Playstation move – Page 3 – Augmented & Virtual Reality Confabulation

February 10, 2017

PlayStation VR’s Tethered Coming to Oculus Rift and HTC Vive

A couple of weeks after Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE) launched PlayStation VR Secret Sorcery released strategy adventure title Tethered for the device. Today the studio has now confirmed it’ll be adding support for Oculus Rift and HTC Vive.

Since Tethered’s arrival in October the studio has developed a range of motion controller interactions allowing players to physically use their hands in the world. As such support for Touch, HTC Vive and PlayStation Move have been confirmed.

Tethered - Screenshot18

“Tethered has never looked more beautiful. Harnessing the additional power of PC VR platforms and PS4 Pro, we’ve created an even more magical experience that really helps cement the player’s sense of immersion. With your hands in the world in front of you, reaching out to interact with things feels totally intuitive,” said Alan McDermott, creative director at Secret Sorcery in a statement. “Until now, the player’s perspective was fixed to the clouds, but with motion control, you can physically move through the lovingly hand painted environments and get really close to the Peeps to watch them carry out their tasks! You can even scale your presence so you’re the same size as a Peep (which genuinely heightens the emotional connection the player has with them) or bigger than the island itself (so it appears as a tiny diorama laid out before you). We’ve also included a range of options to allow the player to customize their hands-on experience and, of course, standard controller configuration is still available on all platforms.

“We couldn’t be more excited about bringing our beautiful virtual reality game to Windows PC platform and we can’t wait for Oculus and HTC Vive players to join the quest to save the Peeps from the evils of the night!”

Secret Sorcery hasn’t confirmed when Tethered will be released on Rift and Vive, but when it does VRFocus will let you know.

January 31, 2017

Simple PlayStation Move Mod Brings Dual Analog Control To PSVR Games

PlayStation VR is a very capable headset, but it does have one glaring weakness: the PlayStation Move controllers.

Sony’s positiontally-tracked wands bring your hands into VR with relative accuracy, but they pale in comparison to the HTC Vive’s wands or Oculus Touch controllers. A lot of that has to do with occlusion, as turning away from the PlayStation Camera tracking your position will instantly lose tracking, but there’s also a noticeable lack of a dedicated navigation feature on the device such as a control stick or touch pad. That makes movement in the few first-person games that do use two controllers stiff and awkward, as seen in titles like Loading Human [Review: 4/10].

Winnipeg-based Playhouse Studio may have accidentally stumbled upon an ingenious solution to this problem five years ago, though.

Take a look at the video above for a system called DualPLAY, which was published in November 2012. It shows a peripheral that links the Move to its companion device, the Navigation Controller, that launched alongside the main unit in 2010. In theory it’s a pretty simple add-on for the kit, but here’s the important bit: each Navigation Controller has a DualShock-style analogue stick fitted to it.

What it doesn’t have is its own light for the camera to positionally track, but by tethering the two together you get a workaround that gives you the best of both worlds. As seen in the video, the player can move through the world with the intuitive controls they’ve come to master over the past two decades of gaming while still accessing the full range of tracking featured in Move.

It’s not an ideal locomotion solution; artificial movement with sticks has been known to cause simulation sickness for some VR users, but it certainly gives PS VR owners some much-requested new options.

The video was shot long before PlayStation VR would be revealed, though its creators have gone back to make mention of the headset in the title. It features gameplay elements that have become commonplace in today’s VR industry.

Of course as a third-party experiment and not an official Sony peripheral, it’s not likely that DualPLAY would gather a lot of software support on PSVR in this day and age. But it’s definitely something Sony itself could consider as an inexpensive way for players to further enhance their VR gaming experience without having to release an entirely new controller.

