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How bad will the dumbing down of game design to accomodate VR get?
Pynda
Member UncommonPosts: 856
I'm not a tech guy, but I know a lot of you here are. So I'm wondering what you think. I do know that I grit my teeth every time I work my way through some stupid nested menu, or can see obvious features that could have been in games but have been left out because of the need to design everything these days around the console controller. But I guess, still, gaming has survived relatively intact. However I'm not so sure that will remain true with VR. But I do admit, I know very little about VR.
- Are VR games quickly going to take over the lions share of the egame market, just as consoles have done in the last 15 years?
- Just how limited are VR controllers? Do they make the console controller look like a sophisticated device? Or do you think they will offer even better opportunity for input than a keyboard and mouse do (ugh, please explain that one to us)?
- Are VR games quickly going to take over the lions share of the egame market, just as consoles have done in the last 15 years?
- Just how limited are VR controllers? Do they make the console controller look like a sophisticated device? Or do you think they will offer even better opportunity for input than a keyboard and mouse do (ugh, please explain that one to us)?
Comments
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
No they most definitely will not be taking a large share. When was the last time you watched a 3D movie at home?
Will the controller be better than a keyboard and mouse? Nope just different.
Keyboards and monitors will still be alive and well, but it is consoles and smartphones that are killing the PC market. Not VR
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In the UK, most households have at least 1 PC, i think when you compare the UK to countries like Japan however, that isn't the case, so perhaps your view of the situation between Smartphones, Consoles, and PC's, is coloured by how such things are regarded in the country you live in, and if you lived in Japan you might well think that nobody used PC's anymore.
Just as an example, in our household we have 3 PC's, 1 Desktop, which is my gaming rig, and 2 laptops, we also have 2 kindles, a PS4, and a Wii. Of the 2 consoles, the Wii is used the most, because when it comes to games for children, they do like to jump around with those controllers.
We don't have any smartphones, because honestly, we don't need one for anything.
It's a similar comparison to a smartphone. A game like Fruit Ninja, where you use your finger to chop flying fruits, is built specifically for a touch screen in mind. It works perfectly on a phone, while being subpar on a PC. On the other hand, strategy games are great on a PC, very problematic on tablets.
VR is similar in that respect. Games that are built specifically for VR are great experiences. They don't directly compete with PC games though - it's a different breed. In the case of Vive, the best games are built with the 3mx3m playroom in mind.
There are two critical limitations with the current VR headsets (Oculus/Vive). First is movement. Everything is restricted to a small play area. I haven't seen anyone solve this issue yet. The best solution currently is have the player teleport around, bringing their 3x3 play area with them. It sort of works, but it's not great. The best games out there don't require you to move, restricting you only to a small area. I don't think any sort of "running machine" is a solution either. People aren't going to buy a clunky running belt for their home.
The other limitation is graphical resolution. Small objects are hard to discern - the resolution simply isn't there. If you try something like the Blu, a game where fish swim around you, it's immediately obvious. If a fish swims right by your face, it's crisp, in clear 3D, amazingly vivid. If a fish is a little further away, not taking up all your screen, it's not as vivid anymore. For that reason, current VR games can't use menus, even if they wanted to. Elite Dangerous is made for PC (a lot of menus) - it's not a great experience for current VR.
All in all, I think VR will need at least 2 more generations until it can attempt to be "mainstream". Once it is, I don't think it will replace PC gaming. It will simply be another medium of entertainment. You'll be able to hop between VR games, PC games and mobile games.
What about, I don't know, trying it for yourself?
"The simple is the seal of the true and beauty is the splendor of truth" -Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar
Authored 139 missions in Vendetta Online and 6 tracks in Distance
For the 'hardcore' gamer it needs to be made much lighter and comfortable (as close to wearing no headset as possible). If you want people who play games for 6 hours a day or maybe 12-14 hours a day on weekends to prefer using your device, it has to be comfortable for that period of time. Even wearing really comfortable headphones for a couple hours gets uncomfortable, heat has to go somewhere, laws of thermodynamics still exist.
For the 'casual' gamer in needs to have a really low barrier to entry and be really accessible. Most casual gamers are not PC gamers, many are console gamers, but most are mobile phone gamers. It's the ultimate in accessibility and there is not barrier to entry as nearly everyone has a smartphone. It's easy to whip out your phone and play a game for 5-10 minutes, maybe a hour if you're really into it. Console have that mid-range covered as well, where you can game for an hour or two a few days a week (obviously Sony's target demographic).
