Camera rocking, cutscenes, etc

[Laserschwert]

Regarding head bobbing:

First of all, in real life you DO constantly bob your head when walking. But it's actually your eyes that cancel it out, because your eyes tend to stay fixed on the point you're looking it. Just try smoothly sweeping your view across something - you won't be able to, instead your eyes "hop" from one fixed point to the next. And when that happens while you walk (especially when looking at something far away), you won't notice much of a perspective shift caused by your head bobbing, as that would only be noticeable on objects very close to you (like when walking in a crowd... yes, I just called people objects).

So, what should NOT be done regarding head bobbing with the Rift is camera rotation. Instead the cam should only translate sideways and up/down, while staying targeted at something straight ahead (Possibly your focus point? The sky-box? I don't know what would work best in VR here...).

So I assume that way the head bobbing could actually increase depth perception, because of the subtle parallex we otherwise don't have because of a) missing positional tracking, and b) even with positional tracking, we wouldn't shift our weight while "walking" in the game, as we're not really walking (at least not yet).

[PasticheDonkey]

probably should have head bobbing on/off option in software just for future compatibility with locomotion devices.

[drifter]

exactly, game devs should let the user decide, as not everyone is equally sensitive to motion sickness.
amount of head bobbing : 0 -> x
and if the dev really want to occasionally deactivate the headtracking, let the user choose what FOVs (H & V) he wants for the cutscenes, or choose the virtual theater solution (the best solution I think for the integrity of our alimentary bolus)

That being said, a virtual theater just for the intro of a game could be great, with the screen expanding and including you as you take control of your avatar.

[cybereality]

Head bobbing is actually desirable when it matches up with your real head movements. I noticed this when I was walking in place (just for fun) while using a Vuzix HMD and also when I got to try Brant's Red Rovr demo. Even though it was tracking orientation only, just the subtle rotations as you walk made it feel more immersive.

The problem is when the bobbing does not match your physical sensation. Then it makes you sick. For example, any time you walk around in real life there is a ton of movement and bobbing, and this is no problem.

[Mystify]

Stop acting like this is an artificial constraint being placed on VR. Its not a matter of "Lets arbitrarily say you can't do these things", as a restriction being placed on it. Its a matter of "These approaches simply don't work well in VR'', as a basic consequence of how VR and humans interact. Saying "but I like the head bob in games" does not make it work in VR. People have tried it, noticed that it does not work, and are passing on that knowledge. Denying that doesn't change it. Suggestions of ways around it are useful. Maybe adding in borders to the vision will work for cutscenes. I suspect that even if you fix the actual experience of watching the cutscene, the presence of it in the VR experience will still detract.
VR is its own medium. Yes, not showing anything away from the player is a limitation, but it may be an inherent limitation to the medium. Its about being there, putting yourself in the world, and the experience would be best-served by catering to it rather than trying to find ways to include storytelling mechanics designed for a different medium.

[PasticheDonkey]

has it been tried with position tracking added on top of the head bob. if predictable user controlled movements don't work then falling, sliding and just moving around is going to make you sick as well. because all those should have a physical sensation as well.

[Delryn]

has it been tried with position tracking added on top of the head bob. if predictable user controlled movements don't work then falling, sliding and just moving around is going to make you sick as well. because all those should have a physical sensation as well.

That's kind of why I think things like head bob should work.

[bubimude]

People seem to quite enjoy seeing films in Omnimax, which essentially is a "cutscene" with a degree of head tracking (since you can look around the screen). If there's some kind of indication that we're entering a cutscene, I don't think you'll need to contain everything in cropped screen.
If people were always aware that they're looking at their TV, then it wouldn't be very interesting in the long run. Viewers get into a show or a movie and they enter that world for a while, forgetting they're in their living room. With VR there just isn't a living room to pull us back out and remind us that its just TV.
It comes down to identifying the triggers that pull us out of the experience, and either avoiding those, or seeing whether those triggers can be ignored over time by someone who has done it a few times.

[jf031]

I'm personally anti-cutscene. I'm generally not one for storyline in my video games (I don't care a vast majority of the time - hate that I cannot skip the cutscenes in Far Cry 3), and I don't like being taken out of the action to watch a scene of mediocre quality at best (compared to good TV shows/movies).

