General VR Catch-All

Phades wrote:

Are they redeemable on Steam or how do you access those games? Sorry, I don't know much about Viveport.

They're *not* Steam codes, you'll install them through Viveport. However, they'll show up in Steam from within VR, either in Steam Home, or the VR dashboard. So you'll have to have Viveport installed, but you don't need to do anything with it once you've installed them.

Viveport does support the Rift for certain games but it was an absolute disaster. The software would lock, my controllers were not responsive, I didn't like any of it.

Well well well.

You know the acid trip from 2001, where Bowman goes into the Obelisk?

Form is that, the videogame, crossed with puzzles from The Room.

It's only an hour and a bit long, but the setting is quite a thing.

I've had my Oculus Rift for about a week now and I love it, but it's not without issues so I thought I'd share my experience and ask some questions here.

- Plug and play this is not. Even though they've been out for a few years I feel like I'm still at the bleeding edge, a pioneer struggling through and solving problems so that late adopters can get an easy ride
- I'm not usually one to dig around in my PC (OMG the dust!), but to get a good experience I ended up installing a new graphics card and a new PCI-e USB hub. Oh yeah USB ports- what is with that? Stuff doesn't work so I unplug a sensor and plug it into a different port and now it works. But then next time I use the rift it doesn't, so I move it back to the port it was in before and now it works again. Quite bizarre.
- I seem to be having trouble with Oculus and steamvr conflicting. Any app I run from the Oculus client seems fine, but steam vr games sometimes don't have any sound (eg pinball FX VR). Once or twice it has sound, mostly it doesn't, it's very temperamental. Had similar issues with Elite: Dangerous.
- I have had nausea, even in 'comfortable' apps like Google Earth. I've been fine in games where I can stand or sit still- Euro Truck for example. Subnautica was the worst. Many have said ginger helps, will be trying that soon.
- My son is 6. He's big for a 6 year old but still a bit small for VR. When he played Toy Box, a free tech type demo that came with the rift, he was just looking underneath the table that all the toys were on. Does anyone know of a way to easily change height without going through the set up again?

Overall, despite the issues it's been one big 'wow' moment for me in gaming. That moment when I first put the headset on and found myself in my clifftop home was just mind-blowing, and there are bigger and better things to come!

Regarding the weird sound settings, both Steam VR and Oculus have some settings for switching your PC's sound device over to the headset to make sure you get Audio. Check both.

SteamVR > Settings > Audio
Oculus > Devices > Click on your Headset > Audio settings appear on the right.

At home I think I have 'mirror audio to headset' on both, which spares me having to switch ever. At work Im not really getting that to work out for me.

Jonman wrote:

Well well well.

You know the acid trip from 2001, where Bowman goes into the Obelisk?

Form is that, the videogame, crossed with puzzles from The Room.

It's only an hour and a bit long, but the setting is quite a thing.

Thanks for this. Love me some trippy VR!

kergguz wrote:

I've had my Oculus Rift for about a week now and I love it, but it's not without issues so I thought I'd share my experience and ask some questions here.

- Plug and play this is not. Even though they've been out for a few years I feel like I'm still at the bleeding edge, a pioneer struggling through and solving problems so that late adopters can get an easy ride

I finally got a headset and I went with the Windows Mixed Reality Odyssey+. It is definitely plug and play. I was worried about Vive or Rift games not working on it, but so far I haven't found one that hasn't. Each game seems to recognize the controller in some fashion. It also has the resolution of the Vive Pro and includes anti SDE diffusion (minimal to no screen door effect).

Setup was literally plug in and walk around the room, then done. If I unplug it and move to different rooms or systems, it's ready to go in less than 5 minutes. I can also go outside the boundary and freely smack my face and hands into walls and be tracked. I got an extension cable on the way so I can try walking out of the room and into another with it (use two bedrooms).

There is a major drawback though. The inside-out tracking of the cameras built into the headset. If the controllers leave field of view or get too close to the headset they don't track. Can't really pull a bow effectively or drop hands to your sides or swing over your head without loosing them. I was doing a flight sim and looked to the right over the ocean. Hands got out of view and plane nosedived. Swinging sword is more like wagging your finger because you cannot swing your arm without it detaching in VR.

But to have it out of the box (Windows 10 had drivers and environment pre-installed) and in room-scale VR in minutes was next gen. Controllers were pre-paired by the factory to the HMD. One USB and one HDMI. I'd probably change over to external tracking for a future HMD, but the high resolution, portability, and 'functional' controller tracking will hold till Pimax/StarVR, Valve, Quest, or complete coverage of inside-out tracking work down the pipeline.

It's kind of fun having a reason to spend 6 hours modding skyrim all over again. I accidentally punched an old lady while trying to scratch my nose though.

Has anyone had any luck finding some good VR experiences for their kids. My son is 6 and the controllers are slightly too big for him, so he can't grip a virtual gun for example and shoot it very easily. When setting up the Rift it does advise that it's not suitable for children under 13. I accept that and for the most part I'm happy to keep it out of bounds, and if he wants to play a game there's always Roblox! But, I know at Christmas the whole family is going to want to try the Rift and I don't want him to feel left out.

Beat saber.

