Virtual reality is here......almost

[novicius]

Sounds fantastic!

[stephenb]

For a bit of fun I recorded my brothers first time in the rift. First up Oculus Dreamdeck followed by a spot of Project CARS - watch the volume at the start of the second one.

[Yw-slayer]

So the MFs at Oculus cancelled my order without explanation, but a bit of searching shows that they probably thought I was trying to circumvent launch region restrictions (which is entirely correct as I was shipping it to a forwarder in the US).

Then again, no big loss as I haven't even finished DOOM E1M2.

[Rare White Ape]

I bought a PSVR

GT Sport is phenomenal. I’m dying to try a ‘real’ sim in VR now, with more than one car on the track. For now, solo hotlapping is just fine. GT’s VR showroom is fantastic; 1:1 scale racing cars in your living room!

Wipeout Omega Cillection in VR is just insane. They really pull no punches here - no limits to the detail or how many vehicles are on track like in GT; the full game is here and available in VR. You can limit your FOV and restrict other sickness-inducing settings if you want to, but all these comfort measures are buried in an options menu. The default setup is pretty much how they intend it to be played and it’s the craziest. Even the menus are a firehose to the senses. It’s easily a must-have VR game.

I’ve also had a go at a few demos (Last Guardian is awesome) and mini games, but by far the coolest is the Star Wars Battlefront X-Wing VR Mission. 12 year old me is just endlessly creaming himself until he shrivels up like a sultana when he hops in the cockpit and goes shooting TIE Fighters that are suddenly as big as houses.

In the not too distant future I’ll be picking up Rez Infinite, Dirt Rally VR, Tetris Effect and, erm, Drunkn Bar Fight on the PlayStation Store.

[Tom Servo]

If you can, spend some time with GT Sport getting acclimated. Dirt Rally VR was one of the first things I fired up on my Rift and I nearly vomited after about 15 seconds of it. I'm fine with it now, but that was a rough intro.

[balki]

Does it work for old people? If I hold my phone's screen a few inches away from my eyes it's all a blur

[Rare White Ape]

Yeah Swervo, I’m taking baby steps at the moment. There’s been one or two times where I stopped *just* in case! I’m waiting for Dirt Rally to go on sale again so there’s plenty of time.

Edit: I just checked the PlayStation Store and Dirt Rally and it’s VR add-on went on sale TODAY… ho-hoo, ha-haaa! *nervous laughter*

I did about 6 laps of off-roading in GT, flying over jumps and performing lurid Scandinavian flicks, and it seemed fine. Negotiating tight corners while looking thru the driver’s side window is great fun! And hot damn, you can be so much more accurate. It’s incredible how much it improves your driving.

[Rare White Ape]

Does it work for old people? If I hold my phone's screen a few inches away from my eyes it's all a blur

These headsets have lenses in them that make the screen appear as though it’s a few feet away from you, so don’t worry. They’re compatible with glasses, too.

PSVR will look blurry, but that’s because it’s a single 1080p screen shared across two eyeballs, and you’re only directly seeing about 50% of that (the rest is filling your peripheral) so all images are massively scaled down.

Blur might be intrinsic to VR devices for now, but it has nothing to do with ‘old people’ vision or how far it is from your face.

[dodint]

Picked up a PSVR for the meet last week. Tried it out and formed the opinion that although interesting, the resolution is just too low for any kind of meaningful immersion. The best way I can describe it is that it looks like watching a 4k TV through the viewfinder of an old digital camera. Scan line city when you try to look at objects on the horizon. I didn't share this opinion with Phil and asked him for his evaluation and he said the same thing, so I don't think it's me seeing something that isn't there.

The idea is cool but it isn't here yet, it feels a lot like a beta product. Going to sell off or return the headset while I can.

[Alan P]

The low resolution is often compared to looking through an old screen door. SDE, Screen door effect. I can't say I thought the Oculus Rift CV was bad for it. I think I noticed it when I first put the headset on but quickly managed to see beyond it.

Obviously the PS4 has lower graphical capabilities compared to a gaming PC and this shows in the resolution of each headset:
Display Resolution:
PSVR: 960 x 1080 per eye (single 1920x1080 screen)
Oculus Rift: 1080 x 1200 per eye (two screens, combined 2160 x 1200)
HTC Vive: 1080 x 1200 per eye (two screens, combined 2160 x 1200)