• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

HTC Vive Launch Thread -- Computer, activate holodeck

Status
Not open for further replies.

Tain

Member
OK, nothing worked. Even Windows 7 exhibited the problem.

Gonna try Intel...then I give up.

Edit: RESOLVED!!!

IT WAS MY USB CARD!

When I switched initially from USB3 to 2, it was due to shitty USB motherboard drivers. I never thought of moving it back after driver updates and motherboard firmware updates, but sure enough, doing that eliminated all these weird timing issues related to I/O.

It even fixed the frame rate issues I was having in some Oculus games during intensive scenes.



Omg, fuck me I'm so happy.

TL;DR

Don't choke your Vive's bandwidth with shitty USB ports.

Ouch. Glad to hear you got it sorted out, though!
 
I hate to be that guy, but after a VR session today I feel like I'm done with my Vive, at least for a while. I'm not about to go sell it or anything, but I don't think I'm going to touch it again for at least a few months. I keep trying to convince myself that I'm having fun, but I'm not, really.

The games just aren't here yet. I love the feeling of being transported to a new place, but as of right now, there just aren't enough places to be transported to. Things might be different if I was the kind of person who was okay with playing unfinished titles and watching them develop, but I'm not. I want completed games.

Not helpling matters: the headset is freaking uncomfortable. That makes it more difficult to enjoy okayish games. A game has to be really good to distract me from wearing the headset.

Looking forward to playing Budget Cuts!
 
What are your guys thoughts on Final Approach? It's on sale For $8.49.

I'm more picky than a lot of people here (see my above post) but I thought it was the definition of a game concept that probably sounded great on paper, but ended up not being enjoyable at all.
 
Had some of the most fun in VR so far last night with Gorn. The haptic feedback with twirling the flail above your head is just right, so much fun! Hope the dev turns it into something bigger cause it has one of the best collision models I've seen so far for a melee VR experience. Dat dismemberment too. You can get a good workout in for sure.
 

Zalusithix

Member
Things might be different if I was the kind of person who was okay with playing unfinished titles and watching them develop, but I'm not. I want completed games.
Yep, that's probably the main problem for you. PCVR is very much about experiencing the evolution of the medium. If you're not a developer, or the type to get enjoyment out of experiencing progress, then a major aspect of these gen 1 devices is lost. This is especially true on the Vive side of things where the tracked controller / roomscale aspects lend more to experiments than the more traditional sit-down experiences on Oculus' end.

It'll get better as time goes on, but for now it's an enthusiast's device through and through. It's great if you go in expecting that. Not so much if you go in expecting something akin to the release of a modern console.
 

Zalusithix

Member
Is it green? There was an update on SteamVR that fixed that for a lot of people, including me. I had almost sent it back (it was my second one because my first one had a bunch of them) until I updated. Then they were all gone!

The update that fixed the hot pixel issue was pushed to general release on July 5th. Anybody that got a Vive after that date should have zero chance of having a SteamVR version older than that. I mean, they could try the beta channel, but it shouldn't make a difference as I haven't seen anything since then about changes regarding individual pixels.

Edit: Unrelated, but Road to VR has another article up on the TS3633 chip.

Triad’s VP of Marketing & Sales, Reid Wender, explained that the chip is cost-optimized for high volume manufacturing. For a complete system (including headset and controllers), which has around 80 sensors, the chip reduces component placements by 2,560 over the 41 component per-sensor design of the first-generation Vive. That brings savings in component placement and also opens the door to simplifying circuit board designs which can further reduce cost, says Wender.

and

The TS3633 excels on several technical characteristics such as detected pulse width versus distance, more sensitivity for longer range detection, better off angle detection, improved optical sync detection, improved start of sync detection, and improved centroid location,” he said. “All of these technical improvements equate to a more robust SteamVR Tracking experience with observably improved user experience.
 

AwesomeMeat

PossumMeat
I hate to be that guy, but after a VR session today I feel like I'm done with my Vive, at least for a while. I'm not about to go sell it or anything, but I don't think I'm going to touch it again for at least a few months. I keep trying to convince myself that I'm having fun, but I'm not, really.

The games just aren't here yet. I love the feeling of being transported to a new place, but as of right now, there just aren't enough places to be transported to. Things might be different if I was the kind of person who was okay with playing unfinished titles and watching them develop, but I'm not. I want completed games.

Not helpling matters: the headset is freaking uncomfortable. That makes it more difficult to enjoy okayish games. A game has to be really good to distract me from wearing the headset.

Looking forward to playing Budget Cuts!