Tagged with: dualplay, playstation move, PlayStation VR, PSVR

January 21, 2017

VRGE VR Dock: Schicke Halterung für verschiedene VR Brillen

Wie bewahrt man seine Virtual Reality Brille möglichst stilvoll auf? Aktuell gibt es nur wenige Optionen und in der Regel beschränken sich die Halterungen auf den Support von einem speziellen Produkt. Dies soll die VRGE VR Dock ändern, sofern das Kickstarter-Ziel erreicht wird. Die neue Halterung soll für die Oculus Rift, die HTC Vive und das PlayStation VR Headset genutzt werden können und bietet auch einen Platz für die Motion Controller.

VRGE VR Dock

Das VRGE VR Dock System könnt ihr entweder auf einen Tisch stellen oder direkt an die Wand hängen. Außerdem bietet das System auch ein kleines Fach, in dem ihr beispielsweise euren Xbox One oder DualShock 4 Controller verstauen könnt. Zudem verfügen die Steckplätze für die Controller über USB-Anschlüsse, mit denen ihr direkt die Controller der HTC Vive laden könnt. Zum Laden der PlayStation Move Controller wird ein Adapter benötigt.

Falls eure Räume mit Sonnenlicht durchflutet sind, dann könnt ihr das Headset auch so in die Halterung einsetzen, dass die Linsen nach unten schauen. Somit beugt ihr Schäden durch starke Sonneneinstrahlung vor.

Doch was müssen VR Nerds für das Produkt auf den Tisch legen? Die Station ohne PlayStation VR Adapter und ohne Oculus Rift Halterung erhaltet ihr als früher Vogel für 59 US-Dollar. Der langsame Vogel bekommt das Kit in verschiedenen Versionen für 79 US-Dollar. Die Standardversion besteht aus eine Oberfläche aus Ahornholz und einem weißen Unterbau. Wer es etwas dunkler mag, der kann für 99 US-Dollar auch zur Version aus Walnussholz mit grauem Unterbau greifen.

VRGE VR Dock mit Walnussholz

Die Kickstarter-Kampagne ist gerade erst gestartet und läuft noch bis zum 16. Februar. Das Finanzierungsziel liegt bei 30.000 US-Dollar und wir gehen davon aus, dass das Unternehmen dieses Ziel auch erreichen wird. Die Auslieferung der Halterungen soll bereits im April 2017 erfolgen und somit ist die Wartezeit auf das Produkt überschaubar. Zumindest wenn man sie mit anderen Kickstarter-Projekten vergleicht.

Der Beitrag VRGE VR Dock: Schicke Halterung für verschiedene VR Brillen zuerst gesehen auf VR∙Nerds. VR·Nerds am Werk!

December 16, 2016

‘The Assembly’ Developer nDreams Was ‘Blindsided’ By Motion Controls

nDreams’ The Assembly [Review: 7/10] was in development for a much longer time than many of the VR games you’ll have played in the last nine months.

I remember first hearing the name of the adventure game all the way back in May 2014, where studio CEO Patrick O’Luanaigh name dropped it ahead of an official reveal at that year’s E3. Back then we were waiting on the Oculus Rift DK2 to start shipping, and VR input was still largely based around the traditional controller. It would be nearly a full year before HTC would revolutionize VR control with its Vive wands, and over a year until Oculus would reveal Touch.

When a traditional game has been in development for a long time, it usually means the team behind it has more time to polish the visuals and presentation, and iron out bugs. For early VR games, though, a few extra months of development can be the difference between releasing a state of the art piece of software or yesterday’s news. The Assembly benefited from releasing on Rift early into its controller-only phase, but its Vive version was arguably dated.

Studio Marketing Manager Ben Finch says the team was “blindsided” by the demand for motion controls upon release.

“We looked at it and were like ‘Yeah, maybe we’ve not quite judged it as well as we should have done’,” he says. “We’ve achieved what we set out to do, but that wasn’t necessarily what everyone wanted us to do.”

