Holodance Gets Brand New Time Dilation Updates Allowing Players To Control Time Itself

We love to dance. Who doesn’t? That’s why we’ve been following Holodance since it’s inception. All the way from initial announcement, to IndieGoGo and beyond, we’ve been dancing away to Holodance’s continued successes and updates. Now, the latest update might be the most exciting one yet as Holodance is adding Time Dilation.

Time Dilation is a new feature, and once this mode is activated players can control passage of time by pacing the movement speed of their hands. It’s not quite a Stand ability, but we’ll take it.

You can activate Time Dilation in the videogame’s settings. If you play with a standard tempo, the music will play out at a standard tempo. Should you speed up or slow down however, the tempo of the videogame will too, adjusting the music and the speed at which orbs will approach the player. Interestingly this can actually increase the difficulty of the game, as forcing yourself to break rhythm and slow down or speed up on purpose can be quite challenging. If players stay entirely still, they can even seem to stop the videogame entirely.

Even more interestingly, if players are able to keep their hands entirely still, they will still be able to move their head or the rest of their body, allowing for some cool dancing improvisation, or the ability to expertly smash through the videogame’s orbs.

Holodance players will know that movement speed and controller rotation matter in Holodance, but Time Dilation is only sensitive to controller movement, and not rotation. This makes the Laserblades mode even more interesting than ever.

You can see a video of Time Dilation in action above, while some intense tunes play out. You can see the player slowing their body and hand movements to adjust the speed of the songs and even freestyle their own tempo and patterns. It’s an interesting dynamic that could be incredibly creative in the right hands.

It’s good to see Holodance continuing to get support years after its initial announcement and IndieGoGo campaign. Since we love to dance so much, we’ll be writing about all of the Holodance content coming out as soon as we hear about it, so for more keep reading VRFocus.

Holodance Fully Integrates HTC’s Vive Trackers, Currently Discounted by 33%

For those that like their virtual reality (VR) rhythm action videogames, Narayana Games’ Holodance has to be near the top of the pile having been available for HTC Vive since launch. Still in Steam Early AccessHolodance has been added to and expanded numerous times, such as the introduction of Osu! Beatmapsimproving the music library or adding HTC Vive Tracker support. Today, the team has revealed the title is now fully integrated with the trackers and there’s also a limited time discount available. 

Using the Vive Trackers players could collect the orbs in Holodance with their feet, adding another level of gameplay and immersion. A basic setup involves two trackers attached to players feet, with the new Holodance Avatar system supporting up to seven Vive Trackers on feet, waist, elbows and knees if desired. The system lets players breathe life into various forms, from Animé characters to sci-fi soldiers, working with just two controllers for hand tracking on all supported platforms: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift with Touch controllers, and Windows VR HMDs with motion tracked controllers.

Holodance can use a single tracker at the waist for improved tracking, but it can also utilise one for reliable mixed reality (MR) camera tracking when recording videos.

As for what’s coming in the future, Narayana Games released this statement:

“Holodance is still in Early Access, and due to its incomplete Story Mode that has dragons take players through a little history of time, reminding them of their duty of care for the planet, will still remain in Early Access for a little while. Early Access or not, narayana games believes in constantly improving their games, listening to player feedback and is fully dedicated to create the best rhythm game experience possible in Virtual Reality.

“With Vive Trackers now soon available to consumers, narayana games are very excited about adding a DDR-style game mode that uses the StepMania beatmap format for pure feet gameplay. The upcoming in-VR beatmap editor is also designed with gameplay for feet in mind, so that players can design choreographies involving just hands, or just feet, or hands and feet.

“Finally, Holodance will get both, multiplayer features, as well as a “Show Mode” that will let spectators watch players beat the rhythm – from directly with VR. The Avatar System is a major milestone toward that goal.”

Holodance is currently discounted by 33 percent, reducing the price from £10.00 GBP down to £7.36 until 28th November as part of the Steam Autumn Sale. As for any other updates, keep reading VRFocus.

And The Beat Goes On: Holodance Updates To Version 0.8

There are a number of music related virtual reality (VR) videogames, many of which we’ve featured on VRFocus down the years. Of those titles a number are rhythm action style videogames. Titles such as Hyperbolic Magnetism’s note slicing Beat Saber, the manic drumming themed title Into The Rhythm VR by NTWO Studio and the self-described “rhythm violence game” Thumper.

