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Hands-on: Pico Neo 2 Could Be the Next Best Standalone After Quest
At CES this week, Pico unveiled a pair of its latest standalone VR headsets, Neo 2 and Neo 2 Eye. While the company is targeting enterprise customers in the West, the Neo 2 line is eyeing up the same hardware category as Facebook’s Oculus Quest, and doing a solid job at that.
The only appreciable difference between the the Neo 2 and Neo 2 Eye is that the latter includes integrated eye-tracking from Swedish firm Tobii. It also comes with slightly more RAM than the standard version to account for eye-tracking as well as a different color scheme; Neo 2 is white and Neo 2 Eye is dark grey. I’ll get to eye-tracking below, but for now let’s talk about the Neo 2 line in general.
Pico Neo 2
The first thing I noticed about my short time with Neo 2 was how comfortable and well-balanced it was—more so than Quest’s front-heavy design—thanks to Pico’s inclusion of a rear-mounted battery, which is incorporated with the headset’s ratchet system with a single knob. An overhead strap is a rubbery affair that has a few fixed length settings, something I wish was instead a bog standard velcro strap for easier and more accurate fitting, but it did the job.
As a company, Pico has been pretty cognizant about weight distribution in the past with its 2016-era Neo headset, which cleverly housed the battery in a Nintendo-style tethered gamepad, so it’s nice to see the company is still focused on keeping one of the heaviest pieces of a standalone VR headset in good balance.
The second thing I noticed was its slightly mushy, albeit entirely serviceable optical positional tracking. To its credit, Neo 2 wasn’t jittery or too lurchy like the company’s previous Pico Neo from 2017, putting Neo 2 in the ‘acceptable’ range for tracking.
My demo didn’t quite live up to Oculus Quest, which by all accounts is the bar to reach when it comes to inside-out tracking for head and hands, but with a useful guardian system and pass-through capability to boot I was mostly satisfied Neo 2’s 6DOF tracking. Granted, the CES show floor’s bright lights and bustling crowd make for a challenging tracking environment, so I’ll have to reserve my ultimate judgement until I see it in a wider range of environments.
By this point, you’re probably wondering whether this really a hands-on piece or a straight-up comparison to Quest, which sells to consumers starting at $400. And you’d be right in saying its a bit of both. The only other real device in the product category currently is HTC Vive Focus Plus, which hasn’t presented much competition for Quest in the West. That said, Pico Neo 2 and Neo 2 Eye are set to launch at some point in the West to businesses for $700 and $900 respectively, both with 128GB internal storage. Meanwhile, Facebook charges $1,000 for the 128GB Quest through it’s ‘Oculus for Business’ program.
While there’s important platform considerations not to be ignored, here I’m looking mostly at how Neo 2 compares to Quest from a hardware and capabilities standpoint.
Tracking aside, what did fare remarkably well was Neo 2’s 6DOF controllers. Although it doesn’t have the precision or finessed ergonomics of Oculus Touch, its range of motion and overall reliability seems more than acceptable for the headset’s enterprise-focused use-cases.
Unlike Quest, which uses inside-out tracking to track both the headset and Touch controllers, Neo 2’s controller tracking is based on a NDI’s Atraxa controller platform which fuses data from an on-board electromagnet (EM) and inertial measurement unit (IMU), resulting in a positionally tracked controller that doesn’t suffer from occlusion (but may suffer from sources of EM interference). I didn’t get a chance to put it through the ringer with something like Beat Saber (an easy benchmark for latency and accuracy), but it felt more than acceptable throughout.
The controller’s plastic feels a tad on the cheap side, and button placement isn’t the greatest, although I was glad to see thumbsticks instead of touchpads here. Ergonomically it isn’t anything to write home about; it’s more wand-like and uses a ‘click-to-grip’ button, whereas most headsets have moved toward a ‘hold-to-grip’ trigger.
Integrated stereo speakers are very similar to Quest’s (hidden in the head-band), though I couldn’t get a good feel for them considering the noisy show-floor environment.
