85 replies to this topic

[DustySkunk]

Moromillas, on 01 April 2014 - 09:41 PM, said:

No, it doesn't work that way. Big capital doesn't equal big success. Why not have McDonald's buy it next, the FB acquisition is ridiculous.

I agree that FB is not the ideal company to have purchased Oculus. Like I said before, when I first found out about the purchase, I was raging. If a company like Valve or Epic had made the purchase, I think many people would be celebrating right now. However, all I'm been saying is that it doesn't necessarily mean that the Rift as we know it is dead, and big capital is not mutually exclusive with success.

Regardless of the company's ownership, can we agree that Rift (or more generally, VR) support for MWO is a good thing? At least until some revelation comes to light that proves otherwise? What I mean by revelation is that so far, there have been no changes announced to the development plan for the Rift, and FB has stated they aren't going to make any. A change would indicate bad faith, and reason to give up on the Rift as a platform; something I will readily do if that happens. What I'm saying is until we do hear something, it's premature to assume the company has gone down the toilet because of its new ownership.

Irrespective of what happens with the Rift, the market for VR has just been opened in a big way with a lot of heavy hitters throwing their towel's in the ring...

Really it boils down to the fact that I just want to be able to sit in the cockpit of my Battlemaster, be able to look around and feel like I'm actually there. Almost full immersion. VR can make that happen.

[Roland]

DustySkunk, on 02 April 2014 - 07:32 AM, said:

Regardless of the company's ownership, can we agree that Rift (or more generally, VR) support for MWO is a good thing?

Having developed with the Rift, I'd generally say no, it's not.

At this point it's little more than an novelty. It's not suited for real gaming. You simply won't be able to use it for extended periods of time.

It actually has more application to various "serious game" environments, where you're doing types of training, for fairly short periods of time.

Some day, it might fit within the realm of commerical gaming, but it's not there yet.... and I don't believe it'll be there in the next few years, at least. I tend to think that development time spent on it is largely wasted effort at this point.

[TehSBGX]

Virtual Boy 2.0 will be DOA, Mark Zuckerberg will see to that.

[Khobai]

Quote

Like computers. They had those in the 90's too. Totally the same as today

For real, there's no comparison.

Computers didnt fail in the 90s. So there is a comparison.

VR tech failed for a reason. And nothing has changed to make it not fail now. The price point is still too high. Maybe if they can get the price down to under $100... but until that happens it will never catch on.

[Roland]

Khobai, on 02 April 2014 - 09:41 AM, said:

Computers didnt fail in the 90s. So there is a comparison.

VR tech failed for a reason. And nothing has changed to make it not fail now. The price point is still too high. Maybe if they can get the price down to under $100... but until that happens it will never catch on.

It's not really fair to say nothing has been done. The rift really was cool, and worked amazingly well for its price.

But it wasn't really ready for commercial use.

[DustySkunk]

Roland, on 02 April 2014 - 08:32 AM, said:

Having developed with the Rift, I'd generally say no, it's not.

At this point it's little more than an novelty. It's not suited for real gaming. You simply won't be able to use it for extended periods of time.

It actually has more application to various "serious game" environments, where you're doing types of training, for fairly short periods of time.

Some day, it might fit within the realm of commerical gaming, but it's not there yet.... and I don't believe it'll be there in the next few years, at least. I tend to think that development time spent on it is largely wasted effort at this point.

Thanks for the info, Roland. I respect your insight.

Khobai, on 02 April 2014 - 09:41 AM, said:

Computers didnt fail in the 90s. So there is a comparison.

VR tech failed for a reason. And nothing has changed to make it not fail now. The price point is still too high. Maybe if they can get the price down to under $100... but until that happens it will never catch on.

My point wasn't whether something failed or not. I'm sorry I didn't make that clear (I'm bad at sarcasm ). My point was that in the early 90s I was playing games on a 33MHz processor. Today I am playing on an i7 which is literally orders of magnitude more capable. To say that just because something failed in the 90s due to the limitations of computing power means that it will surely fail now is a little misguided. There's literally no comparison in the technology. My phone has far more computing power than my Compaq Presario did when I was playing MW2.

