One of the most ambitious virtual reality (VR) projects to arrive in 2018 for Oculus Rift and HTC Vive was Multiverse Entertainment’s Seeking Dawn. A month after release the studio laid out a road map of future updates which included a PlayStation VR version by the end of the year. That was not to be, and this week the team have confirmed the port has been cancelled.
Multiverse Entertainment made the announcement via its Facebook page, stating:
“I have two announcements to make a good and a bad one. Let’s start with the bad one. Long term Multiverse supporters probably understand where this is going. After 6 months of hard work, sleepless nights and tons of frustration we are officially canceling [sic] the Seeking Dawn PSVR project. I know it’s a bummer, trust me we are even more frustrated than you guys are. We didn’t want to accept the obvious and tried our best to deliver on the promise. I have just one request, please be understanding guys, we are an indie company, a startup with somewhat limited resources, and believe me if we didn’t care about our community, we’d drop the project much earlier; honestly, we just didn’t want to disappoint. Seeking Dawn PSVR was a beautiful and ambitious dream, but unfortunately, one that will not come true, at least for the time being.”
The team went on to say: “The good news is we are working on the Seeking Dawn PC version. This time it’s not too ambitious, we are already alpha-testing. I played the demo myself and it’s awesome! Hope you will enjoy it as well as soon as it’s ready.”
It was always going to be a herculean effort to squeeze Seeking Dawn onto PlayStation VR. While many PC VR titles have managed to make the leap to PlayStation 4, Seeking Dawn was one of the most visually impressive VR experiences of 2018 – even if it did lack in other areas. VRFocus gave it three-stars in our review, commenting: “Seeking Dawn is the kind of title you have a love/hate relationship with. On the one hand when it works smoothly it’s a really fun and beautiful VR experience to play, with masses of content and hours and hours of gameplay. Unfortunately, it’s not perfect, with plenty of repetition and glitches that need finessing.”
The team has released a number of updates since then including a Halloween special. As Multiverse Entertainment make further announcements, VRFocus will keep you updated.
Multiverse Entertainment announced that Seeking Dawn (2018), the multiplayer sci-fi shooter adventure, is heading to Steam and the Oculus Store with a new free to play edition on November 1st.
Seeking Dawn puts you in the boots of a space marine who’s assigned to carry out a search and rescue mission on a mysterious alien planet—pretty standard pretense for a sci-fi RPG shooter. You craft weapons, gather supplies from the environment, and replenish your hunger and thirst from food you find, be it the fresh kill of a strange beastie, or the glittering alien fruit picked along the way. The game supports Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, and Windows VR headsets.
Image courtesy Multiverse Entertainment
Seeking Dawn: Free to Play Edition will feature starting level of the full game, including the ability to play either solo or in multiplayer co-op. The free to play version however has been reskinned to fit with the Halloween spirit, including jack-o-lanterns, hostile predators, jump scares, and “ruthless enemies unlike anything we’ve shown so far,” the studio says.
Continuing: “The primary focus of this version of the game is to show players how to get into the swing of things and prepare them for their real adventure found in the official paid version. With that said, the FTP version will contain themed content such as this one which will include a variety of Halloween inspired assets.”
Image courtesy Multiverse Entertainment
We gave Seeking Dawn a middling [6.5/10] in our review for its high degree of polish that was frankly marred by some pretty dull chores. Since launch, the team says they’ve worked with the community to fix some the issues we noted when back in July, including a tune-up for the game’s hunger and thirst mechanic and a number of bug fixes and quality of life issues that are said to make the game a smoother experience overall.
The improvements have been carried over to the game’s free to play version, so it’s a good way to figure out for yourself if the studio has truly delivered.
To inaugurate Seeking Dawn’s new free to play version, the studio is also putting the full game at 25% off the original $40 price tag, available on Steam and the Oculus Store.