That is sad. Elite Dangerous and Onward has me hooked literally hundreds of hours.
 

fuzzy_slippers

Neo Member
Does chaperone / lighthouse warn you about floor differences or is it just about keeping you from walking into a wall/edge of your area? I can't tell from googling around about it they just talk about needing a bunch of space.

Thinking about the Vive but smack dab in the middle of my available space is a weird raised 4-5 inch section of the floor. Flailing around like an idiot in VR it'd be pretty easy to trip unless I got a warning.
 
Chaperone doesn't warn you about floor differences, it assumes you're in a flat area. So, the latter. The passthrough camera will show you the floor as an outline in the headset, but I find that a bit distracting.
 
Does chaperone / lighthouse warn you about floor differences or is it just about keeping you from walking into a wall/edge of your area? I can't tell from googling around about it they just talk about needing a bunch of space.

Thinking about the Vive but smack dab in the middle of my available space is a weird raised 4-5 inch section of the floor. Flailing around like an idiot in VR it'd be pretty easy to trip unless I got a warning.

I would definitely recommend against such an area if it's a trip hazard.
 

fuzzy_slippers

Neo Member
Is there any way to manually indicate a certain area is off limits even if the light beams thinks it is kosher?

It looks like the length of the cord I could position it to utilize a sort of rectangular area that would be 4.5' X 12-15'. Would that work or is it too narrow?
 

Zalusithix

Member
Is there any way to manually indicate a certain area is off limits even if the light beams thinks it is kosher?

It looks like the length of the cord I could position it to utilize a sort of rectangular area that would be 4.5' X 12-15'. Would that work or is it too narrow?

The "light beams" don't do any analysis of the area. They're purely passive tracking triangulation mechanisms. Your designated safe space is mapped out by hand when you first set the Vive up by moving a controller around the perimeter of the safe area. The software then fits the biggest rectangle it can within that area. That said, the 4.5' length would be problematic You need at least 5' on the shorter dimension.
 

fuzzy_slippers

Neo Member
Ah I didn't see a good indication of what it does. Either super technical explanations or just shrugging it off as space magic. If you mark off the space manually it would actually be easy to indicate a 5 X whatever rectangle that didn't include the raised floor section. Presumably then I'd get the chaperone warning as I got close to it.

Thanks for the answers.
 
Ah I didn't see a good indication of what it does. Either super technical explanations or just shrugging it off as space magic. If you mark off the space manually it would actually be easy to indicate a 5 X whatever rectangle that didn't include the raised floor section. Presumably then I'd get the chaperone warning as I got close to it.

Thanks for the answers.

You can't "cut out" a square in the middle of your play space. You set a rectangle for your play space, period.
 

fuzzy_slippers

Neo Member
I meant I can create a sufficiently large rectangle in the room without using any part of the raised floor section. It's a big room and I had thought lighthouse used some part of the physical dimensions of the room to indicate the available space (like bouncing something or reading depth data off a real wall or couch to indicate limits) so lighthouse would think I had a huge safe space while including the raised floor.

Maybe it was dumb but I was thinking I needed physical limitations (like a hallway) to mark off a smaller area.

If I am able to map out a space with the controller it is simple to make a smaller but seemingly sufficient rectangle with no trip hazards.

Looking at some youtube videos it seems like available arm/swing space is more important than absolute walk space. I haven't seen any games yet where people really walk just shuffle back and forth swinging. Does it lose tracking if your hands pass out of the marked area? Like I definitely have lots of swing space if part of the available space issue is making sure you can extend fully it's just smooth floor that is an issue and I need to it to tell me if I'm getting near dodgy floor.
 

Zalusithix

Member
Does it lose tracking if your hands pass out of the marked area? Like I definitely have lots of swing space if part of the available space issue is making sure you can extend fully it's just smooth floor that is an issue and I need to it to tell me if I'm getting near dodgy floor.

It won't lose tracking so long as you're within the lighthouse's laser cast. From a pure tracking standpoint, being inside or outside of chaperone bounds makes no difference. The tracked device just needs to be able to see the lighthouse(s).

The manually defined chaperone space does two things. It defines the points at which virtual walls will erect themselves in VR when your head/controllers get near them, and it provides the base outline by which the roomscale setup attempts to create the actual play space within. The play space is always a rectangle, and is what gets reported to the game for purposes of anything it might need to adjust (scaling virtual environment bounds to be within your real environment bounds for example).