As Roland has pointed out, the technology may not be there yet, but it's close. It may need more time to develop. I hope he's wrong (mostly because I'm really excited about the possibilities) but he has said himself that there are applications it may be ready for right now. Remember early cell phones? They weren't ready for everyone's use when they first came out, but it didn't take long for the technology to mature once the demand was in place and big companies sought to supply that demand.

[Khobai]

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There's literally no comparison in the technology.

Computers have changed. VR technology hasnt. Its the same as the 90s. The only difference is its high definition now. But its still going to fail for the same reason it did in the 90s... its not a commercially viable product at $300 per unit.

[poohead]

All the technology that goes into VR has got better, that's what's changed.

Smaller, lighter, cheaper, less power-hungry components. Precisely what will make VR viable.

The success of smartphones means stuff like miniature screens, accelerometers, gyroscopes etc are now produced in huge quantities. This trend will make VR viable.

[Bhael Fire]

The FB acquisition will only bring the commercial version of the Rift to fruition faster and much cheaper than the already ridiculously cheap price tag it has now.

Make no mistake, it will become a household device for gaming and social interaction.

...much the same way that web cams are pretty standard now.

[DustySkunk]

Khobai, on 02 April 2014 - 11:14 AM, said:

Computers have changed. VR technology hasnt. Its the same as the 90s. The only difference is its high definition now. But its still going to fail for the same reason it did in the 90s... its not a commercially viable product at $300 per unit.

What exactly do you think drives VR? Look at poohead's post. He's got it right.

As to the pricepoint, what do people pay for a monitor? Or a flatscreen TV? What do people pay for consoles? More generally, how much do people spend on entertainment peripherals in general? $300 is not out of the realm of possibility. I know there are people playing MWO with Joystick/throttle/rudder systems that cost more than $300. Furthermore, as competition hits the market and newer products become available, the price will come down. Like we see with game consoles every generation, or for any other technology product for that matter.

poohead, on 02 April 2014 - 11:58 AM, said:

All the technology that goes into VR has got better, that's what's changed.

Smaller, lighter, cheaper, less power-hungry components. Precisely what will make VR viable.

The success of smartphones means stuff like miniature screens, accelerometers, gyroscopes etc are now produced in huge quantities. This trend will make VR viable.

Thank you. This. ^^

Edited by DustySkunk, 02 April 2014 - 12:53 PM.

[Roland]

Khobai, on 02 April 2014 - 11:14 AM, said:

Computers have changed. VR technology hasnt. Its the same as the 90s. The only difference is its high definition now. But its still going to fail for the same reason it did in the 90s... its not a commercially viable product at $300 per unit.

Eh.. this isn't really true dude.
The changes in VR technology are basically the same as changes in computers... hardware has gotten smaller, cheaper, and more efficient.

For instance, back in the 90's, you really couldn't even make a VR headset like the Rift... Even with the Rift's limitations, it's still WAY ahead of anything from back then. You just didn't have the kind of low latency sensors used to track movement back then. There was an inherent latency just in the hardware used that precluded it from being really effective.

And that's not even taking in to account the massive size and cost improvements.

I don't think it's ready for commericalization yet, but it most definitely highlights large technological developments compared to earlier systems.

[kuangmk11]

Khobai, on 02 April 2014 - 11:14 AM, said:

Computers have changed. VR technology hasnt. Its the same as the 90s. The only difference is its high definition now. But its still going to fail for the same reason it did in the 90s... its not a commercially viable product at $300 per unit.

VR has changed dramatically. In the 90's decent video goggles and tracking would run you 10K and then another 20k for the computers, that would get you 10fps if you were lucky.

MWO will never get Rift support. The game is delivered. We won't likely even get Community Warfare. We should be crying for a dedicated server package for when the lights go out.

[Suko]

Khobai, on 02 April 2014 - 11:14 AM, said:

Computers have changed. VR technology hasnt. Its the same as the 90s. The only difference is its high definition now. But its still going to fail for the same reason it did in the 90s... its not a commercially viable product at $300 per unit.

