
The Problem with Reality - runesoerensen
https://storystudio.oculus.com/en-us/blog/the-problem-with-reality/
======
DigitalJack
The problem with all current VR (that I'm aware of at least), is that it
models vision as if our eyes were permanently stuck forward and that all of
our looking around was done by turning our head.

It's not remotely correct, and I personally think it's what makes people sick.

Our eyes are the viewpoint control, the head is a very coarse grained pivot,
but it just controls the boundaries of the viewport. The view is always
centered on whatever our eyes are looking at regardless of head position.

You can read a sentence while shaking your and twisting your head. Try that
with an oculus (or any other headset).

In fact it's actually very hard to simuluate with your body the kind of
sliding view that headsets give. You can do it, but it's hard. I personally
have to totally defocus my eyes to stop them from locking on to something as I
turn my head.

The minecraft hack that snapped view changes to 15 degree increments is
actually much closer to how things work biologically.

~~~
neogenix
This, and the fact that you cannot focus into the distance. In real life most
of your view is blurred except the part you are focussing on. In VR it still
just looks flat, because if you focus on something in the distance, nothing
happens.

~~~
schacon
I'm really curious if this is based on your actual experience with a Vive or
if this is an assumption based on what you know about the technology.

I read an article at some point that claimed this was an issue so I
consciously tested it in the unit - focusing on something near my face and
then farther away without moving my head and it actually feels (to me) pretty
correct.

I don't really know the science behind this versus light field displays or
whatever, but if you have access to a unit I encourage you to try it - it's
very difficult to detect issues with focus and it absolutely does not look
flat (again, to me).

I would be very interested of all the opinions in this thread which of them
are from people who own a unit and have tried these things and which are
assumptions.

This technology is so incredibly convincing I'm embarrassed to say that I fell
over trying to lean on a virtual pool table at one point. I simply forgot that
it wasn't a real thing. :)

~~~
ClassyJacket
There's no focus in any VR headset currently. So whatever you experienced was
not that. You might be thinking of the stereo convergence, where the left and
right images come together where you look at them. But they don't have any
capability to adjust to the focus of your eyes right now.

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adwf
Not to be too much of a downer, but I still think the main problem with VR
isn't the technicality, but the practicality.

We had the exact same problems with motion controls. They might momentarily
enjoy the novelty of a motion game, but it's just a gimmick. When you get down
to it, a lot of people enjoy just sitting on the couch twiddling their thumbs
to get the character to do all the work.

They play games to relax, not get a workout. If you force them to stand up and
move, you've already failed.

Where I _do_ see VR having some interesting applications is in the workplace.
Replacing all your monitors and work environment with a virtual space of
unlimited scope.

Imagine remote working - where one moment you could be typing away on a sunny
beach, the next you're in a scheduled meeting room with all your colleagues,
without having to move an inch.

~~~
supernintendo
Agreed. I would invite VR developers to consider whether or not home is the
best setting for VR gaming. The developers of Killer Queen [1] were smart in
developing their game for arcades; had it merely been a Steam release, it may
have been looked at as just another quirky indie game with pixel art.

Come to think of it, VR in arcades could actually take off. Think of a
physical enclosure designed to contribute to the presence of the VR
experience. Arcade rail shooters have been accomplishing this for years
through the use of a chassis that moves based on events within the game.

[1] [http://killerqueenarcade.com/](http://killerqueenarcade.com/)

~~~
chrisdbaldwin
I've come to the same conclusion: VR belongs in an arcade. The tough part is
coming up with a game worthy of a VR arcade... Batman Beyond-style.

~~~
vvanders
If you want to do arcade VR you'll need to solve the Pink Eye problem before I
get anywhere near it.

~~~
chrisdbaldwin
There's a pink eye problem with HMDs? This is the first I've heard of it, but
I suppose it makes sense.

~~~
TheOneTrueKyle
Yep. A local company in OC is currently developing a VR headset condom that
will solve the hygiene problem. Going to a bunch of meetups and trying out VR
can get disgusting.