The only issues you'll run into is those virtual walls showing up whenever your arm extends close to them - which will be quite often with a 5' distance. You can configure the way the wall looks to increase or decrease how obtrusive they are though. You can actually outright disable them all together if you choose and just keep an outline on the floor representing the chaperone bounds. That's how I have my bounds set up. I'd only do that if you're very familiar with the area though, and not at risk of simply ignoring them. Probably best to start with super obvious bounds and work your way down from there as you get used to it.
 

kn1ves24

Member
Has anybody tried VorpX with the Vive? I know it was originally designed for the Rift. I just got a Vive a couple days ago and I'm interested in trying out some of my "non-VR" games in VR. I'm not expecting perfection but I think some would be pretty neat to try.

Before I drop 40 dollars on it I'm looking for some first hand feedback if anybody has some to offer. I would also be open to other suggestions if there is a better program out there.
 

fuzzy_slippers

Neo Member
It won't lose tracking so long as you're within the lighthouse's laser cast. From a pure tracking standpoint, being inside or outside of chaperone bounds makes no difference. The tracked device just needs to be able to see the lighthouse(s).

The manually defined chaperone space does two things. It defines the points at which virtual walls will erect themselves in VR when your head/controllers get near them, and it provides the base outline by which the roomscale setup attempts to create the actual play space within. The play space is always a rectangle, and is what gets reported to the game for purposes of anything it might need to adjust (scaling virtual environment bounds to be within your real environment bounds for example).

The only issues you'll run into is those virtual walls showing up whenever your arm extends close to them - which will be quite often with a 5' distance. You can configure the way the wall looks to increase or decrease how obtrusive they are though. You can actually outright disable them all together if you choose and just keep an outline on the floor representing the chaperone bounds. That's how I have my bounds set up. I'd only do that if you're very familiar with the area though, and not at risk of simply ignoring them. Probably best to start with super obvious bounds and work your way down from there as you get used to it.

Really good explanation and better than the articles about the Vive I was reading. Thanks!

I had been interested in vr and playing it at trade shows was pretty cool, but getting a Gear, even as limited as it is, has made me really want to bump up to a proper headset now that I've upgrade my video card.
 
Has anybody tried VorpX with the Vive? I know it was originally designed for the Rift. I just got a Vive a couple days ago and I'm interested in trying out some of my "non-VR" games in VR. I'm not expecting perfection but I think some would be pretty neat to try.

Before I drop 40 dollars on it I'm looking for some first hand feedback if anybody has some to offer. I would also be open to other suggestions if there is a better program out there.
I haven't tried it but the majority of impressions I've heard suggest it's not worth the $40. There's apparently a LOT of tweaking that needs to go in to getting any game working at all with an interface that's not exactly the most intuitive. If you're not in to that, you might want to steer clear.
 

Tain

Member
Anybody see the Destinations update? It adds "multiplayer" with cute customizable avatars and it has an example destination that serves as a multiplayer carnival game. There's also a neat Valve office scene.

maybe Valve's lowkey making their own Rec Room with this
 

Zalusithix

Member
Really good explanation and better than the articles about the Vive I was reading. Thanks!

I had been interested in vr and playing it at trade shows was pretty cool, but getting a Gear, even as limited as it is, has made me really want to bump up to a proper headset now that I've upgrade my video card.
What VR did you use at the trade shows?

I haven't tried it but the majority of impressions I've heard suggest it's not worth the $40. There's apparently a LOT of tweaking that needs to go in to getting any game working at all with an interface that's not exactly the most intuitive. If you're not in to that, you might want to steer clear.

Basically this. It's tweak city, and the end results are anything but consistent across games. I'm sure it's worth it for some people that really want to play game <X> in psuedo-VR, but I think most people would be better off dumping the money into actual VR focused/compatible games.
 

fuzzy_slippers

Neo Member
What VR did you use at the trade shows?

Mostly Rift. Eagle Flight was incredible. I had been planning to get a Rift but playing around with the Gear I decided I don't care for the Oculus store and I want to try the more goofy experimental games of the Vive. Even with Touch I'm not sure if those are going to be the same on the Rift. The Oculus exclusives I've seen so far (mostly normal third person action games with a VR god camera) haven't been the most interesting to me either.

I'm gonna see what Oculus reveals in their big event in the next couple weeks but now I'm favoring the Vive.
 

Zalusithix

Member
Mostly Rift. Eagle Flight was incredible. I had been planning to get a Rift but playing around with the Gear I decided I don't care for the Oculus store and I want to try the more goofy experimental games of the Vive. Even with Touch I'm not sure if those are going to be the same on the Rift. The Oculus exclusives I've seen so far (mostly normal third person action games with a VR god camera) haven't been the most interesting to me either.

I'm gonna see what Oculus reveals in their big event in the next couple weeks but now I'm favoring the Vive.

