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HTC Vive (General VR Thread)


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#1 Anthus

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Posted 30 June 2017 - 08:46 PM

I was skeptical. It's an impractical gimmick. It'll never catch on, no one will buy it, there's no games for it. ... Is what I would have said if you asked me a few years ago.

 

But today, I tried the HTC Vive at Microcenter, and wow, it was absolutely amazing. It surpassed my expectations of the budding medium in every way possible. I mean.. there's no way to describe it. The kiosk let you pick three demos. I picked the underwater one, the mini-golf one, and the generic space shooter one. I was reeling (no pun intended) at the underwater one. I caught myself trying to hold my breath at first, and a giant blue whale swims past you, and it was just so incredible. I've never felt like part of a world like that. The mini golf one was fun, and well implemented too, and the space shooter feels like it would actually be a really solid game.

 

I literally almost impulse bought one, but I don't think my computer, or room space would be adequate.

 

That underwater scene though. So, anyone else ever mess around with this stuff?



#2 Eddard McHorn Van-Schnuder

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Posted 01 July 2017 - 09:08 AM

Yeah, I got a Vive a few months back. I was never too skeptical of VR myself but I was worried about a few things like the resolution of the current headsets (I believe both the Vive and the Rift use 720p), and the limited field of view. And these two elements aren't great, the resolution is noticeable, and you can see the edges of the screens but the moment I'm playing a game I forget about that. The immersion VR offers is naturally unrivaled, and it really does add a whole new dimension to gameplay. Motion controls have also finally found their place, and the tracking of the Vive-controllers is dead on. I've had the thing for months and I still find myself amazed at just how accurate the tracking actually is. Motion controls is an essential part of the virtual reality experience, and does just as much for the level of immersion as the headset on your head does. This is by far the coolest aspect about VR for me.

 

Space-wise I do have a fairly sizeable living room if I push my furniture to the side, though for the most part I don't bother as you don't really need that much space. 2x2 meters of free space is recommended just so that the trackers can see all of you without being obstructed, but you can get away with using a small room no problem, just gotta be a little clever about the setup. As for your computer, I was surprised to find that my machine easily runs VR. The only times I run into issues is when I play something that's not specifically designed for VR, like Elite: Dangerous, a game that's already pretty taxing on the hardware. And even then I have to turn the supersampling up a fair bit before I start seeing frame drops in VR. That said, frame drops kills the experience, so you'd want to avoid that like the plague. I believe the Vive wants at least 90 FPS though don't quote me on that. 

 

There's a useful tool on steam that checks if your PC is VR ready. http://store.steampo...rformance_Test/

 

Either way, despite being very much into this thing, and I don't regret getting the thing at all, I would still reccommend waiting a little unless you're really eager to get into this. There's several reasons, the most important one being price. Both the Rift and the Vive are horribly overpriced at the moment, and that will change. No idea when, but I'd expect sooner rather than later. There's also the fact that they're still working on these devices. HTC Vive just got a new headstrap that includes built-in speakers, as well as a strap that is rigid and supposedly goes further down the back of your head. The original strap is a little short in that sense. There's also new controller types coming, that looks more like the Oculus Touch-controllers. The Vive-version will track all of your fingers though, meaning you will effectively have fully tracked hands in-game. This is huge, and hopefully these upgrades will also be packaged together rather than just as separate purchases later on.

 

So yeah, unless you just can't wait, I'd hold off for now. There's many good things coming in the not so distant future, and you're gonna want to get in on those anyway. Might as well just get it all together.


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