Category: htc vive game

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‘Zero Caliber VR’ Studio Announces 4-Player Co-op Shooter ‘Gambit!’, Coming 2021

XREAL Games, the studio behind co-op VR shooter Zero Caliber VR (2018), and 2ndGig announced a new co-op shooter headed to PC VR headsets in 2021. Called Gambit!, the upcoming game tosses four players into what the creators call “a road movie style adventure full of tracks and guns and rock and roll.”

The creators say Gambit! follows four mercenaries who botch an important job and infuriate an influential client.

The creators say Gambit’s campaign will be broken into three chapters, each of which includes three “large” maps. The shooter is also said to include a diverse range of weapons and unlockable content, and can be played in both single or four-player co-op via campaign mode. A multiplayer deathmatch is also planned.

There’s precious little to tell from the teaser (linked below), however XREAL and 2ndGig promise a gameplay reveal video sometime this fall, which should arrive with some more details too.

If it’s anything like XREAL’s Zero Caliber VR or more recent shooter A-Tech Cybernetic (2020), it’s likely the game will first head into Early Access before its full release.

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‘Project CARS 3’ Release Date Confirmed, PC VR Support Included at Launch

Project CARS 3, the upcoming sequel to the racing simulator franchise, is set to include VR support when it launches on PC this August.

Update (June 24th, 2020): Slightly Mad Studios has confirmed that Project CARS 3 will be releasing on all supported platforms on August 28th, 2020. The original article follows below:

Original Article (June 4th, 2020): The game, which was recently unveiled by Slightly Mad Studios, is set to include a bevy of new features in addition to 12K resolution and what it calls “best in class VR support” on PC.

The studio says it will include over 200 race and road cars, over 140 global tracks, customizable liveries, and car upgrades with ‘realistic’ performance parts. Tracks are said to include a 24-hour night and day cycle with all weather represented in addition to “enhanced” AI racers. A new career mode promises to be “deeply engaging.”

SEE ALSO
'Project CARS 2' VR Review – An Ambitious Sequel With Serious Potential

The Project Cars franchise has included VR support since the first in the series was released in 2015, which at the time was experimental but notably a step in the right direction for racing sim fans. Project Cars 2 (2017) improved upon it predecessor with, among other things, a better physics engine, putting in more firmly in the simulator side of things. It also included full SteamVR headset support for the modern era of consumer VR.

There’s no word yet on whether the studio is working on PSVR support as well for the PS4 version, or whether a possible PS5 version will offer it thanks to the upcoming console’s beefier specs, which is said to pack an 8-core AMD Zen CPU, AMD Navi GPU, custom SSD, 4K Blu-ray player.

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VR Physics Puzzler ‘Gadgeteer’ to Get Biggest Update Since Launch Soon

Gadgeteer, the physics-based VR puzzler inspired by the whimsical machines of Rube Goldberg, is slated to get the biggest update since its launch into Earl Access last year.

The update is said to include a number of new devices such as a new color toolhead with 60+ colors to choose from, and two new gadgets, the Start and End Cube, which lets you remotely start and stop your contraptions.

The update will be available starting June 11th on all supported platforms including Oculus Quest, Oculus Rift, Valve Index, HTC Vive, and Windows VR headsets. Another update, slated for release in August, is said to let users upload and share puzzles in an online sharing feature.

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'Blade & Sorcery' to Get Major 'U8' Update on June 4th, Trailer Here

Road to VR contributor Gabriel Moss got a chance to play Gadgeteer in our Early Access review, saying it’s both “a fantastic Rube Goldberg-style reaction machine builder and, at its most gripping moments, a true example of VR Presence—where the act of building and testing a machine becomes so engaging that you forget you’re playing with code instead of physical toy dominos.”

Developing studio Metanaut also released a new trailer highlighting a machine that wasn’t possible to build before, making use of tracks, rails, and catapults to create one of the hottest non-sport sports to come to 2020: marble racing.