As some others have noted, it is also a crutch to lazily force a specific narrative onto the player. I'm fine with the way it's handled in the Half-Life series.

As for head bob, I would listen to people who know what they are talking about, like Palmer, who have actually tried out such things. Insisting that it needs to be in VR games when you have no idea what the experience is like... Come on.

[PasticheDonkey]

i don't think it needs to be there i just haven't heard good supporting arguments for why it shouldn't. which is all i can go on without trying the version of the tech, that i'd think from the factors i know, would work. it's not something that isn't worth actually testing.

[TheHolyChicken]

i don't think it needs to be there i just haven't heard good supporting arguments for why it shouldn't.

Well apparently nausea is a big risk, which seems like a big enough reason to me. We'll know more when the kits get out into the hands of devs everywhere so people can get experimenting, and when Oculus release their "best practices" guide.

[Diorama]

As for head bob, I would listen to people who know what they are talking about, like Palmer, who have actually tried out such things. Insisting that it needs to be in VR games when you have no idea what the experience is like... Come on.

This is what I'm going with.

I invested in the darned thing. I believe in it that much.

Look, there are two kinds of people in the world. Those that doubt the Rift and those that have tried it and are believers.

Games will need to be built for it. You can't just slap it into another game. View bob needs to not be on, for example, or it winds up causing disconnect between what you're seeing and inner ear.

At the end of the day it's all speculation until we have Rifts on our heads, but head bob seems to be a sticking point/ example that has come up a few times in context of converting games to VR.

Lens flare would be stupid. Unless you are playing a robot (with cameras for eyes). I wonder how the "wet windshield" effect from Crysis 2 when you climb out of water will look?

[Libertine]

But I think cut-scenes make for pretty lazy storytelling.

Isn't it completely the opposite? To me its proactive storytelling.

If you need to have the player watch two characters talk, just force them to hide in a cupboard, vent, or be stuck in a room. ...Cut-scenes were really only necessary in the PlayStation 1 era where pre-rendered movies could show a lot more detail than the regular game graphics. If you watch how a lot of people play games (especially kids) they will hit the button and skip "boring" cut-scenes to get back to the action.

In addition to sweeping shots of scenery, cutscenes are also a way to allow the character to perform complex actions, especially interacting with other characters. A Mirrors Edge body/platform system in every game would be sweet, but the Rift is more likely to only nudge the industry in that direction rather than transport us there and in the meantime if we want to play current games with the Rift, we will have to find an easy way to integrate that works.
As far as people skipping cutscenes, I know here is a side of the gaming population that is more focused on gameplay than immersive experiences, but the average age of a gamer is 37'ish according to a few surveys, and rising. I do feel that as you get older the gameplay side of things gets increasingly stale, on average. How stale depends on the person of course, but i believe thats just human nature. Im a huge FPS'er, starting with Doom and im getting a little tired of the purely competitive gameplay unless its immersive and i have trouble mustering excitement for doing almost anything in a game when i haven't been given a compelling reason for doing it. How many other people there are like that i don't know.

[Delryn]

As some others have noted, it is also a crutch to lazily force a specific narrative onto the player. I'm fine with the way it's handled in the Half-Life series.

Says the guy who doesn't care about story in games. Also, the Half Life games have cutscenes, and moments where it hijacks the camera.

Cutscenes are not a lazy method of story telling. If you think Bioware or CDProjekt or TellTale are lazy story tellers, then I don't what wouldn't be lazy.

[PasticheDonkey]

you generally have silent protagonists in the first person perspective so that limits the kinds of stories you can tell in that fashion. or at least all games being like that would become very odd if limited to first person only.

[Diorama]

As some others have noted, it is also a crutch to lazily force a specific narrative onto the player. I'm fine with the way it's handled in the Half-Life series.

Says the guy who doesn't care about story in games. Also, the Half Life games have cutscenes, and moments where it hijacks the camera.

Cutscenes are not a lazy method of story telling. If you think Bioware or CDProjekt or TellTale are lazy story tellers, then I don't what wouldn't be lazy.

