Oculus Rift (VR Gaming)

Oculus Rift?

  • Yes

    Votes: 6 75.0%

  • No

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Double Rainbow!

    Votes: 2 25.0%
  • Total voters
    8
PANDA

PANDA

[13] Hero
Oculus Rift

What do you guys think? is this the future of gaming? Will PS4 and Xbox720 adapt this in the future (or possibly at launch)? Looks like it is already confirmed for Steam. Looks amazing IMO...
Dev kits are already out for around $300. Can't wait to see the final product!

get hype
 
Sorry, I would have posted earlier but I was away on vacation for the past few days in beautiful British Columbia, Canada.

Anyhow, yes... I'm a believer. I think VR is going to be a game changer. If done right, marketed well, support given, whoever does it - whether it's Oculus or some other company like the big guys, this is gonna be some serious shit when it's all said and done.

I'm sure by now, there's plenty of reviews out there, so you can read about it. I haven't had much time with it because of travel plans and such so I still need to mess around with some more. Anyhow, here are my impressions so far.

I ordered my unit by backing the Kickstarter when it was first announced last summer (August 2012) and got the unit about a week ago. This is what you get:

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- A big lunchbox case with some padded foaming inside to house all the components
- A neatly packed welcome letter, instruction manual
- Oculus Rift Headset which is permanently connected to the Control Box.
- 3 pair of cup shaped optics - sized A-B-C cups { A=default for normal vision, B and C for people who normally wear glasses}
- 3 ft USB (mini to normal) cable
- 3 ft DVI cable
- 6 ft HDMI cable
- 3 ft HDMI cable
- DVI (male) to HDMI (female) adapter
- AC Power supply wall unit
- a bunch of electric plug adapters with different prong configurations for international users

Pretty much came with everything you need to get started. You just need a good computer with decent graphics card and download their SDK kit. With their kit you get their SDK support for Unreal and Unity engines, if you got access to them. Otherwise, right now there really isn't that much software for it.

As far as gaming, Valve's Source engine supports it thus Team Fortress 2 works with the unit right now. (I hear support for Half Life 2 and Garry's Mod is in the works). There's a mod that allows Mirror's Edge to work with it - I haven't tried it yet. A bunch of games including the online mech shooter Hawken, Doom 3 BFG, Minecraft, and Chris Robert's (Wing Commander) online space mmorpg Star Citizen are being planned.

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Team Fortress 2 in stereoscopic VR using Oculus Rift

But that isn't the point of this unit. People need to realize this is really a development kit. It's NOT a consumer product so don't expect that there be a lot of gaming support for it. This is meant as a tool for people to use to create and develop new software and interfaces for an entirely new platform of digital entertainment that has yet to be realized. It'll probably be a few years, maybe as little as 1-2 years away before we start seeing a commercial - consumer version of the product refined and with real games built from ground up. There are still a lot of things that need to be solved before this could truly hit the market.

SETUP
It's fairly easy to set up. All you need to do is connect the video cables to the video output port on your computer to either the DVI or HDMI input on the control box. This could be a DVI out or HDMI out on the back of your graphics card or monitor out on your laptop computer. The unit can only handle one source - either DVI or HDMI - not both. You also need to connect the USB cable to your computer and power adapter to the control box.

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Using Windows 7, the RIFT was automatically recognized as a second monitor. Depending upon your setup, you can have it to run as an extended desktop or mirror your primary monitor. The suggested setup is to have the RIFT mirror your primary monitor. I have a dual monitor setup on my workstation and I'm using an Nvidia 5xx series card so I can't run 3 monitors at a time. So whenever I'm using the rift, I just changed the monitor setting to mirror the primary.

I haven't tried this on a Mac with OSX but it should work the same. Software support for both OSX and Linux will be released soon.

The rest is pretty much intuitive. Strap the Oculus VR headset to your head. Tighten the Velcro strapping for comfort and adjust the distance of the LCD unit on the head mount by pulling the unit forward or back. I just pulled it out all the way which works best for me.

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IMPRESSIONS

AMAZING! ABSOLUTELY EFFING AMAZING! - those were my first thoughts.

When I first put it on, I couldn't help but SMILE =)

I fired up the demo that Oculus guys included in their SDK download and I found myself standing in a small room. I looked up, around and behind me, up at the ceiling and a fire place in front of me. It's really such a different new kind of experience that I'm pretty sure almost everyone (except those who have already tried it) have yet to experience. The sense of immersion is really there.

There's an open door to my right. I go outside and again I look up and around. I see a blue sky, clouds, the small house behind me, grass and some weird snowflake like puff thing like pollen floating past and around me. The digital sun is casting this weird lens flare when I move my head. There's a tree branch above me and really feels like I can just stretch out my arm and grab it. I walk further out over the grass and there is an old broken stone wall around the perimeter. I'm looking across a digital harbor. The sea is calm. I can see the other side of the shore taking in the view. I'm looking at the world simply by turning my head. This really feels natural, it's just so weird. I look back. I can see the house. So I head back in and go up the stairs. There's some lit candles hung on the wall. I take a closer look. Digital flames. I head outside to the balcony and I'm looking out taking in the entire scenery. I decide to sit. I'm sitting in my office chair at my desk in reality. But in VR it feels like I'm sitting on this balcony in this digital world. This is so strange, it so cool. Really, it feels like... I'm there.

