Ratcheting sounds ridiculous: to go left, you wave right? To crouch, you drag up? To run, you rapidly wave your arms back and forth to move 12 inches per wave, while precisely timing for the left and right ratchet buttons?
How does one know ratcheting in VR won't make them sick, if they haven't tried it?
I really don't see how ratcheting could be faster than physically moving.
Uh, in VR, you kind of do. That's what keeps everyone from getting nauseous.
Sure, but you're doing a terrible job at making this particular system sound appealing.
Players would look like they're standing still while activating Walkabout. There's no warping, no teleporting.
It give the world weight, it keeps you physically immersed, it prevents nausea in virtually 100% of cases.
Maybe that ahah moment will come once you try Roomscale VR. People who've tried it fall in love with it, and they don't want to let that go in favor of waving their hands around like an idiot.
Which arguably gives you about as much insight into the locomotion issue as someone who's tried Virtual Boy.
And the moment you wave your hand to take a step, it's like playing a Chuck Norris simulator-- in case you didn't know, when Chuck does pushups, he doesn't push himself up, he pushes the earth away.
No? It's a direct result of them wanting to design a balanced handheld peripheral that doesn't feel like you're holding a remote with a ball on the end of it. A bigger surface also reduces the chance of occlusion, possibly better than having a 1-inch glowing orb. The constellation patterns also provide absolute orientation data. By the way, you seem to be suggesting that replacing the Move ball with an identically-sized array of IR LEDs would result in inferior tracking to Move. I would like you to cite sources for that claim.
Sorry for lttp n00b question, but what the fuck is ratcheting?
No, that's a completely different method. In The Fight, you tilt the Move at an angle and hold it there to walk indefinitely. In serversurfer's dream VR locomotion system, you pull the world towards you one arm's length at a time. Like a normal person, duh.
Damn that's amazing.THIS is awesome. Is this a real thing?
I think it was a lizard, but yeah. It would be insanely tiring to use it to play, say, Call of Duty. You'd be the slowest person on the server and you couldn't shoot while moving. It would only work for slow paced games in tiny VR environments, but even then I could imagine it being really, really, REALLY clunky and ONLY a last-resort solution for people who can't/won't use their legs, or don't have a large enough room.
Excuse me? Where have I done that? Id like to discuss our locomotion options and their effect on both gameplay and immersion. If youd like to participate in that discussion, that would be great. If you want to discussing something else entirely like shipping dates or SDK warz or anything else, then again, nobody is stopping you.
I did read your post, and if youd read my response, youd have known that Id hinted yes, there are varying degrees of presence, and by being aware of the fact that you still (mostly) existed in meatspace, then you were experiencing one of the lowest degrees, by definition. Which player is more immersed in the experience?
This actually illustrates my point nicely. You were totally focused on your troops, and your immersion was indeed up in the 8-10 range, which is exactly what we want; the very purpose of VR. You were so engrossed that you almost wandered in to the furniture, but fortunately, the chaperone was there to stop you. GG, Chap. <3
Id say that design philosophy is just as important to gamers as it is to developers. The former typically dont have much direct influence over the process, but there are devs who frequent these forums and most devs are smart enough to know they should be paying attention to what their users want. Some of them are even smart enough to know that users often dont know whats actually best for them
Frankly, nobodys really even tried to do much convincing. I said that physical locomotion seemed to create as many issues as it solved while leaving the need for abstraction unsolved, and the most passionate and persistent rebuttals Ive gotten are, Youre stupid and jealous, and, What even is presence? Oh, and a bunch of, 2 > 1, I guess.
Well, you seemed to agree that having a decent solution for abstraction would be clearly preferable to dealing with the complications and distractions introduced by physical locomotion within mismatched environments, until I pointed out that you had done so
and now you dont wanna talk about it anymore.
Not really. Its more like grabbing on to a handle that aint going nowhere and pulling yourself around relative to it. The pool analogy is pretty good. When I was a kid, Id let as much air out of my lungs as I could to minimize my buoyancy and sink down in to the water and grab the ladder. Then I could use the ladder as a 6DOF controller to move my body anywhere I liked; forwards, backwards, left, right, upside-down Basically, it gave me more freedom of movement than Ive ever had, and it was perfectly intuitive. I was a young child and had no idea what a 6DOF controller was. I doubt there even was such a thing at the time. I just knew it was cool to be able to move wherever I wanted just by grabbing on to something solid.
First, you do understand the irony of criticizing its utility for sustained movement, yes?
