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HTC Vive Launch Thread -- Computer, activate holodeck

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Zalusithix

Member
Did anyone had the chance to play Gorn? Is it as good as "everybody" says?
http://store.steampowered.com/app/578620/GORN/

Picked it up, and honestly it's just a goofy over the top gladiator game with floppy weapons and copious cartoon gore. It's well done for what it's aiming for, but I don't think I'd pay more than the current discount price for it. Also not really sold on the armswinger type movement in a game focused on melee combat. If you have a large play space it might suffice when used with roomscale movement, but I'm not about to use my limited roomscale movement when it encourages so much arm flailing.

On a totally unrelated note, I've finally started to feel like I'm getting to the point where I'm halfway decent at Airtone. Managed a full combo on Clock Tower, and SSS level on Piano Forte tonight on medium. It's nothing compared to the Japanese folk playing the game, but as somebody that doesn't have much skill / background in traditional rhythm games, it's nice. The game desperately needs a locked desktop camera render though. Live recordings are useless due to the hand positions being out of view half the time, and the head movement makes it jerky as hell. To get any halfway decent recording you have to take the headset off, get it at the right angle on a solid surface and record the replay. Then you upload it to Youtube and watch the recompression murder the IQ to high hell. -_-
 

SimplexPL

Member
Dirt Rally works perfectly with Revive since last November. The issue in the github issue tracker was apparently a random bug introduced and then hotfixed.
I showed this to my friend who recently tried to play and he disagrees, he was unable to get stable 90fps on a 1070.

I don't own Dirt Rally, but I've played both Unspoken and The Climb without issues. I'm not even sure what you're talking about with reprojection settings—I've never touched them.
That's very strange because even Revive creator recommends specific reprojection settings for specific games.
https://github.com/LibreVR/Revive/issues/577

If you never touched them then I seriously doubt there were no issues, maybe you just have tolerance for them and not notice them (good for you, but different people have different tolerance levels).

For example, quote from Revive Discord about Unspoken issues:
The Unspoken is free till tommorow if you dont have it. now is a good time to see how to fix the delayed head tracking. its the same as it was for echo arena before you fixed it, slight delay and really disorienting
 

Wardancer

Neo Member
Picked it up, and honestly it's just a goofy over the top gladiator game with floppy weapons and copious cartoon gore. It's well done for what it's aiming for, but I don't think I'd pay more than the current discount price for it. Also not really sold on the armswinger type movement in a game focused on melee combat. If you have a large play space it might suffice when used with roomscale movement, but I'm not about to use my limited roomscale movement when it encourages so much arm flailing.

The floppy weapons are so far the best implemented melee weapons in VR, it gives them some weight and makes heavier weapons slower and lets them impact on shield and armour without disconnecting from your hand etc.

Arm-swinger is not super great though agree.
 
"I showed this to my friend who recently tried to play and he disagrees, he was unable to get stable 90fps on a 1070."

Ground cover - Off. It's a massive performance eater, even on low. That goes for Rift, too, though. Ground Cover, Trees, and Shadows have a big impact on performance in Dirt Rally on both headsets, Revive isn't resulting in noticeably worse performance than Native Rift.
 

derFeef

Member
Is it less than arms length span?

I can stretch my arms jsut fine but if I move of out the center too much, which happens, I am going to hit walls eventually. Smashed the controller pretty badly against the wall one time already. Luckily my wrist stayed intact.
 
Gorn is a ton of fun, but damn is it a workout! I'd say it's worth the price, there are a good amount of weapons and the different armor/weapon combos on enemies gives a good variety. It's still pretty simple at the moment, but that's what'll make it a good party game (as soon as I cover my living room in padding).
 

low-G

Member
I can stretch my arms jsut fine but if I move of out the center too much, which happens, I am going to hit walls eventually. Smashed the controller pretty badly against the wall one time already. Luckily my wrist stayed intact.

I am also in this situation, but I'm disciplined and often place myself in the real world room tactically. Kinda sad I guess, but I can play Gorn fine.
 
Anyone have some Oculus game recommendations to dive in with?

The best Oculus exclusive right now is RoboRecall, but note that you actually want to use a game-specific mod called RoboRevive instead of the normal Revive for this specific game. Revive will work fine, but RoboRevive has no performance penalty.

I also really enjoyed The Climb. And then there's a handful of great but small, free experiences: Lost, Henry, Dear Angelica, and First Contact.
 

derFeef

Member
I am also in this situation, but I'm disciplined and often place myself in the real world room tactically. Kinda sad I guess, but I can play Gorn fine.