On both Neo 2 and Neo 2 Eye I played Angry Birds VR: Isle of Pigs (2019), which I know quite well from my review of the game. Although frame rate wasn’t at all where it needs to be right now on that game in particular, I suspect the Neo 2’s Snapdragon 845 would be more than up to the task after a little bit of headset-specific optimization; in this case it seemed that Pico just grabbed for the nearest game they could to have something to show at CES.
The headset’s Snapdragon 845, which should be capable of running VR apps at an acceptable frame rate for the 3,840 × 2,160 (1,920 × 2,160 per lens) LCD panel, which is clocked at 75Hz. For comparison’s sake, Oculus Quest offers dual panels with a per-lens resolution of 1,440 × 1,600 at 72Hz, driven by the more demure Snapdragon 835.
Neo 2 uses a single panel with software-based interpupillary distance (IPD) adjustment, something that Pico says should serve users with an IPD of between 55mm–71mm. My IPD is a smack down the middle at ~63mm, so I didn’t have any issue, but a physical IPD adjustment is greatly preferred for its ability to help a wider range of people get their eyes into the sweet spot of the lens.
Pico Neo 2 Eye
Then there’s the Neo 2 Eye, which integrates Tobii’s eye-tracking tech. I had the opportunity to go through the Neo 2 Eye demo, which was nearly identical to the one I tried at Vive Pro Eye (which also uses Tobii eye-tracking) at CES 2019.
One of the big benefits Pico is trumpeting for Neo 2 Eye is its foveated rendering, which is supposed to improve performance by only rendering the scene at full resolution where your eye is looking, while reducing resolution in the periphery. Unfortunately the lower-resolution in the periphery was more noticeable than I would have hoped for an eye-tracked solution. Ideally you aren’t supposed to notice the edge of the high-resolution center, which should be locked onto the user’s fovea (the center view of the eye which sees in high detail). It was simply too inaccurate a demo for the illusion to work, which is a shame because we’ve seen remarkably solid Tobii eye-tracking in other headsets.
Though the foveated rendering was easily noticeable, it did what foveated rendering is designed to do: allow for higher frame rates and more complex scenes.
To that effect, I was told the headset was using a generalized eye-tracking profile, which was a possible reason why it wasn’t offering the sort of accuracy I’d seen in Tobii’s tech on the PC-tethered Vive Pro Eye. Again, it’s something I’ll have to test in a less hectic environment where we can go through a proper eye-tracking calibration process and see if Pico was truly able to use Tobii’s tech to its fullest on the mobile VR platform.
And while we’re looking forward to testing the Pico Neo 2 in the conditions of our choice, the hardware seems an admirable entry in the 6DOF standalone category. In may not match Oculus Quest in a few categories but businesses looking to get a solid, lower cost 6DOF standalone with slightly more horsepower, resolution, and the option of eye-tracking wouldn’t be remiss by casting a curious gaze at Pico’s latest and greatest.
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Hands-on: Pico ‘VR Glasses’ Prototype is the Most Impressive VR Viewer Yet
This week at CES 2020, Pico quietly revealed a prototype headset which its calling the Pico VR Glasses. This phone-tethered 3DOF ‘VR viewer’ was surprisingly complete, offering a decent resolution and field of view, focus adjustment, and motion controller in a compact form-factor that’s light enough to stay on your head.
When Pico made its CES announcements earlier this week, the company talked about its new Neo 2 standalone VR headset, a Quest-like device targeting enterprise customers. But when we went to the company’s booth on the show floor, we saw a curious device sitting next to their Neo headsets. The so called Pico VR Glasses is a prototype small form-factor headset that’s designed as a ‘VR viewer’ of sorts—a lightweight, 3DOF headset designed to tether to Android phones for casual VR experiences.
Especially considering that it’s still a prototype, it’s the most impressive ‘VR viewer’ headset I’ve seen yet, being several steps ahead in completeness over others, including a similar VR viewer that Panasonic revealed this week.