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‘Half-Life: Alyx’ Update Adds Impressive Liquid Simulation, Foundation for Mod Scripting

Half-Life: Alyx was updated this week with an intriguing new feature: a new shader which simulates liquid inside of the game’s many bottles; a small but impressive immersive addition. The update also brought some bug fixes, new subtitle languages, and improved the game’s modding tools.

At launch, Half-Life: Alyx already included a cool immersive detail: many of the game’s small bottles and containers had an associated audio event which—when shaken—makes it sound like there’s actually something inside. Valve took this one step further in the Alyx 1.4 update, which was released this week, by actually rendering liquid inside many of the game’s bottles.

It might seem simple enough—after all, liquid simulations have been around for some time—but Alyx’s approach isn’t really a simulation as that would likely consume too many resources. Instead, the liquid is a shader which is made to look like a convincing simulation.

And it does a pretty darn good job, especially with the way that it interacts with environmental lighting. Valve visual effects developer, Matthew Wilde, said on Twitter that “this booze shader has been my lock-down hobby, required lots of research.”

Image courtesy Phe

The Half-Life: Alyx 1.4 update also added subtitles for eight new languages—Brazilian Portuguese, Czech, Hungarian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, Ukrainian, Vietnamese—bringing the game’s total subtitle languages to 18.

SEE ALSO
Valve Explains the Deceptively Simple Design Process That Made 'Half-Life: Alyx' Excellent

The update also added new features, examples, and documentation to the Alyx Workshop modding tools:

  • Enabled the Postprocessing Editor (Documentation)
  • Added “Custom Character” example addon (Documentation)
  • Added example maps for:
    • Blind Zombie (a.k.a. Jeff)
    • Hacking and Toner Puzzles
    • Parked Vehicles and other Interactive Prefabs
    • Visibility System (Documentation)
    • Postprocessing Volumes (Documentation)
  • Added core functionality required for Lua scripting and added some Alyx-specific script bindings for querying VR controller input and creating nav mesh paths from entity scripts
  • Enabled live bone constraints in SFM, which can be baked/enabled as procedural bones, like cloth

The most interesting here is likely “core functionality required for Lua scripting,” which moves the modding tools one step closer to allowing modders to run custom scripts in the game, which should drastically expand the game’s modding possibilities.

The update also made a few bug fixes to the game and the Workshop tools. Check out the full patch notes here for details.

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‘Beat Saber’ is Getting 20 New Free Beat Maps Next Week

If you’ve been looking for more content to play on Beat Saber (2018), you won’t have to wait too long, as Beat Games today announced that the block-slashing rhythm game is getting a big content drop next week including 20 new beat maps.

On May 25th, Beat Saber is getting 20 new beat maps—10 with 360 degree support and 10 with one-saber support.

Beat Saber supports SteamVR headsets, Rift, Quest, and PSVR. Since the PSVR version only supports forward-facing and 90-degree levels due to tracking constraints, it’s unlikely PSVR is getting the 360 maps.

Even prior to the studio’s acquisition by Facebook late last year, Beat Games was able to secure some pretty impressive licencing deals with bands such as Imagine Dragons and Panic! at the Disco for its ongoing paid DLC, and provide a number of free tracks as well along the way.

After the acquisition, Beat Saber nabbed tracks from Green Day and Timbaland; the strategy of filling out its library with new beat maps is a comparatively cheap option to its recent high-level deals, as all of the levels below use previously licensed music. Check out the full list below:

New 360 Beat Maps

Expert +

  • Rattlesnake, Monstercat
  • Reason For Living, Morgan Page
  • PopStars, K/DA
  • Rum N Bass, Boom Kitty

Expert

  • Escape, Jaroslav Beck
  • Fire, Ready, Aim, Green Day
  • Digital, Imagine Dragons

Hard

  • Has a Meaning, Timbaland
  • The Greatest Show, Panic! At The Disco
  • Luv U Need U, Monstercat x Rocket League

