26 replies to this topic

[Rhent]

One of the reasons why the mechwarrior franchise had an initial competitive advantage wasn't necessarily the large installed table top fan base, it was the fact that the game was an early adopter of three dimensional modelling in game design. The franchise started to fail as new genres came about that used the three dimensional modelling better, think of your shooter genre.

Now cut to recent discussions about new engines etc and to me, I would say before looking at a new engine look at the new technology that is coming out, namely vive or occulus 3d head sets. IF PGI wants to get a leg up on the competition, build in direct support for the headsets and not have it be partial support but full support. Anything in cockpit will work better with VR.

[Alan Davion]

Wasn't PGI at some conference or convention or something a few months ago where they had like a half-dozen computers setup with MWO and Oculus?

I could swear they were but I can't be 100% sure.

That said they're clearly keeping VR in mind, but it takes a really, really high end computer to run Oculus or Vive or whatever doesn't it?

[TexAce]

Alan Davion, on 09 April 2016 - 02:22 PM, said:

Wasn't PGI at some conference or convention or something a few months ago where they had like a half-dozen computers setup with MWO and Oculus?

I could swear they were but I can't be 100% sure.

That said they're clearly keeping VR in mind, but it takes a really, really high end computer to run Oculus or Vive or whatever doesn't it?

It was on the steam party.

a new engine is first thing they need to do to have full VR functionailty.
CryEngine 5 and Unreal 4 make it much easier to get into VR.

[Mystere]

Rhent, on 09 April 2016 - 11:17 AM, said:

One of the reasons why the mechwarrior franchise had an initial competitive advantage wasn't necessarily the large installed table top fan base, it was the fact that the game was an early adopter of three dimensional modelling in game design. The franchise started to fail as new genres came about that used the three dimensional modelling better, think of your shooter genre.

Now cut to recent discussions about new engines etc and to me, I would say before looking at a new engine look at the new technology that is coming out, namely vive or occulus 3d head sets. IF PGI wants to get a leg up on the competition, build in direct support for the headsets and not have it be partial support but full support. Anything in cockpit will work better with VR.

The large mass of people playing MWO who insist on running potatoes for computers will not be using VR.

[Rhent]

Mystere, on 09 April 2016 - 02:40 PM, said:

The large mass of people playing MWO who insist on running potatoes for computers will not be using VR.

Its called running the game on lower engine settings for people playing on old machines. IF they can take advantage of VR early on, they would end up getting early adopters and a small but growing captive market.

Edited by Rhent, 09 April 2016 - 04:56 PM.

[Impyrium]

I guarantee you, MWO will struggle with VR. It isn't played as a 'true' cockpit game and has more in common with a traditional FPS than a cockpit sim.

[Mystere]

Dingo Red, on 09 April 2016 - 05:12 PM, said:

I guarantee you, MWO will struggle with VR. It isn't played as a 'true' cockpit game and has more in common with a traditional FPS than a cockpit sim.

I can't even imagine how people can reliably use a keyboard they cannot even see during the heat of battle. MWO having horrible support for joysticks also works against VR support.

Edited by Mystere, 09 April 2016 - 05:24 PM.

[ShadowWolf Kell]

Given how demanding it is in Elite Dangerous which has been designed to fully utilize it and the massive amount of motion sickness people with underpowered systems have been having, I don't see it as a viable option for MWO any time soon.

Also, the HUD colors would be problematic on the Occulus with no way to adjust their color to make them easier to read. Teal and Amber are both hard to read in ED with VR.

[Volthorne]

ShadowWolf Kell, on 09 April 2016 - 08:23 PM, said:

Given how demanding it is in Elite Dangerous

Elite: Safety Space is resource intensive/demanding sitting out in the middle of literally nowhere at the edge of the galaxy, because FD are somehow unbelievably WORSE at optimization than PGI. Except in the graphical department. Then they're still worse but in the opposite sense, in that they butchered the hell out of the visual experience way worse than PGI ever has. Some of the graphics options STILL don't do anything.

Quote

the massive amount of motion sickness people with underpowered systems have been having,

That's because people are trying to run a simulation of human vision at less than the required minimum specifications. Mystery solved.

Quote

Also, the HUD colors would be problematic on the Occulus with no way to adjust their color to make them easier to read. Teal and Amber are both hard to read in ED with VR.

Again, that's because Elite is kind of garbage. The HUD is often difficult to read under any circumstances other than 500 light-seconds from any stellar body and facing away from the system's star(s), with some exceptions (exceptions require modifying the game files to change your HUD colour-scheme on a very low-level global scale. Look it up if you want to know how to do it). Also they tied the HUD to the ship rather than the player camera, which doesn't help in the slightest.

Edited by Volthorne, 09 April 2016 - 09:16 PM.

[Zordicron]

There are a lot of hurdles to the idea of VR for MWO. I am split between wanting PGI to embrace the future there and build for it now, and spending resources on making the game fun enough and fleshed out enough to warrant the longevity of the game required to make a VR investment pay off.

I say this as a vet, an old vet, that has spent the majority of this year so far NOT logged into MWO. For instance, I spent more time on these forums today then i have logged in to play in the last week, i havent even dropped in a match this weekend even though I own mechs to do it. I still support this game, it is still my go to game, but I have been a little miffed about the whole espurts thing and lack of info about key features like CW3 and the mech rescale and new engine etc. New mechs are great, the combat and game is fun. It could be a lot more fun. Not sure if VR would help that situation or just be a distraction.