Pico VR Glasses at CES 2020
Pico’s VR Glasses prototype employ a 90Hz, 1,600 × 1,600 LCD display in each eye, 3DOF headtracking via an on-board IMU, and a 3DOF motion controller. Each eye has a 0-800 diopter adjustment for focus, and while the provided spec sheet says “51mm–75mm IPD,” I saw no physical IPD adjustment on the prototype (so this may have referred to a software adjustment only).
At just 120 grams (excluding the arms of the goggles), the VR Glasses actually stayed on my face with no issue, unlike a handful of other viewers I’ve seen which are too front-heavy that they need to be held up or augmented with some additional strap.
In my hands-on with the headset, the viewer was plugged into an Android smartphone and ran a Daydream-like interface from which I could launch games and media. I was impressed to find a reasonably large FOV given the compact form-factor, and especially one which filled out the entire lens rather than being cropped by the edge of the display. This is known as a ‘lens limited’ field of view, which tends to feel much more natural than a ‘display-limited’ field of view which shows a hard edge.
Pico claims a 90 degree field of view on the VR Glasses, and while that sounds a bit aggressive—at least against the woefully undefined measurements touted by other headset makers—it wasn’t that far off from what you’d expect in an Oculus Quest or Rift. For the casual VR use-case (seated, 3DOF), it felt perfectly viable.
There was a small but notable latency to the headtracking and misalignment of the lenses which would need to be sorted out before this became a real product. Considering the headset’s ‘prototype’ designation, I won’t make a stink about for now; near as I can tell, it’s a lack of final tuning rather than a fundamental issue.
The Secret to Small
What makes the Pico VR Glasses so small compared to headsets like Rift or Vive? The biggest factor is the headset’s novel ‘pancake’ lenses, which Pico says is of their own design.
Most consumer headsets today use a single, simple lens. In order to correctly focus the light from the display onto your eye, the display must be at a certain distance from the lens. For simple lens designs, it’s difficult to make the distance from the display to the lens smaller than what we see in headsets like Rift and Vive, which is why so many of today’s headsets feel like boxes on your face.
The pancake lens approach condenses the length of the optical path by ‘folding’ it back on itself through the use of polarized light and multiple lens elements. This approach has various tradeoffs, but allows the display to be much closer to the lens compared to the simple, single lenses found in most consumer headsets today.
Beyond using Pancake lenses, Pico’s VR Glasses also off-board most of the other components—the headset has an IMU for tracking, but it relies on a phone for compute and power. Further still, the headset lacks any sensors for inside-out head, controller, or hand-tracking… which brings me to my next thought.
We’re Past 3DOF, Even for Casual VR
As the prototype exists today, the Pico VR Glasses would have been a great Daydream-like headset back in, say, 2017. But VR has evolved much since then, and 3DOF tracking just feels like a huge step back. Even for casual, seated VR experiences, it’s important for comfort and immersion to be able to track the movements of the user shifting in their seat—not to mention how much it limits the kind of experiences the headset can support.
For the VR Glasses to be a truly viable product in 2020 or beyond, Pico will need to figure out how to get some cameras on board to support 6DOF tracking on both head and hands (doing 6DOF head and only 3DOF hands is a mistake made clear by Lenovo’s Mirage Solo). Inside-out tracking would also open the door to a pass-through feature (which is increasingly a key convenience in a VR headset), and controller-less hand-tracking which would probably be a great fit for VR Glasses considering the likely focus on causal, phone-based experiences.
This is no easy feat though, especially considering the extra power and compute requirements that such tracking would add, and the need to send that much more data back and forth between the phone and headset.
Once the right components come into place, Pico may have the chops to pull this off though, considering the company is one of just a handful so far to have built a solid standalone 6DOF headset, it’s upcoming Pico Neo 2.