New Single-Saber Maps

Expert +, Expert, Hard

  • Unlimited Power, Jaroslav Beck, Frank Bentley
  • Escape (NO Expert), Jaroslav Beck
  • This Time, Monstercat
  • Believer, Imagine Dragons
  • High Hopes, Panic! At The Disco
  • PLAY, Monstercat x Rocket League
  • American Idiot, Green Day
  • While We’re Young, Timbaland
  • Origins, Jaroslav Beck/Jan Ilavsky
  • Reason For Living, Morgan Page

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‘Superhot VR’ Has Now Sold More Than 2 Million Copies

Superhot VR (2016) has now gone double platinum, putting the stylish red-guy-smashing action game at over two million copies sold across all VR platforms.

Released in 2016 on Rift as an Oculus Touch launch title, Superhot VR eventually made its way to nearly every VR platform, including SteamVR headsets, PSVR, and most recently Oculus Quest.

And it’s only gotten more popular over the years since launch, with its Quest release in 2019 seeing a 300 percent sales increase on the first day over its initial launch on Rift.

During holiday season 2019, the game grossed over $2 million in revenue in only one week across all platforms. And that was well after the VR game surpassed the original flatscreen game in overall revenue in April 2019.

“Across all sales platforms, we’ve managed to achieve something that not many developers manage to do in any medium, and that’s pretty meaningful to us so we thought we’d send a press release about it,” said Callum Underwood, Director of Special Projects at SUPERHOT Team. “VR has enabled us to do all the cool stuff we do here, and is paying for the livelihoods of over 45 people to put it bluntly.”

“2020 is shaping up to be our best year yet, sales of SUPERHOT VR are up at least 195% compared to this time last year, and we couldn’t be more proud,” said Alastair Hebson, Director of Other Special Projects at SUPERHOT Team.

The studio says various sales for Superhot VR game will start May 21st, and that users on all platforms should keep any eye out for savings.

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Valve Releases ‘Half-Life: Alyx’ Steam Workshop Tools for Making & Downloading Mods

Valve today launched new Half-Life: Alyx modding tools which will allow developers and tinkerers to make and publish mods and user-generated content via the Steam Workshop system. Valve says the tools will allow for the creation of new levels, models, textures, and animations for the game.

It’s been about a month and a half since Half-Life: Alyx launched and made its mark as one of VR’s most acclaimed games ever. Today Valve has released the promised modding tools which will allow the game’s community to make and distribute new content for Alyx.

Valve says the Alyx Workshop Tools are still in beta and it plans to improve them over time, but for now here’s what’s being released:

  • Hammer – the latest version of the Source 2 level editor.
  • Material Editor – the tool for creating and tuning materials in Source 2.
  • ModelDoc – a tool for viewing, editing, and compiling models with animation, collision, and other gameplay attributes.
  • AnimGraph – our animation tool used to create complicated animation setups with blends and transitions.
  • Particle Editor – for making new particle effects.
  • Subrect Editor – for creating smart texture sheets known as “hotspots.”
  • Source Filmmaker – the Source 2 cinematic renderer and animation tool.

The tools include several sample maps which demonstrate the pipeline that Valve used to make the game’s levels.

“The entire set of Half-Life: Alyx maps is also included as editable source for reference; this includes a large collection of interactive objects and prefabs. We’ll have news on more features and some smaller additional tools and examples in an future update,” Valve writes.

SEE ALSO
Valve Explains the Deceptively Simple Design Process That Made 'Half-Life: Alyx' Excellent

Developers and modders can download the official Half-Life: Alyx modding tools here on the Valve developer site where they’ll also find documentation, though Valve notes that it’s still writing the docs.

Once published, players will be able to install Half-Life: Alyx mods through the game’s Steam workshop page.

Alongside the release of the Alyx modding tools, Valve today also released a native Linux version of Half-Life: Alyx which uses the Vulkan rendering API. This also brings optional Vulkan rendering support to the Windows version of the game.

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Rock Star Simulator ‘Hotel R’n’R’ to Launch on PSVR May 28th, Trailer Here

Hotel R’n’R, the rock star lifestyle simulator, is headed out of early access on PC VR headsets soon, which will coincide its release on PSVR.