There's the VR as an arcade experience in which entire warehouses are transformed into VR playgrounds and that's probably the best example of VR I've seen. True immersion and full movement enabled. Unfortunately, this isn't a great individual consumer market model.
So there are lots of questions to be answered still, not to mention Facebook's desire for VR as a social platform (I honestly don't think they give two craps about gaming or gamers).
You can still use mouse and keyboard, or gamepad, or new touch controllers. So, on the surface there is no need to dumb anything down.
However, it all comes down to what controller the games are designed for. If they're using new touch controllers then the games will be relatively dumbed down to start with (just like the Wii) but they don't have to be. For example, if the new controllers are 100% accurate then sword fights could be extremely complex. If you can actually duck, dodge and swing your sword in any direction you want then sword fights start to approach realism.
Personally I feel VR is just a gimmick. Its too expensive for mass market (at the moment) but most importantly, it doesn't add anything to gameplay - its just a different way to view the virtual world. Because of this, I don't think VR will ever make it big and so I don't think it will ever have a big influence on PC gaming.
The switch will come when user input / VR can be used to improve gameplay.
We have seen a very noticeable trend in game design ,from super cheap,cpost effective to devs asking for money before the game is even started lol.
This current trend should tell us that devs are NOT going that extra mile when comes to quality and effort,instead they want to toss out games in a few months,ideas like Moba's and TCG's all low bandwidth cost effective games.
It has been easier for devs to sell an idea or some cash shop items than to sell a finished game,so i see them sticking to the ease of no risk game development.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Games being made prioritizing a nice VR experience, end up on wonky experiences for non-VR users.
Annnnnnd vice-versa of course.
VR is not about to "take over the world" though. It will remain a niche in the gaming market at least until high-quality VR-headsets can be bought for under $200 or so AND there are "killer games" to play in VR.
If you read through the Vive reviews, nearly all of the people have nothing but praise for the Vive controllers.
I made two prototype games for Vive. I'm definitely not an experienced developer - was mostly just messing around. Regardless, the input was a pleasure to develop for. Unlike console controllers, VR controllers are actual objects present in the game space. On console, the Xbox/PS4 controller may be "pointing somewhere", but the game has to do some maths to decide where you are pointing. On VR, the controller is a game object, much like an enemy skeleton or your character. The cameras map the controllers into the game world, the same way it maps your display position. From a design standpoint, it lets you interact with the world in a whole new way.
From a user point of view, the controllers feel extremely natural. If you think about it, it is more natural to swing a VR "stick" at an enemy, rather than slide your mouse around the table. I think in the long-long term, it will make gaming more accessible. Non-gamers will find it less clunky, more approachable.
It has one downside. When trying to put your controllers on a virtual table, they fall to the ground. :frown:
Happened to me on my first day.
Game design is in little danger from VR anytime soon. Let the VR devices deal with the technical issues, ergonomic issues, the entry price issues and gain a foothold in the market before VR will seriously start to impact how games are designed. Then, there's no real assurance that the marriage of VR to the MMORPG genre will be as natural as anticipated. For all we know, VR may work better for adventure / puzzle games like Myst or Tetris. From a market perspective, there's a lot more Tetris players than MMORPG players, so there's a lot more money to be made from Tetris players.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
I think it's what Facebook and Oculus have gone on and on about the past four years, so much so that the word has nearly lost its meaning to some perhaps: presence. As simply as possible: for me "presence" has more to do with the after-effects of a VR experience than when one is "in it"; VR allows digital spaces to become more like real places in my subconscious memory, regardless of photorealistic fidelity. In my opinion the simple gesture of turning one's head to look somewhere, and having a cohesive, extensive digital space presented (slightly differently) to each eye generates biofeedback (using the term liberally). My perception only, of course. It takes about four or five seconds to really 'kick in', for me.
The first time I used VR it was a near-religious experience; nothing else expanded the way I thought about computers in a similar fashion since I first started to use them at 4 years old in 1984.
Currently, all I can say is that I am having a great time in VR and it is now my preferred method of playing games.