The same way I know that teleportation and snap turns and physical locomotion and simply pointing your wand and saying, Take me that way, doesnt make you sick; I actually listen to what other people have to say. That's actually why I asked if anyone wanted to discuss the implementation of physical locomotion solutions with me. My plan was to listen to what they had to say, thereby increasing my understanding of what it entails. Unfortunately, most havent been able to manage much more than hostility towards a perceived threat to their differentiating factor.
Well, it sorta depends on what youre comparing. Sure, sprinting will beat vanilla ratcheting, but youre not going to be sprinting in your bedroom anyway, so thats a strawman to begin with. I was talking about short-burst movement, which is faster with ratcheting because your hand has less inertia than your hand plus the rest of your body. You can grab hold with Square and move the wand two feet to the right way faster than you can move your entire body two feet to the left, but both would have the same result on your avatar; itll seem like you moved two feet to the left. The only difference is whether youre pushing off with your right foot or your right hand. Yes, for the first week or twelve your first instinct will be to push off with your foot and you always can, if you want but over time you may realize that not only is performing the same maneuver with your hand faster and easier, not encountering the chaperone is far less distracting than doing so.
You would think so, but thats not actually how it works. Imagine removing your head and spiking it on the end of one of your wands. Oh, and dont die. Instead, look around by pointing your head with your arm instead of your neck. Now start whipping your head-wand around as quick as you like, and continue to enjoy the view from your disembodied eyes as you do so. None of this will make you ill, because youre in control of it and its completely predictable. It the same reason you dont get motion sickness when youre the one driving; all is going as it should, even though its going an unfathomable 100 MPH. Its over in the passenger seat where you have no control that everything feels so sloshy.
Perhaps, but to be fair, up until this point, I was mostly just trying to get it tabled for discussion.
Hopefully, theres no shooting or pickpocketing there either
There are other solutions that prevent nausea. Im not buying that being able to take three steps towards something instead of a mere two steps somehow creates weight and physicality without the presence of weight and physicality. If you reach out to touch the virtual wall and theres a physical wall lined up with it, then yes, youve created an additional layer of presence. Without some actual physicality to the wall, your experience is precisely the same as mine, except youre one step closer to the wall. MMMM, ROOMSCALE, SO GOOD!! Oh, and instead of getting a good look at the wall, you actually activated the chaperone again. I didnt, because I simply ratcheted myself four steps towards the wall to take a close-up look.
Maybe it will, and maybe when people try ratcheting, theyll realize its the people still waving their legs around who havent thought it through.
How could I forget my favorite rebuttal; Only Party Members may speak.
Do you see the young lady or the old witch?
People see what they choose to see* but we can give the users cues to help indicate theyre the ones who are moving./sigh Again, mentioned in the very text you quoted. As for the rest, Im a little disinclined to provide citations for you guys as Ive cited all of this stuff before, yet here we are again, having the very same arguments about whether I should be allowed to comment with you not even bothering to read my posts before you attempt to mock and discredit me. Repeatedly, no less.
I think theres ways to handle travel over longer distances fairly easily. Gliding, for example. Head to the ice rink and push off from the wall. Feels pretty normal to glide along for quite some time, doesnt it? Might sound crazy, but it should be comfortable, because again, the user sets the velocity. Just give a good shove with your ratchet, and glide along on your virtual roller skates. Youll want to keep your head free for looking around, but you can just point with your wand to make any necessary course corrections or spike yourself to a stop. It caps travel speed at however fast they can swing their wand, and theyre free to do other things as they glide along. You can either have them gradually slow, requiring periodic booster pushes, or just let them glide along indefinitely.
Ive been thinking about looking in to getting a dev kit, but Im sure they cost far more than I could justify, given how much time Im likely to be able to spend with it. I dont even do anything with my iOS membership. =/ Really, I just wish I had access to the docs. Thats how I learned to program my Mac.
This is.Sorry for lttp n00b question, but what the fuck is ratcheting?
Its not my term. The technique has actually been around for a long time. Its just particularly spiffy with a 6DOF.
Yeah, teleportation is cool, but it seems like it has too many caveats to really be your primary method in most cases.
Actually, yes, normal people use their hands to facilitate movement without thinking, every single time it's convenient to do so. We're just making it considerably more convenient for them.
I have concerns that I would like to see you try to address. The more you go on, the more I can dissect all the faults in your thinking. Are you scared to go down the rabbit hole?
"Teleporting doesn't make me nauseous" is proof that teleporting doesn't make a person nauseous.