Yeah I am disciplined as well after that incident ;) I will try out Gorn I guess, it looks fun and if it's a workout like some suggests then that's a plus in my book.
 

Leatherface

Member
The best Oculus exclusive right now is RoboRecall, but note that you actually want to use a game-specific mod called RoboRevive instead of the normal Revive for this specific game. Revive will work fine, but RoboRevive has no performance penalty.

I also really enjoyed The Climb. There's also a handful of great but small free experiences: Lost, Henry, Dear Angelica, and First Contact.

Oh good stuff. Thank for the info!
 

Zalusithix

Member
Thinking more on the tendency for VR games to not have a stabilized camera for the desktop view which makes recording/streaming less than ideal... I can't help but think that it can be side stepped to a certain extent. There's already software that can take real life FPV camera recordings and stabilize them in post via analysis of the frames. This is computationally expensive though, and not something you'd want to do in the middle of recording or streaming. In VR though, we know the relative headset position change between each frame. Much like reprojection can warp a previous frame to match a new rotational value on the headset, the same positional information should be able to be used to warp a certain amount of movement back out of the final render. By buffering a second's worth of image and positional data, smoothing the headset movement, and then warping the frames based on actual position vs the smoothed position, it should greatly reduce the jitter from a direct headset capture.

And speaking of direct headset captures, OBS has a plugin now that can capture directly from the SteamVR mirror. It's kind of limited currently in that the image is post-lens warp, but that should be able to be undone. Combine it with the smoothed motion idea, and you could have game independent capture and smoothing of the headset view for recording/streaming. Theoretically at least. It's rather outside of my abilities to whip up a prototype to see if it works as well in practice as it does in my mind lol.

nowhere near enough unfortunately

If you're looking for them to try and get close to what Oculus is doing, then I wouldn't hold your breath.
 

Tain

Member
Nice, I'll keep my eye on the OBS plugin. Could come in handy for recording footage from my game.

I noticed that Airtone's videos are all super-stable, and suspect that making marketing videos is one of the main reasons the game has Replay functionality. Doesn't help for streaming, though, of course.
 

Zalusithix

Member
Nice, I'll keep my eye on the OBS plugin. Could come in handy for recording footage from my game.

I noticed that Airtone's videos are all super-stable, and suspect that making marketing videos is one of the main reasons the game has Replay functionality. Doesn't help for streaming, though, of course.

Replay actually isn't stable at all - at least not on the Vive. It still detects and alters the video feed in relation to headset movement. That makes sense for watching the replay in VR, but isn't good for recording, and useless for streaming. I've just gotten to the point where I just take the headset off if I get something worth recording and then record the replay with it sitting on the floor or something. Else I have to try and not move my head and look just right so the score doesn't get cut off. So yeah, replay is useful for figuring out where you botched things up or planning another run, but useless for sharing gameplay. Unless the Oculus version is inherently different, I assume all marketing videos are using some feature not available to end users, or via putting the headset in a stand to hold it at a consistent angle.
 
Thinking more on the tendency for VR games to not have a stabilized camera for the desktop view which makes recording/streaming less than ideal... I can't help but think that it can be side stepped to a certain extent. There's already software that can take real life FPV camera recordings and stabilize them in post via analysis of the frames. This is computationally expensive though, and not something you'd want to do in the middle of recording or streaming. In VR though, we know the relative headset position change between each frame. Much like reprojection can warp a previous frame to match a new rotational value on the headset, the same positional information should be able to be used to warp a certain amount of movement back out of the final render. By buffering a second's worth of image and positional data, smoothing the headset movement, and then warping the frames based on actual position vs the smoothed position, it should greatly reduce the jitter from a direct headset capture.

There's actually a Unity plugin that is literally meant to be a VR camera gimbal. Would require devs to implement it though instead of users after the fact.
 

Tain

Member
Unless the Oculus version is inherently different, I assume all marketing videos are using some feature not available to end users, or via putting the headset in a stand to hold it at a consistent angle.
Yeah, I was assuming the latter but it may be that they were made with developer-only functionality.
 

Zalusithix

Member
There's actually a Unity plugin that is literally meant to be a VR camera gimbal. Would require devs to implement it though instead of users after the fact.