Multiverse Entertainment’s Seeking Dawn arrived earlier this summer with the intention of offering a massive sci-fi adventure for virtual reality (VR) players. While in parts it excelled in other areas it fell short of the grand design, so in the following months the studio has released a swath of updates to finesse the experience. Today, the team has made quite a surprising announcement, a new version of the title for players to try for free, Seeking Dawn: Free to Play Edition.
Seeking Dawn: Free to Play Edition is a cut back version of the main title, designed to give you a taster of the main event. Crucial features are still in play, so you can enjoy it solo or participate in co-op and multiplayer modes.
“The focus of this version, and specifically this theme, is to get players to team up and explore a hostile planet plagued by some of the scariest monsters we’ve seen yet,” said Multiverse in an email. “As they progress through the levels they will encounter many odes to Halloween, including extremely hostile predators, jump scares, and ruthless enemies unlike anything we’ve shown so far.”
That’s right, with it being Halloween season Multiverse Entertainment has embraced the spooky side. So the very first level of Seeking Dawn has been decked out in Halloween revelry – as you can see from these screenshots – with glowing pumpkins and ghoulish surprises strewn across the landscape.
Seeking Dawn: Free to Play Edition will also see several other additions including the difficulty level being increase – much better for co-op play – the introduction of treasure boxes to find, new lobby settings if you’d like to just play with friends, you can lock it as the private room before jumping into the videogame itself plus a friendly fire option. And to top it all off, the general atmosphere and feel of the title is darker than the original.
Seeking Dawn: Free to Play Edition will be available via Steam from 1st November 2018. If you like the free version and want to go in depth with Seeking Dawnthen Multiverse Entertainment is running a limited time discount for the title. From 29th October, 1am PT until 1st November there will be a 25 percent discount on Steam. Oculus Store gets a little longer with the 25 percent discount running from 26th October to 2nd November. For any further updates on Seeking Dawn keep reading VRFocus.
If VRFocus created a list of videogames that promised so much but didn’t quite hit the mark then Multiverse Entertainment’s Seeking Dawn would definitely make the top five. It looked to be the summer blockbuster with beautiful visuals and an expansive game world, yet lacked the polish in key places. Since the July launch the studio has release a number of patches looking to improve things, the latest being one of the biggest.
The team have now released a long list of bug fixes, improvements and changes for Seeking Dawn, with some that probably should’ve been there from the start.
Features like a left-handed control scheme should really be basic additions nowadays, that has now been included. A nice touch is the addition of respawning next to collectible resources, mean less trudging around looking for a crucial part of the experience.
In VRFocus’review Seeking Dawn achieved three-stars, because: “Seeking Dawn is the kind of title you have a love/hate relationship with. On the one hand when it works smoothly it’s a really fun and beautiful VR experience to play, with masses of content and hours and hours of gameplay. Unfortunately it’s not perfect, with plenty of repetition and glitches that need finessing. It might not be VR’s summer blockbuster but Seeking Dawn isn’t quite the dud either.”
Check out the full list to see if Multiverse Entertainment has fixed any issues you may have had with Seeking Dawn. For any further updates, keep reading VRFocus.
Full Seeking Dawn changelog:
Bug fixes：
Fixed an asset loading issue where non-romanized characters in a file path caused the game to get stuck on the main menu
Fixed a bug where you could activate the shield while climbing
Fixed a bug where you could damage yourself in multiplayer while shooting close to your hands
Fixed a bug where Oculus users would not hear anything in the Oculus headset
Fixed a bug where the player orientation after teleporting in blink mode would be different from the hologram model’s orientation
Fixed a bug where firing the shotgun while having the hand close to the head would open the quick mission interface because of recoil
Fixed a bug where a drop pod door would not close in multiplayer if someone left the game before entering it
Fixed a bug where Locilus corpses would still move after dying
Fixed several network issues
Fixed several other errors
Improvements and changes:
Added a backpack function to only drop a portion of an item stack
Added a left-hand control scheme
Added achievements on Oculus Store version
Added the room code inside of the settings menu
Added more information in the save slot interface
Added camera rotation controls to the joystick of the Windows MR controller
Added the option for Vive controllers to move while either touching or pressing the trackpad
Added respawning to collectible resources
Changed remote players’ damage checks to be local for more realistic combat
Changed the firing mechanism of the Spitting Cobra
Changed forest lighting to make it brighter
Optimized several sudden framerate drop issues
Optimized networking
Optimized rendering and particle effects
Optimized logic calculations
Optimized environments
Balanced enemy and weapons stats
Updated the localization
When Seeking Dawn arrived last month promising hours of gameplay on a gorgeous looking alien world what it delivered wasn’t quite on target. Multiverse Entertainment then started to detail improvements it had planned and today announced a road map of planned updates which include a PlayStation VR version at the end of the year.