I don't think there is any point, in the Half Life 2 series at least (not sure about original HL), where the camera leaves the viewpoint of Gordon Freeman, or you lose control of the camera.
The closest I can think of is the opening 10 seconds of the game when a disembodied G-Man head gives you that speech.

As for cutscenes, there are scripted actions such as explosions and conversations between Alyx and Dr Kleiner etc, but at no point are you 'watching' a cut scene, you are always in control of Gordon. Its a pretty fundamental constant throughout the game.

As for cut-scenes being lazy, of course they are not lazy. But most of them are not very good. Great cut scenes in games, the real AAA stuff, is on a similar level to straight-to-dvd Jean Claude Van Damme/ Segal movies. For me at least. I understand that this is all opinion.

But for people like me, who feel the same way, this is exactly why Half-Life 2 is such a seminal game; it doesnt insult me with cheap exposition, which pretty much every other game I have played does.

Imagine if HL2 started like this:

"The year was 2032.....Earth was at Peace.....But thats when THEY came..... *camera cuts to attack ships over New York*
They called themselves 'the Combine'... a coalition of alien races, bent on destruction and conquest......we never stood a chance.
In just 7 short hours the armies of Earth were defeated...and their rule began"

Now for a lot of game designers, if they have spent time coming up with a great backstory, they want to tell you it, instead of letting you find out.
They shove their B-grade sci-fi story in your face with cut-scenes and cheap exposition and it is embarrassing.

But hey, straight-to-DVD Van Damme movies sell pretty well.

No, cut scenes are not a lazy way to tell a story, but they are very often used lazily.

Again I understand its an opinion thing, games with cut scenes have a lot more of an 'interactive movie' feel which I'm not a massive fan of, I understand that it's a big appeal to a lot of players.

But this is Virtual Reality.

Virtual.
Reality.

In my entire life, my viewpoint has never left my eyeballs, and I would not expect it to do so in any simulation of reality.
And I think thats the big issue here. Pure VR versus 'Gaming with a VR headset'.

Sorry for rambling, everyone's opinion is valid here because we are talking about personal preferences.

To sum up, HL2 was a huge moment in my gaming life, the way they told their story was incredibly engaging and believable to me, and I think it would be ideal as a template for OR games, although incredibly time-consuming, because you can't get a scriptwriter to tell the gamer the story, you have to make the world itself tell the story.

[Delryn]

I don't think there is any point, in the Half Life 2 series at least (not sure about original HL), where the camera leaves the viewpoint of Gordon Freeman, or you lose control of the camera.

It usually doesn't leave the viewpoint of Freeman, but there are several times where you either lose control, or lose 90% of control. It's not a bad thing, but my point is that while Half Life pioneered telling story without cutscenes, they also used them tastefully. If the Rift doesn't work well with cutscenes, it's worth exploring ways to make it work.

Note these vids contain spoliers of Half Life 2 and its episodes:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZ6HdITR6mQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIO3lDSoCcc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbL0RKVRysk (warning: may contain alien brain-sucking penis)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8BtA9CcmFM

[Diorama]

Yeah, basically it's the 'cut' in cutscene that bothers me. Those vids are great examples of a compromise where a scene in front of me is very heavily scripted like a cutscene, but never suddenly and instantly 'takes me out of myself', if that makes sense. Some pretty out there stuff though. One good example is the scene early in HL2 when you are in the teleporter and it starts going wrong. It feels like a cut-scene as you are locked in place and watching pandemonium break out among the characters, but the whole time you have a valid reason for being stuck in one place just watching.

On a side note I was just re-watching a clip from Mass Effect 2, the camerawork is basically straight from film, wide shot of both characters, mid shot of talking character, close up of other character reacting etc. It looks fantastic, but I wonder what the best Oculus solution is. I think if you want to keep the cinematic cut scenes as they are, it might have to be the virtual cinema idea.

Anyway, it is a fantastically exciting time to be a gamer! I can't wait to see how developers deal with the issues thrown up by VR.

[Libertine]

I definitely would rather cutscenes be substituted for VR friendly techniques, but i don't think they are going anywhere for a long time.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUY-x4zH0Kk[/youtube]

What I can tell you, though, is that cutscenes have to be done very carefully. It can be fine if you keep your head perfectly still during the cutscene as long as the camera movements are not too crazy, but as soon as you tilt your head, your brain starts getting some pretty panicky signals from your vestibular response! The best way to convert pre-existing cutscenes might be to detach them from the view of the player, similar to the VR Theater ideas people have been throwing around. That way, it is clear that the cutscene is a video floating in space, but any small incidental movements won't make you feel ill.