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phkahler
I'm really not a fan of the external camera. IMHO the ultimate solution is for
a camera (or two) on the headset running SLAM to create a virtual world that
overlays the real world. Then the experience has to be designed to map onto a
large variety of real world environments. You're still free to change the
textures and lighting of course. While this is not a generally applicable
concept, it would make the virtual experience vary depending on your real-
world location. Imagine going to a friends house to play Doom because his
house is actually more fun.

~~~
nitrogen
_Imagine going to a friends house to play Doom because his house is actually
more fun._

That reminds me of the days when kids could make maps of their friends' houses
and schools in various 3D games without being labeled as a psycho killer.

~~~
lijason
Or playing with nerf guns in a friend's house?

~~~
mlvljr
We used real air guns, but loaded with paper balls once while celebrating a
school year's end, was lots of good laughter :)

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Animats
That's just how you get started. Then what? How do you move? You usually can't
move very far in the real world. Although it would be fun to have VR events on
big open spaces, so you could.

The U.S. Army has tried VR big spaces.[1] It works. Their people wear knee
pads and helmets, so falls aren't too serious. The Army also accepts that
getting banged up a little in training is a normal part of life.

This isn't going to translate to the living room.

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V34gCw4fyLs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V34gCw4fyLs)

~~~
agildehaus
There are plenty of locomotion solutions in VR. Simple teleportation works the
best. The best implementation of teleportation that I've seen is in the game
Budget Cuts:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwtEw2ggPnA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwtEw2ggPnA)

~~~
TeMPOraL
Wow, genius!

Though I wonder, why most of the VR games I see now keep showing tools you
handle "floating in the air"? It's a pretty immersion-breaking element, I
think.

~~~
agildehaus
You mean how there are no hands and arms attached to the guns? While it looks
funny on a video like this, it doesn't bother you a bit while you're in there.

My best explanation is your brain doesn't really care about your limbs while
you're holding something. Your attention is on the object.

Rendering fake arms and hands would be a bit off-putting, I think. VR isn't
tracking the position of your elbows or fingers, so it would have to guess
their positions, and pretty much anything that's doesn't match reality gets
noticed by your brain.

Rendering nothing instead of the wrong thing is more immersive.

~~~
cwilkes
It bothers me. I was playing with the Vive and the controllers with the smooth
trackpad and it was a really odd experience.

First I couldn't tell what I was doing as the pad was frictionless. Then I saw
a little red light to indicate I was touching the pad and it would move around
in a circle. Okay that was helpful.

Except when looking down and it I was weirded out by knowing by hands are
there in real life but I couldn't see them. What the heck was going on?
Shouldn't I be seeing myself there but I'm not?

It was sort of like looking into a mirror and not seeing a reflection and
wondering if you're a vampire or something. Yes that sounds crazy but it was
quite odd.

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Razengan
I was just musing with my girlfriend about the logical progression of
immersion technology, especially as it applies to games.

Right now, we're still trying to perfect the visual part of VR. In 5 to 10
years we may get to the point where graphics are no longer indistinguishable
from reality as we know it.

Research into providing the sensation of touch has begun already and in, say
25 years as a safe estimate, we may be able to perfect that as well. Games
where you can comprehend the texture and weight of every object, wince from
every blow you receive, and even feel a cool wind or gusts of heat all over
your skin.

In about 50 years we will have the senses of smell and taste covered as well,
and by 100 years from now VR may become impossible to tell apart from reality.

But.. people will still KNOW that it's fake, because they will remember being
out here in reality.

So what's the next step for achieving maximum immersion?

Voluntarily wiping out your memory of the real world before you log into that
next-gen VRMMORPG. Eventually you have people being born into a world without
a clue and having to be cared for by and learn from others until they can
orient themselves, and all sorts of theories about what happens when they
"die."

~~~
bognition
> In 5 to 10 years we may get to the point where graphics are no longer
> indistinguishable from reality as we know it

I feel like I've been hearing this statement for decades now. The human brain
is remarkably good at pattern separation, and given enough time and exposure
to a stimulus it will work out what is real and what isn't. Until we have a
simulated reality that is as information rich as reality we'll always be able
to tell the two apart

~~~
semi-extrinsic
This. Does your game have a river? If so, humans observing the river will
veeery easily be able to spot it's a fake. Because an actual realistic
simulation of turbulent river flow is way beyond the largest supercomputers
today, and Moore's law has run out of the steam that has made todays consoles
have the computing power of your fathers supercomputer.

I'll bet dollars to doughnuts that even twenty years from now, by far the
cheapest way of creating a completely photorealistic VR river scene is to
build the actual river and record video of it. Then you "only" run into the
problem of storing and distributing the petabytes of data you record.