Listing details for August, September and December, the studio has plenty of improvements planned for this month, fixing critical bugs, optimising graphics and networking as well as including a mode for left-handed players.
Once all of that has been smoothed out September looks like it’ll be a big month for the content and features. A free DLC update called Age of Master sounds like it’ll expand the story mode whilst adding a higher difficulty level. There will also be a new playable area and a level redesign, adding further weapon updates and skins. A big part of Seeking Dawn was resource collection which could slow the pace down, that’s also going to be addressed.
Finally, in December PlayStation VR owners will get their hands on Seeking Dawn. Not only that but it’ll be the new and improved version that PC players have been treated to.
In a statement the team said: “After the release of Seeking Dawn, feedback and reviews have been mixed. Players who enjoy this game are thrilled by this breathtaking VR world. But there are also players who really want to love this game, but have had to deal with bugs and other tech issues. The dev team has acknowledged much of this through social media and has responded by showing their passion and dedication to make this game better. Now a more detailed development roadmap sets the next few milestones for 2018, with improved optimization, updated game mechanics and more content to expand the VR world of Seeking Dawn.”
Check out VRFocus’three star review of Seeking Dawn, which said: “Seeking Dawn is the kind of title you have a love/hate relationship with. On the one hand when it works smoothly it’s a really fun and beautiful VR experience to play, with masses of content and hours and hours of gameplay. Unfortunately it’s not perfect, with plenty of repetition and glitches that need finessing.”
As the studio release further details on the videogames’ improvements, VRFocus will keep you updated.
Seeking Dawn (2018), the sci-fi VR shooter adventure from Multiverse Entertainment, didn’t exactly hit the intended mark when it released last month on HTC Vive and Oculus Rift, but now the developers have released a road map to improving the game and eventually releasing it on PSVR.
The team is focusing on ‘critical’ bugs first, with a fix coming in August that’s also intending to improve the multiplayer experience, and addresses performance issues—something the devs say are mentioned across most negative reviews.
In September, a free DLC update is said to arrive that will bring a ‘Master Mode’ difficulty, which will contain a weapons update system and increased difficulty, along with balance changes and more customization options. Also for the September update are player skins, a new playable area, and a redesigned level.
“The dev team hopes to add more replay value to Seeking Dawn by having these changes affect both single and multiplayer modes,” Multiverse says in a press statement.
Image captured by Road to VR
At the last stop of the current road map is the PSVR version, which is slated to arrive in late December. Other updates include an Emoji system.
“After the release of Seeking Dawn, feedback and reviews have been mixed. Players who enjoy this game are thrilled by this breathtaking VR world. But there are also players who really want to love this game, but have had to deal with bugs and other tech issues,” the team said in the statement. “The dev team has acknowledged much of this through social media and has responded by showing their passion and dedication to make this game better. Now a more detailed development roadmap sets the next few milestones for 2018, with improved optimization, updated game mechanics and more content to expand the VR world of Seeking Dawn.”
Check out our full review here, which garnered the game a middling [6.5/10] points. Our major complaints centered around the inclusion of dull chores, such as resource collection and a toothless crafting system, decidedly making Seeking Dawn a launch day downer. We’re hoping some of these things will be fixed too as a result of the studio’s many updates between now and the end of the year.