But nDreams is making it right; The Assembly now supports Touch and the Vive wands, and will be getting PlayStation VR support within the next week. It doesn’t completely change the game, as they act more like pointers than a pair of hands within a virtual environment, but their inclusion will still come as a welcome change for many, and maybe a signal that the gamepad is no longer a suitable input solution for first-person VR games, at least on PC. Even Google’s Daydream has made steps toward hand controls on mobile VR with its Wii remote-like controller.

“It’s interesting,” Finch says, “because there’s certain games within VR that you can’t see ever working without motion control. I suppose if you’re a first-person game which is based around exploration like The Assembly, then maybe it’s less tolerant than a game where you’re locked to a cockpit or not in first-person or something like that.”

I suggest that the situation is a byproduct of the time that The Assembly started development, and Finch agrees. It’s a problem that only a few other titles have — Iris VR’s Technolust also springs to mind — and will surely be resolved for their second wave of games.

Perhaps it’s a sign that Oculus could have done a better job letting developers get involved with Touch earlier, or that it should have been announced earlier? The question is, what’s in the works for VR hardware right now that today’s developers should be working on for tomorrow?

Tagged with: adventure, ndreams, oculus touch, playstation move, The Assembly, Vive wands

September 1, 2016

PlayStation Move Twin Pack Revealed For PS VR Launch

August 27, 2016

PlayStation VR: Neue PlayStation Move Controller?

Während Oculus und HTC ihre trackbaren Controller speziell für Virtual Reality entwickelt haben, so sind die PlayStation Move Controller schon deutlich länger auf dem Markt. Da Sony aber den Einstiegspreis gering halten wollte, greift das Unternehmen für das PlayStation VR Headset auf die Move Controller zurück und ermöglicht damit die Bewegungssteuerung in VR für die PlayStation 4. Doch die Move Controller sind eigentlich nicht für VR optimiert und schon etwas in die Jahre gekommen. Könnte Sony bald eine neue Version der Move Controller vorstellen?

Neue PlayStation Move Controller

Im Beyond3D Forum ist ein User auf eine neue Modell-Nummer in Indonesien gestoßen. Das neue Modell trägt die Bezeichnung CECH-ZCM1G, während das herkömmliche Modell als CECH-ZCM1E gelistet wird. Im Hinblick auf das PlayStation Event am 7. September, könnte es also gut möglich sein, dass Sony nicht nur die kleinere Version der PlayStation 4 vorstellt, sondern auch optimierte PlayStation Move Controller.

Das grundsätzliche Prinzip wird aber dabei gleich bleiben müssen, denn Sony bietet auch Bundles aus PlayStation VR und PlayStation Move an. Somit wäre es nicht sinnvoll, wenn die neue Version der Controller zwingend für manche Anwendungen benötigt wird. Wir könnten uns aber vorstellen, dass Sony eine neue Version mit mehr leuchtenden Stellen auf den Markt bringen könnte, um das Tracking zu verbessern.

Zwar wären auch Analog-Sticks bei den PlayStation Move Controllern wünschenswert, doch diesen Schritt wird Sony vermutlich nicht gehen, weil dann die unterschiedlichen PlayStation Move Controller Versionen zu weit voneinander abweichen würden.

Das Sony an einer neuen Version arbeitet, scheint relativ logisch. Auch die PlayStation Dual Shock 4 Controller wurden wohl verändert und kommen in einer neuen Version auf den Markt. Warum sollte Sony also nicht auch an den PlayStation Move Controller geschraubt haben, wenn alle anderen Produkte auch eine Neuauflage erhalten.

Der Beitrag PlayStation VR: Neue PlayStation Move Controller? zuerst gesehen auf VR∙Nerds. VR·Nerds am Werk!

December 10, 2010

Xbox outsells Wii in record November, but not by much

The Xbox 360, fueled by Kinect, had one of its best months ever, selling 67 percent more consoles than last year. And despite gloom and doom reports, the Wii held its own. The PS3, on the other hand, did not fare so well.

The post Xbox outsells Wii in record November, but not by much appeared first on Digital Trends.