Yeah, I'm aware of that plugin, but like you said, you'd have to rely on the devs, and it's only for Unity on top of that. The idea was to think of a way that users wouldn't be beholden to what devs implemented.

On a side note, upscaling the Airtone recordings to 1440p (from sub 1080p) before upload to YT certainly helps with the encode quality - even when viewed at the previous 720p. Odd given the bitrate I used for the original 720p encode was basically the same I used for the 1440p encode lol...
 

XShagrath

Member
Committed my first VR assault yesterday..

I'm a college professor and some students of mine are making a VR game. They had a bug where an object got stuck to the controller. One of them said you could force the game to drop it by either pushing it through the floor or wall. I tried to put it through the floor and nothing happened, so I went to smack it against the wall. One of the other students was sitting on a chair within the chaperone bounds (for whatever reason) and I clocked him on the top of the head with the wand. It wasn't a serious injury, and maybe he'll think twice about sitting inside the chaperone bounds from now on.
 

Zalusithix

Member
Tip for those playing Gorn: turn on the strict chaperone option. Your furniture will thank you.
In my experience this doesn't work unless you already have a fairly large play space. If you're on the smaller side of things, you'll trigger the blackout timer all the damn time. I'd recommend people with smaller spaces to just try and play it as a standing 360 game with minimal dodge movement and OVRAS center marker on.

For some reason my OBS OpenVR source is just black.
That's odd. Do any of the other capture methods in general work for you in OBS?
Committed my first VR assault yesterday..

I'm a college professor and some students of mine are making a VR game. They had a bug where an object got stuck to the controller. One of them said you could force the game to drop it by either pushing it through the floor or wall. I tried to put it through the floor and nothing happened, so I went to smack it against the wall. One of the other students was sitting on a chair within the chaperone bounds (for whatever reason) and I clocked him on the top of the head with the wand. It wasn't a serious injury, and maybe he'll think twice about sitting inside the chaperone bounds from now on.
Good thing you weren't playing Gorn. Poor bastard would have been knocked out cold. =P I assume the chaperone bounds are marked off in the real world so people are aware of where the safe space is? Even then I'd want to be a couple feet back from the virtual wall for any active game, as swinging at / through chaperone bounds isn't entirely uncommon.
In the 10 seconds it took me to enter my CC info, it changed to $15
Well, that sucks. There was no indicator of how long that discount was going to last, and honestly I have to wonder if it was even intentional. Nearly 50% off a newly released VR game isn't exactly the norm.
 
In my experience this doesn't work unless you already have a fairly large play space. If you're on the smaller side of things, you'll trigger the blackout timer all the damn time. I'd recommend people with smaller spaces to just try and play it as a standing 360 game with minimal dodge movement and OVRAS center marker on.

Does Gorn even work as a standing game? I thought it had a minimum room size requirement (2.5x2.5 maybe?).
 

Zalusithix

Member
Does Gorn even work as a standing game? I thought it had a minimum room size requirement (2.5x2.5 maybe?).

It does have a minimum room size requirement, but it's more of a recommendation than anything. The game isn't designed to match the room size. In games where the virtual environment you'll be interacting with far exceeds the physical room size and artificial movement makes up for difference, it doesn't really matter how big your room is. You'll eventually reach the point where you hit chaperone bounds. Larger spaces just give more freedom of physical movement before the limit is hit. This does give you an advantage in a game like Gorn where the dev for some reason decided arm motion to both move and fight was a good idea, but it's not insurmountable.
 

jotun?

Member
The floppy weapons are so far the best implemented melee weapons in VR, it gives them some weight and makes heavier weapons slower and lets them impact on shield and armour without disconnecting from your hand etc.
I like the idea, but I think they should be a little stiffer. NVIDIA's VR funhouse did the same kind of thing, and I liked it better there

It would be amazing to play this in a room the size of the full arena, and with a wireless setup

Well, that sucks. There was no indicator of how long that discount was going to last, and honestly I have to wonder if it was even intentional. Nearly 50% off a newly released VR game isn't exactly the norm.
I think it was a mistake. On Steam its normal price is $20, 25% off to $15. Humble probably just accidentally entered the $15 and 25% numbers instead of $20 and 25%
 
It does have a minimum room size requirement, but it's more of a recommendation than anything. The game isn't designed to match the room size. In games where the virtual environment you'll be interacting with far exceeds the physical room size and artificial movement makes up for difference, it doesn't really matter how big your room is. You'll eventually reach the point where you hit chaperone bounds. Larger spaces just give more freedom of physical movement before the limit is hit. This does give you an advantage in a game like Gorn where the dev for some reason decided arm motion to both move and fight was a good idea, but it's not insurmountable.