Multiverse Entertainment, the studio behind VR sci-fi shooter Seeking Dawn (2018), recently announced their 10+ hour title is due for a “huge content” update, which is said to arrive sometime before the game makes its way to PSVR.
The team initially released plans for the update via a Steam forum post, which mention things such as bug fixes and adjustments to gameplay mechanics that should make the game more fun. Here’s the relevant bits from the Multiverse’s post:
Since yesterday’s launch of Seeking Dawn, we have received tons of constructive feedback, suggestions and good wishes from our passionate community.
There are also technical issues and bug reports that we value equally. We’d like to take the time to thank each and every one of you for using your precious time to provide us with important information so we can continue to improve Seeking Dawn.
Our mission to develop one of the best VR games is not yet finished. But thanks to your undying support, we are more encouraged than ever before.
We sincerely apologize to every player who is having technical issues at the moment. We have located several issues that require immediate attention, such as crashes, stutters, and blurry graphics. Our dev team is working night and day to fix these issues.
Also, we are making some adjustments to gameplay mechanics to make Seeking Dawn even more fun!
We will release a more detailed roadmap along with plans for new content soon. Stay tuned for some exciting announcements!
Seeking Dawn isn’t the perfect, full-length VR game many were hoping for; in our review, we gave it a middling [6.5/10] points for its inclusion of some pretty grating game mechanics, such as its overemphasis on repetitive resource collection, and its gutless item crafting and base building mechanic. These issues notwithstanding, Seeking Dawn has accomplished some important feats in graphical fidelity, and also features an interesting variability of enemy types that should keep you not only in awe of the world around you, but on your toes for some of the bigger, badder enemies out there.
In a statement obtained by VRFocus, CEO Freeman Fan says the studio has “huge content and upgrade plans,” which should release closer to the launch of the PSVR version. At the time of this writing, the game’s PSVR launch date is still TBA.
“On top of any bug-fixes, we’re working on a plan to include 5 more hours of playable story, a weapon-leveling system, new alien beasts to challenge, and texture improvements to Seeking Dawn’s already stellar visuals,” Freeman said.
We’ll be keeping an eye on further Seeking Dawn updates, so check back soon.
Yesterday Multiverse Entertainment launched its sci-fi epic Seeking Dawn for Oculus Rift and HTC Vive, receiving mixed reviews. Yet the studio isn’t stopping just there, confirming plans for more content as well as launching a new gameplay video.
Seeking Dawn offers a 10+ adventure in the 23rd century where mankind has conquered the stars and two factions are at war. You play a marine who’s been sent to a dangerous alien world that could hold the secret to winning the conflict. The experience already offers plenty of gameplay via first-person gunplay, crafting and survival elements, but there’s more instore.
“We’re not stopping here,” says Freeman Fan, CEO of Multiverse Inc., on the launch of Seeking Dawn in a statement. “We have huge content and upgrade plans as we get closer to the PSVR launch as well. On top of any bug-fixes, we’re working on a plan to include 5 more hours of playable story, a weapon-leveling system, new alien beasts to challenge, and texture improvements to Seeking Dawn’s already stellar visuals.”
The already impressive visuals don’t need much work, offering some of the best vistas seen in a virtual reality (VR) title. The addition of extra content will please fans who’ve been involved with the beta and already finished the story, and the bug-fixes will hopefully give the title the polish it needs.
VRFocus only gave Seeking Dawnthree stars for its review, saying: “Seeking Dawn is the kind of title you have a love/hate relationship with. On the one hand when it works smoothly it’s a really fun and beautiful VR experience to play, with masses of content and hours and hours of gameplay. Unfortunately it’s not perfect, with plenty of repetition and glitches that need finessing.”
