Category: alex silkin

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Axon Park and Survios’ CTO to Teach Unreal Engine VR Masterclass

A couple of days ago VRFocus reported on John Moores University in Liverpool, UK, announcing plans to launch an MA in Immersive Arts later this year. Which is fine if you happen to live or plan to move to the UK. Not everyone does or can, which is why remote, online courses are popular avenues for learning. This week virtual campus Axon Park has revealed it’ll be running a full semester course taught in virtual reality (VR).

Axon Park image

Axon Park has begun a strategic partnership with VR First with the Unreal Engine VR Masterclass being the first endeavour. They’ve brought on board Survios CTO and Co-Founder Alex Silkin to teach the course who will also be supported by the Unreal Engine Team. Survios is well known for a number of VR titles including Raw Data, Sprint Vector, Creed: Rise to Glory and Electronauts, as well as upcoming projects Battlewake and The Walking Dead Onslaught.

Starting on 4th September and running for 14 weeks until 11th December 2019, the course is designed for expert-level developers used to Unity (or other engines) who want to learn Unreal Engine 4 of VR. Classes take place two times per week with the curriculum being project-based. Prerequisites include 3D linear algebra, C++ and access to a VR ready PC and Oculus Rift/Rift S.

“This is not just a simple online class,” commented Silkin in a statement. “This is the first class of its kind. We’ll meet twice a week in virtual classrooms and build amazing virtual reality content together. I feel very fortunate to have had the opportunity to work with VR since 2012 and contribute to the development of many innovative VR systems over these years. I want to share my experience with the community to make it easier for newcomers to break into the VR industry. I am beyond excited to help students invent their solutions for the still relatively untamed landscape of VR development.”

Raw Data Saija BotGardens

Thanks to the partnership Axon Park and VR First are also announcing a needs-based scholarship program providing students with low cost or free access to VR hardware and resources through their partner network of 850 universities.

“We are inviting organizations and public institutions internationally to build custom in-VR training with VR First and welcoming our VR/AR experts to become the first generation of certified Axon Park trainers,” adds Rahel Demant, COO & Academic Relations Lead at VR First. “We have already started to prepare a diverse range of in-VR courses to be available in Axon Park starting in 2020.”

Head to the Axon Park website for further information on the course. As more VR courses are created VRFocus will let you know.

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Survios CTO to Teach Full Semester VR Development Course in a Virtual Classroom

Survios, the studio behind a host of VR games such as Raw Data (2017), Sprint Vector (2018) and Creed: Rise to Glory (2018), has been a stalwart pioneer of the medium since the birth of consumer VR. Now, Survios CTO and co-founder Alex Silkin is set to share his experience by teaching a full semester course on expert-level Unreal Engine VR development. Plenty of high-profile industry pros will also be available too as mentors.

What’s more, the course will be taught in VR, so you can connect remotely and learn from Silkin—virtual face to virtual face.

“We’ll meet twice a week in virtual classrooms and build amazing virtual reality content together,” Silkin explains. “I feel very fortunate to have had the opportunity to work with VR since 2012 and contribute to the development of many innovative VR systems over these years. I want to share my experience with the community to make it easier for newcomers to break into the VR industry. I am beyond excited to help students invent their solutions for the still relatively untamed landscape of VR development.”

Although the full semester course is priced at just under $2,500, there are also scholarship opportunities for exceptional students. Axon Park has partnered with VR First, an organization which maintains a network of international VR lab-enabled universities and science parks; the partnership will provide needs-based scholarships to get students either low-cost or free access to VR hardware and resources through their partner network of 850 universities.

Prior to Silkin’s course, Axon Park ran the first remote in-VR class at the MIT Media Lab to explore teaching and learning in social VR classrooms. The class focused on VR Development with Unity and was taught remotely by an instructor in LA with students split between two buildings on the MIT campus.

Here’s some of the basic course info, although check out the course website for the full details and application process.

Course Specifics

  • Course Name: Unreal Engine VR Master Class
  • Duration: 14 weeks (September 4 – December 11, 2019 – current dates with MIT fall semester).
  • Frequency: 2 times per week in VR.
  • Target Student Demographic: Expert-level Unity (or other game engine) developers who want to master Unreal Engine 4 for VR.
  • Prerequisites: Game engine development experience (Unity preferred), 3D linear algebra, C++, visual studio (or similar), and Github (or similar). Must have access to VR ready PC and Oculus Rift or Rift S (hardware access scholarships available at selected destinations through partnership with VR First).
  • Curriculum: The course is project-based and designed to help you build a stellar portfolio piece from scratch. Classes are designed to help you learn the core concepts, while providing ample time for project work and support from your instructor and mentors. More details can be found on the syllabus.
  • Select mentors: Nick Whiting (Technical Director at Epic Games, Unreal Engine), Ray Davis (creator of Robo Recall, previously ran Unreal Engine), Jacki Morie (Previously at NASA, Disney, DARPA, Board of Advisors Axon Park), Ron Millar (Chief Creative Officer at VRChat, founding team of Blizzard), Oculus founders, and numerous other industry professionals
  • Tuition: $2,495
  • Scholarship opportunities: Needs-based scholarships will be provided to exceptional students to foster inclusion and diversity in the class.
  • Inclusivity & Equality: Neutral avatars will be used in the admissions process and virtual classrooms to reduce unconscious and conscious student and teacher bias and equalize opportunity.
  • Additional Features: Dedicated networking with VR industry’s top professionals, career coaching, Virtual Field Trips “VFTs” to explore other social VR enabled tools, like MasterpieceVR, and a virtual job fair where top companies will setup virtual booths to meet the students. Axon Park Alumni are invited to meet IRL after graduation with XR Nomads.