If I pushed off a wall that wasn't there in VR, I wouldn't FEEL my body going in the opposite direction. I'd just SEE it going in the opposite direction. Seeing locomotion without feeling it is the #1 cause of nausea in VR.
I've told you before Walkabout doesn't require you to reverse to gain open space- you simply pivot to face a spacious direction in your room, while in-game you're still facing the chest. The long-winded essay that you continued to write has just been voided. *frowny_face
See, this is why people are hostile towards your idea. You're pulling these claims straight out of your ass, with no direct experience with your proposed locomotion technique. I can tell you right now that any VR head movement that you don't physically feel IN YOUR HEAD, will cause nausea. You can't just shift that feeling to your hand and expect your brain to just magically rewire.
Nobody's saying that 3 steps is less-nauseating than taking 2 steps. Just that using your hands to move your head is going to be nauseating because something's telling you your head is moving, but your inner ear doesn't feel those forces.
Again, nausea isn't caused by the disconnect between when you touch with your hands- it's caused by your pesky inner ear detecting false movement.If you reach out to touch the virtual wall and there’s a physical wall lined up with it, then yes, you’ve created an additional layer of presence. Without some actual physicality to the wall, your experience is precisely the same as mine, except you’re one step closer to the wall. MMMM, ROOMSCALE, SO GOOD!! Oh, and instead of getting a good look at the wall, you actually activated the chaperone again. I didn’t, because I simply ratcheted myself four steps towards the wall to take a close-up look.
Just answer the question :/ What is the reason you claim that a Move sphere can track better than a theoretical Move-sphere-sized Touch constellation pattern?
Yet another false claim about inner ear/vestibular disconnect. Really, you should educate yourself. Even short periods of acceleration and deceleration cause nausea. In fact, this is the period that causes the most nausea, as it's when we expect to feel the most opposing g-force- once you're moving at a constant rate in real life, the forces mostly equalize. People who've played games in VR that have gradual acceleration and deceleration periods when triggering artificial means of locomotion report getting more nauseous than when that abstract input method skips the acceleration/deceleration period and just goes straight into full-speed travel. But people still get nauseous at a high enough frequency in the latter, that it's not 100% advisable.
My advice would be to talk to a developer who will execute it so they can prove/disprove it works the way you've convinced yourself it will. Because almost every time you open your mouth on the subject of artificial locomotion here, all you're doing is showing off how uninformed you are on vestibular issues.
I like how when describing Walkabout on Vive, you make it sound extremely complicated, but when describing how well it could be half-assed on PSVR, you make it sound intuitive.
If you have this at a park near you you might want to go ahead and experience it because it won't last long.THIS is awesome. Is this a real thing?
Well, no, because there's nothing stopping me from performing the same physical sidestep to dodge the attack while laying down covering fire with both hands. Then I just hold the ratcheting button as I make my return to center, pulling myself behind the cover in the process. Or I could simply dodge the attack initially by ratcheting myself behind cover, which is far more effective than your dodge would be, because I can move my hand a lot faster than you can move your entire body.
But your first instinct is still to shift your entire meatbag. That's fine. So what happens when there's a physical wall in the way of your instinctive dodge? Which is more real to you, the fireball or the wall? Your sense of presence was firmly rooted in whichever environment you picked, and I suspect you didn't pick the virtual environment, as was our goal.
Actually, our goal was to make you forget there was even a decision to be made, and it seems we've failed miserably in that regard. The user who's learned to move with their hands instead of their feet is never presented with such a decision, because they never get closer to the wall. They can easily dodge in any direction at any time. Thusly, their sense of presence in the virtual environment is maintained. Will they eventually teeter their way out of the trackable zone? Of course they will, even if you can track an entire football field, but it will take a hell of a lot longer than would if you sent them trucking straight towards the edge.
And that's the real point here. You keep saying I'm focusing on the limitations of Lighthouse and proposing we replace it with a more limited system, but that's not what I'm doing. Why would we replace Lighthouse at all? It's the most capable tracking system we really have access to.
But having a larger tracking volume only helps you so much. Hitting the tracking limits is bad, so having them further away is better, but that doesn't make hitting them any less bad. If your trackable volume doesnt correspond to your game environment, youre going to have mismatches, and thats a violation of presence every time the user finds one.
Yes, yes, this is all well and good, but what if we needed to crouch to avoid that attack? Well, if youre still super attached to your meatbag, then go right ahead. If youve abandoned it to a comfy chair or a hammock somewhere like a normal person, then just ratchet your head up and down through the range of available heights. If youve got a rag doll following you, the system just shows it to be standing or stooping or whatever. Or maybe instead of crouching down, Im actually getting really tiny Hey, look. Now Im Antman, changing my size at will as I hurl myself through keyholes with some well timed ratchet vaults. You can do whatever you like now; its not like your meatbag is going anywhere.