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Pico Unveils Neo 2 Standalone Headset with Integrated Eye-tracking
Pico Interactive, the company behind a number of enterprise-focused standalone VR headsets, unveiled their newest line of Neo 2 headsets, one of which includes integrated eye-tracking from Tobii.
Neo 2 has been floating around for a few months now in its prototype form, albeit without the newly unveiled addition of eye-tracking. Venture Beat’s Jeremy Horowitz points out that headset made a few public appearances late last year when it was featured using Qualcomm’s Boundless XR streaming tech, which allows content streaming from a VR-ready PC over wireless 2X2 MIMO 802.11ac 5G link with a MIMO 5G router.
Powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 845 processor with Boundless XR, the six degrees of freedom (6DOF) Pico Neo 2 line of standalone headsets includes both the Neo 2 Standard and Neo 2 Eye. Both are said to ship later this year, with Neo 2 Standard priced at $700 and the Neo 2 Eye at $900.
Tobii, the Sweden-based eye-tracking firm, says its integrated eye-tracking in the Neo 2 Eye allows for both improved graphics and longer battery life thanks to its dynamic foveated rendering, which is said to increase framerates “by up to 66% and reduces shading loads by up to 72%.”
Eye-tracking in VR allows for a few other things too outside of foveated rendering though. Knowing where a user is looking can unlock some insights into user behavior, something Tobii says can be used in a variety of use cases such as training and assessment, simulation, knowledge and skills transfer, and customer research. Other uses include eye-based UI input and enhancement of avatars for social VR interaction.
Neo 2 Specs
- Resolution – 3,840 × 2,160@75Hz, PPI: 818, 5.5 inch x 1 VR TFT
- FOV – 101 degree，Fresnel lenses
- IPD – Adaptive, 55mm – 71mm
- Tracking – Inside-out 6DOF Head tracking and Guardian System
- Controllers – 6DOF haptic controllers
- Audio – Integrated Spatial stereo speaker, Dual Mic EC/NR, 3.5mm Jack
- Connections – USB-C 3.0 Extendable 3.5mm Power DC Jack
- Eye Tracking (Neo 2 Eye) – Gaze data output frequency (binocular), 90Hz refresh
We have feet on the ground in Las Vegas for CES 2020, which takes place January 7 – 10. Check back soon for all things AR/VR to come from one of the world’s largest consumer electronics shows.
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Pico Neo 2 und Pico Neo 2 Eye vorgestellt
Den Rahmen des CES 2019 hat das Unternehmen Pico genutzt, um zwei neue und autarke VR-Brillen für das Jahr 2020 in Aussicht zu stellen.
Pico Neo 2 und Pico Neo 2 Eye vorgestellt
Die Neo 2 wurde bereits im März 2019 angekündigt, doch bisher schien ein Release noch in weiter Ferne. Dies wird sich bald ändern, denn der Hersteller hat nun verraten, dass die Neo 2 in zwei Versionen erscheinen wird. Die Version ohne Eye Tracking soll für 700 US-Dollar und die Version mit Eye Tracking für 900 US-Dollar auf den Markt kommen. Beide Brillen sollen mit einer Bildwiederholrate von 75Hz arbeiten, ein Field of View von 101 Grad bieten und mit einer 4K-Auflösung punkten. Angetrieben werden die autarken Brillen von einem Snapdragon 845 und 128 GB Speicherplatz stehen zur Verfügung. Beide Varianten werde zudem mit trackbaren Controllern ausgeliefert, welche magnetisch erfasst werden. Vermutlich also ein ähnliches System wie bei der Vive Focus Plus.
Die Pico Neo 2 Eye wird auf ein Eye Tracking-System von Tobii setzen. Tobii stattet beispielsweise auch die Vive Pro Eye mit Eye Tracking aus. Durch die Verwendung des leistungsstarken 845 Snapdragon-Prozessors von Qualcomm mit Boundless XR ermöglicht die Neo 2 wohl sogar das Streaming von Inhalten von einem VR Ready PC und vorhandenen PC VR-Plattformen über eine drahtlose 2X2 MIMO 802.11ac 5G-Verbindung mit einem tcommon MIMO 5G-Router.