For those that haven’t tried Seeking Dawn just yet, Multiverse Entertainment has released a comedic gameplay video focused on the multiplayer side where up to four players can join in for some co-op action. For any further updates to Seeking Dawn, keep reading VRFocus.
Ahead of launch some videogames just have that instant attraction, they look stunning, seem to offer tons of gameplay and tick every box for an awesome experience. Then you get your hands on it and that golden glow starts to fade as expectations aren’t quite met. This is very much the case for Multiverse Entertainment’s Seeking Dawn. The build-up promised a summer blockbuster, yet instead delivers a straight to Netflix job instead.
Seeking Dawn is the epitome of a big bold sci-fi action-adventure title, dropping you on a hostile alien world to save the day and hopefully survive. Set a war-torn 23rd century you play a marine sent on a mission to uncover secrets that could turn the tide of the war. In all honesty the story and voice acting are somewhat on the cheesy side and can easily be ignored for the most part, adding a little light relief after the more intense combat segments.
There are three main components to Seeking Dawn’s gameplay, guns, survival and crafting. One is fun and the rest slightly more tedious than experience defining. The gunplay in the videogame isn’t bad at all. Fairly standard in its design you start off with a pistol and then eventually work your way up to crafting assault rifles, shotguns and explosive weaponry. As with any decent virtual reality (VR) first-person shooter (FPS) there’s plenty in the locomotion options menu to choose from, with smooth locomotion (or walk) the only real choice. Teleportation is short and slow, while Blink – seeing your ghost run out before teleporting to its location – will have you running of cliffs in no time.
As for the survival and crafting elements, the former is about eating enough and drinking plenty of water. The percentages will tick down in the helmet’s HUD display and once below 30 percent the character will then verbally let you know he’s hungry/thirsty every 15 seconds or so. Becoming quite the annoyance if supplies are low.
To build those supplies you need to craft and hunt for suitable materials. While some videogames make this a deeply involved and intrinsic part of the experience, in Seeking Dawn the process feels more tacked on, offering a limited array of options. However, what will grind most player’s gears is the difficulty in finding certain items. Need to make more bullets, or get a better gun to pass through a difficult location, but find you’re missing just one ingredient? Well good luck with that, as Seeking Dawn makes no effort in helping you find what location it might be in. This then involves plenty of retracing your steps to find a particular rock or tree.
Yet for every disappointment Seeking Dawn shines a little ray of light. So the survival and crafting aren’t top notch, sometimes you just won’t care as the studio has created some breath taking scenery. As if mixing the worlds of Alice in Wonderland and Starship Troopers together for a bizarre alien paradise filled with nasty creatures, Seeking Dawn is stunning to look at and be immersed in. It’s well worth keeping the helmet HUD design on as it adds that sense of presence, grounding you further as you peer over a cliff edge or up into the sky to spot planets and mountainous creatures.
Best of all you can enjoy this with several mates, teaming up for some co-op action that certainly helps when facing some of Seeking Dawn’s larger creatures. One thing to note however, the minimum spec that Multiverse Entertainment recommends isn’t suitable for a smooth experience. Loading times are horrendous and even mid-level a pausing glitch can happen on the lowest setting. The biggest glitch VRFocus encountered more than once involved a black square appearing in the landscape. This then grew rapidly, essentially turning the entire landscape – and everything in it – black. All that was visible was some light shining down. This made the videogame completely unplayable and required a restart.
Seeking Dawn is the kind of title you have a love/hate relationship with. On the one hand when it works smoothly it’s a really fun and beautiful VR experience to play, with masses of content and hours and hours of gameplay. Unfortunately it’s not perfect, with plenty of repetition and glitches that need finessing. It might not be VR’s summer blockbuster but Seeking Dawn isn’t quite the dud either.
Seeking Dawn (2018) is a sci-fi first-person shooter which puts you in the boots of a space marine who’s assigned to carry out a search and rescue mission on a mysterious alien planet. Including a single player campaign, and online co-op which lets you and your friends or strangers team up, Seeking Dawn promises a full-feature game with multiple hours of gameplay, however this results in only just enough incentive to keep you hunting around for that last uranium rock to spend on that OP rocket launcher you’ve had your eye on.