Ratcheting may seem like a ridiculous amount of abstraction, but it's actually far less abstraction than what we've been dealing with for the last 50 years that's why it doesn't make you sick and figuring out what all you can do here has always been part of video gaming. Git gud, son. Don't you wanna play Celerity Ninja 3 with us?
As I explained above, I dont think these intuitive actions are nearly as complex or difficult to perform as you seem to think. Conversely, I think environments more than three paces long are typically quite common in video games.
Well, no. As I was telling Zap, teleportation has some complications, but a basic ratcheting implementation is pretty natural and straightforward. Sure, the lack of inertia makes it unnaturally fast, but the range is short, and once everyone in the world moves similarly, it will seem perfectly normal, just as circle-strafing at 20m/s does now in CoD.
Users dont need real world physics standards, and as Ive said before, I think well have more design options to us if we dont arbitrarily constrain ourselves to them. What they really dont need are experiences where they need to stop every three paces and wait for their meatbag to catch up. I mean, playing through two or three of those might be interesting from an intellectual curiosity standpoint, but going on WalkAbout for dozens of games? Just let me get on with it already. And how does that work with multiplayer? The other players walk for three seconds, disappear for five, then reappear and walk for three more? Yeah, that sounds way more realistic than my suggestion of walking with your hands =/
Anyway, youre basically just arguing that rather that avoiding the tracking bounds as I suggest, you can incorporate them in to your gameplay. Of course you can, and that was my initial argument; theres only so much you can do with physical locomotion unless youre willing to build a build a comparatively large facility. Why? Because every time the user reaches the tracking bounds, unless it's also the game bounds, they gotta stop and figure something else out before they can progress.
So knowing that will always be an issue, why not just avoid it from the get go and stick with the abstraction? Either youve eliminated the need for abstraction or you havent, and constantly changing your primary form of locomotion is both immersion-breaking and tiresome. You still cant make it out of your room without ratcheting (or whatever), and if you can ratchet, why would you ever walk?? As you argued at the top of the page, you never would. You'd do the sensible thing and ratchet to the corpses, because stopping to futz with the CB is nothing more than an unnecessary complication.
So we have ratcheting, which allows full freedom of player movement, subject only to developer constraints. "No, you can't ratchet yourself straight in to the air. Sure, you can hop around a little bit. No, you can't clip through the walls, but you can scale this one. Hang on tight. You unlocked Spider Ninja; scale whatever you like and don't worry about falling." Best of all, it never ever fails to deliver the expected results, so it never ever breaks presence. (Presumably, any dev constraints will be similarly predictable, at least in context.) So given the presence of this necessary system, what does wandering around your bedroom bring to the party beyond regular reminders that you're really still just stuck in a bedroom? Reminders which typically come in the form of blocked progress followed by a compensatory adjustment phase performed by the user.
When do we get to the part where physical locomotion becomes a huge win? Because so far I'm behind on presence, playability, and couches.
Okay then. I think this stuff is sorta important.
Actually, I was just staying on topic.
As I said earlier, Ive used Virtuality and Gear. Move too, obviously, if that counts for anything. How much ratcheting have you done? How many times have you seen it demonstrated?See what I did there?
It still exists as a reminder that the virtual environment is nothing more than that, which is precisely the opposite of the effect were trying to achieve here. We have a myriad of systems working together to make your brain say, Yes, this is really happening, and a single system designed to apply the brakes and say, Nah, you're still in your room. It exists solely to ground you in reality, and it does precisely that.
Standing at the edge of a cliff is our classic example for presence, yes? Your brain should be telling the rest of your body, Holy shit! Watch the fuck out! One gust of wind and we fall to our deaths!! The chaperones job is to say, Nah, youre alright, but you're about to stumble backwards in to your coffee table, so if anything, chose the safety of the cliff.
Cliff or coffee table? Fireball or wall? Those are decisions the user should never be making. Thats not presence.
Anyone in the midwest wanna let me come try theirs? lol
Texas is a bit of a trek, Krej, but it might be worth it if you knock up something I can ratchet around in
Thats still the case, and while I would say Touch is the better controller overall thanks to its additional inputs and ability to get a true yaw lock, the impressive girth of its tracking ring is a direct result of the comparatively poor visibility of IR markers.