Even with the Rift, you can access any OpenVR game on Steam. You'll need the Touch controllers to make use of the vast majority of them, and I'm not sure how the default mapping of those controllers to the Vive wands will pan out in all games, but the option is there nonetheless. Meanwhile on the Vive end, Vive owners can also play Oculus games, but access is dependent on ReVive being able to inject into the game. (It also depends on Oculus not being dicks and deciding they want to be a DRM laden closed system. I'd like to think that wont happen again, but it'll take years for me to have any confidence in that..)

The biggest thing I'd think about is tracking. Can you even set up a Rift with equivalent tracking capabilities in your space? Roomscale/360 tracking requires opposing cameras/lighthouses. With the lighthouses this is fairly easy. They just need to be mounted somewhere near an outlet - something that's normally available at multiple points around the room. Give em power, and you're done. With the Rift, the cameras need to route back to the PC. This means a USB extension cable from the far camera will be needed, and it'll either snake along the floor or be pinned to the ceiling all the way back. This is annoying at best, and depending on the room setup potentially a deal breaker. The cameras also have a smaller FoV than the lighthouses, so have to be further from the designated play area to have full coverage.
 

E-flux

Member
Is there any proper games for the vive? I'm buying one next week so that i can play Elite with it, but searching for worthwile games is not that easy for the system. So far i have found Budget cuts, some similar Fantasy type game, and hover junkers. Is there anything in the horizon? Or any mods for old games that i should try out?
 
Is there any proper games for the vive? I'm buying one next week so that i can play Elite with it, but searching for worthwile games is not that easy for the system. So far i have found Budget cuts, some similar Fantasy type game, and hover junkers. Is there anything in the horizon? Or any mods for old games that i should try out?

Solus Project is a proper game with native VR support.

But outside of stuff like that and Elite there's a reasonable amount of good, worthwhile games that might not be considered traditional/"proper." But if you're considering the Budget Cuts demo and...I bet the fantasy game you're talking about is Vanishing Realms, yeah there are games like those. Stuff that's not just an "experience" or sandbox.

The Gallery: Call of the Starseed is a short but really impressive Myst-like game.

Quar: Battle for Gate 18 is an Advance Wars/Fire Emblem sort of game, turn based strategy.
 

SomTervo

Member
Is there any proper games for the vive? I'm buying one next week so that i can play Elite with it, but searching for worthwile games is not that easy for the system. So far i have found Budget cuts, some similar Fantasy type game, and hover junkers. Is there anything in the horizon? Or any mods for old games that i should try out?

As mentioned by UncleSporky, The Solus Project is a 10-15 hours non-VR game which had VR built in since about May. If you have any questions pop over to the OT.

It's not perfect and VR is still technically work in progress, but we've had a lot of people pop up saying it's their favourite VR experience because it is a proper long campaign with a fair amount of gameplay depth. Many played have 30+ hours in it (some 100+... apparently it's great virtual tourism). It has quite a lot of stat systems, between 10-14 levels depending on how you cut it, lots of narrative content, puzzles and adventure.

Aside from that I'd recommend Rec Room, which is just long-term fun, Call of the Starseed Episode 1 - not very long but a proper great adventure. A Chair in a Room which is pretty long and excellent - but it's a horror game and some bits of it are fucking horrific.

In terms of action games HordeZ and Raw Data are my faves and both have a lot of content at this stage (Raw Data less so but it's still decent). Both are pretty damn stressful, too.

My son wrecked my OLED TV on his first day trying out, I should have had the boundaries a bit further away.

jrqgO.gif


I haven't tried it but the majority of impressions I've heard suggest it's not worth the $40. There's apparently a LOT of tweaking that needs to go in to getting any game working at all with an interface that's not exactly the most intuitive. If you're not in to that, you might want to steer clear.

Wish I'd read this before I dipped on VorpX. It's powerful but the time input makes it not worthwhile.

I spent a good 4-5 hours trying to get GTAVR working in it but it just wasn't worth it.
 

SimplexPL

Member
Is there any proper games for the vive? I'm buying one next week so that i can play Elite with it, but searching for worthwile games is not that easy for the system. So far i have found Budget cuts, some similar Fantasy type game, and hover junkers. Is there anything in the horizon? Or any mods for old games that i should try out?
Budget cuts is still far out. Only the short demo is available.
Brookhaven Experiment is ok if you're not sick of arena/wave shooters.
 

Paganmoon

Member
Is there any proper games for the vive? I'm buying one next week so that i can play Elite with it, but searching for worthwile games is not that easy for the system. So far i have found Budget cuts, some similar Fantasy type game, and hover junkers. Is there anything in the horizon? Or any mods for old games that i should try out?

I'd suggest Vanishing Realms . One of my favorite games on the Vive, the latest update expanded it a bit, and there will be more acts added as well.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top Bottom