The post Survios CTO to Teach Full Semester VR Development Course in a Virtual Classroom appeared first on Road to VR.

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‘Raw Data’ Devs Share Player Metrics & Insights Ahead of October’s v1.0 Launch

Raw Data (2016) launched more than a year ago in Early Access. Following a number of major updates including the addition of a PVP mode, the game is set to hit version 1.0 and launch out of Early Access on October 5th on Rift and Vive, are will also come to PSVR for the first time on October 10th. At an event this week developers behind the game shared a range of interesting player metrics that informed the development of the game.

Speaking at VRDC Fall 2017 this week, Survios CTO Alex Silkin and Design Director Mike McTyre stressed to VR developers in the crowd that collecting proper player analytics should be a major priority. The pair said that it was a mistake to wait as long as they did before they began collecting and analyzing player data from Raw Data, but once they did they found a number of major surprises that disrupted their understanding of how players were playing, and prompted them to make changes.

What Players Want and What Players Do Can Be Radically Different

Silkin and McTyre said that some of the most vocal changes players were requesting of the game turned out not to be as popular as they might have thought. Among those consistent requests from the community were more maps/missions and PVP.

As they looked into the data, the team was surprised to find that only 21% of players had gone past the 5th mission in the game, despite there being more than 10 levels total.

As for PVP, a massively requested feature—which the pair said took a lot resources for development and maintenance—only 13% of players have given it a try.

About 80% of players played only the single-player mode, and while cooperative play was billed as a major selling point to the game, only 17% of players have played that mode.

Players Not Playing as Intended

Image courtesy Survios

In Raw Data players can make use of Defenses, deployable objects like turrets and force shields, an important part of the player’s survival tool kit. Yet the team found that just 1% of players were even using them! ‘Powers’ and teleportation were also underutilized, prompting the developers to add a helper system to remind players about all the capabilities at their disposal.

When it came to the launch of one of one of the game’s new heroes, the developers thought players would be excited to play as ‘Boss’, the shotgun wielding street merc. But the data showed a palty 7.5% of players were choosing him. The team discovered that some of his abilities were overly complex and players weren’t using them, making the hero feel weaker than the others. The devs ended up altering the way the hero played to make him easier to understand and a more attractive choice.

Rift vs. Vive Population and Preferred Controls

Raw Data was designed initially as a 360 degree experience for the Vive and launched in July 2016. I wasn’t until March 2017 that the game was adapted for the Oculus Rift and Touch and launched on Oculus Home. That’s contributed to the population split of 80% Vive and 20% Rift players.

Among the two headsets, there’s a clear trend among the three control schemes offered in the game:

  • Sticky: Click Grip buttons once to pick up a weapon or object. It will remain in your hands until you interact with another item.
  • Toggle: Click Grip buttons once to pick up a weapon or object. Click Grip buttons again to drop it.
  • Hold: Click and hold Grip buttons to pick up and use a weapon or object. Releasing the Grip buttons will make you drop the item.

Vive

  • Sticky: 79%
  • Hold: 3%
  • Toggle: 18%

Rift

  • Sticky: 21%
  • Hold: 72%
  • Toggle: 7%

The developers said this makes it clear that user preference in control schemes can vary drastically from one platform to the next, so providing options is important.

Marketing Tips

Image courtesy Survios

As Raw Data is one of the best selling VR games to date, it’s probably worth heeding the following advice. When it comes to selling your game, Silkin and McTyre said that customers respond well to bundled deals (where multiple games are discounted together). “Bundle often,” was their suggestion.

The duo also said that platform-wide sales events drive spikes in sales too, like when Steam or Oculus Home has a seasonal or holiday themed sales. Silkin and McTyre encouraged developers to participate in those sales since they drive lots of user traffic to the storefronts. “You might be surprised at what a simple $2 or $3 discount can do,” said Silkin.

And, of course, the pair said developers should strive to be on as many VR platforms as possible. That’s important given the size of the VR marketplace right now. And with new platforms like Windows VR launching soon, developers should plan from the start to be multi-platform with as little porting work as possible so that they can reach as wide an audience as possible.

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Survios credited video game analytics firm Exostatic for helping to implement and analyze Raw Data metrics.

The post ‘Raw Data’ Devs Share Player Metrics & Insights Ahead of October’s v1.0 Launch appeared first on Road to VR.