Developers Wolf & Wood Interactive say the full version is set to release on May 28th, which will be available on SteamVR headsets, Oculus Rift, and PSVR.

Hotel R’n’R landed on Steam and the Oculus Store for Rift back in late August, serving up plenty of opportunity to approach destruction with a creative flair. As a failed musician who struck a deal with the Devil, you smash up different physics-based hotels with over 30 weapons, letting you take out a bit of that pent up rage in the process.

In addition to single player mode, the game also supports up to five players in its ‘Pass and Play’ mode, which lets you compete against your friends in a number of mini-games.

Wolf & Wood are also known for creating VR titles The Exorcist: Legion VR (2017) and A Chair in a Room: Greenwater (2016). 

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Developer Reveals How Live Actors Sneak into the ‘The Under Presents’, and When You Can Find Them

The Under Presents is a genre-defying VR experience with a curious secret: from time to time some of its characters are puppeteered by real people, and if you’re lucky, you could be part of the show.

Created by Tender Claws, The Under Presents is a unique VR experience that mixes game and performance in mind-bending ways. Aside from interacting with past versions of yourself and the ability to control time, you’ll also come across a roster of mysterious characters which are at times live acted remotely by real people. Tender Claws recently revealed how this works in practice and its quite fascinating.

There’s a whole side of the game which is only seen by hand-picked actors. When donning their headset, a special interface allows them to select and customize a unique avatar. They also have the ability to move themselves and players, spawn items as props, and control the scale of objects. With these tools the actors jump into the game world and find players who get to experience a slice of immersive theater.

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But how to find these moments as a player? Tender Claws says that through the month of May, players can jump into The Under Presents every Friday for two hours starting at 5PM (your local time here) for a chance to catch one of these fleeting performances.

The Under Presents is available on Oculus Rift & Quest and Steam.

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This ‘Beat Saber’ Project Uses AI to Generate Custom Beat Maps for Any Song

Manually creating beat maps for your favorite songs in Beat Saber (2018) requires a bit of know-how and time. If you’re looking for a quick and surprisingly effective solution to automatically creating beat maps for any song, look no further than the fan-built service called ‘Beat Sage’.

Beat Sage is an AI which creates custom beat maps with any song on YouTube, or any mp3 in your possession. Simply navigate to the Beat Sage website, plug in the song’s YouTube URL (or upload your own mp3), tick a few boxes for level difficulty, game modes, and song events, and you’ll have a brand new mess of levels for Beat Saber on SteamVR headsets and Oculus Quest. And it’s free.

Created by Beat Saber fans Chris Donahue and Abhay Agarwal, Beat Sage is said to use two neural networks to map an audio file into what the team calls “a plausible Beat Saber level.”

Image captured by Road to VR

“These neural networks were trained on Beat Saber levels created by humans,” the team explains. “The first neural network listens to the audio and predicts at what points in time blocks should be placed. The second neural network looks at the predicted timings and maps each to a timestamp to a block type (e.g. red up, blue down, red up + blue down).”

Check out the promo below to see some of the results, timestamped showing Ariana Grande’s song ‘thank u, next’.

Installing the songs is fairly straightforward on PC, as it doesn’t require any modding. Find the ‘CustomLevels’ subfolder in your directory either via Steam or Oculus Home—depending on where you bought Beat Saber. Here’s the default locations.

  • Steam VR: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Beat Saber\Beat Saber_Data\CustomLevels
  • Oculus Home: C:\Program Files (x86)\Oculus Apps\Software\hyperbolic-magnetism-beat-saber\Beat Saber_Data\CustomLevels

From there you unzip the downloaded folder into CustomLevels and you’re off to the races.

Installing for Oculus Quest is a bit more involved, as it requires modding through the unofficial sideloading app SideQuest. Check out the full instructions on how to install the custom songs on Quest.

Beat Sage is free, however the team is taking donations through its Patreon, which they say will help keep the service free moving forward.

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