Why virtual reality makes a lot of us sick, and what we can do about it.
Are they just using shitty headsets, such as the Oculus ones? I’ve never had this issue with HTC Vive OR Valve Index…
there are pros/cons to each brand, plus there are tons of models across each product line. I own many headsets (index, vive original, vive xr elite, oculus dk2, quest 2) and honestly I can’t say any one of them is the best as each is unique from the screens (oled VS not), wired/wireless, full body tracking, standalone VS pc, comfort, etc.
That being said, I personally go for the vive over quest as it has more accurate tracking (laser VS camera), full body tracking, better screens (OLED), and works better with steamvr.
Plus as a VRChat user I can use vive advanced controls which is a godsend for expressing yourself in VR, other controllers just don’t have as much flexibility in terms of mixing expressions and being able to set intensity levels to each expression ingame.
VR has very little appeal to me.
People get very stuck on this part, and I genuinely don’t think it’s the issue.
Look, l have very decent “VR legs” at this point, but I’m still not a likely spender and I don’t play long games in VR or crack out my headsets very often at all.
The issue is not motion sickness or space or tracking stations. The issue is having to put something on my face and not being comfortably on my couch, free to go pee or get a snack without removing a thing from my face.
And yeah, it’s uncomfortable. That’s part of it. A version of it that looks and feels like glasses would be less of a problem. But the thing is, those aren’t a thing that exists, they are not even an incremental step that we can get to at any point, and also TVs and monitors look just fine.
VR is a neat trick, and I gladly keep my headsets around for any time when something actually interesting pops up. But it was never going to be the next big thing.
VR continues to make more sense as an arcade-like attraction than as a consumer product.
Except for the part where I would have to wear a headset that 5000 other people have also worn. (And except for the VR sickness that, it turns out, I’m very sensitive to).
It makes a bit of sense for that, and there are HMDs built for that purpose that are… eh… less gross? I guess?
But mostly it’s a secondary device. A toy you keep on the side and pop out for parties or when something reignites the novelty.
VR is Guitar Hero. Does that make sense? I think that makes sense.
Having gone to a VR gaming business (the kind where you book a time slot, not an open arcade) I wasn’t impressed. The hardware isn’t really rugged enough for that kind of commercial use, so it was clear they were struggling to keep the gear in decent condition.
But besides that, the limited time nature of the setup meant that the game options needed to be significantly dumbed down so that anyone could pick it up in a few minutes. And there isn’t enough of a demand to create any interesting experiences, most of what was on offer was neutered VR games I’d already tried on my personal VR setup.
I played a six player zombie shooter at one where you had actual gun controllers, it was fun enough, and a good laugh for the half hour sesh, but it was the most basic game I’ve ever played in itself.
Summed up my feelings 100%. I love VR and almost every experience I’ve had with it have been great, but I’ve touched my Index probably 5 times in the past two years (and probably 3 of them were to watch VR porn). There’s just a big setup and time commitment required to VR game that a lot of people don’t have time for.
Bigscreen Beyond is a new vr headset that is a little bigger than pool goggles. It’s manufactured based off of a lidar scan of your face, and is supposed to be very comfortable.
Additionally full color passthrough is becoming more of a common feature so you can see the real world in good definition while wearing the headset. Also some models hinge the display upwards off of your face.
We are getting there. Personally I play for hours a day. Sometimes multiple 4 hour sessions if it’s a free weekend for me. I agree we need more experiences. But it will come.
See? No, this is what I mean. It’s not this. It’s not even Apples insane thing.
It’s not an incremental progression that will take us there. I will not pop out a headset of any kind and put it on my face as my default mode of engagement. Won’t happen. Not a thing.
It could be shaped like pool goggles, it could have color passthrough, it could have perfect resolution and field of view, it could solve the nausea problem, it won’t matter. Because the reality is that anything that straps to my face and substitutes my normal free field of view is by definition and by design a secondary device.
It’s cool that you like what they offer, and hey, unlike the weird people out there mourning Stadia you can still use all of these things.
But a replacement for PCs, TVs or consoles they are not.
Oh. It’s just that you listed these reasons as detractors. I don’t really know what you mean by default engagement. I’m not understanding your use case. Do you expect to be wearing VR goggles while you walk down the street to the convenience store? They are for play right now… not so much work.
I’m in a similar boat. The use case where I really would use it regularly, simming, is hamstrung by two things. One, it’s so damn fiddly and laborious doing settings non stop to make it playable, and two, even if I get the settings right—I start noticing weird crap with my eyes after a couple sessions. Like you end up basically crossing your eyes all the time inside the visor, and I’ll notice fatigue/trouble focusing after using it a lot, what I would imagine it feels like to have a bad prescription or something (don’t personally have glasses).
And as you say, it’s bloody uncomfortable. Something like big screen beyond with good AR/passthrough would go a long way to fixing that I guess.
Yeah I’ve been interested in replacing my index eventually, this headset looks pretty promising:
https://store.bigscreenvr.com/products/bigscreen-beyond
Each one is custom to your face, and it’s extremely light. I’m sure the future will bring more headsets like this
I haven’t touched my VR headset and over a year. VR games just are not good and have very little contents and very little replayability. What I’m trying to say is it’s still very much a gimmick.
It’s well suited for anything where you’re seated, eg racing sims, flight sims, euro truck sim etc.
If you’ve got any interest at all in those genres give it another try and it’ll be hard if not possible to go back. Digital Combat Sim in VR is a whole nother game.
Other than that I agree. Just a gimmick and I don’t see the way forward.
It isn’t a problem with screen technology or processing technology or anything like that. We aren’t going to “tech” our way out of this.
It is a biological problem and as such, I think the appeal of VR will always be rather niche.
Even the best selling VR headset that I found online was the Quest 2 and it “only” sold like 15M units (honestly way more than I ever expected) with everything else being considerably lower volume. Compare that to the number of Nintendo Switches sold (130M) and you start to see how small the VR market is. I am very curious to see how the Sony VR2 will end up selling. I would love to get a pair, but I think all these headsets will be short lived.
VR has been around since the 20th Century. It is still here, and the market is expanding with more options as time goes on.
I wanted to play VR games since I saw the first VR stuff in the 90s. Finally got a Valve Index set this year, and it’s fuckin’ awesome. For all the Quest and Vive users on here saying VR sucks - it’s your gear that sucks.
Here’s a list of VR games that are fuckin’ awesome:
HL Alyx (as everyone already mentioned)
Into the Radius (S.T.A.L.K.E.R. in VR)
Grapple Tournament (UT2004 with grappling hooks in VR)
Dragon Fist Kung Fu (kung fu fighting in VR duh)
Blade and Sorcery (swords and sorcery)
Battle Talent (ripoff of Blade and Sorcery that is also cool)
Assetto Corsa (racing sim)
DCS World (flight sim)
Beat Saber (music chopping)
I don’t know man. Feels like the whole damn field of medicine does just that. It fixes body problems with (medical) technology.
I would not at all be surprised if later we find a certain framerate or fov reduces motion sickness. Or maybe there’s some device that will go over our ears to trick our equilibrium from getting confused. Or maybe really good head tracking fixes it…
I think it’s more likely than not that we do “tech” our way out of it - just in some unforeseen way.
Only one way to find out, I guess. But still, a lot of this stuff comes from the high end that eventually trickles down, and I’ve never heard any discoveries that claim to have solved the problem. You’d think that since the military would be all over this tech, their limitless budgets would have stated they have sickness-free headsets. But in all these years, nothing.