It's obvious you never used the Rift or played any VR games from the 90's, because you don't know what the f*ck you're talking about.

I used my Gen 1 dev kit to play Hawken and the entire time I was thinking "This would be so much better in MWO". I will say that the latency and low res of my dev kit limited my Hawken game time to ~10 minutes before I started to feel motion sick, but Hawken is a much quicker, more motion excessive game than MWO. Also, MWO's cockpit's are far better constructed for looking around in 3D than those of Hawken's.

Edited by ShadowVFX, 02 April 2014 - 01:10 PM.

[Roland]

ShadowVFX, on 02 April 2014 - 01:04 PM, said:

It's obvious you never used the Rift or played any VR games from the 90's, because you don't know what the f*ck you're talking about.

I used my Gen 1 dev kit to play Hawken and the entire time I was thinking "This would be so much better in MWO". I will say that the latency and low res of my dev kit limited my Hawken game time to ~10 minutes before I started to feel motion sick, but Hawken is a much quicker, more motion excessive game than MWO. Also, MWO's cockpit's are far better constructed for looking around in 3D than those of Hawken's.

You'd get sick in 10 minutes of playing MWO too. The latency just isn't good enough to do anything for an extended period of time without making you sick.

[Suko]

I

Roland, on 02 April 2014 - 01:56 PM, said:

You'd get sick in 10 minutes of playing MWO too. The latency just isn't good enough to do anything for an extended period of time without making you sick.

I played War Thunder and that space tour sim game (can't remember it's name), for quite a while without getting sick. However, most of those don't take place in a Call of Duty style, run and gun experience.

Needless to say; I have a gen 1 dev kit, the commercial version will be leaps and bounds superior in probably every way.

[Bhael Fire]

Roland, on 02 April 2014 - 01:56 PM, said:

The latency just isn't good enough to do anything for an extended period of time without making you sick.

They've eliminated a vast amount of the judder and blurry motion tracking in DK2...along with a much higher res display. I expect it will be a complete non-issue by time the commercial version is released.

Besides people that get motion sickness easily won't be able to use this device any more than they could ride on roller coasters or long car trips anyway.

[Roland]

Bhael Fire, on 02 April 2014 - 02:04 PM, said:

They've eliminated a vast amount of the judder and blurry motion tracking in DK2...along with a much higher res display. I expect it will be a complete non-issue by time the commercial version is released.

Besides people that get motion sickness easily won't be able to use this device any more than they could ride on roller coasters or long car trips anyway.

The thing is, they can't eliminate that stuff.

At its absolute best, the rift will have a latency just on the edge of acceptable. That's really the best they can hope to pull off with today's technology.

But that's only with PERFECTLY OPTIMIZED software... And Occulus doesn't make the software. They make an SDK to use in software.

Which means that if the game using it has any kind of framerate hiccups.. then it's gonna screw up the experience. Consider the times throughout development where folks have complained about MWO having framerate issues. Those types of issues go from annoyances to vomit inducing when you put on the rift.

[Khobai]

Quote

Needless to say; I have a gen 1 dev kit

Well have fun using it to browse facebook.

[Bhael Fire]

Khobai, on 02 April 2014 - 04:11 PM, said:

Well have fun using it to browse facebook.

Facebook has nothing to do with the games development aspect for the Rift. That is, you're not going to see Facebook ads in your Oculus Rift games (unless for some stupid reason the game's devs put them there) or even a Facebook logo anywhere on the device. They will not have any role in the development of games for the device.

[Bhael Fire]

Roland, on 02 April 2014 - 03:33 PM, said:

At its absolute best, the rift will have a latency just on the edge of acceptable. That's really the best they can hope to pull off with today's technology.

I think you're going to be surprised at just how far beyond "acceptable" the commercial version of this device will be. DK1 and DK2 are worlds apart as far as motion blur and persistence go.


Sure, some games may require lower graphics settings in order to get smooth FPS, but the extra immersion provided by the Rift makes for a nice trade-off.

And now that Oculus has fat stacks to work with, it's only going to get better at a much faster rate.