~~~
adwf
Yeah, Witcher 3 is one of the best games I've ever played and has some of the
best graphics too. The characters are simply amazing and the general look and
feel is superb.

But... look at the ground and you'll just see a flat greenish noise texture.
They try to cover it with clumps of grass and vegetation, which works to a
degree, but not completely.

Look at the water flowing - particularly on any kind of whitewater
rapids/waterfall - compared to the character textures and the buildings, it's
really quite disappointing.

You need a fairly complete simulation to really fool the human eye and we're a
long way from that.

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0xfeba
I'm glad that racing sims and flight sims don't have to solve these problems,
because VR flight sims are exhilarating. Only thing that's needed is G-force.

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ohitsdom
The podium/teleport concept seems very intuitive, at least it definitely was
in my mind before the article explained it. Lots of interesting gameplay
mechanics still need to be solved for VR, interesting times ahead.

~~~
excalibur
Personally I think the best solution will involve some sort of hardware that
can keep the player stationary while giving them the feeling of walking around
freely. I'm not sure exactly what this will look like, it's generally not a
good idea to walk on your treadmill while blindfolded.

~~~
wlesieutre
The Virtuix Omni is a device like what you have in mind. Essentially you run
in a shallow bowl shape with slippery foot pads and it holds you still at the
waist.

[http://www.virtuix.com/](http://www.virtuix.com/)

[https://www.reddit.com/r/oculus/comments/49nbih/a_full_month...](https://www.reddit.com/r/oculus/comments/49nbih/a_full_month_with_the_virtuix_omni_my_review/)

~~~
infogulch
The problem with this type of solution is that you still don't feel the
acceleration, you're just flailing your limbs around in a single spot without
actually moving.

It's the missing _acceleration_ that makes you sick, not that you can't move
your limbs.

~~~
Nadya
Not having used it - I would think of it like an omni-directional treadmill.
Treadmills don't make me feel sick, why would this? Legitimate question.

~~~
infogulch
The sickness comes from the _disconnect_ between what you _see_ and what you
_feel_.

When you're running on a treadmill you see that you're standing (relatively)
still, just moving your limbs. Your inner ear corroborates this when it
doesn't feel any horizontal acceleration. Everything agrees; no sickness.

In VR, you _see_ that you were stopped and then the gun went off and you
started running. But your inner ear disagrees: you're not accelerating at all,
you're still standing still. Disconnect, sickness.

~~~
wlesieutre
Just stick some electrodes on your head to poke at your vestibular system so
that it matches up with what you're seeing

[http://www.fastcompany.com/3058414/mayo-clinic-technology-
sa...](http://www.fastcompany.com/3058414/mayo-clinic-technology-said-to-
alleviate-nausea-from-vr)

If their system actually works hopefully we'll see consumer implementations in
the next couple of years.

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Houshalter
What if you rotate the camera slightly while you move? By the time you reach
the end of the physical room, the camera is facing the opposite direction in
virtual room and you have to turn around.

~~~
746F7475
if it's small enough that user won't notice, you'd still need a big open
space. Otherwise it's obvious and obnoxious. There was some games where once
you got close to a wall, you could spin in place and the world would keep up
with you, but this means you can't have any kind of fight or escape scenes in
your game.

~~~
Houshalter
It might be obvious, but the user could probably get used to it and learn to
live with it.

For the other idea, the game could pause during rotations. Would be annoying,
but it wouldn't destroy the game mechanics.

No solution is going to be perfect. I think people interested in this will
probably have to do it outdoors, or at some public space.

~~~
746F7475
Just that, say you play one of the survival horror games that people are
waiting for to hit VR, you get jump scared and have to run away from the
monster and you just blow straigh into a wall. unless of course it starts to
show the turning thing way before you a wall (like 2 meters away) which would
mean you have to have big room to play in.