(No sound in the video - the demo did not have any sound or I may have not enabled it)

The most mundane things you're use to seeing in games like rocks, barrels, grass, lighting, are suddenly interesting again when experienced in VR for the first time.

It's hard for me to describe exactly what the experience is like. I could just spat what everyone has said so far of how cool and awesome this thing is and you guys may or may not be phazed from me (and everyone else) just telling you so but really this is something you guys have to simply try on to appreciate. There's no way for me even with pictures or video to actually show what the experience is like.

It's because of the way in which this thing works.

Underneath the hood, it's a simple rectangular high density 7 inch LED LCD display which is housed in head mount unit that fits on your head with straps. There's foam around the edges that press against your face kind've like ski goggles. Inside, there are two removable diopter optics that magnify and correct the image you see on the LCD display. The image that's displayed on the LCD screen is split for each eye designed to be viewed in stereo - one image for each eye. If done properly in software, each eye should be seeing whatever you're looking at from a slightly different perspective - the same way our natural eyes see the world. Your brain of course naturally combines both images and the final image is "displayed" in your head.

So with the Oculus Rift, you get this added benefit of 3D stereoscopic vision. Your eyes are focused to infinity so you get this natural dimensional depth perception without all the strain from cross-talk you get with watching movies on current displays with 3D glasses. What sets the Oculus apart from past VR head mount displays is the low latency head tracking built into the unit and wide (FOV) Field of View.

The LCD screen is literally "in your face" thus the use of correcting optics to set the proper spatial distance to the screen. The image on the screen also has to be distorted in a way to allow a wider field of view. You get this "fish eye effect" on screen but together with the correcting optics when viewed up close it wraps around you covering your peripheral vision and it really feels like "you're there".

There is no noticeable lag when moving your head in 3D space and watching whatever's on the display in the virtual "world". When you move your head, the "world" isn't catching up which would break the immersive experience. You turn your head to the left, to the right, look up or down, you're seeing whatever there around you, above you, below you, behind you.

It's not without problems however.

The LCD could use better resolution which is rated right now at something like 720p (it's actually 1280x800 or 640x800 per eye). It's not that the display in itself is bad, it's actually quite good when viewed normally like any high quality display on a modern smart phone. However the problem is when your looking at the screen a few inches away up against your face, you could see the individual pixels so it gives you this "screen door" effect as if you're looking at the world through something like a insect/mosquito screen. With the commercial version, there will need to be higher resolution with better pixel density. I'd imagine something like Apple's Retina display at 2K+ resolution (beyond 1080p HD) would do the trick.

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Oculus headset with one of the eye cups removed. The LCD screen is actually a very high quality display when viewed from afar.

There is no Z-space motion tracking or simply tracking within spatial distance. Another words, the unit does not track your position in space relative to some distance like the Xbox Kinect. You can tilt your head left and right along the rolling axis but peeking around walls or leaning your head forward doesn't work. So you can't bend down, lean foward and look at things like rocks, insects, computer screens, whatever with the unit although you can tilt your head down.

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There is no physical IPD (Inter-Pupillary Distance) adjustment. What this mean is adjusting the distance of stereoscopic images to suit the different distance between two eyes from one person to another. Everyone's eye's are spaced differently and for some people, they may have slight problems fusing stereoscope images causing overlap or crosstalk. This is similar to the problem people get with current 3D displays requiring special 3D glasses. This can result in motion sickness, dizziness, and nausea in some people and is amplified more in VR. Fortunately this can be corrected in software and the better demos and applications I've tried work well (like TF2).

Software developers will have to rethink their approach when making gaming worlds and environments in VR. What was passable and okay when viewing and navigating within 3D space on something 2D and flat like a monitor screen doesn't always translate well within VR. Things like having proper scale, size ratios and speed of movement will have to be considered in relation to the view camera. i.e. running around normally like in FPS shooter seems like your running around at 40mph in VR.

This leads to another area that will need some exploration. VR will need some new kind of interface. The head mount unit does an excellent job changing your view inside the world but something else is going to be needed besides traditional keyboard, mouse or gamepad controller. Currently I'm using an XBOX 360 controller and it works fine.

So in a nutshell:

PROS
- This is the "real deal". The Virtual Reality we've all been waiting for.
- Very low latency head tracking.
- Wide FOV (field of view)
- Kit has everything you need to get started (minus software, SDK is downloadable). Has adapter plugs for international standards and comes with DVI/HDMI cables including DVI/HDMI adapter.
- Head unit doesn't weigh a lot. It's fairly comfortable when strapped on properly.
- Supports Unity3D and Unreal Engine platform
- Some games (existing and new) supported/planned. Valve's Source Engine currently works.
- Cost - it's affordable, price is a bargain if you know what traditional head mount displays and past VR solutions costs. This is so much cheaper and really pulls off VR immersion that many other units in the past have failed to do.

