistic. It's better shown by example:
I was using VR on an i5-3570k 8GB RAM and first GTX 670 (DK2) then 1070 (vive) and finally 1080Ti till a year ago when I finally upgraded the CPU to an i7-9700k and bought an Index. And that puny i5 (granted overclocked to 4.2GHz) was able to pull many games including Elite for so many years, thanks to Intel's greed and incremental cpu upgrades ;-)
Don't self-eliminate... what you describe is nothing out of the ordinary. If you were demoed Elite, I am not surprised you had nausea, especially with what you wrote about glasses. HTC Vive had ample space for glasses, provided you knew that you can move the panels a little back. I still remember lifting straight up from a Coriolis pad gave me butterflies in my stomach. And not the good kind. It all went away after ~6 weeks. I have now 116 hrs in Onward which is a VR FPS, no problems whatsoever. But, some poor souls never do adapt. Also some poor souls get epillepsy when playing on a monitor. I suspect the percentages are about the same
I still remember my first contact with VR on a crappy DK2. It was a simple table with a house built of cards on it. Not interactive, nothing. But the wow effect was so huge I promptly called my wife and practically dragged her to my friend's house to try it
Anyhow, at this stage the brain is susceptible to sensory mismatch, so it can cause these kinds of unpleasant sensations because it's convinced you're poisoned and need to throw up.
Conversely it is the best time to try ekhem... adult entertainment in VR. Because your brain is sooo easily fooled, it really wants to believe what it's seeing and... assumes certain things. What this does is it throws your way some ghost sensory inputs that aren't really there like an illusion of touch. I won't go into details as forum is PG7. Just trust me on this one
Last but not least, VR won't eliminate traditional gaming. People are lazy slobs, they don't want to stand for X amount of hours and shoot baddies in Onward. And oftentimes I just don't feel like going in VR and play some popcorn-class 2d game like Overwatch. So yeah, 2d is still here to stay, for a long time. That said, I'd literally KILL for Cyberpunk 2077 in VR. CDPR plisss... At least it's not off the table like with Witcher. But, alas, also "not on launch".
There are some other interesting suggestions that headset ownership is way above average amongst ED players.
Some of these have been mentioned, but worth a recap:
Vrflg.com is interesting. On the 5th June it showed this for example:
The current reddit poll is running at about 33% ownership.
And of course there’s the breakdown for NMS, which may attract a similar geeky sci-if crowd:
The brass tacks though are that FDev have the accurate numbers, and they’ve still made the decision they’ve made...
Think we can only hope that global VR uptake continues to grow, and that Odyssey sells well. That way FDev can make the business case to have a punt on it.
Or that FDev market a higher-priced VR version to fund the extra dev required.
(I’ll keep my fingers crossed for Sony offering a lump sum for them to make it a PS5VR launch title though in the meantime)
Some of these have been mentioned, but worth a recap:
Vrflg.com is interesting. On the 5th June it showed this for example:
The current reddit poll is running at about 33% ownership.
And of course there’s the breakdown for NMS, which may attract a similar geeky sci-if crowd:
NMS’s experience was interesting. Sean Murray reckoned 1/4 of all VR owners owned NMS (before the VR update):
Those numbers are boosted by PSVR, but if ED’s comparably sci-fi-geeky fanbase has similar tendencies, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see, say, a quarter of a million headset owners? (And given the 3.5mil units of the base game sold over its lifetime, that’d be an above-average VR presence
The brass tacks though are that FDev have the accurate numbers, and they’ve still made the decision they’ve made...
Think we can only hope that global VR uptake continues to grow, and that Odyssey sells well. That way FDev can make the business case to have a punt on it.
Or that FDev market a higher-priced VR version to fund the extra dev required.
(I’ll keep my fingers crossed for Sony offering a lump sum for them to make it a PS5VR launch title though in the meantime
)
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![[VR] Mad Mike](https://forums-cdn.zaonce.net/data/avatars/m/27/27910.jpg?1553527108){kind=avatar}
Lol if hypothetically FD removed VR from the PC version and put in as a PS5VR launch title as livid as I would be, even I would be a little bit entertained by watching that s..t show . I may be wrong but I don't see Sony footing the bill for that and allowing pc to get it as well... But again I may be wrong.