Ah, I always thought those were hard minimums (the Steam description kinda implies this). A couple friends have actually avoided some VR games because of this.

In Gorn's case, I would definitely take their recommendation. I'm playing in a pretty large area and still managed to put a chip in my desk before finding out about the strict chaperone option. I just kinda get in the zone and ignore the chaperone when things get intense.
 

cakefoo

Member
That's odd. Do any of the other capture methods in general work for you in OBS?
No issues in general with other capture methods but I do have issues capturing Pavlov directly- it's just rainbow-colored outlines set against a black background, so I have to capture via the Mirror window.
 

Zalusithix

Member
No issues in general with other capture methods but I do have issues capturing Pavlov directly- it's just rainbow-colored outlines set against a black background, so I have to capture via the Mirror window.
Hmm, don't know what the problem is then. The game shouldn't matter since it's capturing the SteamVR mirror.

Sairento is preeetty neat but wow it gives me motion sickness with the artificial moves...
If you don't have the teleport only option enabled, the game does require that the player have a level of resistance to artificial movement. That said, I find Sairento actually feels more natural to me than the slide movement used in many games for artificial locomotion. Aside from wall running, the artificial movement in Sairento is stuff that you normally wouldn't accomplish by moving your real legs. In the middle of a jump, for instance, it's natural that you'd still be moving without moving your legs. Likewise when you crouch to enter into a slide, you'd also not be moving your legs. Meanwhile non-jump movement is a quick tele-dash. The inner ear difference is still there, but the cognitive dissonance isn't as great. As such, I tend to feel like I'm actually moving in Sairento more than slide movement games where I sometimes get the feeling that the world is moving around me.
 

low-G

Member
Does Gorn even work as a standing game? I thought it had a minimum room size requirement (2.5x2.5 maybe?).

Yep, it does work as standing. I can take a step or two in some directions but not others.

There are other games where you actually have to pick up some item that's off in some corner of the play area. Gorn actually lets you walk around the arena with an arm swinging locomotion.
 
In my apartment, the play area encompasses basically all standable space, so when I have multiple guests over, I basically tell whoever's not currently playing: "Remember, we're standing within the VR chaperone, if [person] walks near here we need to move."
 

cakefoo

Member
Hmm, don't know what the problem is then. The game shouldn't matter since it's capturing the SteamVR mirror.
The Mirror window looks fine regardless of game. I meant I only have an issue if I try to capture the Pavlov exe source.

Speaking of Pavlov, check out these multiplayer levels:
Rats in My Room
Duke Nukem 3D
Blood Gulch
 

IMACOMPUTA

Member
Is there anything about that OBS capture that would prevent Echo Arena from working? I couldn't get EA to launch while I was running it. Could have been a coincidence.
 

Zalusithix

Member
Don't have the game myself, but it would be a pretty huge bug if it didn't even launch due to OBS. Given how much VR games rely on the community to get exposure, you don't want a situation where one of the biggest streaming/recording programs out there interferes with your game.
 
Have not checked into Swevivers channel for a while, so I was surprised to see some old games now working in VR via unofficial mods.

Dying Light no tracked motion controls so a hard pass from me but maybe other people are interested.

Richard Burns Rally which seems to be abandoned ware now and easy to supersample the crap out of.

Maybe already mentioned here, I'm not going to get to check them out anytime soon tho due to other stuff.
 

IMACOMPUTA

Member
Don't have the game myself, but it would be a pretty huge bug if it didn't even launch due to OBS. Given how much VR games rely on the community to get exposure, you don't want a situation where one of the biggest streaming/recording programs out there interferes with your game.
I wondered if somehow revive was failing due to the ovr obs source.
 

Zalusithix

Member
There's a few things you could try ranging from running OBS as admin, to disabling the OpenVR source and using the game capture source instead. I don't have the game nor Oculus software / Revive installed, so I can't really say one way or another where the issue lies.
 

Putosaure

Member
After going into calibration process for one of my Vive controllers for Windlands, I can definitely feel that the clicking course is shorter on the one causing problems. Any game touchpad clicking heavy to try it out ?
 

MaDKaT

Member
Just finished Superhot which was very enjoyable once I started using the original controls via the new beta. How is Robo Recall via revive?
 
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