[Dibujor]

Mystere, on 09 April 2016 - 02:40 PM, said:

The large mass of people playing MWO who insist on running potatoes for computers will not be using VR.

Yep, I insist on using a potato because obviously everyone can buy a high end machine right?

Not all of us have the spare money to buy a new machine when we want or even need, you know?

I'd love to get into the VR wagon but, alas, I can't.

[Troutmonkey]

Step 1: Move MWO to a new engine. Preferably NOT CryEngine.
Step 2: Optimize the ever loving crap out of everything (VR needs 70+ constant FPS)
Step 3: Redesign + Fix the user interface
Step 4: Fix Joystick support
Step 5: Wait for Gen 2 VR with reduced specs (or for everyone to get better computers)
Step 6: Add full VR support

Right now it doesn't make sense for MWO to spend resources on VR support. Not until they move to a new engine and not until VR is more widely adopted. Right now MWO is niche and VR is niche and MWO VR is really really niche.

[Tombstoner]

Zordicron, on 10 April 2016 - 09:40 AM, said:

There are a lot of hurdles to the idea of VR for MWO. I am split between wanting PGI to embrace the future there and build for it now, and spending resources on making the game fun enough and fleshed out enough to warrant the longevity of the game required to make a VR investment pay off.

I say this as a vet, an old vet, that has spent the majority of this year so far NOT logged into MWO. For instance, I spent more time on these forums today then i have logged in to play in the last week, i havent even dropped in a match this weekend even though I own mechs to do it. I still support this game, it is still my go to game, but I have been a little miffed about the whole espurts thing and lack of info about key features like CW3 and the mech rescale and new engine etc. New mechs are great, the combat and game is fun. It could be a lot more fun. Not sure if VR would help that situation or just be a distraction.

PGI needs to reguild the game in the context of the new TT kickstarter. VR vs. fixing magicle levels of precition and ghost heat.

[Troutmonkey]

Tombstoner, on 10 April 2016 - 04:43 PM, said:

PGI needs to reguild the game in the context of the new TT kickstarter. VR vs. fixing magicle levels of precition and ghost heat.

No more kickstarters please

[Rhent]

Troutmonkey, on 10 April 2016 - 04:16 PM, said:

Step 1: Move MWO to a new engine. Preferably NOT CryEngine.
Step 2: Optimize the ever loving crap out of everything (VR needs 70+ constant FPS)
Step 3: Redesign + Fix the user interface
Step 4: Fix Joystick support
Step 5: Wait for Gen 2 VR with reduced specs (or for everyone to get better computers)
Step 6: Add full VR support

Right now it doesn't make sense for MWO to spend resources on VR support. Not until they move to a new engine and not until VR is more widely adopted. Right now MWO is niche and VR is niche and MWO VR is really really niche.

Joysticks < Mouse and Keyboard

Always have been, always will be. There is NOTHING that can be done to make a joystick even come to 80% parity of a keyboard and mouse w/o hard coding in specific handicaps to keyboard and mouse interface to slow them down to the joystick level of performance. People coming to the forums asking for Joysticks to get better, have missed basic research on the differences between the keyboard mouse combo vs all other controllers for shooters. Simply put, keyboard and mouse always wins against players using other interface input devices.

[Troutmonkey]

Rhent, on 10 April 2016 - 05:09 PM, said:

Joysticks < Mouse and Keyboard

Always have been, always will be. There is NOTHING that can be done to make a joystick even come to 80% parity of a keyboard and mouse w/o hard coding in specific handicaps to keyboard and mouse interface to slow them down to the joystick level of performance. People coming to the forums asking for Joysticks to get better, have missed basic research on the differences between the keyboard mouse combo vs all other controllers for shooters. Simply put, keyboard and mouse always wins against players using other interface input devices.

I'm not saying that they'll ever be better than keyboard and mouse, but right now they could stand to be a lot better. The mandatory deadspot is pretty bad, and I think some sort of absolute movement system (half up means half up instead of look up at half speed) would make it much more viable.

[Khobai]

Quote

Always have been, always will be. There is NOTHING that can be done to make a joystick even come to 80% parity of a keyboard

Agreed. Steering wheels are the future of MWO not joysticks.

[GRiPSViGiL]

I agree with your point OP but VR is a novelty and will be until the price point consumer friendly and game industry goes all in on it.

However, PGI has their hands full with, at this point, a very old engine so what makes you think they have the skills or the foresight to hire people that can be at the front of the next genre of gaming technology?

[Mechwarrior1441491]

Game updates and engine porting? bahahaha

Alright, that was a good one.

[ShadowWolf Kell]

GRiPSViGiL, on 10 April 2016 - 06:07 PM, said:

I agree with your point OP but VR is a novelty and will be until the price point consumer friendly and game industry goes all in on it.

However, PGI has their hands full with, at this point, a very old engine so what makes you think they have the skills or the foresight to hire people that can be at the front of the next genre of gaming technology?

Not to mention most platforms really pushing solid VR support in their games are already primed for DirectX 12. Isn't MWO still running on DX9?