Developer: Multiverse Available On: Steam (HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, PC), PSVR (TBA) Reviewed On: Oculus Rift, Tested on HTC Vive Release Date: July 12th, 2018
Note to the reader (July 11th, 2018): I wasn’t able to get into an online match during my time with Seeking Dawn, so I’ll be posting an update once the game goes live and multiplayer servers are up and running.
Gameplay
As a soldier of the First Centauri Republic (FCR), you’re after the missing Major Walker and his team who were sent to the alien planet to find what promises to be a powerful key to put an end to the ongoing war with the Alpha Centauri Commonwealth (ACC), a new nemesis in the 24th century universe of expanding human influence over the stars. The story is your standard sci-fi shooter fare, so don’t expect much more than a SyFy ‘B’ movie script and voice talent. While it can be cringey at times, it’s mostly an innocuous pretense to the alien-ganking action.
Like a jack of all trades, Seeking Dawn carries with it a longer than usual list of features for VR games currently: single player and online multiplayer co-op, resource gathering, weapon & equipment crafting, base construction, and survival elements that require you to stay properly fed, watered and full of appropriate ammo types throughout the game.
Image courtesy Multiverse
Shooting is a simple experience. All guns have a projected aiming reticle that requires no need for lining up the sights and aiming down the barrel. All guns are single-handed, so you can choose to go dual auto-pistols, or even dual rocket launchers if you have the material. Simply grip to reload, or wait for the last spent cartridge to exit the gun.
Basic crafting materials are found in a number of ways; everything you destroy drops something valuable to the overall goal of building guns, armor, mini construction factories, ammo – everything has its price. Enemies drop meat, and crafting items like collagen which are used in construction. Trees, which you explode with your handy Woodchucker, give a few types of wood and health-restoring berries. Dedicated mineral deposits, which you can explode with your Excabreaker, give out a number of minerals that are important to crafting guns and other non-lethal tools. Your Woodchucker and Excabreaker are invaluable, as you use them up the very end of the game to harvest resources.
A tree ready to explode, Image captured by Road to VR
That said, there are no tech trees, or upgrade systems—what you see is what you get, and you’ll predictably abandon about half of the 5-6 total guns as you encounter more powerful enemies like high-level ACC soldiers. In the later quarter of the game, I found myself using the rocket launcher almost exclusively, as it provides infinite ammo and does around 400 HP damage; this felt a bit cheaty, as I would launch a barrage of rockets at a wall where I suspected enemies to be, and hit points would magically register. For a game that boasts crafting as a big feature, I was expecting a lot more variability in that department. Once you get the hang of clearing an area of minerals and trees, crafting really just becomes a timed hurdle to obtaining any specific weapon (eg: a big boss is coming up, and surprise surprise, I see my first deposit of uranium – something required for a level item.)
Crafting guns and tools, Image captured by Road to VR
In short, weapon and tool crafting is fun to begin with, but soon becomes a dull chore with expected rewards handed down at important intervals in the game, making it essentially a monolithic loot chest with tedious extra steps in between.
To manage all of your weapons and tools on the go, you’re given what I consider a basically good and functional inventory system. A button press brings up a ring with a limited number of slots, and by selecting the weapon or health item, you equip it in either your left or right hand to be used. Because of how often you use the Woodchucker and Excabreaker though, I would have much rather preferred a hotbutton to quickly switch between guns and tools for quicker harvesting and battle readiness. A larger inventory, which is best consulted when out of harm’s way, lets you swap out items into your quick inventory.
Full inventory, Image captured by Road to VR
Enemies are varied enough to keep things interesting. Regular enemies include flying bug-types, massive tanks, fast tiger-like aliens, hopping scavengers, and ACC soldiers of various abilities. While you can count the number of bosses on two or three fingers, they always prove to be extremely tough—which when compared to the crappy little baddies running around, make for a clear ramping of difficulty. To beat the mid-game boss, I struggled for over an hour to scavenge wood to create enough bullets to take him down. Only near the end did I feel like the difficulty plateaued to an even pace.