It will take a lot of help from the community to figure out the best way to handle this, I don't have all the answers!

Im just thinking out loud, but: If a display mode that makes incoming video display on a window floating in space is already necessary for the windows desktop, perhaps that could be a high level mode in the Rift drivers anything could call on for use. Perhaps cutscenes could call on it and turn it on and off. I would guess that most cutscenes code involves code that is only used in the display of the cutscene, like switching to a dedicated cutscene camera, or having an outright C++ "cutscene" function. Perhaps the "VR theater" could be written into that code very easily, without need for much testing. Also, if the VR Theater mode had an adjustable FOV setting, perhaps it could be set to display a much lower FOV window for those who find themselves highly sensitive to nausea. I wonder if it would be beneficial to have the option for some very faint orientating blue lines similar to the lines in the Star Trek holodeck rendered in 3D around the user that would help people re-orient themselves to view the cutscene in the case that they were turned far around using the kinect or otherwise, or had the aforementioned FOV set low. This could be a simple box rendered around the player with a simple texture inside.

In thinking about this, i remembered its pretty common for games to re-orient you after the end of a cutscene, like just before a boss fight. Not sure how that would effect the Rift and Rift+Kinect or 360 degree setups.

[drifter]

That's kind of why I think things like head bob should work.

Saying "but I like the head bob in games" does not make it work in VR. People have tried it, noticed that it does not work, and are passing on that knowledge. Denying that doesn't change it.

This.

[rhinosix]

Yup. Head movements will come naturally as a result of positional tracking and a locomotion device.

As for cut scenes, I still don't think they're a good idea for VR. But to be clear, I mean pre-rendered video originally made for a rectangular television.

Cinematic action is fine - it just needs to be built for VR. I think wide-angle establishing shots (of planets, cities, etc.) could work as long as the scene is built for a wide FoV, the player is transitioned in and out smoothly, and can still look around. If you want to approach a planet, there's no reason why you can't put the player on the deck of a ship.

I'm sure there are examples of cut-scenes being used well, but I think they promote lazy story-telling as they tend to separate 'story' from 'gameplay'. What a lot of games will do is have the player move through a bland level, then show a piece of the story via a cut-scene, when story needs to be happening all the time and integrated into all aspects of game design.

If you want to show me an old style cut-scene in the middle of a VR game then you'd better be able to justify why.

I think a good examples of thoughtful video game story-telling from the current gen are BioShock, (or looking to be even better, BioShock Infinite) or Red Dead Redemption. The story has something to say and is integrated tightly into the world. You don't need to depend on a cut scene to know what's happening - you're part of the story and it's happening all around you in the design of the levels, unique visuals, symbolism of props, ambient audio, radio transmissions, gameplay, ally and enemy dialogue. The player is always taking the story in subconsciously even if they are only concentrating on action. And by acting they are forced to move the plot forward.

Games like The Last of Us handle dialogue well while action is taking place.

I guess you could fall back on a cut-scene. But I don't know why anyone would limit themselves when there are so many new methods to explore in VR.

There are two things to keep in mind:

1. The player can move their head around the world very quickly (which will be better with positional tracking).
2. Objects will look big and detailed (which will be better with high res screens).

With the level of detail in graphics we have now, this opens up a whole range of techniques for story-telling. Think about all the options you have before you fall back on a cut-scene. You can:

- Show cinematics on a television in the game.
- Have a character grab you by the shirt, get in your face, yell at you with spit coming out of his mouth.
- Make a painting or a photo come to life when the player looks at it.
- Fade video in and out to the side's the player's head so they look like memories.
- Give the character a HUD or some other kind of communications device.
- Have the player look through scopes, binoculars, etc.
- Artistically transition between different worlds like in a dream.
- Put the player in the body of an eagle during the introduction of a game like Red Dead Redemption to get an overview of the world.