Turn no fail mode on

kergguz wrote:

Has anyone had any luck finding some good VR experiences for their kids. My son is 6 and the controllers are slightly too big for him, so he can't grip a virtual gun for example and shoot it very easily. When setting up the Rift it does advise that it's not suitable for children under 13. I accept that and for the most part I'm happy to keep it out of bounds, and if he wants to play a game there's always Roblox! But, I know at Christmas the whole family is going to want to try the Rift and I don't want him to feel left out.

My niece is 5. She has probably 10-15 hours in Job simulator Kitchen. I had to get her in the kitchen but she just loves playing around their.
She also has spent probably 10 hours in Tilt brush. Although did take me a while to get her use to how to change colors etc.
If your kid likes music (you can pick anything on youtube or local) You can try Audio shield. She has played that but only a few hours but did enjoy it.
She also spent a few hours in "The Lab" although this one she did get bored of after a few hours.

GoldenDog wrote:
kergguz wrote:

I've had my Oculus Rift for about a week now and I love it, but it's not without issues so I thought I'd share my experience and ask some questions here.

- Plug and play this is not.

I finally got a headset and I went with the Windows Mixed Reality Odyssey+. It is definitely plug and play.

The motion controllers are still Bluetooth on those, right? And other than the Odyssey/Odyssey+, WMR is still the cheapest of the PC-based systems.

Hot tip for Elite Dangerous: if you want space to go true black, put your Vive in extended mode and crank the contrast to 52% in the display control panel. Makes a huge difference. Probably would create a ton of ghosting in a game with faster action though.

Are any of the sets good for video or 3d video? Though I guess 3d has died again. I have a few 3d movies but no 3d devices.

Been looking at some media glasses but they seem to be around the same price of VR sets.

Watching 3D movies on the PSVR works very well, so I can only assume they would look at least as good on a more feature-rich PC set.

Doesn't Google cardboard do 3d video? I haven't looked much into it but it's super cheap.

3D video works in VR, probably better then with a flat tv with 2D glasses. But at least for the original Vive, the resolution is too low to make watching a good 3D movie a good immersive experience. The Vive Pro might do better but the 8k units that are being developed today are probably going to be where VR really shines with 3D movies.

Just played Beat Saber for the first time.

What. A. Game.

Mantid wrote:

Watching 3D movies on the PSVR works very well, so I can only assume they would look at least as good on a more feature-rich PC set.

From my point of view, the 3D part of 3D movies works well enough on the PSVR, but the resolution's so bad that I'd much rather forego the headset and watch the movie on the flat TV. I adore my PSVR, especially now that the library is so robust, but I don't see the appeal of using it for movie watching.

God help me I'm thinking of getting a Go for movies and a Rift or Odyssey for games. Maybe wait on the go to see if the rift or odyssey are good enough for movies. I want a movie theater sized screen to watch anime.

The Rift bundle is $329 at Best Buy today, cheapest I've ever seen it.

Phades wrote:

The Rift bundle is $329 at Best Buy today, cheapest I've ever seen it.

Same price on amazon.

The rift needs 3 usb 3.0 slots. Can a powered hub be used?

Cool beans. I'm getting the odyssey instead. The tracking is the worse of the bunch because of the cameras are on the headset, but it isn't game breaking from what I can tell. Easier setup, no cameras to deal with, and best visuals sold me.

I'll be back with praises or regrets.

I just finished Moss and it was amazing and adorable and everything I want in a chill VR game (even though the first appearance of the

Spoiler:

snake Sarffog

made me scream and my friends laughed at me on Discord). It's the first one I played (at home) and I feel like I've been spoiled for all others.

I got my PSVR bundle on a Black Monday sale so I also have Robot Rescue game, and soon enough I'll get the Move controllers and Beat Saber and Super Hot. I'm so excited to finally have my own gear

Kurrelgyre wrote:
GoldenDog wrote:
kergguz wrote:

I've had my Oculus Rift for about a week now and I love it, but it's not without issues so I thought I'd share my experience and ask some questions here.

- Plug and play this is not.

I finally got a headset and I went with the Windows Mixed Reality Odyssey+. It is definitely plug and play.

The motion controllers are still Bluetooth on those, right? And other than the Odyssey/Odyssey+, WMR is still the cheapest of the PC-based systems.

The controllers are bluetooth, but they are paired to the Headset from the factory and you do not need to pair them to the PC with bluetooth.

The old style controllers did need to be paired to the PC running bluetooth, but they got rid of that with the Odyssey+ and you just plug in the headset and everything is already paired and works. You can get a lenovo WMR set for like $170 at walmart US. I don't have any experience with that one, but it has decent likes on vr reddit.

The Samsung Odyssey is fantastic.

Are you guys using vr controllers or flight sticks for space sims? If flight sticks which ones are good?

I was using my X52 Pro for Elite Dangerous back when I played it regularly. I've never used it for anything else but I have zero complaints for how it works with Elite. If you're going to use a HOTAS setup while in VR I'd spend some time getting used to it out of VR though. Having the controls down pat so you're capable of using it when you can't see what you're doing is a necessity IMO.

I use the simple and cheap, but very good: Thrustmaster T-Flight Hotas X Flight Stick
My only complaint with it is I'd like more buttons. But I use my gamepad to fill in the gaps.