Image courtesy Multiverse
The game includes a single prefabricated base, and that’s where the part of the game forces you to throw some resources at building turrets during specific times (no random attacks). But even skimping on turrets and using my own two hands proved to be a fairly simple.
Image captured by Road to VR
Like with crafting, this is a moment when I wish the feature set could really lived up to my expectations instead of being a couple of wave-based defense missions. I wanted to build out my base and have to worry about defending them from savage alien beasts, but instead I was given a voice over prompt from my omnipresent Captain Coleman for the games few base defense missions.
My personal gameplay time was 11 hours, which is about half as long as the studio says it should take. I’ll admit I was using the fastest possible way to get from point A to point B: walking at max speed with automatic running, which I’ll talk about in the Comfort section below.
Immersion
Immersion is a bit of a mixed bag in Seeking Dawn.
Every once in a while you’re treated to real moments of awe, as you round a bend and find yourself staring at an enormous mushroom swarming with neon jellyfish, or what I can only describe as a skyscraper-sized alien Brontosaurus who curiously casts a look in your direction from what seems like a mile away. There are a few giant baddies out there too that will have you fearing the long trudge back to the start of the level if you forgot to set a teleporter node. The set pieces and level design are definitely highlights in Seeking Dawn.
Image captured by Road to VR
The game’s visuals are certainly a cut above many, but I do have a few healthy niggles. Smaller geometry like plants and ammo boxes pop in after only a short radius, and faraway textures can look muddy at times even on high settings (low is decidedly much more messy). Several times I’ve wandered into a level to find it barren of enemies, only to hear the drumming beat of the fight music piped into my ears as creatures pop out of nowhere. This only puts a slight damper on the overall effect: a varied, iridescent world that transmits an eerie beauty across several biomes. Dank cave systems open up to underground crystal structures, pulsing alien trees loaded with glowing fruit, and even a few hellish underbellies littered with bones and rotting corpses, and some with burping volcanoes and dizzying heights.
Let’s make no bones about it: Seeking Dawn is very much a game that relies on some traditional gaming shorthand that’s oftentimes more concerned with delivering an efficient way of traveling, killing enemies, building structures, etc, than giving you a 1:1 experience of crash landing on an alien planet.
Hit counters let you know when you’ve landed a critical hit on an enemy, and big white numbers pop up above their head to tell you what it’s worth. This is convenient, and maybe even forgivable for a sci-fi shooter game, but it still feels like I’m playing a game, with all the regular traditional conventions attached.
Image captured by Road to VR
Object interaction is carried out via ‘force powers’, meaning you need to hit a single button to quickly collect crafting items, even ones out of your arm’s reach. This is much more comfortable than having to pick up the thousands of items, but it does come at the cost of hand presence. Once an item is locked on, you can’t let go until you reinsert it into your inventory, or swap it for something else.
Comfort
Seeking Dawn offers a bevy of locomotion choices suited for most people: head and hand-relative forward locomotion, smooth turning, snap-turning, ‘blink’ teleportation (driving a ghost of yourself until you reach your desired teleport destination) and of course room-scale locomotion, although there’s not much of a reason to move around your room outside of the standing position. You can also play seated, although you’ll be ‘seated’ in the game as well. There is brief exception during climbing portions of the game, where handholds may be out of your reach.
One other locomotion style rounds out the bunch. There’s also a ‘swinging your arms to run’ mode which turned out not to be as fun or comfortable as I’d hoped, as it introduces artificial head-bob. This in general is something most VR developers stay away from because of the associated nausea, although it seems the arm-swinging did help mitigate this some. Instead, I opted to use head-relative walking with an automatic run option which lets you pick up speed gradually.