In terms of videogames with dramatic personal movement however you’d have to go some to beat Holodance. Holodance is heavy on the physical activity involving catching orbs, tracing sliders and spinning spinners.  The latest update brings a raft of changes, fixes and new content and takes the Early Access title to version 0.8.

  • The Music Library now has 55,000 beatmaps for more that 12,000 different songs.
  • Three new environments, ‘Sci-Fi Tunnels’, ‘Trippy Tunnels’ and ‘Mutant Club’, have been added bringing the total number of environments from the Story Mode up to 12 with five bonus levels for special events.
  • Additional Story Mode improvements include new music, animations and a preview of the fifth level.
  • The addition of Vive Tracker support, allowing you to use hands, head or feet as controllers.
  • Regarding the head there’s a new ‘Ruirized Achievement’ for catching orbs on difficult osu! beatmaps just using the head.
  • The addition of Steam Trading Cards for the title.
  • Fixes to SteamVR-based implementation for mixed reality (MR).
  • Improvements to Streamer Mode for those that are using YouTube or Twitch with the addition of timer settings for bars allowing you to time switching cameras based on the beat. Additionally, quality improvements have been made to the third person camera.
  • A new UI has been added improving the shape of Orbs and sliders with outlines more visible to players. A new HUD, redesigned achievement icons and customisable score bubbles are among the other items to get graphical upgrades.

A new trailer has also been released in conjunction with the update which you can see below. VRFocus will bring you more news about Holodance as we get it.

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VR Rhythm Game Holodance Gets Osu! Beatmap Support

Virtual Reality (VR) rhythm dancing videogame Holodance has introduced support for Osu! Beatmaps in its recent update. This means that user-created content is able to be played within the videogame for the first time.

Osu! Beatmaps are designed for the Osu! series of videogames. The Osu! videogames were originally for the Nintendo DS and comprised of titles such as Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan! which was ported to the West as Elite Beat Agents. Beatmaps consist of a song with hit circles, sliders and spinners that correspond to the rhythm of the music that the user must interact with in the correct way to score points.

holodance 1

As VRFocus have reported before, Holodance largely uses its own custom method of gameplay which involves more freestyle dancing in a way that collects the largest number of ‘orbs’, with certain special orbs allowing for special effects such as score multipliers.

By introducing this new method of gameplay, Holodance is now compatible with hundreds of user-created Beatmaps, which can be downloaded from several websites that archive and catalogue the Beatmaps according to the song they are for, along with a user rating on how good the community believes the map to be.

holodance 3

Holodance have also produced a new gameplay video displaying the new gameplay method. You can watch the video below. Further details are available on the Steam Page.

Holodance is currently available on Steam Early Access as a price of £9.99 (GBP) and is compatible with HTC Vive and Oculus Rift.

VRFocus will bring you further updates on Holodance and other Early Access VR games.

VR Rhythm Game Holodance Gets Osu! Beatmap Support

Virtual Reality (VR) rhythm dancing videogame Holodance has introduced support for Osu! Beatmaps in its recent update. This means that user-created content is able to be played within the videogame for the first time.

Osu! Beatmaps are designed for the Osu! series of videogames. The Osu! videogames were originally for the Nintendo DS and comprised of titles such as Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan! which was ported to the West as Elite Beat Agents. Beatmaps consist of a song with hit circles, sliders and spinners that correspond to the rhythm of the music that the user must interact with in the correct way to score points.

holodance 1

As VRFocus have reported before, Holodance largely uses its own custom method of gameplay which involves more freestyle dancing in a way that collects the largest number of ‘orbs’, with certain special orbs allowing for special effects such as score multipliers.

By introducing this new method of gameplay, Holodance is now compatible with hundreds of user-created Beatmaps, which can be downloaded from several websites that archive and catalogue the Beatmaps according to the song they are for, along with a user rating on how good the community believes the map to be.

holodance 3

Holodance have also produced a new gameplay video displaying the new gameplay method. You can watch the video below. Further details are available on the Steam Page.

Holodance is currently available on Steam Early Access as a price of £9.99 (GBP) and is compatible with HTC Vive and Oculus Rift.

VRFocus will bring you further updates on Holodance and other Early Access VR games.