Die Pico Neo 2 und Pico Neo 2 können ab sofort bei Pico angefragt werden. Beide Brillen richten sich in erster Linie an Entwickler und Unternehmen und daher wird das Software-Angebot für Konsumenten eher gering ausfallen.
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CES 2020: Pico Neo 2 Pricing Revealed Alongside New Eye Tracking Model
China-based VR hardware company Pico Interactive announced the specifications and planned prices for its upcoming Neo 2 standalone VR headset. The company also revealed a new model in the line called the Neo 2 Eye which incorporates eye-tracking technology in partnership with Tobii.
The Neo 2 line is a successor to the original Pico Neo headset and the company plans to market this one toward businesses. The Pico Neo 2, now called the Pico Neo 2 Standard, was first revealed in March of 2019 but specifications for the device weren’t revealed until now. The headset is priced around $700 while Pico also plans to sell the Neo 2 Eye for around $900 offering the same specifications with the addition of eye tracking.
The company claims the headset includes a display with 4K resolution, 105 degree field of view and a 90Hz refresh rate powered by a Snapdragon 845 alongside 128 GB storage. Pico also says it is going to separately sell the Pico Stream Box using a 60 GHz wireless connection to play PC VR games via a nearby computer.
Pico claims the Neo 2 Eye model will use eye tracking technology from Tobii to “improve daily enterprise operations and applications.” Tobii is the same company that provided the eye tracking technology for the HTC Vive Pro Eye. We gave our impressions of the technology back at CES this time last year, and Tobii later went on to launch their eye-tracking SDK at GDC a few months later.
The Neo 2 headsets will employ full 6 degrees of freedom with inside out tracking and the company says it uses “electromagnetic” tracking with its controllers, pictured below.
This tracking technology may benefit from resistance to occlusion but may be heavier to hold. We’ll plan to see the device at CES in Las Vegas and hopefully report back more details and impressions.
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Pico Neo 2 Is A Standalone VR Headset Which Can Also Wirelessly Connect To Your PC
At GDC this week Qualcomm announced an update to their VR845 reference design which allows it to also wirelessly connect to a gaming PC. The first headset to be based off this design and using its technology is the Pico Neo 2.
The Neo 2 will launch in the second half of this year. They aren’t announcing price just yet, but the Neo 1 was $749 and the Qualcomm VR845 development kit is $1600 so don’t expect it to be cheap.
In standalone mode the headset will have access to Viveport M– HTC’s mobile store used on the Vive Focus Plus. That means you’re not going to be getting access to the same level of games as Oculus Quest. But if you’re using your PC for games, standalone mode should be sufficient for media viewing.
In wireless PC mode it will work with HTC’s Viveport PC store, but it will likely work with SteamVR also thanks to that platform’s open driver model. Yes that’s right, you should be able to play SteamVR games wirelessly on this headset.
The wireless connection to the PC uses 60 GHz technology, just like the HTC Vive wireless adapter and TPCast. That allows for significantly higher bandwidth than WiFi and for low compression with low latency, but has to be within line of sight of the headset and needs a dedicated transmitter- not your router. This will likely add significantly to the cost, so it’ll be interesting to see whether the transmitter is included or sold separately.
There are no images of the Neo 2 or further details yet, but we’ll keep you updated as soon as Pico provides further information.
Tagged with: GDC, gdc 2019, Pico, Pico Neo, qualcomm, Standalone VR, VR headsets
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Pico Announces Goblin 2 Standalone VR Headset Amid $24.7M Series A
Beijing-based VR hardware manufacturer, Pico Interactive, just recently completed a successful $24.7M Series A funding round co-led by GF Qianhe and FG Xinde Investment, with participation from Jufeng S&T Venture Investment and others. Included in that announcement was also the news that they are planning to release an upgraded version of their 3DOF standalone Goblin headset known as the Pico Goblin 2.
