Today marks the first day I was able to try out the VR technology of the future. I’ve been waiting for this a long time, the last few months I’ve been keeping close tabs on what’s happening with the Vive especially. It so happens that we got our hands on an Occulus Rift for the weekend, so imagine my excitement.
And it does not disappoint, although I feel fairly nauseous as I write this. My friend tells me I’ve been too greedy during my first steps, exploring the villa in Tuscany sim at too fast a pace – this vertigo is something I did not anticipate to this degree. I hear it’s all part of an adjustment process however and I can’t wait to see more. I’ve been in outer space and up a skyscraper, I ambled into a scene from Spirited Away chasing the dust puppies, I’ve been hunted by witches. For a fair few seconds, the experience was smooth enough to fully immerse myself and lose all notion of where I really was, in favor of the VR. It was bewildering, scary and wonderful.
I can’t wait to visit Tamriel. I cannot even fathom how it would feel walking through Elwynn Forest in true first person mode. I imagine I’d break out into tears arriving at the Lion’s Pride Inn, listening to the music. Be still, my heart.
Is this the future of gaming? It sure as hell is! And I can’t wait.
Yeah ! I also tries the oculus rift, and the resolution was not enough, but the two games I play were fun. The first was only a gimmick ( I fly over an island) but give great feeling – the first crash is quite a shock. But the second – a platform game were you can use your arms as a grapple to navigate higher and higer was very good !
I think the first generation will not be enough – I will still buy it 😉 : the screen will not be reactive and precise enough, and consume too much GPU/CPU and game dev will have to rethink how to create games.
I did not think of it before, but MMORPG with their big world and slow pace will be great candidate for VR.
I can’t wait for the first VR-ready MMO experience but I’ve a feeling we’re still several years away from that. Am certainly not gonna invest in any first generation releases but once the Vive starts looking reasonable, that will probably be my first VR system of choice. Can’t beat Valve when it comes to backing it up with software I don’t think.