I haven't given up on PC gaming (I still play from time to time: 3 most recently played games on Steam at the time of this writing are Massive Chalice, Kairo, and Windward) but the false sense of superiority I run across in some PC gamers, as evidenced in the title of this thread, is certainly off-putting.
"The simple is the seal of the true and beauty is the splendor of truth" -Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar
Authored 139 missions in Vendetta Online and 6 tracks in Distance
For MMOs I think you actually will need a room vive style but also a good way to handle all controls with body movement and voice commands. Attacking someone with a sword should mean you actually move your body just like the attack while a spell might demand a movement and one or several activation words.
That also means that you will need a far lighter rig then a Vive or Occulus and preferably it should be cordless so you wont step on it all the time. A VR gear should not feel different from wearing a light helmet allowing you to play longer time.
I don't think VR games need to be dumbed down, in fact can you probably make them more advanced with the right mechanics but huge scrolling menus need to go, the games should have as little as possible that isn't what your character see. health bars should be placed on you so you can see them, like a tattoo or placed on your weapon.
We are still a far way off to good VR for all genres, I think the early cashcows will be racing games, vehicle focused war games, porn and 3D movies of course. If those earn enough money the technology will improve enough for FPS, RPGs and MMOs.
Platform, 4X and RTS games might never be popular in VR, both the view and the usually far longer playtime will make them hard to implement.
And if you had asked a decade ago where a major challenger to the precious leisure time spent on PC gaming would come from, the vast majority would not have said 'my phone'.
My point is that these things are not always predictable. Just because 3D TV didn't grab, doesn't mean VR won't. They are not connected.
The next generation of better cheaper headsets and a killer app could easily see VR become mainstream.
As to what the OP asked, VR needn't dumb down MMORPGs. It will be the drive for mass market broad appeal that does that, not the medium. Systems in VR can be easily as complex as anything else.
The Google Pixel phone presentation was all about speech recognition. It's clear Google is heavily focused on that area. Then you have all the "home assistants" - Amazon Echo, Google Home, or even iPhone Siri. They may be gimmicks at this stage, still it shows a large push for speech-based interaction.
A good chunk of people now send text-messages by talking at the screen. People are lazy, anything that saves them time is appealing. A wide adoption of speech-based interaction is one of the most certain tech predictions I can think of. It will likely come first in non-gaming areas and become second nature in games eventually.
For me, the issue is roleplay. When I play an RPG, I like to be the hero. Same to when a kid pretends to be an astronaut. Using voice on my behalf often breaks that connection. If it was a speech-to-text system though, I might not mind as much. It could even be my speech, to text, to my character then speaking. That setup would still maintain the illusion for me.
VR is a long way away from being mainstream. Sure, they could make VR with today's technology and graphics akin to Battlezone (the 1980 version, not more recent games of the same name) or even Faceball 2000 and have VR otherwise work about how you'd hope. But it's not at all clear that VR with graphical fidelity akin to today's PC games and frame rates and resolutions high enough to work how you'd hope will be possible before Moore's Law comes to a screeching halt and computer chips stop getting meaningfully faster.
Yes, there will be some niche VR games in coming years. But it's not going to be anything like the move from 2D to 3D graphics around the turn of the millennium that left far fewer 2D games still being made apart from games on a shoestring budget. At most, VR games could end up being a parallel market like smartphone games or Facebook games, and it probably won't even get that far in the next decade.
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
Obviously VR has the potential to "add" a lot to gaming, not just to dumb it down (in certain respects). Perhaps my choice of words was unfortunate there. But thanks to all the people who managed to find a way to contribute here. It was interesting reading. And jeers to you who could only be deigned to toss off an insult.
I also predict that VR will have more of an impact in narrative story telling (TV, movies) then it will be in gaming. In both venues it will be large but not a replacement.
My prediction and my view is not up for debate. its what I think will happen and I am not changing my prediction at this time regardless of what anyone says on the matter at least at this time
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This is a dumbing down of design that is plaguing the business across the spectrum. A lot of this has to do with the infusion of bad capital and the things that come with it. Some of it has to do with the kind of programmers that are being hired. It all adds up to a lack of fun, and the time window of the less-fun-but-addictive-to-some-the-first-time is closing.
So if VR is going to be big, it's probably going to depend a lot on solving this issue of actually remembering how to make a game rather than these tech demos that are passing themselves off as $60 titles these days.
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
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