When we reviewed the $249 original Pico Goblin last year, we were impressed with the device from a build and quality perspective, but had doubts about the Snapdragon 802-based headset’s longevity due to a limited content library. Following that headset, Pico later launched the $749 Pico Neo, which was a 6DOF standalone headset (similar to the Mirage Solo) that also featured 6DOF controllers. When we tried it at CES this year the controllers had some major tracking concerns.
The Goblin 2 is built on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 835 XR platform with 4GB of RAM and 32GB of internal storage, plus up to 256GB of expanded storage via microSD card. The Goblin 2’s display will feature two 3.5-inch LCD screens with a combined resolution of 2,880 × 1,600 (3K), a 101 degree field of view, and 90Hz refresh rate. All Goblin 2 headsets will also come with a single 3DOF controller, similar to the Oculus Go or Daydream View’s single controller.
According to the announcement, “the Pico G2 utilizes the VIVE WAVE VR Open Platform, which brings a consistent user experience across a variety of mobile VR headsets and allows developers to create content for a common platform. To bring a better experience and more VR content to Pico G2 users, Pico’s partnership with HTC Vive also provides Pico G2 users access to the VIVEPORT content platform.”
The Pico Goblin 2 isn’t available in the West yet, but is available to consumers in China for ¥2,000 RMB (about $300) at this website.
Let us know what you think of this new standalone headset down in the comments below!
h/t: Abacus News, Road to VR
Tagged with: Goblin, Goblin 2, Pico, Pico Neo
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The Pico Neo: The Oft Forgotten Other Stand-Alone HMD
Now into my 4th year of working in the virtual reality (VR) space, the quest for an ideal headgear is an on-going quest. During that time, my team first embarked on the first, second, and third generation Samsung Gear VR, the first and second-generation Google Daydream, the Oculus SDK, and most recently, a pair of Oculus Rifts. A few months ago, the self-contained headgear manufacturer Pico appeared on my radar.
The Pico Goblin, priced at $250 (USD), was one of the first stand-alone VR headgear units with decent imager to hit the US market but the low refresh rate of 60Hz, dissuaded my investment past two units. Shortly after the Goblin, the Neo, Pico’s higher priced unit, appeared in the market. With a 90HZ refresh rate, 1440 x 1600 image resolution (2880 x 1600) and 6DOF, the Neo was a stand-out compared to other units presently on the market or those delivering during 2nd and 3rd quarter of 2018. The Neo is packaged with either one or two Bluetooth controllers (wands) which further stirred my curiosity. The cost of $750 (includes two wands) is steep but was right in line with what I had been my go to demonstration unit, a Samsung Gear VR driven by a Samsung Galaxy 8+ smart phone.
On many fronts the Neo delivers. The 90Hz refresh rate negates nauseousness and the imagers produce the best VR image I have seen. The head band, similar to the Sony Playstation VR headgear, is effective and, IMHO, preferable to the elastic bands found on most headgear. A Micro SD card can store up to 256GB and the unit has an internal storage of 64GB. Additionally, the Neo is equipped with a viewing angle of 101 degrees, a Snapdragon 835 processor, 2.4GHz WiFi, and 6DOF. Compared to other present US based VR headgear offerings, Neo is at the top. Curiously, the headgear escapes media attention and is constantly overlooked in headgear top 10 lists. I remain unsure of why that is.
The Neo is not without problems. The wands are constantly needing realignment. This is not a issue for our VR applications as the majority of our training based clients do better without wands as they are lost over time. Additionally, the Neo takes a bit of getting use to as the headgear does not naturally find an optimized position on a user’s head like the industry standard elastic bands. Because the headgear has no focus control, proper focus is obtained by shifting the headgear up and down over the front of one’s face until the sweet spot is found. This is fine for the seasoned user but the novice may find themselves struggling during the first couple of uses. Many of these shortcomings are negated after repeated use.