I think you could even experiment with something like comic book panels to show close-ups. For example, you're watching a woman from a distance move a statue. An outlined panel could pop-up beside her, showing a detail of her hand lifting the statue and placing a key.

I think game designers will be compelled to put a lot of story details into visuals and audio, like BioShock does. When you're able to study walls, desks, etc. so closely you don't want to be looking at bland textures until you get to the next chunk of story.

[Delryn]

Yup. Head movements will come naturally as a result of positional tracking and a locomotion device.

We're a long way off from a practical wide-use consumer locomotion device.

As for cut scenes, I still don't think they're a good idea for VR. But to be clear, I mean pre-rendered video originally made for a rectangular television.

The same problems with VR apply when the game takes over the camera, so I'm focusing on that limitation as well. Blizzard-style cutscenes are in the same boat as Red Dead game-rendered cutscenes.

Cinematic action is fine - it just needs to be built for VR. I think wide-angle establishing shots (of planets, cities, etc.) could work as long as the scene is built for a wide FoV, the player is transitioned in and out smoothly, and can still look around. If you want to approach a planet, there's no reason why you can't put the player on the deck of a ship.

This is a good idea, but you can't always get this situation. An example is when the narrative is not limited to the player character, like in Mass Effect when you get updates on what Saren is doing. You could switch to Saren's PoV, or a henchman's PoV, but ... that's weird if I'm the protagonist. Looking at what they're doing is OK, but becoming the enemy would give me a schizophrenic feeling.

I'm sure there are examples of cut-scenes being used well, but I think they promote lazy story-telling as they tend to separate 'story' from 'gameplay'. What a lot of games will do is have the player move through a bland level, then show a piece of the story via a cut-scene, when story needs to be happening all the time and integrated into all aspects of game design.

Just because a cut-scene allows the game designer more freedom with telling a story doesn't mean it's lazy story telling. Examples of excellent story with cutscenes: Mass Effect, KotOR, The Walking Dead, Uncharted, Batman (note: these are games of the year from various critics)

I think a good examples of thoughtful video game story-telling from the current gen are BioShock, (or looking to be even better, BioShock Infinite) or Red Dead Redemption. The story has something to say and is integrated tightly into the world. You don't need to depend on a cut scene to know what's happening - you're part of the story and it's happening all around you in the design of the levels, unique visuals, symbolism of props, ambient audio, radio transmissions, gameplay, ally and enemy dialogue. The player is always taking the story in subconsciously even if they are only concentrating on action. And by acting they are forced to move the plot forward.

Red Dead Redemption had cutscenes for every mission.

Games like The Last of Us handle dialogue well while action is taking place.

If The Last of Us is anything like Uncharted, it will have cutscenes between every level.

I guess you could fall back on a cut-scene. But I don't know why anyone would limit themselves when there are so many new methods to explore in VR.

It's really not a limitation, it's another tool for story telling.

There are two things to keep in mind:

1. The player can move their head around the world very quickly (which will be better with positional tracking).
2. Objects will look big and detailed (which will be better with high res screens).

Palmer willing, at the high res screens comment.

With the level of detail in graphics we have now, this opens up a whole range of techniques for story-telling. Think about all the options you have before you fall back on a cut-scene. You can:

- Show cinematics on a television in the game.
- Have a character grab you by the shirt, get in your face, yell at you with spit coming out of his mouth.

This is the problem with VR, taking control of the camera apparently causes disorientation. This is what I wanted to address in this thread. Anything in video games that takes control of the camera. Be it cutscenes, camera restrictions, head bob, explosion feedback, etc.

- Make a painting or a photo come to life when the player looks at it.
- Fade video in and out to the side's the player's head so they look like memories.
- Give the character a HUD or some other kind of communications device.
- Have the player look through scopes, binoculars, etc.
- Artistically transition between different worlds like in a dream.
- Put the player in the body of an eagle during the introduction of a game like Red Dead Redemption to get an overview of the world.

I think you could even experiment with something like comic book panels to show close-ups. For example, you're watching a woman from a distance move a statue. An outlined panel could pop-up beside her, showing a detail of her hand lifting the statue and placing a key.

I think game designers will be compelled to put a lot of story details into visuals and audio, like BioShock does. When you're able to study walls, desks, etc. so closely you don't want to be looking at bland textures until you get to the next chunk of story.