CONS
- This is NOT a consumer product. It's a development kit. Therefore doesn't have a lot of bells and whistles. It's designed to get software/game developers, hackers, enthusiasts to develop an entirely new platform that has yet to be realized.
- Needs a much higher resolution display (because you're looking at it really up close, it's in your face literally). You can see each pixel so it looks like you're looking through a screen door. The current model is only 720p (half that for each eye). The consumer version will really need something like Apple's Retina display or something even better.
- No Z-space spatial motion displacement tracking. It won't detect movement like bending forward or peeking around corners.
- No optical diopter adjustment.
- No IPD adjustment (need to be handled in software)
- There is little software (and games) that support it at the moment since this is meant for developers to use to experiment a new platform of digital entertainment. If you don't know how to program or write your own software, don't have access to Unity/Unreal development software, then you have to wait for others make them for you and/or release them to the community
- May (will probably) need a new kind of interface beyond keyboard/mouse/gamepad
- Some people may experience motion sickness
- No built in sound or headphones. Need to use your own. Not really a con but maybe for some.
- Cost - I list cost again here because the price for this development kit costs $300. Probably expensive for most people for just an early development kit and lack of software and very little gaming support.

Overall I'm very impressed. VR is something you need to experience. Once you do, I'm pretty sure you'll agree that there is definitely some interesting things to be done here.
 
I've been meaning to put up some additional stuff dealing with the Oculus but I've been pretty busy with work and family. Anyways, for now, here's a quick video of a recent demo I've been playing around with. It's a simple flight sim in space which reminds me of something like Mass Effect - detachable rover and all the boring exploration on a barren rock included. Until some of the mechanics for navigation and movement in virtual environment are handled better (other than using an xbox controller), right the now demonstrations or games where you're stationary like this - in cockpit or driver seat - works best with what we have at the moment (controller or mouse/keyboard).

Anyhow, here is a short stereo video feed. I truly wish there was some way to show you guys what it really feels like to try this. It really feels like I'm in this flying thing that looks like 'Spaceship 1'. The whole sensation of flight (minus the butterflies in your stomach) is really there. There is so much potential here.

 
There's been some recent interesting news involving Oculus and VR in general.

Facebook announced today (3/25/14) that it is planning to buy Oculus VR for $2 Billion which will be a boon for the company. The reality of VR now has some real funding behind its back to bring it to fruition for consumer use.

Several weeks ago Oculus VR announced the discontinuation of the popular prototype dev kit - the Oculus Rift that I posted about above due to supply issues. But I think that was just simply PR deflection. A week later they announced the public release of Oculus DK2 or "Development Kit 2". This is a far more improved version over the first one which based more on their "Crystal Cove" Prototype which they showcased at CES, GDC, and other electronic/gaming expos.

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With DK2, we finally get z-space motion tracking thanks to the external IR camera and additional sensors built into the headmount unit. What this means is now we can lean forward and peak around corners in VR space which previously couldn't been done on the Rift. This adds an additional dimension of immersion, it was sort've the missing piece to trick your brain into thinking it's experiencing simulated "reality" and greatly reduces "motion sickness".

Another thing they added was a low persistence HD OLED display @ 960 x 1080. OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode) is the latest tech being deployed for display and TV sets. It exceeds traditional LCD (including LED backlit) displays being far more energy efficient and more vibrant in color range with deeper black levels. An example of this technology you can find in first generation PS VITA (phat) and some of the newer HD/UHD (UltraHD) 4K displays as this technology is the running candidate to replace plasma (and eventually LCD). By using OLED, they will have eliminated the "screen door" effect and images will be much more sharper.

They're deploying something called "low persistence" in their displays. What this does is eliminate judder or frame lag (a sort've ghosting or after imaging with moving pixels - motion blur). With low persistence, the image is shut off for a short period of time during its process cycle. The image simply goes black during the switching cycle which all happens in less than a millisecond. Originally it was thought that just by having a high enough refresh rate would solve the problem of judder kind've like what you see with some modern HD TV's which produce that "motion flow" or "soap opera" video effect by interpolating frames. However, with the display being so much closer to your eyes, they conducted a study with Valve and determined that its better to deploy this technique of using low persistence instead. Your "mind" so to speak fills in the details and what results is a truly lag free display.


Interesting though, roughly around the same time as this announcement, Sony announced their VR plans for consoles with "Project Morpheus" for the PS4.


It's basically utilizing the same principle of technology behind the Oculus without the low persistence display. Aesthetically it looks better however and gives us an idea what a consumer version will look like. Both devices however are still very much in development phase but it really isn't that long off till we see consumer versions from both sides and perhaps even others. So the future of VR - jacking into the Matrix - (Lawnmower man if you're old school) is getting closer to "real" reality.

Anyways, I'll be report back later in few months when I get the Oculus DK2 in hand to review.
 
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