The future is promising for Pico. An updated Neo with 120Hz refresh rate, further improved image quality and the addition of a focus control, will keep my attention on this overlooked headgear throughout 2018, and if they continue to stay ahead of the pack, well into the future.
Magic Moovr für Pico Neo hilft bei Rehabilitation von Schlaganfall
Auf dem South by Southwest Festival (SXSW) im texanischen Austin präsentiert das nordirische Medizintechnikunternehmen AppAttic ihre neue VR-Erfahrung Magic Moovr für die autarke VR-Brille Pico Neo. Der durch Audioshield inspirierte VR-Titel soll neben der alltäglichen Unterhaltung einen nützlichen Beitrag zur Rehabilitation von Schlaganfallpatienten bieten.
Magic Moovr – VR-Spiel für Pico Neo hilft Betroffenen eines Schlaganfalls
AppAttic nutzt innovative Technologien zur Problemlösung von komplexen Aufgaben im Gesundheitsbereich. Dafür entwickelt das Medizintechnikunternehmen diverse Projekte, unter anderem eine App zur medizinischen Kontrolle von ADHS-Patienten. Auf der SXSW stellen die Verantwortlichen nun ihre neue VR-Erfahrung Magic Moovr für die Stand-alone VR-Brille Pico Neo vor.
Das VR-Spiel erinnert vom Gameplay her stark an Audioshield, Spieler müssen anfliegende Kugeln im passenden Rhythmus zur Musik abblocken. Im Gegensatz zum populären VR- Klassiker verfolgt Magic Moovr jedoch einen zusätzlichen Zweck. Denn es soll bei der Rehabilitation nach einem Schlaganfall helfen, indem es den Betroffenen ermöglicht, je nach Schweregrad der Schädigung des Gehirns entsprechende Bewegungen auszuführen.
Playing with hands! @LeapMotion Barrett Fox @Protodeep takes Magic Moovr #VR for a spin @ #ImmersedinNI – join us @ Latitude 30 #SXSW #UKatSXSW til 3:30pm
Thanks @DigiCatNI @InvestNI @UKatSXSW @chipster30 et all! pic.twitter.com/r6hT4MqdPA
— MAGIC Moovr (@MagicMoovr) March 12, 2018
Die häufigsten Symptome nach einem Schlaganfall sind ein eingeschränktes Sichtfeld, die teilweise Lähmung einer Körperhälfte sowie eine Beschädigung des Sprachzentrums. Die Spielelemente werden dabei an die Einschränkungen des Patienten angepasst, wodurch dieser innerhalb der VR in der Lage ist, je nach eigenen Möglichkeiten voranzuschreiten. Die Geschwindigkeit der heranfliegenden Kugeln passt sich also an die physischen Fähigkeiten des Patienten an. Zudem soll für Schwergeschädigte sogar eine Steuerung komplett ohne Controller möglich sein. Dafür sammelten die Entwickler über eine jahrelange Testphase hinweg Daten von Patienten, Krankenhäusern und gesunden Spielern, um eine optimale Spielerfahrung zu gewährleisten.
Durch den VR-Titel sollen Schlaganfallpatienten nicht mehr das Stigmata eines Kranken tragen, sondern eine völlig neue Perspektive als Gamer erhalten. Damit dies gelingt, soll Magic Moovr nicht zu simpel sein, sondern auch für gesunde Spieler eine Herausforderung darstellen.
Magic Moovr ist Teil des europäischen Horizon 2020 Rehabilitationsprojekt MAGIC und soll erstmals im Jahr 2018 oder 2019 in Italien und dem Vereinigten Königreich zu klinischen Zwecken zum Einsatz kommen.
(Quellen: Upload VR | Magic Moovr | Video: AppAttic Twitter)
Der Beitrag Magic Moovr für Pico Neo hilft bei Rehabilitation von Schlaganfall zuerst gesehen auf VR∙Nerds. VR·Nerds am Werk!