There are some good ideas, but, again, forbidding the game developer to take control of the camera is a hell of a restraint. It's like telling a film maker they have to make the film a continuous shot, and not use cuts. Using a continuous shot would force the film maker to make a more organic and immersive story like the camera was apart of the world and had to obey the same laws, but it's a severe restriction to impose.

[Pingles]

Well, this is the kind of stuff that really excites me.

The Oculus Rift is going to shift our gaming experience a bit. There will be things that no longer work, there will be things that we will discover bit by bit. Some may end up being very powerful.

Bottom line: Things will change a bit.

And don't let anyone in this discussion scare you from trying something. Go for it. Try it out. Worst case: You get vomit on your keyboard.

We'll all find out soon enough.

I can't wait to see where it leads us.

[Delryn]

Don't get me wrong. I am dying to see what the Rift brings us that's entirely new, but I think the best way for the Rift to succeed is to be "backward compatible", so to speak.

[PasticheDonkey]

That's kind of why I think things like head bob should work.

Saying "but I like the head bob in games" does not make it work in VR. People have tried it, noticed that it does not work, and are passing on that knowledge. Denying that doesn't change it.

This.

not good enough. tried it how? to what degrees? i already did an reductio ad absurdum on the idea and now i'll point out that there's such a thing as argument from incredulity.

[oculusfan]

Don't get me wrong. I am dying to see what the Rift brings us that's entirely new, but I think the best way for the Rift to succeed is to be "backward compatible", so to speak.

I have to respectfully disagree. We cannot depend on backwards compatibility. The majority of people can't even watch a 3D movie without side effects. Look at the negative response the 3DS got when it came out due to causing eye fatigue. These issues can kill a product. We need perfect VR to succeed in mass market. Sure, us all at this forum, we don't mind strapping in to non-VR games and vomiting a couple times is a cheap price to pay. We don't mind. This is our hobby and we will have fun with it no matter what. But we aren't large enough to sustain a company. If we want to see Oculus succeed, we need lots of games built from the ground up for VR because the average person will not accept side effects, not even minor ones.

[Pingles]

These arguments are a bit premature.

We'll likely ALL be trying the same stuff over and over again, tweaking and modifying.

My earlier post just meant to say "Go for it. Try something crazy. Try something that everyone here says will never work."

And certainly there will be plenty of stuff that rocks one person's world and makes someone else sick.

I look forward to everyone's failed experiments. There's gonna be a lot of fun to be had in jumping into everyone's ideas.

[PasticheDonkey]

i think the major problem with 3D can be mismatched FoVs. not a problem for the rift. i'm currently thinking most head bob is too extreme, since it's designed for display on a small fov screen. a subtler approach may not trigger nausea. much like spinning slowly is not the same as spinning quickly.

[Delryn]

Sure, us all at this forum, we don't mind strapping in to non-VR games and vomiting a couple times is a cheap price to pay. We don't mind. This is our hobby and we will have fun with it no matter what.

To quote PC Gamer UK...

But it's so immersi--blraaaaagghhh

If the Rift can't have head bob/cutscenes/etc then so be it. But I would hope that developers at least try to integrate these things. It may require changes to the implementation, but it'll be a waste if we don't try.

[Fredz]

If the Rift can't have head bob/cutscenes/etc then so be it. But I would hope that developers at least try to integrate these things. It may require changes to the implementation, but it'll be a waste if we don't try.

Why don't you simply try it yourself ?

Furlan published the instructions to build your own DIY HMD and Cybereality published his stereo 3D driver for the Rift as open source. Now it's only a matter of testing that with cutscenes from the different games that have been mentioned in this thread to make up your mind whether it does work or not.

[Delryn]

Why don't you simply try it yourself ?

Furlan published the instructions to build your own DIY HMD and Cybereality published his stereo 3D driver for the Rift as open source. Now it's only a matter of testing that with cutscenes from the different games that have been mentioned in this thread to make up your mind whether it does work or not.

The dev kits aren't that far off. I think I'll wait for one of those.

[Libertine]

People that work on ships build up a tolerance for motion sickness, so im sure just about anyone else can too. That why i hope Oculus or the community creates a simple program that mimics uncontrolled movement helping people get acclimated to using the Rift. Making the program graphically pleasant might go along way toward holding the interest of the inevitable segment of people who get motion sick and who also have only a lightweight interest in the Rift to begin with -like maybe a nice looking scene on a ship that is rocking in high seas. For paid reviewers who aren't gamers and who write in their reviews that they get significant nausea, a program like this and just the concept of an ability to overcome nausea made known in a "quick users guide", might greatly influence the over-all stance of many reviews.

[Delryn]

People that work on ships build up a tolerance for motion sickness, so im sure just about anyone else can too. That why i hope Oculus or the community creates a simple program that mimics uncontrolled movement helping people get acclimated to using the Rift. Making the program graphically pleasant might go along way toward holding the interest of the inevitable segment of people who get motion sick and who also have only a lightweight interest in the Rift to begin with -like maybe a nice looking scene on a ship that is rocking in high seas. For paid reviewers who aren't gamers and who write in their reviews that they get significant nausea, a program like this and just the concept of an ability to overcome nausea made known in a "quick users guide", might greatly influence the over-all stance of many reviews.

You're a genius.

[PasticheDonkey]

ironically people acclimatized to ships could get sick on a VR ship, and those who aren't wouldn't.

[Libertine]

You're a genius.

Nope. Depressed loner who thinks about this stuff way too much in a dark room in front of the dim light of a computer monitor with a single tear running down the cheek.

[Mystify]

"In order to use VR, you will have to go through a nauseating training program" does not seem like a way to win people over to me.

[oculusfan]

People that work on ships build up a tolerance for motion sickness, so im sure just about anyone else can too. That why i hope Oculus or the community creates a simple program that mimics uncontrolled movement helping people get acclimated to using the Rift. Making the program graphically pleasant might go along way toward holding the interest of the inevitable segment of people who get motion sick and who also have only a lightweight interest in the Rift to begin with -like maybe a nice looking scene on a ship that is rocking in high seas. For paid reviewers who aren't gamers and who write in their reviews that they get significant nausea, a program like this and just the concept of an ability to overcome nausea made known in a "quick users guide", might greatly influence the over-all stance of many reviews.

You guys are thinking about this all wrong. Oculus Rift needs to be a commercial success. This community is too small to sustain a company financially. Sure we wouldn't mind training ourselves to overcome motion sickness but I guarantee you 99 out of 100 people will not put up with that.

The correct answer is to attack the problem at the root and eliminate motion sickness from even being a possibility. If that means losing cutscenes then im all for it. I still support the compromise of having in game cutscenes where you never lose head tracking.

[Libertine]

"In order to use VR, you will have to go through a nauseating training program" does not seem like a way to win people over to me.

Thats completely ridiculous, i was obviously thinking along the lines of:

Before using the Rift, we recommend you establish the most convenience and comfortable position the provided "Oculus Rift Wide Neck(tm) Puke Bucket". We also recommend to practice reaching for your tissue box with the Rift off your head since it will be blocking your vision and puke may be all over your hands. Maintain good communication with your spotter while using the Rift to prevent any life threatening levels of nausea and make sure to keep a phone nearby to dial 911 in the event nausea or vomiting reaches incapacitating levels.

Is anyone thinking what im thinking? We could package the Rift IN! the Puke Bucket!

or....maybe we could go with something a little more delicate? Like: "A small number of users may experience nausea. If you find yourself with nausea that persists, [prepare to set sail?],we have provided an entertaining program designed to gently acclimate users to motion.

The whole point of this was to ensure that any mentions of nausea would be accompanied with a mention of a solution. However, I think its true that this idea could bring up the idea of nausea in reviews where there otherwise would not have been one. That wouldn't be good. The Oculus crew should have a much better idea of what needs what.

[Diorama]

However, I think its true that this idea could bring up the idea of nausea in reviews where there otherwise would not have been one. That wouldn't be good.

That's what I worried about, you know how reviewers can be. I think any reviewer who gets carsick/airsick might try the nausea-acclimatization system first, get seasick, and write a scathing review.

I think training yourself against nausea for a better VR experience will remain a 'hardcore' gamer thing to do. Although young kids growing up with VR might never have a problem.